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26-03-2025
WASHINGTON: The White House has confirmed that a journalist was inadvertently added to an unsecure group chat in which US national security officials planned a military strike in Yemen.
The Atlantic magazine’s Jeffrey Goldberg reported that he was included on a Signal message group where Vice-President JD Vance and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth were apparently among members.
He said he saw classified military plans for US strikes on Houthi rebels, including precise details of weapons packages, targets and timing, two hours before the first bombs struck.
Goldberg said he was added to the message chain, apparently by accident, after receiving a connection request from someone who appeared to be White House National Security Adviser Michael Waltz.
President Donald Trump told reporters on Monday afternoon that he was not aware of the Atlantic article.
“The attacks on the Houthis have been highly successful and effective,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
“President Trump continues to have the utmost confidence in his national security team, including National Security Advisor Mike Waltz.”
On 15 March, the US launched what it described as a “decisive and powerful” series of air strikes against the Houthis in Yemen.
Four days earlier, on 11 March, Atlantic editor-in-chief Goldberg writes that he received the connection request on the encrypted messaging app Signal from an account that purported to be Waltz’s.
Signal is used by journalists and Washington officials because of the secure nature of its communications, the ability to create aliases, and to send disappearing messages. Two days later, Goldberg said he was added to a Signal chat entitled “Houthi PC small group.”
A number of accounts that appeared to belong to cabinet members and national security officials were included in the 18-person chat, Goldberg reported.
Accounts labelled “JD Vance”, the name of the vice-president; “Pete Hegseth,” the defence secretary; and “John Ratcliffe,” director of the Central Intelligence Agency; were among names in the chain.
Top national security officials from various agencies also appeared in it, including Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s director of national intelligence, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
At one point during the communications over the strikes, the account labelled “JD Vance” seemed to disagree with Trump, Goldberg reported.
“I am not sure the president is aware how inconsistent this is with his message on Europe right now,” the Vance account wrote at approximately 8:15 on 14 March.
“There’s a further risk that we see a moderate to severe spike in oil prices.
“I am willing to support the consensus of the team and keep these concerns to myself but “there is a strong argument for delaying this a month, doing the messaging work on why this matters, seeing where the economy is, etc.”
In a statement to media on Monday, Vance spokesman William Martin said the vice-president “unequivocally supports this administration’s foreign policy.
“The president and the vice-president have had subsequent conversations about this matter and are in complete agreement,” Martin said.
Goldberg writes that he initially “had very strong doubts that this text group was real, because I could not believe that the national-security leadership of the United States would communicate on Signal about imminent war plans.” (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
