On This Day In History Techno-Thriller Novelist Tom Clancy Passes Away At Age 66

Erica Lamberg at Fox News notes that on this day in history thriller author Tom Clancy died. 

Tom Clancy, author of such bestselling novels as "The Hunt for Red October" and "Patriot Games," and a lifelong Republican who counted President Ronald Reagan among his fans, died at the age of 66 on this day in history on Oct. 1, 2013, according to multiple sources. 

 

Clancy was an American author best known for his espionage, military science and technological thrillers, noted Biography.com.  

 

He was the author of 17 New York Times bestsellers — and had his career launched by President Reagan.

"'The Hunt for Red October,' his first novel, had been bought for a lowly $5,000 by the Naval Institute Press. When Reagan pronounced it ‘the perfect yarn’ in 1984, Clancy, then a Maryland insurance agent, was propelled into a hugely successful writing career," said The Guardian.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

On this day in history, October 1, 2013, techno-thriller novelist Tom Clancy passes away at age 66 | Fox News

Note: I was a huge Tom Clancy fan, and I enjoyed his thrillers and his nonfiction books on the military. I was saddened by his early death.

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan Is America's James Bond

Broad + Liberty published my piece on Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan character and the Amazon Prime Video series.

You can read the piece via the below link or the below text:

Paul Davis: Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan is America’s James Bond (broadandliberty.com)

This past weekend I watched the final two episodes of the final season of “Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan” on Amazon Prime Video.

I enjoyed the four seasons of the series, which rebooted the Jack Ryan character, much like the 2006 film “Casino Royale” rebooted Ian Fleming’s James Bond character.

I’ve been a fan of Tom Clancy (seen in the above photo) and his Jack Ryan character since the publication of his first novel, “The Hunt For Red October,” in 1984. The Naval Institute Press published the thriller, which was the first fiction the publisher had ever published.

Clancy, an insurance salesman who loved naval history but had no military experience (he had bad eyes and wore thick glasses), based his debut novel on extensive research and the stories he heard from his neighbor, a retired Navy submarine captain.    

Clancy’s novel introduced Jack Ryan, a former Marine and CIA analyst who is an expert on Marko Ramius, the Soviet submarine commander who wished to defect to the United States, bringing along his submarine, the Red October, with him.

I was especially interested in reading this submarine spy novel, as I served two years on a Navy harbor tugboat at the U.S. nuclear submarine base at Holy Loch, Scotland in 1974 and 1975 after serving two years on an aircraft carrier during the Vietnam War.

I bought the novel but put off reading it as I wanted to read it while on vacation in Jamaica with my wife. After a bout of freediving in my mask and fins in the clear and warm water off Ochos Rios in Jamaica, I grabbed a drink and settled into a chair on the beach next to my wife and began to read the novel. 

I was enjoying the military “techno” thriller until one passage made me pause. Tom Clancy described the underwater telephone that surface boats and ships lowered into the ocean to communicate with submerged American submarines. He even got the nickname the American sailors called the communication device right. 

I knew of the device, as the tugboat I served on often went out into the Irish Sea and operated with submarines on classified missions, and we used the device during those operations. I was aghast as I read the passage, as the communication device was Top Secret. 

Years later, I interviewed former Secretary of the Navy John Lehman, a Philadelphia native, who told me he too thought Tom Clancy had published classified information. He had someone check it out, and he was told that the communications device had been declassified. 

As Tom Clancy, a dedicated American patriot like his character Jack Ryan, said later, “If someone gave me classified information, I’d call the FBI.”

“The Hunt for Red October” launched Tom Clancy’s career, especially after President Ronald Reagan read the novel and publicly praised it, much like President John Kennedy aided Ian Fleming’s sales in America after praising Fleming’s “From Russia With Love” in the early 1960s. 

As a young teenager in the 1960s, I was a huge fan of the James Bond films with Sean Connery as Bond, which led me to read the Ian Fleming novels. I was pleased to discover that Fleming’s Bond novels were darker and more complicated than the films, and I’ve been an Ian Fleming aficionado ever since. 

