Hillary Clinton divulged Top Secret nuclear security intelligence to tens of millions of worldwide television audience viewers Wednesday night during the third presidential debate, according to high-ranking Department of Defense personnel.
Clinton, responding to opponent Donald Trump and a question posed by debate moderator Chris Wallace, boasted specific and “damaging” details about the United States’ nuclear response time to retaliate during a nuclear attack. Clinton said:
“But here’s the deal. The bottom line on nuclear weapons is that when the president gives the order, it must be followed. There’s about four minutes between the order being given and the people responsible for launching nuclear weapons to do so.” –Hillary Clinton, National TV Appearance
“Secretary Clinton proved tonight she is unfit to be commander-in- chief,” a top-ranking DOD intelligence source said. “What she did compromises our national security. She is cavalier and reckless and in my opinion should be detained and questioned so we can unravel why she did what she did.”
According to Pentagon sources, the information Clinton disseminated publicly is Top Secret intelligence governed under the U.S. Special Access Program (SAP) which dictates safeguards and protocols for accessing and discussing highly classified and Top Secret intelligence. The specific details of the country’s nuclear response time discussed by Clinton, sources said, are only known by a handful of individuals outside top military brass, including the following “need-to-know” (NTK) officials:
- President
- Vice President
- Secretary of State
- Secretary of Defense
- Secretary of Homeland Security
- Attorney General
- Director of National Intelligence
- CIA Director
- Deputy Secretary of State
- Deputy Secretary of Defense
- Special personnel designated solely by the President in writing
Sources said late Wednesday Clinton likely violated two different types of Dept. of Defense SAP protocols. Since nuclear response is part of the sensitive national plan for nuclear war operations, all of its schematics are covered under both “Intelligence SAPs” and “Operation and Support SAPs,” sources said. Both contain Top Secret information.
“Targeting options by ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missiles), air or sea, launch order, launch procedures and response are some of the most secretly guarded tenets of national security and nuclear war policy,” a Pentagon source said. “It’s truly incredible that (nuclear) response time as part of an ERO (Emergency Response Option) is now out there in the public domain to our adversaries.”
U.S. Defense sources said according to developed U.S. counterintelligence, military officials in China, North Korea, Syria, Russia, Iran and even actors like ISIS had no previous definitive intelligence to determine the U.S. nuclear response time, especially during an ERO, prior to Clinton’s admission Wednesday night. Sources reluctantly acknowledged her calculations were accurate.
“Any time frame calculated would have merely been an educated hypothesis, absent leaked documents and there have been no such breaches,” the DOD source said.
Clinton has come under fire time and time again for mishandling national security secrets via email, telephone and secure facsimile during and after her tenure as secretary of state. Her mishandling of classified and top secret intelligence sparked a year-long investigation by the FBI and various Congressional committees which continue to examine Clinton’s lackluster security controls with and attitude toward protecting some of the nation’s most sensitive data which she stored on an unprotected home server in the basement of her Chappaqua, New York home during her post at Foggy Bottom.
Clinton, just this week, unleashed a series of campaign ads painting Trump as a loose cannon who should never be in control of nuclear secrets and weapons. Clinton trumpeted the seemingly ill-timed ads Wednesday night at the debate prior to her rant divulging nuclear secrets herself.
