Wikileaks report U.S. intellegence services were able to penetrate the walls of the Sistine Chapel.

November 29, 2010. Apparently, not even the sophisticated U.S.  intellegence services were able to penetrate the walls of the Sistine Chapel. According to sensitive U.S. documents fed to the Wikileaks website and deemed illegal by the State Department, Joseph Ratzinger's papal election came as a total surprise. 

The report was among a cache of a quarter-million confidential American cables over the past three years. 

The not-so-top-secret documents show that the United States was expecting the first South American to rise to the throne of St. Peter's. 

Italian right-wing newspaper il Giornale said on its website that American diplomats were thrown off by news reports. 

Some top US Vatican correspondents said Ratzinger was an obvious candidate but wouldn't pass the first round of votes in the 2005 Conclave. 

Other hotly-contested specifics of the Wikileaks dossier were released to top international news organizations. 

The documents allege, among other things, that Saudi Arabia was pushing the United States to thwart a possible attack by Iran and that the U.S. believes North Korea provided Iran with nuclear missles that could be pointed at Western European capitals, like the Vatican's host city of Rome. 

 

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