Unlike Bond, a sophisticated, debonair, womanizing bachelor, and a ruthless intelligence operative with a license to kill, Jack Ryan is more of an average, decent guy, a cerebral intelligence desk analyst who is happily married with a daughter. Circumstances forced Ryan to become a field operative and engage in close combat with America’s enemies.

Tom Clancy bucked the trend in most spy novels, films and TV shows that portrayed the CIA in a negative light, with duplicitous, corrupt and amoral men working for self-satisfaction and against the best interest of the American public.  

Tom Clancy‘s Jack Ryan is a dedicated CIA officer whose primary mission was protecting the American public from terrorists, international criminal organizations and foreign spies. In Clancy’s novels, the CIA is a force for good.

Jack Ryan was first portrayed by actor Alec Baldwin in the fine 1990 film adaptation of “The Hunt For Red October,” with the late, great Sean Connery as Marko Ramius. Tom Clancy liked the film, although he picked out two errors. 

Harrison Ford took over the role in the 1992 film “Patriot Games” and 1994’s “Clear and Present Danger.” Ben Affleck portrayed a younger Jack Ryan in 2002’s “The Sum of All Fears,” and Chris Pine portrayed Ryan in a reboot of the character in 2014’s “Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit.”

Although I dislike actor Alec Baldwin personally, as he appears to be an arrogant, angry man, I think he was the best Jack Ryan.    

Tom Clancy, who died in 2013 at the age of 66, also liked Alec Baldwin as Jack Ryan.

In 2018, Amazon Prime Video aired “Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan,” with John Krasinski as a rebooted Jack Ryan. Krasinski was the fifth actor to portray Tom Clancy’s character. 

Krasinski, most known for his comedic role in the TV series “The Office,” bulked up for his role as a former Navy SEAL in the 2016 film “13 Hours: The Secret Soldier of Benghazi,” which no doubt prepared him for portraying Jack Ryan. 

In the Amazon series we are introduced to a young Jack Ryan and other characters from the Tom Clancy novels. Ryan is once again a desk analyst who is forced into the field after he discovers suspicious bank transfers that he suspects were done by an Islamic extremist terrorist.

For four seasons, we’ve watched the patriotic, intelligent, resourceful and tough CIA officer Jack Ryan take on the enemies of America. 

I think the late Tom Clancy would have liked the series and John Krasinski as Jack Ryan. 

Jack Ryan is America’s answer to Britain’s James Bond.

Paul Davis, a Philadelphia writer and frequent contributor to Broad + Liberty, also contributes to Counterterrorism magazine and writes the “On Crime” column for the Washington Times. 

Trained To Protect Foreign Dignitaries, Hunt Fugitives, And Write Tom Clancy Novels: How A US Marshal Inherited An Iconic Spy Fiction Series

CrimeReads.com offers a piece by thriller writer Marc Cameron (seen in the above photo) that looks back on his youth and former career as a police officer and a U.S. Marshall as he continues writing about Tom Clancy’s character Jack Ryan in Oath of Office.

A few years ago, at my thirtieth high school reunion, my wife and I sat beside a friend of mine named Merri—a girl on whom I had a massive crush my freshman year.

“You know what I remember about Marc?” Merri said to my wife in her honeyed Texas accent.

I braced myself.

“He always wanted to be a spy…”

Merri could have made a worse revelation. My wife already knew I was odd in college, so the fact that I was odd in high school was not news.

I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t reading, writing, or imagining adventure stories. My aunt sent me a box of Hardy Boys mysteries when I was eight, and I burned through those by the time I hit the fourth grade. By middle school, there was usually a Fleming or Forsyth on my nightstand—along with assorted notebooks filled with my attempts to write stories of my own. The Hunt for Red October came out about the time I joined the police department, and I quickly added Tom Clancy to my reading pile.

As a would-be writer, I read with a pencil, noting story structure and interesting turns of phrase. Plot ideas inspired by other books and my own work escapades filled countless legal pads. I felt certain that the fistfights, foot chases, and high-speed pursuits I was involved with would somehow, someday, end up in a novel.

