Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The material facts of this case have already been laid out in the House. I am happy to repeat them in response to questions, but I'll use my opening statement to instead make some specific arguments about what we can learn from this situation.
Generally speaking, we expect a high level of secrecy when it comes to national security. While, in a free democracy, people should generally have access to information about what the government is up to, information pertaining to national security is closely guarded because it could be used against us by adversaries.
On the other hand, it is a well-established principle of national security that information must be shared with citizens if they need that information to defend themselves. For example, if we were at war and a particular area faced imminent bombardment—