Retired U.S. General Is Focus of Inquiry Over Iran Leak

The leak investigation, being carried out by the United States attorney for Maryland, Rod J. Rosenstein, was announced by Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. after articles in The New York Times described an ambitious series of cyberattacks under the code name Olympic Games that were intended to slow Iran’s progress toward a nuclear bomb. That General Cartwright is a focus of the leak inquiry was first reported by NBC News.

The general, 63, who served as vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 2007 to 2011, became a favorite adviser of President Obama and was considered an influential voice in the White House on security matters.

A lawyer for General Cartwright, Gregory B. Craig, who served as White House counsel early in the Obama administration, declined to comment.

Marcia Murphy, a spokeswoman for Mr. Rosenstein, declined to confirm or deny whether General Cartwright was being investigated. “We don’t have any comment at all,” Ms. Murphy said.

Since his retirement in 2011, General Cartwright has joined the Center for Strategic and International Studies and has spoken in favor of major cuts in nuclear weapons and warned of possible “blowback” from the use of drone aircraft by the United States in Pakistan and Yemen.

Asked about the NBC News report, Jill Abramson, executive editor of The New York Times, said, “We don’t comment on our confidential sources.”

Since President Obama took office in 2009, seven current or former government officials or contractors have been charged under the Espionage Act with leaking classified information, compared with three under all previous presidents. The seventh person charged was Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who has acknowledged giving classified documents to The Guardian and The Washington Post.

Press advocates have criticized the unprecedented crackdown on leaks, in which F.B.I. investigators have used e-mail and telephone records to track exchanges between reporters and sources, saying it endangers reporting on national security. But Mr. Obama and Mr. Holder have said that leaks can put American security at risk.