When I was a green detective, a savvy Texas Ranger helping me with my first homicide investigation told me to write down everything I observed, even stuff that didn’t seem important at the time. It was excellent advice for a detective—and a writer. I chased bad guys during work hours and banged away on my Smith Corona typewriter during my off time. I’d piled up a sizable stack of rejection letters by the time I left the PD for a position as a deputy US marshal. Tom Clancy’s The Cardinal of the Kremlin had just come out in paperback and I took a copy with me for my four-month stay at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center near Brunswick, Georgia.

… I’ve always had a vivid imagination, but I never imagined that I’d someday have the opportunity to carry on writing Tom Clancy’s iconic characters. One of the plots of last year’s Power and Empire let me explore what John Clark might do if faced with similar circumstances to those in Without Remorse.

In The Cardinal of the Kremlin, Clancy (seen in the below photo) wove plenty of interesting technical information into the story, but Cardinal is at its core, a book about spies, the case officers who handle them, and the counter intelligence operatives who hunt them. My aim was to give Oath of Office that same flavor.

Over the years since high school, I was fortunate to have a job that let me drive fast, carry a gun, and fight a bad guy or two—experiences that were invaluable to my writing. Despite my dreams from back when I had that crush on Merri, I never did get to be spy. But, thanks to this new job writing about Jack Ryan, John Clark, Mary Pat Foley, and countless other Clancy characters, I get to come up with stories for some of the best.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

https://crimereads.com/trained-to-protect-foreign-dignitaries-hunt-fugitives-and-write-tom-clancy-novels/

On This Day In History: Thriller Writer Tom Clancy Died On This Day In 2013

As History.com notes, on this day in 2013 thriller writer Tom Clancy, author of The Hunt For Red October, Clear and Present Danger and other thrillers, died.

You can read about Tom Clancy via the below link:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/tom-clancy-author-of-mega-selling-techno-thrillers-dies?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2016-1001-10012016&om_rid=de5e4076c942a595dbda53f758321d197499484f6d117f61b6ac5c08e0d6f0aa&o

You can also read an earlier post on Tom Clancy via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2014/01/command-authoritytom-clancys-last.html

Spies In Fact And Fiction: My Q&A With CIA Analyst Mark Henshaw, Author Of 'Red Cell' And 'The Fall Of Moscow Station

My Q&A with Mark Henshaw, CIA analyst and author of Red Cell, Cold Shot and The Fall of Moscow Station, appears in the current issue of The Journal of Counterterrorism & Homeland Security International. 

You can read the interview above and below:

Note: You can click on the above to enlarge.

Locked Down And Locked On

I've not posted anything in a while as I've been once again crippled and bedridden with great arthritis pain in my back and feet. The first few days were awful. I could not read, talk on the telephone, work on my Dell Notebook or watch TV.

I felt like a prisoner in my own bedroom.

Thankfully the medicine kicked in the first few days so I could at least read and listen to music. And thankfully I had on hand a paperback copy of Tom Clancy's Locked On.

Written with Mark Greaney, Locked On is a perfect thriller to make one forget his or her own pain.

The book has a great story, an amazing plot and a wild cast of characters, including one of my favorite's, John Clark, the former U.S. Navy SEAL and CIA officer.

Even though Tom Clancy, who recently died, sold enormous amounts of books over the years and made enormous amounts of money, he believed that he did not receive the critical acclaim he rightly deserved.

Of course, he had a very loyal fan base and they - and I - loved his books and will miss him.

Tom Clancy was a great storyteller and a great patriot and I'd like to thank him for helping me get through my week of being ill and "locked down" in my bedroom.

You can read an earlier post on Tom Clancy via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2014/01/command-authoritytom-clancys-last.html

Best Thrillers Of All Time

The British newspaper the Telegraph offes a list of the best thrillers of all time.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service - It might almost have been any of them, but Fleming’s tenth Bond book reveals the spy in a softer, more humane light, even falling in love and getting married – though not for long – while battling with Ernst Blofield in his high alpine fastness.

 

The Hunt for Red October - At the height of the Cold War the captain of a Russian nuclear submarine that cannot be detected defects to the west, bringing his craft – Red October – with him. The Russians try to stop him. The Americans and the hero Jack Ryan try to stop them. Incredibly tense and superbly claustrophobic.

 

 

The Manchurian Candidate - Set during the Cold War, The Manchurian Candidate concerns the brainwashing of a whole company of soldiers by Korean Communists, to allow their officer to become a “sleeper” in the American Government. Complex and steeped in the paranoia of the time.

 

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10609803/Best-thrillers-of-all-time.html 

Command Authority: Tom Clancy's Last Thriller

Veteran journalist and author Joseph C. Goulden offers a good review of Tom Clancy's Command Authority in the Washington Times.

A feeling of sad finality gripped me as I read the last of the 739 pages of Tom Clancy's 18th and final thriller. Once again, the acrid scent of cordite wafted through my imagination during the climactic gunbattle as Clancy’s characters from the world of intelligence achieved yet another victory over the forces of evil.

Clancy, who died on Oct. 1 at 66, had boosters as disparate as President Ronald Reagan, who pronounced “The Hunt for Red October,” his first of 18 books, “the perfect yarn” and “non-put-downable.” National Public Radio's Alan Cheuse called him “Faulkner in a flak suit.”

Let’s be blunt about it. Clancy was an acquired taste — beloved by patriots who support a strong military and an effective intelligence community; mocked by leftist woo-woos who argue that a turned-cheek is the best defense against an adversary.

Clancy was an unabashed hard-liner. In his first novels, his heroes fought the USSR and its KGB. When the Iron Curtain tumbled, burying world communism under a heap of rubble, he made a seamless segue into a war against terrorism. I was one of the millions of fans who put him on the best-seller list for 17 straight books.

In “Command Authority,” Clancy has at it again with his original foes, correctly equating the current regime in Moscow as merely a relabeled version of what Reagan once termed “the evil empire.” The Russian president, one Valeri Volodin (somewhat rhymes with “Putin,” eh?) is threatening the military annexation of  Estonia, Ukraine and other former states of the USSR. 

Volodin's plan includes enhanced powers for the FSB, successor to the KGB as a vehicle to subvert his targets from within. He accuses the United States and other Western powers of instigating anti-Russian provocations in Estonia.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/17/book-review-tom-clancys-final-thriller/

Note: In 1984 my wife and I visited Jamaica, our favorite vacation island. I brought along several thrillers to read, including Tom Clancy's The Hunt for Red October.

I had not heard of Clancy at this point, but being a Defense Department civilian employee, as well as a Navy veteran who spent two years on an aircraft carrier during the Vietnam War and another two years on a Navy tugboat at the nuclear submarine base at Holy Loch, Scotland, I was drawn to the novel by the subject matter.

Reading the book on the beach and by the pool, I was surprised at how accurate the details were (he even got the nickname right of a phone dropped into the sea by surface craft to communicate with submarines), and I was even more surprised at his detailing what I believed at the time was classified information. (I later discovered that I was wrong - the information had been declassified).

I became a Clancy fan and I've enjoyed reading all of his subsequent thrillers and his nonfiction books.

Tom Clancy died far too young at 66 and he shall be missed.

A Look Back At Thriller Writer Tom Clancy

Michael Walsh at National Review looks back at Tom Clancy.

It’s probably incorrect to call Tom Clancy, who died on Tuesday at the age of 66, the father of the modern political thriller. That honor should rightly go first to Ian Fleming, about whose James Bond novels little more need be said. Not only did Fleming create the most dashing British hero since Sherlock Holmes, he was also a pulp craftsman of no small literary gifts: “The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning,” runs the opening line of the first Bond novel, Casino Royale (1953), a beginning worthy of Melville.

