The arrest last week of 21-year-old air National Guardsman Jack Teixeira on charges of espionage has sparked a debate in the intelligence community and elsewhere about whether his behavior is criminal or heroic. He apparently shared top-secret intelligence and military briefings – to which he had lawful access – with folks in his chatroom, at least one of whom let the cat out of the bag.
Is Teixeira a pawn for folks in the government far senior to him who believe that the United States needs to cease its criminal foray into the Russia/Ukraine war? Or should he be prosecuted because government agents have risked their lives to amass data about Russia and the compromise of this data can be fatal to them and their sources?