The Insider

Senior Trump administration officials, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, are under fire today for allegedly disclosing highly classified U.S. plans to launch airstrikes against Yemen's Houthi militants on an encrypted commercial messaging service text chain that included a journalist.

Jeffrey Goldberg, editor of The Atlantic magazine, reported today that he was accidentally added to a text chain which spanned several days on the Signal encrypted messaging service that, along with Hegseth, appears to have included Vice President JD Vance, national security adviser Mike Waltz, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard.

According to Goldberg, the text chain included classified operational information about airstrikes launched against Houthi militants last week, including targets, timing and weapon systems. Atlantic has not published the information, which Goldberg said came from an account attributed Hegseth, who is out of the country this week traveling to Asia.

The bombshell story was confirmed by the White House, though President Trump, when asked about it during a press conference, said a reporter’s question was first he’d heard of it.

“At this time, the message thread that was reported appears to be authentic, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain,” Brian Hughes, spokesman for the National Security Council, said in an email.

Hughes, who pointed to the apparent success of the Houthi operation as an indication that “there were no threats to our servicemembers or our national security” as a result of the disclosure, asserted that the text chain is “a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials.”

Lawmakers, however, felt differently.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) told CNN the matter “sounds like a huge screw up.”

Democrats also seized the moment to criticize the Trump administration and call for accountability, especially as the Pentagon has sought to crack down on alleged leakers and hold military officials accountable for the violent and chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), ranking Democrat on the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, called for an investigation.

“If senior advisers to President Trump in fact used non-secure, non-government systems to discuss and convey detailed war plans, it’s a shocking breach of the standards for sharing classified information that could have put American servicemembers at risk,” he said. “There needs to be an oversight hearing and accountability for these actions.”

Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI), ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said the story, if true, “represents one of the most egregious failures of operational security and common sense I have ever seen.”

“Military operations need to be handled with utmost discretion, using approved, secure lines of communication, because American lives are on the line,” he said. “The carelessness shown by President Trump’s cabinet is stunning and dangerous. I will be seeking answers from the administration immediately.”

Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, released a statement on X criticizing the Trump administration for selecting senior officials based on personal loyalty to the president, rather than experience serving at the highest levels of national security.

“When you hire based on sycophancy and loyalty f* ups are going to happen,” he wrote. “This endangerment of national security is an unbelievable disaster. We need to put pressure on the Trump administration to get back to focusing on competency, get back to focusing on serving the American people instead of just focusing on going after Donald Trump’s enemies and sucking up to Donald Trump. We need competent government. The Trump administration is not giving that to us.”

Critics of the administration also pointed out that senior government officials like Hegseth and Waltz have access to classified communications systems, rather than Signal, a commercially available app developed by a non-profit group.

Sen. Rueben Gallego (D-AZ) wrote on X that the incident could be summed up as “amateur hour.”

“If I handled classified and sensitive information in this way when I was in the Marines . . . oh boy . . .,” Gallego wrote.

The Army's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) has chosen HII's Mission Technologies division to develop an open architecture high-energy laser, the company announced this morning.

HII will develop and test a prototype that will track and destroy groups 1 through 3 unmanned systems, which are those weighing less than 1,320 pounds. The high-energy laser system will be capable of fixed-site defense and integration onto Army vehicles, according to HII.

HII will provide the data that supports that Army’s “objectives for interoperability, affordability, scalability, supply chain resilience and rapid innovation,” according to the company.

The HII award follows a RCCTO solicitation released last July that called on companies to submit white papers describing solutions capable of delivering lethal effects against groups 1 through 3 UAS. That solicitation also said the system should be capable of fixed-site defense or be capable of integrating onto an existing Army platform.

The HII award is in the form of an other transaction agreement, and the eventual goal is for it to transition to the service’s Program Executive Office for Missiles and Space, after it undergoes testing and demonstrations.

Grant Hagen, president of Mission Technologies’ warfare systems group, said today the company is “proud to provide a critical enabler for the Army, delivering an effective, interoperable, sustainable and scalable system that will meet force protection requirements and support U.S. strategic objectives.”

The Senate Armed Services Committee is slated to hold a hearing next week to consider nominees for several top Pentagon jobs.

The committee is scheduled to meet on Thursday to consider the nominations of Troy Meink to be Air Force secretary, Michael Duffey to be under secretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, Emil Michael to be under secretary of defense for research and engineering, and Keith Bass to be assistant secretary of defense for health affairs.

This Friday INSIDER Daily Digest has big news on the Air Force's multibillion-dollar Next Generation Air Dominance effort, plus coverage of the nascent Golden Dome missile defense program and more.