Next comes Frederick Forsyth, whose 1971 novel The Day of the Jackal remains the gold standard for clandestine-world fiction, a gripping tale that has the reader rooting for a cold-blooded assassin, motivated solely by money, to put a bullet through the head of the father of modern France, Charles de Gaulle. Forsyth’s command of history and tradecraft gave the novel its realistic feel, and his inversion of the moral universe immediately distinguished the book from the competition. It would not be until the publication 13 years later of Clancy’s The Hunt for Red October that another work of spy fiction would have such an impact.

That book, you’ll recall, told the story of a rogue Soviet naval officer who hijacks his own submarine and precipitates an international incident. With the world on the brink of World War III, it’s left to the hero, CIA analyst Jack Ryan, to save the day by divining and then acting upon his educated guess that Captain Ramius is defecting, not attacking. But it wasn’t the story itself that rocketed Red October to the top of the best-seller lists. Clancy had never published fiction before — the novel had been rejected by the major publishing houses and was issued by the U.S. Naval Institute Press — but an astute editor saw the possibilities in his command of technology wedded to his narrative gifts. Red October wasn’t just fiction; it was really happening.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/360430/tom-clancy-rip-michael-walsh#! 

Tom Clancy And Ronald Reagan - Two Of America's Greatest Defenders

James Jay Carafano at Foxnews.com offers a column on the late President Ronald Reagan and thriller writer Ton Clancy, who died Tuesday.

Over the last four decades, only two people were able to make wide swaths of the American public really care about the importance of guarding against our nation’s enemies. One was Ronald Reagan. The other was Tom Clancy. The Gipper died in 2004, aged 93. Clancy died Tuesday in Baltimore, just 66 years old.

Despite their age difference, Reagan and Clancy had a lot in common. They loved this country more than anything. They most admired those who put service to nation above service to self. And both were gifted story tellers. Best of all, the stories each man told revealed large and necessary truths.

You can read the rest of the column via the below link:

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/10/02/tom-clancy-made-americans-care-about-importance-guarding-against-our-enemies/

Happy Birthday To Thriller Writer Tom Clancy

Biography.com noted that today is Tom Clancy's 66th birthday.

Tom Clancy is an American author, best known for his espionage, military science and techno thrillers. Clancy was working as an insurance broker until he wrote his first novel in 1984, The Hunt for Red October. Ten of Clancy's books have earned No. 1 rankings on the New York Times best seller list. Over 50 million copies of his books have been printed and three have been made into movies.  

You can read more about Tom Clancy at biography.com via the below link:

http://www.biography.com/people/tom-clancy-9542178

The Selling Of The Navy SEALs: My Piece On America's Newest Heroes

My piece on America's newest heroes, the U.S. Navy SEALs, appears in the latest issue of Counterterrorism magazine.

You can read the piece below:

Top Five Cold War-Era Spy Thrillers

With the film version of John le Carre's classic spy thriller Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy opening in British cinemas this week, DigitalSpy.com's Simon Reynolds offers his take on the top five Cold War-era spy films.

You can read the piece via the below link:

http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/at-the-movies/a340046/video-top-5-cold-war-era-spy-thrillers-james-bond-ipcress-file-more.html    

I agree with four of his picks.

From Russia With Love is the best James Bond film, in my view, and Ian Fleming's best Bond novel. The film is a first-class spy thriller and I watch it again and again every couple of years. Sean Connery is the best Bond, in my view, and his fight with the late, great Robert Shaw is the best film fight scene.

The Manchurian Candidate is another great spy film. Based on Richard Condon's great novel, the film offers Frank Sinatra in one of his finest film roles and his fight scene with Henry Silva comes close to matching Sean Connery and Robert Shaw's fight in From Russia With Love. Angela Lansbury, Laurence Harvey and James Harvey are terrific in this clever film of a brain-washed Korean War who returns home as a political assassin.

I also like The Ipcress Spy and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold.

But I would not have picked Three Days of the Condor. The idea of the CIA killing their own officers in New York is absurd. The film is a paranoid fantasy. I've spoken to several CIA officers who just hate this film.

My fifth pick would have been The Hunt for Red October (based on the Tom Clancy novel) or The Fourth Protocol (based on the Fredrick Forsyth novel).  

