This is one of those moves that can be “transparency” and “ammo” at the same time. And if you don’t think that matters, you’re not paying attention to how information actually works now.

Tulsi Gabbard, as Director of National Intelligence, released declassified documents on June 12 about U.S. funding for biological laboratories around the world—public reporting says it’s over 120 labs in more than 30 countries, including Ukraine. And almost immediately, Russian state propaganda networks amplified the release. That part is not a side detail. That’s the whole problem.

Let’s start with the plain fact that keeps getting lost: these facilities aren’t some secret “evil lab” network. From what’s been shared publicly, they’re tied to U.S. biosecurity programs that go back decades, to the period after the Soviet Union collapsed. In other words, this isn’t a sudden new project cooked up in the shadows. It’s something governments have been doing out in the open, in some form, for a long time.

But here’s my view: declassifying something “publicly known” doesn’t automatically make it harmless. Sometimes it makes it easier to weaponize.

Because the average person does not read declassified documents and calmly think, “Ah, a long-running biosecurity partnership.” They see the words “Ukraine,” “biological,” “labs,” and “U.S. funding” in the same sentence and their brain jumps to the most dramatic possible story. And there are people—states, influencers, grifters, partisans—who make a living guiding that jump.

So yes, you can argue this is honest government. Fine. But you can also see how it lands in the real world: it creates a neat package for anyone who wants to say, “See? They admitted it.” Not “they admitted to funding labs.” They admitted to whatever scary version the audience already suspects.

That’s the asymmetry that makes me uneasy. The truth has to be explained. The lie just has to be repeated.

Now imagine you’re a normal person in Ukraine reading that Russian networks are amplifying this. You’re already living through a war where narratives get people killed. You don’t have the luxury of treating this like a debate club topic. You hear “biolab” and you start thinking about justification—what story gets built to excuse the next attack, the next escalation, the next wave of global doubt about your country.

Or imagine you work in public health in one of these countries. Your job is boring in the best way: training, testing, reporting, safety standards. The kind of work you want nobody to notice. Then suddenly your work is dragged into a global propaganda blender. People who don’t know your name start treating you like you’re part of a sinister plot. That doesn’t just hurt feelings. It can lead to threats, harassment, resignations, and a chilling effect where the best people decide it’s not worth it.

And if you’re an American who generally supports transparency, here’s the uncomfortable part: you can be right in principle and still be reckless in practice.

Declassification isn’t just a moral act. It’s a tactical act. Timing matters. Packaging matters. Context matters. When the same facts can be used to support public understanding or to support a hostile narrative, you don’t get to shrug and say, “Not my problem.” If you’re in a top intelligence role, it is literally your job to anticipate how adversaries will use your choices.

Of course, there’s another side. Secrecy is its own kind of poison. People are tired of being told to trust institutions that don’t explain themselves. And when officials resist releasing information, they create the perfect breeding ground for conspiracy theories. In that light, sunlight can be the responsible move. It can say: here’s what it is, here’s what it isn’t, stop filling the gaps with fantasies.

I get that. I even sympathize with it.

But I don’t think you can drop documents into a charged environment and act surprised when bad actors sprint faster than the public can read. Russian propaganda doesn’t need the documents to prove anything; it needs them to confuse people who are only half paying attention. Confusion is often the goal. If enough people end up thinking “maybe both sides are hiding something,” that’s a win for the side that benefits from distrust.

The stakes aren’t abstract. This touches real things: whether allies keep cooperating on disease monitoring, whether scientists can do their work without becoming targets, whether people trust basic public health efforts, whether “bio” becomes the next word that automatically triggers paranoia. The loser is ordinary people who just want fewer surprises—fewer outbreaks, fewer wars, fewer reasons to distrust every institution.

And it puts the rest of us in a nasty spot as readers. If you dismiss the release entirely, you look like you’re defending secrecy. If you treat it as proof of something sinister, you’re doing the propagandists’ work for them. The uncomfortable middle is admitting two things at once: yes, the labs can be legitimate and publicly known, and yes, releasing documents can still be a political and information-war move with consequences.

What I don’t know—and what I wish we could be honest about—is the intent and the care. Was this released with a serious effort to prevent misreading, or was the misreading part of the point?

If declassification predictably feeds an adversary’s narrative in wartime, should the standard for releasing it be “the public has a right to know,” or “the public has a right to understand”?