In a recent blog I zeroed in on one aspect of that leaked Signal chat story that I thought had received insufficient attention at the time—namely, the impact on the people of Yemen of the strike that was discussed over the thread. After senior members of the administration stupidly added a journalist to their group chat, much of the outside scrutiny focused instead on the security implications of this blunder.
But I found myself no less disturbed by the actual content of the leaked messages themselves. The participants in the thread, after all, cheer on the bombings they are carrying out in Yemen with "fist bumps," jingoistic bravado, and flame emojis. When one of them reports that a "building collapsed" from a U.S. strike, J.D. Vance replies to this grim news with one word: "Excellent."