Five Eyes Become Three Blind Mice

George P. Shultz, the late Secretary of State, regularly reminded me and my Hoover Institution colleagues that in diplomacy, “trust is the coin of the realm.” Trust is even more critical in intelligence sharing. Without it, even the most sophisticated satellites, signals intercepts, and cyber tools are just expensive toys.  

For decades, the Five Eyes alliance—the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand—has relied on trust as its currency across oceans and governments. Born of World War II code-breaking cooperation and formalized in the UKUSA Agreement of 1946, the network of English-speaking nations and bilingual Canada became the world’s most durable intelligence partnership, fusing shared values with shared secrets. But the trust account now looks overdrawn on our side of the ledger. The shortfall isn’t just an accounting technicality—it threatens the alliance’s utility and credibility. 

Washington’s trust deficit is partly self-inflicted. The 2023 Discord leaks, where an enlisted U.S. airman at a Massachusetts base shared classified Pentagon assessments on gaming servers, embarrassed national security institutions and exposed operational details about Ukraine’s defense. The American response has been predictable: tighten the aperture; stamp more reports NOFORN—no foreign dissemination. The label, meant for rare use, increasingly appears on frontline intelligence about Russia’s war against Ukraine, denying even the closest partners critical insights. Classification, once a scalpel, risks becoming a bludgeon. When everything is restricted, collaboration atrophies. 

British caution adds another strain. London has now completely suspended intelligence sharing in the Caribbean, asserting that the U.S. sinking boats off South America is illegal. Further, the U.K. might now be unwilling to believe anything American officials say following FBI Director Kash Patel’s recent broken promises to MI5 to protect a bureau operative in London who was helping counter Chinese surveillance. Such caution isn’t betrayal—it’s accountability. The message to Washington is unmistakable: British officials want clarity on operational intent and legal limits before reopening British intelligence’s legendary vault. 

Canada and New Zealand face their own reckonings. Ottawa has spent two years investigating credible allegations of Chinese interference in its elections. Wellington, with its economic dependence on Beijing and Pacific partnerships under scrutiny, calibrates every data exchange. Meanwhile, Australia, the southern anchor of Five Eyes, doubles down on defense integration through AUKUS—a trilateral pact with the U.K. and U.S. that strengthens cooperation on nuclear submarines and in emerging technologies—but must still soothe regional neighbors anxious about militarization in their backyard. 

Across the broader Pacific, the picture grows more complex. The Solomon Islands’ 2022 security pact with China and Fiji’s vacillation over maritime surveillance cooperation have complicated regional monitoring and raised alarms in Canberra and Wellington. In the Caribbean, overlapping efforts by U.S., U.K., and Canadian law enforcement struggle with intelligence deconfliction amid anti-narcotic operations around Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, testing the alliance’s ability to synchronize protocols across distant theaters when the U.S. acts unpredictably and, perhaps, possibly unlawfully by taking out boats. 

The breakdown in trust among these close English-speaking allies echoes in domestic divisions. As Washington increases power through expanded ICE operations and even the National Guard, it fosters suspicion and resistance among state and local officials. Across the country, officials and citizens worry that sharing data with the Department of Homeland Security or federal law enforcement could be used against vulnerable groups, enabling surveillance or enforcement actions that conflict with local values and priorities. This creates growing hesitation to cooperate—even on essential public services—because the fear of federal overreach undermines the mutual trust needed for information sharing, creating an environment similar to the “NOFORN” mentality that hampers allied cooperation. 

California stands at the front lines of this trust crisis. Governor Gavin Newsom recently signed SB 361, expanding state oversight of data brokers by requiring new disclosures about whether data is furnished to federal agencies and imposing stiff penalties for noncompliance. State leaders cited evidence of federal agencies skirting privacy laws by acquiring information on residents indirectly, raising fears that state-originated data could enable federal actions such as ICE raids or enforcement sweeps despite local opposition. The rollback of a data-sharing initiative designed to expand CalFresh food aid captured the impact: outreach ended not only because of funding constraints, but also because of apprehension that federally accessible data could undermine trust and harm California’s most vulnerable populations. California agencies and community organizations are reluctant to share much beyond the minimum, wary that federal scrutiny could turn collaboration into exposure. 

The stakes go well beyond bureaucratic boundaries. Transnational threats—ransomware gangs, fentanyl cartels, money-laundering syndicates—seize on gaps between jurisdictions. When allies hesitate to share, those gaps widen into avenues. Consider the FBI–Australian Federal Police’s 2021 ANOM sting: agents built a fake encrypted-device platform that criminal syndicates used for years, leading to over 800 arrests and major narcotics and weapons seizures. That success depended on precise, timely collaboration—showing that when trust is strong, five democratic eyes see clearly. 

Today, authoritarian rivals face no such coordination dilemmas. Russia and Iran have integrated battlefield intelligence in Ukraine, from drone production lines to jamming tactics. China expands technological and data-sharing ties with Russia and Pakistan, weaving its “Digital Silk Road” through surveillance networks and telecom infrastructure. Autocracies don’t answer to privacy commissioners or courts; they centralize, coordinate, and deploy. The West’s answer must never be to imitate consolidation, but to outpace it through lawful, verified trust. Voluntary suspension of sharing among democracies becomes an own goal. 

Domestic politics have worsened the situation. The Trump administration’s 2017 disclosure of highly classified Israeli-gathered intelligence to Russian officials inside the Oval Office shook allied confidence. Populist rhetoric that treats alliances as disposable or undermines faith in professional intelligence heightens suspicion even among friends. The result is corrosive: shared information now passes through more channels of doubt than it does through encryption firewalls. 

Repairing this breach requires no surrender of sovereignty. The United States can limit NOFORN use to exceptional cases while developing releasable intelligence tailored for coalition needs. Allies can establish more precise limits on secondary use, with auditable oversight and joint after-action reviews to ensure compliance. Public transparency—within reason—can restore faith that the machinery operates within law and purpose. 

Five Eyes became the gold standard not because its members always agreed, but because they trusted each other enough to argue without rupture. Allowing that collaboration to dissolve into three blind mice chasing shadows would be a historic self-inflicted wound. In a world where adversaries coordinate faster than democracies deliberate, seeing together is not a luxury. It is survival.