Joseph C. Goulden's Review of Tom Clancy And Peter Telep's Thriller 'Against All Enemies'

The Washington Times published a good review of Tom Clancy's new thriller Against All Enemies by author, journalist and espionage expert, Joseph C. Goulden.

Writing in these pages several years ago, I unkindly commented that the literary factory of master thriller-writer Tom Clancy “seems to be showing signs of rust belt obsolescence.” Essentially, I argued, Mr. Clancy had milked the same character for so many books that his material was running thin.

Well, relax and rejoice. The master of his genre is back, with the expert insight - not to mention boom-and-bang - that has captivated millions of readers since his 1985 debut with “The Hunt for Red October.” Mr. Clancy has taken on a co-writer, Peter Telep, author of about 40 novels on his own - a man who knows the Clancy territory and writes with Clancy zest. The product is pure Clancy.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/aug/19/book-review-against-all-enemies/

I happen to be reading Against All Enemies at this time and I agree with Goulden's view of the novel. Clancy's new thriller is up to his old standards.

Joseph Goulden also reviews Robert Ludlum's The Borne Dominion. Like Goulden, I'm not a fan of Robert Ludlum's silly thrillers. 

WikiLeaks Release of Classified Documents Endangers American Troops in Afghanistan

Thriller writer Tom Clancy once told a reporter that if someone tried to give him classified information, he'd call the FBI. Unfortunately, few writers, journalists and political activists share this view.
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As a writer who covers crime, espionage and terrorism, I'm in contact with many former and current military, intelligence, security and law enforcement officers. Like Tom Clancy, I would never accept classified information.
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Having spent more than 37 years doing security work for the U.S. Navy and the Defense Department - man and boy, sailor and civilian - I know that the release of classified information endangers American troops, government civilian officials and citizens
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The exposure of classified information often fuels dangerous criminals and terrorists who wish to do us harm.
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I believe the recent release of classified documents by WikiLeaks will do harm to our troops serving bravely in Afghanistan.
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I'd like to see the U.S. soldier or official responsible for the leaks shot, just as I believe John Walker and other American spies and traitors ought to be executed.
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Below is a link to a FoxNews piece on The Times of London report that the names of many Afghans who provided intelligence to American forces were exposed in the released classified documents.
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http://www.foxnews.com/world/2010/07/27/leaked-afghan-war-files-expose-identities-informants/
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For more information on the leaks, below are two pieces from the American Forces Press Service.
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Pentagon Launches Probe into Document Leaks

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By Army Sgt. 1st Class Michael J. Carden, American Forces Press Service

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WASHINGTON, July 27, 2010 - The Pentagon has launched an investigation to find out how thousands of classified military documents were leaked to the group WikiLeaks.org, a Defense Department spokesman said.

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The Army's Criminal Investigation Division, also known as CID, is heading the investigation, Marine Corps Col. Dave Lapan told Pentagon reporters today.

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"An investigation has been initiated and Army CID has the lead," Lapan said.

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Having the Army take charge of the investigation doesn't suggest that Army personnel are responsible for the leaks, Lapan explained. CID was chosen for its capabilities in such matters, he said.

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"CID is an investigative agency that has the ability, the capability, to do these types of things," Lapan said. "There are a number of investigative agencies within the Pentagon, but the decision was made that Army CID takes the lead."

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Army CID, he said, also is investigating the case of Army Spc. Bradley Manning (seen in the above photo), who has been charged with leaking a video of a U.S. helicopter attack in Iraq to WikiLeaks. The document leaks investigation is a continuation or extension of the existing open investigation on Manning, Lapan said.

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However, he added, the document leak investigation is "broader" than the Manning case.

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"The current investigation into the leak of the documents to WikiLeaks isn't focused on any one, specific individual," Lapan said. "It's much broader. They're going to look everywhere to determine what the source may be."

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In an interview broadcast today on a segment of MSNBC's "The Daily Rundown" television news show, Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell (seen in the below photo) said that Manning "is a person of interest with regards to this leak, but we just don't know at this point."

