Sensitive information must stay under wraps

Henry Stimson, a predecessor of Hillary Clinton as US secretary of state, once remarked that "Gentlemen do not read each other's mail". If that remains the case, there must be precious few gentlemen left in the US, and President Barack Obama's administration must start by blaming itself for the mess it now finds itself in.

The 250,000 dispatches and diplomatic cables revealed by WikiLeaks have, apparently, been on a Pentagon-run electronic database that could be accessed, quite properly, by at least tens of thousands and, possibly, hundreds of thousands of officials and military personnel with the appropriate security clearance.

The intention appears to have been to ensure that information available to any one of the US's intelligence agencies should be available to the whole of its intelligence community, in the national interest. While that was reasonable, it is disturbing that so little care was taken to ensure that highly sensitive material reached only those who needed to know.

These, and cables like them, should have been restricted for the personal attention of the President, the Secretary of State, the Chiefs of Staff and, at most, a couple of dozen others. I don't imagine anyone in Washington would disagree with me.

What is appalling is that the distribution system had got out of control and nobody seemed to notice. This incompetence does not entirely excuse WikiLeaks, however. Some of what has been revealed doesn't matter very much and will irritate rather than alarm foreign governments. There isn't an ambassador anywhere who is not reporting to his government with his personal opinions of the strengths and weaknesses, warts and all, of the presidents, prime ministers and politicians of the countries to which he is accredited.

That is part of the job of diplomats and long may it be so. Likewise, other governments will not overreact. They all have their own problems of unauthorised leaks and, although on this occasion it has been a flood rather than a leak, there will be some comradely sympathy within the trade union of world leaders. But that doesn't apply to genuine secrets, where real damage of a serious kind will be done. Here, there are two problems which should be acknowledged.

First, there is a difference between "the public interest" and "the public are interested". Of course, we are all fascinated by these leaks and wish to learn all that has been revealed. But there are many areas where the public interest will suffer by either the publication or premature release of sensitive information. While governments may like to conceal information to protect themselves from embarrassment, there are many cases where secrecy really is essential to protect lives and advance the common good.

That brings me to the second problem.

When the public hear of leaked information, most people know that it should not be published if it reveals personal details that might endanger lives. Most people would also acknowledge that information that might endanger national security should not be revealed. That sounds straightforward, but can be extremely difficult unless you have a serious and detailed knowledge of international diplomacy.

Raw facts

The blunt truth is that, in many areas, only governments and diplomats have the knowledge or experience to judge whether national security or legitimate policy objectives might be seriously harmed by unauthorised publication of sensitive information. Let me offer examples, starting with a hypothetical situation. The United States might be seeking the release of an American hostage held by the Taliban. It might be having very private contacts with them to explore whether that is possible.

Then, it is leaked that US diplomats are meeting the Taliban, and the premature publicity destroys the chance of that hostage's peaceful release. One can consider also the very private contacts that took place between the British government and the IRA when Gerry Adams began signalling that he and his colleagues were willing to give up terrorism.

If news of the meetings had leaked it could have ruined an opportunity for a permanent peace. The more difficult and dangerous the problem, the more secret diplomacy may be needed in the early stages if progress is to be made. That was true in the steps that led to the release of Nelson Mandela from prison.

Regardless of whether the spotlight of unauthorised publicity might, occasionally, help rather than hinder, the deliberate leaking of sensitive dispatches and diplomatic cables is highly damaging in what is already a very dangerous world. It all comes down to trust in government. This was, very sadly, deeply corroded in both the United States and in Britain by the controversies surrounding the Iraq war and the failure to find any weapons of mass destruction. That trust must be rebuilt.

Presidents and prime ministers of democratic nations must be allowed private and secure dialogue as they try to resolve some of the most difficult problems the world has known. If they are not allowed this freedom, the likelihood is that we will all suffer.

— The Telegraph Group Ltd, London 2010

- Sir Malcolm Rifkind MP is a former British Foreign Secretary. He is chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee.