Pete Hegseth, the US secretary of defence, is once again under scrutiny after reports that he shared details of air strikes in Yemen in a second group chat on the Signal messaging app.
The criticism was that Signal – a commercially-available app that sends encrypted messages – was not secure enough to discuss the plans for US military action, in this case a wave of airstrikes on Houthi rebels.
One factor that makes this breach look worse is the list of people who received the war plans.
The fatal exception was Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor of US magazine The Atlantic, who was seemingly added to the chat by mistake and later published many of the messages.
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The second chat, which was created by Hegseth, included people with no obvious need to know about the strike.
All in all, around a dozen people were in the chat, according to the reports – including senior aides whom Hegseth later fired.
Even before the revelations about the second Signal chat, it had been a tumultuous week at the Pentagon, the seat of the world’s strongest military with a yearly budget due to surpass $1 trillion under Trump.
One of those to quit, John Ullyot, wrote an article for Politico excoriating Hegseth for a “full-blown meltdown” at the Pentagon. He argued that the messy staff purge and his lax approach to secrecy meant Trump should fire him.
Anna Kelly, the White House deputy press secretary, said: “”Recently-fired ‘leakers’ are continuing to misrepresent the truth to soothe their shattered egos and undermine the President’s agenda, but the administration will continue to hold them accountable.”
A Pentagon spokesman repeated the defence for the first Signal chat – that the information was not secret enough to worry about.
Elon Musk, the Tesla billionaire who is one of Trump’s key allies, also signalled support for Hegseth. Musk posted an “on target” emoji in response to one of Hegseth’s defences of himself.
Hegseth is a key Trump ally, and the president fought hard to get him confirmed as Pentagon chief, despite concerns over his experience and allegations of sexual assault, which Hegseth denies.
Sharing secret military plans in one Signal chat wasn’t a firing offence, and a second may prove survivable too.
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