Transcript of US intelligence about Israel's plans to attack Iran leaked, sources say

Deeply concerning. That's how US officials are describing the leak of highly classified intelligence documents detailing Israel's preparations for an attack on Iran. Axios was the first to report on that leak. And CNN's Natasha Bertrand is joining us now live more, Natasha, with more. Natasha, I know you've been talking to sources as well. What are you learning?

Well, Jessica, we have managed to confirm that these two documents that were leaked on Telegram on Friday do appear to be authentic, and they are highly classified documents that suggest that the US has been essentially spying on Israel's plans to retaliate against Iran for that massive missile barrage that Iran inflicted on them on October first. These documents are marked top secret. They also have marking suggesting that the only entities that should be viewing these documents are the US and some of its closest allies, the Five Eyes Partnership. This is obviously very concerning to US officials. And while we are not going to quote from these documents or share them directly, we can outline them broadly. One of them, for example, which is sourced to the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, discusses Israel's movement of certain munitions in order to prepare for a possible strike on Iran. Another document, which is sourced to the National Security Agency, discusses the Israeli Air Force's preparations and exercises for a strike, including information about the Israeli Air Force's use of air-to-surface missiles. And so this is obviously going to cause some consternation, to say the least, in Israel itself. And of course, it comes in a very delicate moment between the US and Israel.

And it really reveals, I think, something interesting, which is that for all of the United States's efforts to get information directly from Israel and intelligence about what they're planning to actually do in Iran and having all of these conversations, they're still collecting intelligence on them and doing surveillance violence on their activities so that the US, of course, can get its own understanding of what might transpire. And so for now, what we're hearing from US officials is that they're not going to confirm the authenticity of these statements for now when we reached out for official comment. But we are told that one of the main focuses of the investigation at this point is just determining who had access to these documents to begin with, Jessica.

Let's bring in CNN military analyst Colonel Cedric Layton. Colonel, great to have you here.

Good Good to be with you, Jessica.

I want to ask you first about this breaking news story we're following tonight, that the US is investigating this leak of highly classified US intelligence about Israel's plans for retaliation against Iran. They began circulating these documents Friday online being posted on a pro-Iranian Telegram account. In your opinion, how damaging is that leak?

Well, it could be quite damaging, and it could be an indicator, Jessica, of several different things. One of them It might be that the Iranians have somebody who is working for them within US intelligence. That would be a very bad thing, to put it mildly. The other thing could be that it's somebody who is trying to, in essence, take matters into their own hands and trying to prevent Israel from doing things by revealing what the Israeli plans are. The documents themselves may not go into great detail about what the Israelis are doing, but of course, there may be more documents where those came from, and we could find out more perhaps in the next few days. But it's clearly a damaging situation and documents like that because they have not only high classification level, but they expose sensitive collection method and sensitive collection targets, they should never be released like this at all.

And what effect, if any, can this have on the military and its preparations, both the Israeli military, but also the US, we all remember, has military assets in that region as well.

Yeah, absolutely. 40,000 US troops in and around the Middle East right now, and that includes from all the services. So it could have a significant impact. Certainly, The Israelis could be forced to change their plans, could be forced to change the timing of their operations, could be forced to change the targeting, what particular targets they're going after. All these things are possible. It's not a foregone conclusion that they will do those kinds of things, but it is definitely possible. And as far as US assets in the region are concerned, they could become targets because of the fact that they are not only in the region, but also that they may be seen as aiding the Israeli effort. Whether or not they do that is, of course, a completely different issue. But the perception might be that they are, in fact, aiding the Israeli effort. So that would be a problem for the US, potentially in that regard.

And also today in Israel, there was a drone attack on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's home. No one was home, no one was injured. Iran has denied it was involved, saying it was carried out by Hezbollah. Netanyahu said that agents of Iran were behind that attack. They would pay a heavy price. Hezbollah is not claiming responsibility. Now, let's remember that Hezbollah is sponsored by Iran. So what do you make of all of this?

Well, it seems as if either Hezbollah or Iran or both were trying to send a message to the Israelis that their leadership is also potentially vulnerable to attacks. It would be a logical choice of targets, given the fact that the Hezbollah leader was killed by the Israelis, and of course, the Hamas leader was killed by the Israelis, and actually several Hamas leaders in rapid succession. So in essence, what you had the Israelis do was conduct basically a series of decapitation strikes against both Hezbollah and Hamas, and to some extent, Iran as well. And that, of course, then leads the other side, in this case, the Iranians and their proxies, to potentially go after leaders like Netanyahu on the Israeli side. So in essence, they've upped the ante. And of course, it's pretty clear that Netanyahu wants to respond, once again, in kind to this. So we might be on a ladder of escalation as this goes forward.

I also want to talk about Russia's war in Ukraine because we have some really incredible new information, which is that South Korea's spy agency says that North Korea has sent at least 1,500 troops to aid Russia in its war in Ukraine. We have even video of North Korean soldiers receiving Russian uniforms and equipment at a Russian training base. It just reminds us, Colonel, how connected a lot of these countries are that are adversaries of the US and its allies. How alarming is this? How should the US and its allies respond?

Well, this is alarming. It's not the first time something like this has happened. In fact, during the Korean War, back in the early 1950s, the Russians would actually be the pilots of North Korean planes, North Korean fighter jets. And that is something, so I guess we could say that the North Koreans are paying the Russians back, finally, for those services. But the key thing is this, now we have another power potentially getting involved in the war in Ukraine. It shows that Russia has a manpower problem. They also face significant domestic resistance to actually being grafted into the war in Ukraine. So the way to solve that manpower shortage appears to be to hire foreign troops. In this case, those foreign troops are North Korean. And that, of course, means that North Korea is more directly involved than we previously thought. And that potentially widens the conflict beyond just Ukraine-Russia. It could also impact the Korean Peninsula. And of course, the US has best interests both in Europe and on the Korean peninsula.

All right, Colonel Cedric Leighton. Thanks so much. Good to see you.

Good to see you, too, Jessica. Thank you.