The Trump Administration’s Signal Leaks – An Analysis Of American Security
By Luke Collins
On the 24th and 25th March, The Atlantic editor Jeffrey Goldberg revealed transcripts [1] of “Houthi PC small group”, explaining that had accidentally been added to a group chat on the app Signal with Trump’s inner circle, including Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. The group chat discussed and inadvertently revealed the plans for bombing the Houthis in Yemen, in a civil war which the US has now been involved in for more than a decade.
For Jeffrey Goldberg, the accidental addition of him into the “small group” chat presented him an opportunity to write one of the most important articles of the 21st century as well as probably the most important article in his 25 years as a journalist. The leak arguably echoes Watergate, where Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward had to go to extreme lengths and risk their journalistic career in order to reveal the corruption of the Nixon administration, whereas here Goldberg has been unwillingly reeled into his story. While the Watergate scandal exposed Nixon leading to his eventual resignation, ‘Signalgate’ reveals a chaotic crisis of privacy in Trump’s inner circle.
Background and the Exchange
As for the contents of Goldberg’s article titled ‘The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans’ published on March 24, Goldberg admits that he “didn’t think it [the chat] could be real. Then the bombs started falling”. Goldberg firstly focuses on the seemingly routine airstrike on the Houthis [2], an armed military group in Yemen who are part of the Iranian-led ‘axis of resistance’ to Israel and the west in general.
Since 2015, Yemen has been torn apart by civil war as the Houthis have taken control of Western Yemen and forced President Hadi to flee the country. A Saudi Arabia-US coalition force intervened to prevent the Houthis from taking control of Yemen which has led to the civil war that has – directly and indirectly – killed nearly 400,000 people. [5] The Trump administration has promised a tougher response to Houthi attacks which is where Goldberg comes in describing being sent a connection request by Michael Waltz, Trump’s National Security Advisor.
Goldberg states that he has met Waltz before but was unsure if the real Waltz was sending this request on Signal, an “open-source encrypted messaging service popular with journalists.” [1] Goldberg alleges that some messages were set to disappear after one week and some were set to disappear after four weeks which is a violation of US federal law concerning the preservation of official records such as war plans.
The first message read by Goldberg was a memo given by Waltz outlining precise war plans which refutes the claim made by US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth after the article was published that “Nobody was texting war plans”. Waltz texted “State and DOD, we developed suggested notification lists for regional Allies and partners. Joint Staff is sending this am a more specific sequence of events in the coming days and we will work w DOD to ensure COS, OVP and POTUS are briefed”.
Doubts were issued by Vice-President JD Vance but Hegseth reinstated that the attack needed to happen as he saw “2 immediate risks on waiting: 1) this leaks, and we look indecisive; 2) Israel takes an action first” , he stated he would “enforce 100% OPSEC” (operational security) to prevent the information falling into the wrong hands (which ultimately happened anyway). The next exchange between Vance and Hegseth revealed animosity towards Europe [4], as Vance bemoaned having to ‘bail out Europe again’ while Hegseth called “European free-loading” “pathetic”, sensitive sentiments at a time when the US-Europe relationship is already tense and fractured.
The day after this exchange, Hegseth laid out detailed attack plans including “information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing. Goldberg rightfully did not share this as it “could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel”. Hegseth stated the first attack would be at 11.45am on Saturday 15th March so Goldberg waited in his car, checked his phone, and the attack happened as planned [1], killing 53 people. Every member congratulated the team – including Mike Waltz, who expressed his delight with a fist bump, American flag and fire emojis.
Goldberg reached out to members in the group chat asking if it was authentic and whether Signal had been used before to plan attacks to which he received a response from a spokesperson for the National Security Council confirming the authentication of the messages. [3]
Consequences Or Not? Washington’s Reactions
With the scandalous actions of the group chat participants revealed and the mainstream press criticising their actions, the Trump administration had to defend themselves. Pete Hegseth, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe all denied war plans being discussed in the group chat, Ratcliffe denied that the affair was a ‘huge mistake’. [3]
Goldberg released the full transcript of messages two days after the fallout from the initial article being published. The messages show Hegseth outlining attack plans, discussions of weapons and timing of attacks that confirmed the Signal group chat was used to discuss war plans. Hegseth mentions the use of F-18 fighter jets and top secret information on the whereabouts of the targets as well as top secret information on CIA action in Yemen as revealed by Joe Kent, Director of National Counterterrorism Centre such as the possibility of Israel carrying out further strikes.
Goldberg specified that the Trump administration got lucky that they leaked the information to him and not to enemies of the United States who may have used the information to prevent the attack. So, what will the consequences be of this? Trump has not fired anyone involved in the group chat, Goldberg’s name has become more recognisable worldwide, and Signal has been given great free promotion which they have used to their advantage as the founder of Signal joked that if someone downloaded it, they would have “the opportunity for the vice president of the United States of America to randomly add you to a group chat for coordination of sensitive military operations”. [6] Now that Trump has accelerated another war – one of trade -, the group chat feels like old news but it still indicates a string of pronounced controversies in the return of the Trump administration.
References
[1] Goldberg, J., “The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans”. The Atlantic, 24 Mar 2025. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2025/03/trump-administration-accidentally-texted-me-its-war-plans/682151/
[2] Cursino, M., “US launches wave of air strikes on Yemen’s Houthis”. BBC News, 15 Mar 2025. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c05mvr3j3yro
[3] Smith-Schoenwalder, C., “A Signal Chat With Top U.S. Officials Leaked This Week: Here’s Why It Matters”. US News, 25 Mar 2025. https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2025-03-25/what-to-know-about-the-leaked-signal-chat-with-top-u-s-security-officials
[4] Adler, K., “Disdain for Europe in US Signal chat horrifies EU”. BBC News, 25 Mar 2025. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c204vl27n2qo
[5] “The War on Yemen’s Civilians”. Campaign Against Arms Trade, 25 Aug 2023. https://caat.org.uk/homepage/stop-arming-saudi-arabia/the-war-on-yemens-civilians/
[6] Altchek, A., and Tan, K.W.W., “Signal’s founder pokes fun at the US military group-chat debacle”. Business Insider, 25 Mar 2025.
https://www.businessinsider.com/signal-founder-pokes-fun-at-military-group-chat-mistake-2025-3https://www.businessinsider.com/signal-founder-pokes-fun-at-military-group-chat-mistake-2025-3