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Morrell said the question was posed to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates recently about changing the way the Pentagon shares information with uniformed members. Gates, he said, doesn't believe that that sort of adjustment is necessary.

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"What makes our military the envy of the world is that we entrust the most-junior officers, the most-junior enlisted with incredible amounts of responsibility," Morrell said. "Gates doesn't want to alter that dynamic, that trust element that exists because of one or two 'bad seeds.'"

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The answer, Morrell said, is "to go after the 'bad actors,' hold them responsible, prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law, but don't change the fundamental trusting relationship that makes the military so effective."

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The documents, reportedly given to several U.S. and international media weeks ago, are said to detail field reports from Afghanistan, as well as alleged Pakistani partnership with the Taliban. The more than 90,000 documents cover the period from January 2004 through December 2009, according to news reports.

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Morrell refuted questions about Pakistan being a questionable ally, saying Pakistan is a sovereign nation with its own interests. The U.S. military is thankful, he said, that Pakistan's interest in eliminating terrorists coincides with that of the United States.

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"We are aligned in that respect," Morrell said of the U.S.-Pakistan relationship. "But we each have our own interests here that we have to balance and work through. We think we're making a lot of progress there, but we're not alone in the driver's seat.

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"As Secretary Gates says, we're in the passenger seat. They're at the wheel," Morrell continued. "They determine the direction and the pace, but we're going to be their partner in this effort."

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On questions regarding the documents' outlining of miscues in Afghanistan, Morrell said the United States effort there is long term and moving in the right direction. Although civilian casualties there are a concern, he said, the numbers are down by a third this year, while the civilian casualties taken at the hands of the Taliban has nearly doubled.

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Morrell noted "rules of engagement" changes U.S. and international forces made a year ago when former commander of forces in Afghanistan Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal took the helm.

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"General McChrystal, when he came in, instituted this tactical directive which has seen civilian casualties, due to our forces and coalition forces [efforts], plummet by a third this year," Morrell said. Meanwhile, he said, Afghan civilian casualties caused by the Taliban casualties are up by about 90 percent.

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Turning back to the WikiLeaks situation, Morrell noted that the Pentagon's investigation of the leaked documents continues.

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"To the issue of whether it's damaged operational security or endangered our forces, we're still trying to get our arms around that," he said. "We've got a team working around the clock going through them bit by bit to try to see is there any information in there that could imperil our forces, our coalition partners, the civilians who are on the battlefield with us.

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"And are there any things in there that could jeopardize our operations or our nation's security?" he continued. "We just don't know at this point."

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Chairman Appalled by Wikileaks Release

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By Jim Garamone, American Forces Press Service

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ABOARD A U.S. MILITARY AIRCRAFT, July 27, 2010 - The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said he is "appalled" by the breach of security represented by the Wikileaks case.

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Navy Admiral Mike Mullen (seen in the above photo) told reporters traveling with him that the leaks could put American service members at risk. Investigators are still sifting through some 90,000 classified documents to determine the exact harm that the release could bring, he said.

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The chairman said the information is older – from 2004 to 2009 – and this may mitigate the situation to an extent. Many of the documents are field reports covering the situation in Pakistan.

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"From the time I've been chairman I've been very clear about the need to improve the relationship with Pakistan, re-establish the trust that was broken in the 1990s," he said. "In the Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy, none of us have been anything but very forthcoming on the criticality of Pakistan. We can't get at the safe havens that we know exist in Pakistan without their cooperation."

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The chairman is very concerned about the release of these documents. "Releasing classified documents could put in jeopardy American lives," he said.

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"We're going through a review to see in fact if that release has done that. But in my experience with troops from conventional to special forces, I think sometimes people don't appreciate what information could be out there that makes their jobs a lot more difficult and in fact, could jeopardize their lives."

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"I feel very strongly to do all we can to make sure leaks like this don't occur in the future," he continued.

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Mullen spoke to the reporters aboard an Air Force C-17 transport following meeting in Kabul, Bagram and Kandahar, Afghanistan. Previously the chairman had visited Islamabad, Pakistan; New Delhi, India and Seoul, South Korea

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