How EmailGate Weakened America’s National Security
How EmailGate Weakened America’s National Security
It’s safe to say that Moscow, Beijing and Tehran know a lot more about Hillary Clinton than the American public does
By John R. Schindler • 06/01/16 11:53am
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. (Photo: Eric Thayer/Getty Images)
Last week’s devastating report by the State Department Inspector General has made it plain to all who wish to see that Hillary Clinton, as secretary of state, violated numerous regulations pertaining to federal records and cybersecurity, then lied effusively about it to the public.
That State IG assessment has left Clinton’s defenders without much of a leg to stand on if they want an honest, fact-based defense of her actions in EmailGate. Therefore, Team Clinton has resorted to their customary deceptions and dissimulations, buttressed by legalisms designed to obscure truths rather than reveal them.
Here we have Lanny Davis, a top Clinton consigliere for more than two decades, explaining how Hillary is innocent of any wrongdoing, citing five allegedly “indisputable” facts. Then follows the customary litany, cited by her defenders whenever EmailGate comes up. This was legal. Besides, everybody does it. Plus nothing was “labeled” classified at the time it appeared in Ms. Clinton’s private email. To those acquainted with Clintonspeak, the only thing missing is a discussion of the meaning of “is.”
Mr. Davis’ most interesting claim is his assertion that “there is no evidence that Clinton’s private server was ever successfully hacked… all the dire and dark warnings from partisan Republicans about the secretary of state risking the nation’s security by using a private server are, in fact, all speculation—based on no facts whatsoever.”
This is deception of a special kind. In the first place, why has the Romanian hacker Guccifer pleaded guilty to hacking into Hillary’s server if he did not, in fact, do so? Moreover, the FBI has been in possession of said server for months, and they have uncovered several successful hacking efforts into it when it resided in an upstairs bathroom of the Clinton residence in Chappaqua, New York.
“We know it was hacked numerous times, it’s that simple,” explained a senior U.S. counterintelligence official who is privy some of the FBI’s findings. “If I were Vladimir Putin I’d fire the head of the SVR [Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service] if he didn’t get a good look at Hillary’s emails when they were sitting in plain sight online,” he added with a laugh.
Here, Mr. Davis is hiding behind the fact that the FBI has not yet released the findings of its investigation into EmailGate to the public. Until they do, there is indeed “no evidence” of foreign intelligence services accessing Ms. Clinton’s emails—since the FBI considers that evidence classified until it is deemed fit to be publicly released. This is how the classification rules that Hillary and her staff so assiduously ignored actually work.
In their customary fashion, Team Clinton is pushing back with a touch of cheek. Ms. Clinton now plans a serious effort to sell herself as the better national security candidate than Donald Trump, based on her tenure of secretary of state. While there is no denying Mr. Trump is a national security neophyte who seems unacquainted with some of the basic lingo of that field, he is not under FBI investigation for espionage and political corruption.
Such existential cluelessness has to make anyone who understands how the world really works wonder about Ms. Clinton’s fitness to be commander-in-chief.
Republicans are beginning to push back too now. Over the weekend, Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin made statements on EmailGate that some considered shocking. “What isn’t being discussed is how reckless and dangerous her private email server was,” he said, adding, “You have to assume that our enemies and adversaries had access to every email that went over her private server.” Sen. Johnson then asked what that might mean: “Did it affect their actions as it related to for example Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Crimea or Eastern Ukraine? What about the negotiations with Iran? What about Assad?”
Although some Democrats acted aghast at these comments, Sen. Johnson was merely asking what anybody acquainted with 21st century espionage wouldautomatically ask about EmailGate. Moreover, as chairman of the Senate’s homeland security committee, the Wisconsin Republican regularly receives classified briefings from our Intelligence Community, so he knows what spies worldwide are looking for in the secret struggle between spy agencies that is seldom witnessed by the public.
Moreover, the notion that Clinton’s emails are in the hands of many foreign intelligence services is anything but controversial among those in the know about spying. I’ve made this case for a year and more, even penning a parody account of what the Kremlin must know from Hillary’s emails. John Kerry, Ms. Clinton’s successor at Foggy Bottom, stated that it’s “very likely” foreign spy agencies—especially Russia’s and China’s—are reading his unclassified state.gov emails (the kind Ms. Clinton refused to use, opting instead for her homebrew server which was wholly unencrypted for a time).
Robert Gates, President Obama’s first secretary of defense, stated “the odds are pretty high” that Clinton’s emails are in the hands of the Russians, Chinese and Iranians. Since Gates—before taking over the Pentagon—served as a career CIA officer and then director, his opinion carries weight. To say nothing of the fact that neither John Kerry nor Gates is exactly a member of the “Vast Right Wing Conspiracy,” which the Clintons see lurking behind every tree inside the Beltway.
The reality is that the secretary of state is always among the top four American officials whose communications are targeted by literally dozens of spy services worldwide, along with the secretary of defense and the director of national intelligence. Only the president’s phone calls and emails are accorded higher priority by our adversaries in the SpyWar. Anything sent unencrypted (or even lightly encrypted) is automatically assumed to have been intercepted, with good cause.
The reason for this is simple. If you can read the secretary of state’s emails, you will get an excellent look at the topmost inner workings of our government. You will witness how America’s foreign policy sausage gets made. Even if the secretary of state is discreet, restricting classified and sensitive communications to proper channels which are much more secure—as Clinton’s predecessors did but she did not—any foreign spy agency that accesses them will know a fair amount about how the secretary of state feels and thinks about a wide range of important topics.
If you’re Clinton, and you conduct a great deal of business via your private email, you’re showing foreign spies virtually everything about you that’s worth knowing. From her emails, intelligence agencies—including some that are anything but friendly to us—would be well acquainted with her talking points before important meetings with foreign diplomats, her thoughts about coming trade deals, plus her take on a myriad of crises worldwide.
Not to mention that if Clinton was doing anything shady—for instance, illegal activities such as pay-for-play schemes while she was at Foggy Bottom—our enemies know all about that. It’s safe to say that Moscow, Beijing and Tehran know a lot more about Hillary Clinton than the American public does. Needless to add, any illegalities would render Ms. Clinton subject to potential blackmail—an alarming prospect for someone standing a good shot at being our next commander-in-chief.