Lockheed Martin has lost its bid to build the Air Force's multibillion-dollar next-generation fighter aircraft:

Boeing wins multibillion-dollar bid for the Air Force's next-generation fighter

The Trump administration today announced Boeing has been selected to produce the Air Force's multibillion-dollar Next Generation Air Dominance penetrating platform, beating out Lockheed Martin in the contest after months of uncertainty.

Michael Griffin, former under secretary of defense for research and engineering, and Lisa Porter, former deputy under secretary of defense for research and engineering, contend the Missile Defense Agency, while technically proficient, is not structured to lead the Golden Dome program:

Former Trump DOD officials: Don't put MDA in charge of Golden Dome

As the Pentagon readies to present a proposal next week to President Trump for a new national missile defense system, two former top defense officials are warning against handing the job to the Missile Defense Agency, arguing the effort requires a fresh, integrated approach that transcends existing bureaucracies.

The venerable KC-135 Stratotanker may wind up being in service for more than a century:

AMC: KC-135 Stratotankers may be giving gas well past 2050

As Air Mobility Command gradually recapitalizes its fleet of 60-year-old KC-135 Stratotankers, it "may need to look at a service life extension" to keep the refuelers in the air beyond their stated 2050 retirement date and fill in capability gaps, AMC Commander Gen. John Lamontagne said recently.

Funding tables sent by House Appropriations Committee Chairman Ken Calvert (R-CA) and Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Mitch McConnell (R-KY) express congressional "intent" only as Congress did not pass an FY-25 defense appropriations bill:

Appropriators look to guide DOD spending during uncharted yearlong CR

Republican chairmen of the House and Senate Appropriations committees have sent a blueprint to the Defense Department for how they would like to see funding spent in fiscal year 2025, though the Pentagon, which is operating under a yearlong continuing resolution, is in uncharted territory, according to documents obtained by Inside Defense.

Document: Appropriators' FY-25 DOD funding tables

Inside Defense recently interviewed the provisional head of the Air Force's nascent Integrated Capabilities Command:

ICC building trust with Air Force major commands while working on POM

The Air Force's major command chiefs are still hesitant about handing over their requirements-writing duties to the service's nascent Integrated Capabilities Command, a senior Air Force official told Inside Defense.

CHARLESTON, SC -- On a spring day in South Carolina, shipyard workers at HII's newly acquired facility here were laying the groundwork for submarine modules and putting the finishing touches on an initial aircraft carrier "structural unit" that will soon become part of future Ford-class aircraft carrier Doris Miller (CVN-81).

Fewer than 60 days have passed since HII took over this 480,000 square foot metal fabrication facility from previous owner W International, and the team has just finished building this first carrier unit, which was loaded onto a truck on Friday and driven some 400 miles to HII’s Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia for installation on CVN-81.

Read the full story, now available to all.

The Space Force on Wednesday published its Data & Artificial Intelligence Fiscal Year 2025 Strategic Action Plan that aims to give the young, digitally focused service a roadmap for integrating existing and new technologies.

The service needs to “emphasize AI literacy” to effectively use such capabilities as a deterrent against Chinese or Russian aggression, acting Deputy Chief of Space Operations for Cyber and Data Col. Nathan Iven wrote in the strategy’s introduction.

“In this contested and congested domain,” he wrote, “superiority will be defined by our capability to integrate with interagency, allies and commercial partners to advance data capabilities, real-time analytics and emerging AI technology to outpace adversaries and maintain operational superiority.”

The strategy consists of four lines of effort:

• Mature enterprise-wide data and AI governance.
• Advance a data-driven and AI-enabled culture.
• Rapidly adopt data, advanced analytics and AI technologies.
• Strengthen government, industry and international partnerships.

The first line of effort will primarily work to create the bureaucracy to manage data and AI capabilities, uses and investments.

The second stresses the need to boost awareness and understanding among Space Force guardians of the data and AI available as well as how to use it. The effort also orders a framework for collaboration and competition for data and AI technologies and uses.

The third focuses on acquisition, evaluation and management of data and the technologies that exploit data.

Advancing the Unified Data Library -- the data-repository intended to consolidate a variety of information streams -- is a key component of this effort. The strategy calls for the Space Force to transition UDL into a program of record and identify new data sets and collection sensors to integrate.

The fourth line of effort sets up plans for working with partners -- including other services, the intelligence community and allies -- on addressing common needs, integrating data and sharing AI capabilities.

All of the activities laid out in the strategy are set to be completed by the end of the fiscal year.