Latest Bush Blunder: A Mole Made Public

To justify the Ridge announcement, unnamed officials revealed that an Al Qaeda operative arrested in Pakistan had provided fresh information. On Aug. 2, The New York Times named the captured operative, Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan.

Leaking Mr. Khan's name enhanced nobody's safety?-with the possible exception of certain Al Qaeda members warned of their own impending capture when they read the morning newspapers. For within a few days, Reuters reported that following his arrest, Mr. Khan had been "turned." A computer expert picked up in Lahore, he was said to be helping the authorities break up terrorist cells in Britain and the United States.

Security officials in London are still enraged because the Khan leak from Washington forced them to act too precipitously, rushing to arrest 13 suspects in broad daylight raids across Britain the next day. No doubt the C.I.A. officials whose high-tech tracking efforts led to Mr. Khan's capture felt similar frustration. In a war against terrorist groups that have proved nearly impossible to penetrate with human agents, the loss of such a well-placed turncoat could prove tragic.

There is no question about who perpetrated the leak. On Aug. 8, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice admitted that the administration had disclosed Khan's arrest to The Times "on background." Experts around the world are still astonished by this reckless decision.

"The whole thing smacks of either incompetence or worse," said Tim Ripley, a security expert who writes for Jane's Defense publications. "You have to ask: what are they doing compromising a deep mole within al Qaeda, when it's so difficult to get these guys in there in the first place?"