On Wednesday, it was revealed that The New York Times, The Washington Post and other news outlets withheld information about the Obama Administration's controversial drone attacks in the Middle East. The media outlets confessed that they concealed information about the secret bomb attacks because they were asked to do so by the federal government.
In Tuesday's paper, the NYT came clean about the info they possessed concerning a drone strike in Yemen last August that killed suspected Al Qaeda terrorists as well as Americans. Within the article, The Times revealed top-secret info about the location of a drone base in Saudi Arabia. The report also talks about the architect of the drone program, John O. Brennan, who has been nominated as chief of the Central Intelligence Agency
According to NYT blogger Margaret Sullivan, The Times decided to reveal more info now because the location "was central to the story because the architect of the base and drone program is nominated to head the C.I.A," said the NYT managing editor.
The Washington Post also admitted that it withheld info about the drone strike in Saudi Arabia killed American radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki and his 16-year-old son in 2011. The WashPO wrote:
"The Washington Post had refrained from disclosing the location at the request of the administration, which cited concern that exposing the facility would undermine operations against an al-Qaeda affiliate regarded as the network's most potent threat to the United States, as well as potentially damage counterterrorism collaboration with Saudi Arabia.
The Post learned Tuesday night that another news organization was planning to reveal the location of the base, effectively ending an informal arrangement among several news organizations that had been aware of the location for more than a year."