Operations

The Topline: Senators from both parties were not pleased about last Friday’s New York Times story that detailed a U.S. cyberattack on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said Tuesday afternoon that the committee’s chairman, Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), had agreed to hold hearings on the Iranian leak and other recent national security disclosures.

McCain and Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) also called for a special counsel to investigate leaks within the Obama administration.

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Abu Yahya al-Libi was reportedly killed when U.S. drones launched the airstrike against the suspected al Qaeda hideout.

The Pentagon has announced it is replacing the general in South Korea who said last week that U.S. special forces were on the ground spying in North Korea, a comment he later retracted.

Brig. Gen. Neil Tolley, head of the U.S. Special Operations Command in South Korea, caused a stir last week when he said at a special-operations industry conference in Florida that U.S. forces had been on the ground in North Korea. 

The Pentagon at first accused reports of his comments of being “contorted, distorted and misreported.” But two days later, Tolley said he was quoted accurately but that he “misspoke.”

The United States launched its third drone strike in three days in Pakistan on Monday morning, according to reports from the region, further inflaming tensions with Islamabad.

The drone strikes killed 15 militants in the North Waziristan region in the deadliest U.S. strike in Pakistan this year, and the eighth attack in the past two weeks, according to AFP.

The continued drone campaign in Pakistan will add to difficulties with Islamabad as Washington tries to reopen supply routes into Afghanistan.

Less than a year before Afghan forces will take over security operations from U.S. forces and two years before Americans leave Afghanistan for good, local troops are will not have enough weapons or equipment they need to do the job. 

A new Defense Department spy service was authorized in a Thursday House vote in favor of a bill authorizing U.S. intelligence operations for fiscal year 2013.

The House approved the Intelligence Authorization Act, H.R. 5743, in a 386-28 vote. The bill was broadly bipartisan, as it has been in the last few years, and reflects cooperation on the part of the Intelligence Committee on reaching funding priorities for the next year.

Rep. Conyers is pushing agencies to release information about the number of Americans who have their communications monitored under FISA.

The Defense Department on Thursday confirmed that elements of al Qaeda's Iraqi faction are on the ground in Syria, but have no proof that members have infiltrated the ranks of Syrian rebel forces. 

U.S. military officials are denying claims troops have been carrying out covert special reconnaissance operations inside North Korea.

"We’ve seen levels of violence going down, So, we’re on the right track," Panetta said.