Even in the article here, it's "according to former U.S. officials..." and "three former officials..." which of course isn't a hard source.

Weirdly enough I hadn't read this with the target audience in mind so it came off as putting the US in a really bad light, but now I can see why you'd be confused with what I said because this is precisely the type of article they use the "anonymous sources said" tactic with.

Now when I re-read what I said maybe I hadn't actually realized that I don't read shit like this in the 'target audience' mode that maybe I used to read it in without even realizing it. Thanks for your thoughts!