The ‘Houthi PC small group’ chat and the tragedy that was barely averted

Jeffrey Goldberg’s lengthy account in The Atlantic of his inclusion into a highly sensitive war planning discussion at the most senior levels of government has quickly made the rounds of both national and international media. Reactions have ranged from total incredulity to hilarity and ridicule.

No one can understand, much less justify, how National Security Advisor Mike Waltz could have enabled a journalist, the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic, to be privy to highly classified conversations that Waltz and his Cabinet-level colleagues held in what was called “the Houthi PC small group.” It was this group that debated and ultimately recommended that the president approve a carrier-based aerial strike against the Yemeni Houthis.

Even more shocking was that these conversations took place over Signal, an encrypted messaging service that nevertheless is vulnerable to penetration by any sophisticated foreign intelligence service.

Equally puzzling is why none of the 17 other members of the group — which included Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, Middle East negotiator Steve Witkoff, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and CIA Director John Ratcliffe — alerted their counterparts that Signal was insufficiently secure.

Some of those involved had experience during the first Trump administration and knew, or should have known, that such conversations, if conducted face-to-face, would normally take place in a Secure Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF). They should also have recalled that if participants in classified discussions could not gather in one place, as was the case with the preplanning for the operation against the Houthis, those involved would all be located in various secure offices and linked via Secure Video Teleconferencing (SVTC), pronounced “civits,” or on secure government devices.

Goldberg initially, and not surprisingly, thought that the “Houthi PC small group” wasn’t real and simply an elaborate and sophisticated hoax. When the plans to which he had inadvertently been made privy actually took place, he dropped out of the conversation. As he writes, “no one seemed to notice that I was there. And I received no subsequent questions about why I left — or, more to the point, who I was” since he was only identified by his initials “JG.”

Goldberg reported the conversations in considerable detail. In particular, he documented Vance’s opposition to the operation. That Vance was unable to sway his colleagues and went with the consensus, and that the president sided with their recommendation rather than his, may indicate the limits of the vice president’s influence.

Although he was privy to all the discussions leading up to the first attack on the Houthis on March 15, Goldberg carefully avoided revealing elements of the conversations that, as he put it, “if they had been read by an adversary of the United States, could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel.” All told, however, he concludes that “I have never seen as breach quite like this” and he argues that Waltz and others may have violated the Espionage Act, federal records laws and other provisions relating to the dissemination of classified information.

Goldberg does not address the question of why those members of the “Houthi PC small group,” or their deputies who had prior executive branch experience, did not raise a red flag as soon as Signal began to be used. Nor does he query why Hegseth’s various military and civilian assistants, and those who supported the other members of the group, did not inform their respective bosses that it is improper, if not illegal, to use Signal for anything other than unclassified routine information.

There can be no denying that responsibility for the security breach must rest with the principals who actually used Signal on their cell phones to discuss highly classified matters. Nevertheless, if a military or civilian assistant fails to keep the boss out of trouble, he or she is not doing his or her job.

There is more than enough blame to go around in what can only be termed a fiasco. It was saved only by the fact that Goldberg acted responsibly even before he realized that he had been included in a conversation to which he did not belong. Someone else might not have been as careful.

If the attack plans on the Houthis had fallen into the wrong hands, the result of the leaked discussions could well have been the tragic and unnecessary loss of American military lives.

Dov S. Zakheim is a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and vice chairman of the board for the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He was undersecretary of Defense (comptroller) and chief financial officer for the Department of Defense from 2001 to 2004 and a deputy undersecretary of Defense from 1985 to 1987.

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