Washington.- The 21-year-old National Guard airman was frantic when he joined a call with members of a small online gaming community that unlikely ended up at the center of a federal investigation into a major security breach in the United States.
It looked as if the aviator, Jack Teixeira, was in a speeding car, said a member of the group who goes by the screen name Vahki.
“Guys, you’ve been good, I love you all,” airman Teixeira said, Vahki recounted. “I never wanted it to be like this. I prayed to God that this would never happen. And I prayed and I prayed and I prayed. Only God can decide what will happen from now on.”
The FBI on Thursday arrested Airman Teixeira, an hour and a half after The New York Times identified him as the administrator of the online group Thug Shaker Central, where a cache of leaked intelligence documents that captivated the world first surfaced. for a week.
It was Airman Teixeira, a member of the Massachusetts National Guard, friends in the group said, who somehow obtained the classified documents and sent them to the group. From there, they eventually came to light, potentially compromising US intelligence gathering and damaging its relations with allies.
In interviews, members of Thug Shaker Central said their group had started as a place where youth and teens could come together amid the isolation of the pandemic to bond over their love of guns, share sometimes racist memes, and play war themed video games.
But Airman Teixeira, who was called OG by a member of the group and was also its unofficial leader, wanted to teach the young attendees who gravitated toward him about real warfare, the members said.
And so, starting at least in October, aviator Teixeira, who was attached to the Guard’s intelligence unit, began sharing descriptions of classified information, members of the group and law enforcement officials said, eventually climbing Hundreds of pages of documents, including detailed maps of the Ukrainian battlefield and confidential assessments of Russia’s war machine.
Their goal, group members said, was to both inform and impress.
Aviator Teixeira’s access to secret information and his ability to learn about major world events before they made headlines fueled the curiosity of the group, which numbered 20 to 30 people.
“Everyone respected OG,” Vahki said in an interview. “He was the man, the myth. And he was the legend. Everyone respected this guy.”
What Airman Teixeira was not, Vahki said, was a whistleblower along the lines of Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning, whose outrage over perceived injustices led them to break the law and reveal closely guarded government secrets.
The secret documents in the news now, Airman Teixeira’s friends said, were never intended to leave their little corner of the Internet.
“This guy was a Christian, an pacifist, he just wanted to let some of his friends know what was going on,” said Vahki, a 17-year-old recent high school graduate who went by the screen name he used. “We have some people in our group who are in the Ukraine. We like fighting games; we like war games.
Now her world is falling apart around her.
