Classified Military Documents are Posted Online Without Hesitation

By: Matt Zhang

In the game “War Thunder,” many players have arguments over certain aspects of the game and the design and function of military vehicles within it. Some of these arguments get heated with players going very in-depth into their debates about the vehicles to the point that they leak classified military documents. These documents include design plans for several tanks, including the British Challenger 2, the French Leclerc S2, and the Chinese DTC10-125. These classified military documents were each released with a certain purpose but luckily, none of these documents drew any special attention or particular interest.

“I didn’t see anything I’d jump up and down about,” said Steven Zaloga, a senior analyst at the Teal Group, which has been analyzing tanks for about 50 years and published dozens of volumes about armored vehicles and military technology.

The British Challenger 2 tank was leaked to increase the accuracy of the game's design and usage of the tank. As for the French Leclerc S2, it was leaked to win a debate on the tank’s rotation speed. Finally, the reason for the Chinese DTC10-125’s being posted remains unknown.

“We explain to the users again and again that it’s pointless to give us any documents that we cannot and won’t use, but we probably can do more to explain this,” said Anton Yudintsev, the founder of Gajin Entertainment. “Unfortunately, there is no way to completely prevent people from publishing something on the internet. We delete the posts and permanently ban those who break the rules, so our users know that they risk everything essentially for nothing.”

Sources: https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2022/08/05/tank-plan-leaks-war-thunder/