Did She Say Too Much?

摘要

This much is known: On April 20, career CIA analyst Mary McCarthy was fired from her job 10 days before retirement. McCarthy admitted to having undisclosed contact with reporters, and a CIA spokesperson says, without identifying McCarthy, that the fired CIA officer also admitted disclosing classified information to the media. Sources said this includes the Washington Post's Dana Priest, who had just won a Pulitzer Prize for writing that the CIA secretly detained terrorists in Eastern Europe who hadn't been charged with a crime. Beyond that, the case gets murky. Government sources tell Time that McCarthy might have helped inform the prisons story. Through her attorney, she denies the allegation and denies that she leaked classified information about the detention program or any other topic. Although much remains unresolved, the McCarthy case has sparked heated debate, not least among current and former members of the intelligence community. Should CIA officers be fired for talking to reporters? Is leaking ever justified? And who decides? Time asked four retired career CIA officials to weigh in.