Official Says Phone Calls About Secret Media Combat Pools Can Alert Enemy

Assistant Defense Secretary Michael I. Burch said Wednesday that tighter rules should govern news media pools covering secret military operations because “the other side” can learn that a pool has been convened by using satellites to intercept telephone calls.

Burch said this potential eavesdropping means secrecy surrounding last month’s test of the Pentagon pool was theoretically breached. During the test, word spread on the telephone within news organizations in the pool and to other news organizations that the pool had been convened, even though the news organizations did not publish or broadcast the information.

He said mere knowledge that a pool “is activated can compromise security” when that fact is known by those without a need to know.

Burch made his comments at a forum on whether communications within the news industry amount to security breaches. The discussion was convened Wednesday by the Washington Journalism Review to assess the question: “Can the Press Keep a Military Secret?”

Burch acknowledged that Pentagon officials used regular unsecure telephone lines on April 20 when they convened the first test of the pool by notifying eight news organizations.

The press pool was airborne before the journalists were told that it was a drill, rather than an actual military operation. The pool was flown to Honduras to cover a previously announced military exercise.

Within eight hours of the pool’s being formed, Pentagon officials received phone calls from news organizations--not members of the pool--asking for information on what was developing. No news organization published or broadcast information on the drill until the Pentagon confirmed its existence on the record.