Declassified documents confirm former president Donald Trump illegally posted a satellite image of a failed missile launch in Iran on Twitter in 2019. Tthat photo showed a rocket exploding on a launch pad after country officials without success tried to launch a satellite. Trump reportedly released the image apparently try The US was not involved in the incident.
“The United States of America was not involved in the catastrophic accident during final launch preparations for the launch of the Safir SLV at Semnan Launch Site One in Iran,” Trump wrote at the time. “I wish Iran the best of luck and good luck in determining what happened at Site One.”
The image was so sharp that some experts suspected it wasintaken at all by satellite. “This picture is so fine and you see so much detail,” said Jeffrey Lewis, who studies satellite imagery at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey. NPR. “At first I thought it must have been taken by a drone or something.”
Through a Freedom of Information Act request, NPR obtained the original image from the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA). The paper says they went through a full review with the Pentagon to confirm the image could now be to be shared with the public. However, some details remain redacted.
Steven Aftergood, a secrecy and classification specialist at the Federation of American Scientists, told NPR that the decision shows that Trump seemed to have no problem sharing highly sensitive information on social media when he was president.
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“He was literally looking at some of the most sensitive American intelligence on Iran,” Aftergood told the paper. “And the first thing he seemed to want to do was show it on Twitter.”
When the image was first posted, aerospace experts determined the photo was taken by a classified spacecraft called USA 224, believed to be a multi-billion dollar KH-11 reconnaissance aircraft. The spaceship is similar to The Hubble Telescopebut instead of taking a closer look at the stars, he looks at the surface of the Earth.
According to last year’s reports from Yahoo! tidingsTrump was shown the satellite image during a daily intelligence briefing with top national security advisers. According to Yahooa former Trump administration official told the newspaper that Trump had requested if he could hold the picture. After some hesitation, he was told he could. About an hour later, Trump posted on Twitter out of the image to his millions followers.
Aftergood told NPR that by releasing the image, Trump may have provided invaluable information to other countries, including Russia and Iran, saying that if one of those countries had released a similar image, the U.S. would have gathered a task force to learn what they might have around them. Information.
This new information comes just days after Trump officially announced his offer to run for president in 2024. This announcement now makes him immune for fact-checking on Facebook, according to Meta’s policies that prevent moderators from weighing– in the posts of politicians. And it’s anyone’s guess whether he’ll keep posting whatever he wants on Truth Social or whether he will return to his old stomping grounds, waiting for the green light from I tweet after being banned for his role in January 6.
Nthe sufferings of recklessly posting classified photos may not be so surprising to those who follow. The former President seemed to have a thing for classified information. During summer, FBI SEQUESTRATED the grounds of classified documents from his Mar-a-Lago estate.
