Mrs. Clinton’s Attitude Toward National Security

Mrs. Clinton has dismissed the rules concerning classified documents, This behavior is typical among the more senior echelon officers in the Department of State. On more than one occasion, I witnessed State Department officers “declassifying by scissors” documents they wished to retain in a personal vice official file. They merely snipped off the document any mention of its classification. Clearly, the document was now “unclassified”.  A review of Mrs. Clinton’s unsecured server revealed many e-mails containing classified and/or sensitive information. I wonder how this could have happened if her minions had respected the classification of the original documents.

During my years of overseas duty, I witnessed many such violations. But on one occasion, the disregard for security extended well beyond scissors declassification. The most egregious occurred at an African post. My wife, working in a U.S. Embassy administration office, visited a women’s lavatory. Inside, to her surprise, she found an African woman bathing a small baby in a sink. She asked the woman how she had managed to get into the embassy. All entrances were protected with cipher locks, the combinations known only to cleared U.S. Embassy employees. The woman told my wife that she’d gotten the combination to the cipher locks from her husband, a U.S. Embassy local employee.  She had come into the embassy to inform her husband’s supervisor he wouldn’t be coming in that day as he was ill. 

In my mind, this represented a serious violation, placing the entire embassy at risk. I reported this state of affairs to the ambassador, recommending he see to it that all cipher locks be recoded ASAP.  Also, I suggested to him that an investigation be mounted to learn how that employee came to have such access.

The ambassador stated that such an investigation would not be necessary as he, personally, had provided the cipher codes to a few local employees.  Of course, he furnished this information only to the most loyal and most trustworthy employees. He found nothing wrong with this arrangement, claiming it made for a more efficient workforce. Also, it demonstrated to these employees the faith he had in their continued loyalty.