“The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the Secretary of Defense and other DoD personnel complied with DoD policies and procedures for the use of a commercial messaging application for official business,” Acting Inspector General Steven Stebbins said in a memo.
“Additionally, we will review compliance with classification and records retention requirements.”
The chairman and Ranking Member of the Armed Services Committee requested that the inspector general investigate the use of the Signal chat to discuss the strikes.
The messages posted by The Atlantic show that Hegseth texted the group specific weapons systems and launch times before strike operations were scheduled to start on March 15, 2025. The Atlantic reported that the messages in the chat were set to disappear after one week for some users, raising questions about whether or not the chat complied with records preservation regulations.
“Nobody’s texting war plans,” Hegseth said last week after The Atlantic published the messages. “There’s no units, no locations, no routes, no flight paths, no sources, no methods, no classified information.”
But some lawmakers and experts have questioned the claim that the information wasn’t classified because the messages included the timing of strikes before they took place.
This is a breaking story and will be updated.
Signal, Pete Hegseth
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