Every Credential a Vow of Silence - How the Pentagon Puts the Press in Shackles and Why Leaks of All Things Save the Public

With a 17-page paper to the capital press, the Pentagon is tightening the reins: anyone who still wants to report on the Department of Defense must now take a pledge - namely, not to gather or use any information that is not “formally authorized for release.” Even if it is not classified. Anyone who does not comply will lose accreditation. The oath is accompanied by a new set of house rules that lead reporters through the labyrinth of the Pentagon only under escort, block large parts of the corridors, and reduce the freedom of movement of the approximately 90 permanent Pentagon journalists to a few islands marked on plan pages. The language of the authorities sounds friendly: they remain “committed to transparency to promote accountability and public trust.” The sentence that reveals the core follows immediately afterwards: “Information must be approved for public release by an appropriate authorizing official before it is released - even if it is unclassified.” Legally speaking, that is prior restraint. Politically, it is the dream of every apparatus that fears oversight.

“To ensure press access and OPSEC (operations security), the following updated security measures for resident and visiting press representatives are required to reduce the opportunities for in-person inadvertent and unauthorized disclosures.” - Was that also said to Hegseth?

The careful reading of the papers shows, without not getting a laughing fit every 2 minutes, how comprehensively the shackles are supposed to fit. Reporters must now confirm that even the “acquiring or using” of unauthorized information leads to the “immediate suspension” of their access. This explicitly applies not only to secrecy in the classic sense, but also to the vague category of “Controlled Unclassified Information” - a stretchable blanket term for anything that one would rather not see printed if in doubt. In parallel, the house decrees new “Physical Control Measures”: which corridors may be entered without escort, which rings are taboo, where cameras are allowed, where IDs must be worn visible above the waist - right down to the requirement to apply for property passes if a tripod is to leave the building. Anyone who violates the measures risks losing their PFAC credential, as the “In-brief for Media Members” lectures over many pages.

The “Acknowledgements” that everyone has to sign read like a catechism of control: I understand that my credential can be revoked at any time. I understand that I and my belongings can be inspected at any time. I understand that without escort I may only go to the precisely designated zones. I understand that any visual or audio recording, including cell phone photos, is prohibited - unless explicit authorization is given. I understand that failure to comply leads to suspension of my access. One can read this as a security catalog. One must read it as a political project.

That the spokesman claims all this is “aligned with every other military base in the country” does not make it less dangerous. A capital newsroom is not a barracks yard, and the Pentagon is not Fort Whatever. In Washington, a different deal applied until now: journalists moved freely along the main axes, met sources in the hallway, verified in conversation what was surfacing elsewhere. Exactly this spontaneous oxygen - the informal correction of the official - is now to be cut off. It fits a government that pushes media out of workspaces, takes their places off the wall, and replaces them with friendly portals. It fits a Secretary of Defense who behaves toward the press as if he had a personal martial law over the truth. And it fits a week in which an FCC chairman threatens local stations with “fines or license revocation” because a late-night joke is politically displeasing.

That of all people Pete Hegseth signs the new gag is mockery by design. In the corridors his string of blunders is long since mockingly called “Foxtrott” - a small reminiscence of the television station that fueled his career. The man, it is said, is constantly paranoid that someone in the Pentagon might talk to the press about “the crazy shit” he is doing day by day - so he issues rules that restrict access. The question that remains: why are they actually trying constantly to hide everything from the public? Whoever seals up that much rarely confesses strength. He confesses fear.

The irony the house does not seem to be aware of: perhaps the Pentagon should hope that journalists continue to pass on “unauthorized” information. Because this club was never the best public source. And because many in Washington are visibly underpaid, there are evenings at the corner not only with cigarette breaks but with actual conversations about responsibility. People who do not have to be bought because they do not want to be sold. People who would rather put a stop to things yesterday than today when a stop is in the way where the rule of law should be. Leaks are not romantic. But in times of truth scarcity they are often the only thing that still lets air in.

Because security here is just the backdrop. The actual plot lies elsewhere. Under Hegseth’s supervision, incidents accumulate that provoke publicity - and therefore are supposed to be taken out of circulation. The Signal chat with journalists (“Signalgate”) in March 2025, in which confidential operations against the Houthis in Yemen were discussed and into which a journalist was accidentally added. A second Signal channel in which air strikes and flight plans were texted with wife, brother, and personal attorneys. Added to that the invitation of a tech billionaire to a briefing on top secret war plans for the conflict case with China. Only recently, questions about the legality of two attacks on Venezuelan boats with 14 dead - and the boastful announcement of a third destroyed boat. In this mix of intrigues new access rules do not look like fire protection. They look like damage control in the wrong place.

To Hegseth’s long shadows is added what critics have been documenting for years: financial imbalances during his time at the head of “Concerned Veterans for America” and “Vets for Freedom,” deficits, improper use of funds, the prospect of insolvency, severance pay and NDA at departure. Reports of frequent alcohol consumption at events, accusations of sexism, a hostile working environment. Allegations of sexual misconduct that were later removed through settlements. A leadership style that sees budget, personnel, and organization more as a backdrop than as a task. Much of this is allegation, some documented, some disputed - read together it creates a picture. And this picture explains why a minister is trying not only to retain but to decree the prerogative of interpretation.

The reactions outside the house are accordingly clear. Press associations speak of a “direct attack on independent journalism,” constitutional lawyers remind that the state may not force journalists to exchange their right to investigate for a credential. “Prior restraint” - the advance restriction of publication - is in the US the most serious conceivable violation of the First Amendment. Exactly there this rulebook aims, by putting not only publication but already the gathering and verification of information under approval. Then it is no longer the facts that decide, but the stamp.

That the president at the same time considers “punishing” broadcasters and “maybe taking away their license” because reports displease him completes the panorama. An executive that sees publicity as an act of grace is building itself the cover of night. The task of journalism is the opposite: it creates light. And if the light only comes through cracks, then in the end it is the informants who create the net of cracks. Not because they want to be heroes - but because they are citizens. The new Pentagon order is therefore more than a temporary house ban. It is a political test. For newsrooms that must now decide whether to become supplicants. For sources that must decide whether to stay silent when silence covers injustice. And for a public that must decide whether it allows itself to be fobbed off - with officially approved sentence modules, neatly laid out, empty.

We decide against emptiness. We document, we investigate, we contradict. And we call things by their name: what is happening here is not a security update. It is a Foxtrott - a sequence of steps made of vanity, fear, and authoritarianism. Whoever wants to dance may do so. But not on the back of truth.