Secrecy or Spin?

Justin Rood points out an interesting leak–the tidbit that some of the people arrested in last week’s alleged terrorist plot made phone calls to the United States.

That’s why my antennae started buzzing when I read this paragraph from an Aug. 12 AP story about U.S. government efforts to trace possible domestic links to the recently-foiled London terror plot:

Two. . . U.S. counterterrorism officials, speaking oncondition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation,said the British suspects placed calls to several cities in the UnitedStates before their arrests. At least some of the calls were placed topeople in New York, Washington, Chicago and Detroit, one official said.The suspects are all British citizens, mostly men in the 20s and 30s ofPakistani descent.

Now, that appears to be remarkably specific intelligence leaked fromwithin an ongoing terror investigation — classified information thatcould not only reveal sources and methods, but also tip off possiblesuspects before the Feds got to them

But I suspect he may be misreading the administration’s dominant impulse with regards to information. Rood argues that because the administration hates leaks, the leak must either have been sanctioned or just something the administration missed.