This isn’t good…
NY POST – Shortly after his first visit to US troops stationed in a war zone, President Trump posted a video on Twitter that showed him posing for pictures with service members who appear to be from SEAL Team Five in Iraq — without shielding their faces, a report said.
Trump, who had taken criticism for not visiting US forces in hot zones, traveled with the first lady to the al-Asad Airbase near Baghdad, where he mingled with troops, signed MAGA hats and defended his decision to pull out of Syria.
But during the trip, which had been shrouded in secrecy earlier Wednesday, the president apparently accidentally revealed classified information by showing the special-ops forces, Newsweek reported.
At one point, Trump paused to take a selfie with US Navy Lt. Cmdr. Kyu Lee, who said he was the chaplain for SEAL Team Five, which is based in Coronado, California, according to the mag.
The chaplain said the president told him: “Hey, in that case, let’s take a picture.”
After Air Force One left the country’s airspace, Trump posted a video in which Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless America” is heard as he and Melania Trump posed for pictures with the special warfare operators clad in full battle gear and night-vision goggles.
Malcolm Nance, a former US Navy intelligence specialist, told Newsweek that posting the video ran against traditional procedures that are meant to protect the identities of US special operations forces in a combat zone.
“Operational security is the most important aspect of personnel deployments. The real names, faces, and identities, of personnel involved in special operations or activities, are usually a closely held secret in a combat zone,” Nance said.
“Revealing them casually, through an unusual media exposure even if it’s the commander-in-chief, would prove a propaganda boom if any of this personnel are detained by a hostile government or captured by a terrorist group. There would be no denying who you are and what you do.”
The tweet from Trump is still up and apparently the White House hasn’t responded to requests about this:
.@FLOTUS Melania and I were honored to visit our incredible troops at Al Asad Air Base in Iraq. GOD BLESS THE U.S.A.! pic.twitter.com/rDlhITDvm1
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 26, 2018
The Pentagon is referring questions about this to the White House.
My guess is if their safety was compromised as the reporting suggests, then the military will take swift action to move them somewhere else or pull them altogether and replace them with perhaps another SEAL team.
UPDATE:
There are some who say this reporting is bunk:
This story is bunk. “Covert” SEALs do not attend massive press dog and ponies at chow halls.
Re blurred faces: that falls to PAs and the team’s commander to properly communicate to WH personnel.
Pool report revealed the team’s number, another Mil PA failure if one exists. https://t.co/X3K5IYIhVh
— Geoffrey Ingersoll (@GPIngersoll) December 27, 2018
This is overwrought. It’s unusual to show these guys’ faces, but they are part of the “white” SOF advisory task force CJSOTF-I, not JSOC operators, and their mission is not “covert.” https://t.co/zMyJJZzpXi
— Wesley Morgan (@wesleysmorgan) December 26, 2018
Perhaps all of this is much ado about nothing?