Keeping the Right Secrets Secret
Chris and Zack are joined by special guest co-host, Emily Harding of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The three review the Biden administration’s latest responses to the crisis in Ukraine before turning to the issue of information security, both in the U.S. government and in the private sector. What information is, and should be, classified? And are we striking the right balance between keeping government secrets secret, and ensuring that private information about customers and users is well protected? Emily has a grievance about the apparent poisoning of Ukrainian peace negotiators and Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, and the subsequent response by U.S. officials who seemed to cast doubt on the story. For the second show in a row, Zack has a grievance toward Chris, and Chris is cold and cranky because his March Madness bracket was busted after the first weekend. Attapeople to the U.S. intelligence community for strategically releasing information that reset the terms of the debate over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Emily gives a shout-out to working mother and Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson for being an inspiration to other working moms. And Chris praises his colleagues Emma Ashford and Kelly Grieco.
Episode reading:
- Oona Hathaway’s “Keeping the Wrong Secrets: How Washington Misses the Real Security Threat,” Foreign Affairs (January-February 2022)
- Emma Ashford, Oil, the State, and War: The Foreign Policies of Petrostates (Georgetown University Press, 2022)
- “Transcript: Ezra Klein interviews Emma Ashford,” New York Times, March 18, 2022
- “Lessons Learned from the First Month of the Air War with Dr. Kelly Grieco,” The Airminded Podcast, March 25, 2022
- Kelly Grieco, “Engagement Reframed #3: Appoint a European SACEUR,” New American Engagement Initiative, February 14, 2022
- Global Security Forum on “softening sharp divides”
- U.S.-U.K. intel partnership
- Amy Zegart and Michael Morell, “Spies, Lies, and Algorithms: Why U.S. Intelligence Agencies Must Adapt or Fail,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 2019
- “The Man in Blinken’s Ear: State’s Derek Chollet on Ukraine,” Politico, March 25, 2022
