Slashdot Mirror
Soldiers Can't Blog Without Approval
denebian devil writes "Wired.com has obtained a copy of updated US Army rules (pdf) that force soldiers to stop posting to blogs or sending personal e-mail messages without first clearing the content with a superior officer. Previous editions of the rules asked Army personnel to "consult with their immediate supervisor" before posting a document "that might contain sensitive and/or critical information in a public forum." The new version, in contrast, requires "an OPSEC review prior to publishing" anything — from "web log (blog) postings" to comments on internet message boards, from resumes to letters home. Under the strictest reading of the rule, a soldier must check with his or her superior officer before every blog entry posted and every email sent, though the method of enforcing these regulations is subject to choices made by the unit commanders. According to Wired, active-duty troops aren't the only ones affected by the new guidelines. Civilians working for the military, Army contractors — even soldiers' families — are all subject to the directive as well, though many of the people affected by these new regulations can't even access them because they are being kept on the military's restricted Army Knowledge Online intranet. Wired also interviewed Major Ray Ceralde, author of the new regulations, about why this change has been made."
Oh, you meant soldiers.
Someone prematurely punctuated. There are pills for that now.
"Soldier's Can't Blog Without Approval" was not the title I gave it. Perhaps CmdrTaco has just had a long day.
I work for subcontractor on-site for a major armed forces contractor. Posting anonymously for obvious reasons.
Sounds like more of a PITA than anything at all... and to me, it doesn't seem like it'll make any difference in keeping information "secure" anyways. Anyone that wants to know anything about our military can probably just watch the news. They seem to tell enough of our "secret" plans most of the time anyways.
To Whom it May Concern:
Today we are going to be traveling along road X and going to destination Y around noon. Boy, it is going to be hot. While there, we are going to be picking up an informant. He would be in big trouble if he is found out.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
...though many of the people affected by these new regulations can't even access them because they are being kept on the military's restricted Army Knowledge Online intranet.Is this like an unenforcable EULA? If I can't read it before I have to abide by it, is that legal and binding?
Non calor sed umor est qui nobis incommodat.
AKO is not restricted, neither is it an intranet. It's the Army's main web portal and e-mail site for Service Members (and DA civilians.) Everyone in the Army (and National Guard and Reserves) is required to get an account.
I would expect better fact checking, but then I remembered this slashdot.
This isn't news, truthfully. The whole thing is pretty much a reinforcement of status quo.
rules not able to read them is part of plan to get rid of people they don't like by saying that you broke a rules that is restricted to you and I can't say anything more about it.
Soldiers (and soldier's) have always known we give up some of our liberties for the privilege of serving. For instance, criticizing the President is a crime. I bit permanent holes in my tongue when Clinton was the CinC.
Why are you not taking the expierence to heart , and work on a real solution?
Political people are just like the 'student body president' an ineffectual
asswiper.
I would NOT emphasize Democracy, I would try ti unite "disparet" factions, and
show how they are sharing common goals.
Oooops.
Its just like a NDA for a major corporation. But the stakes are life and death. If the censorships is being abused is one thing but that fact that it exists is to be expected.
First off, I'm not in the Army. I am, however, in the Navy and there have always been regulations about what can and cannot be shared with the public. OPSEC (Operational Security) is something every active duty military member is familiar with. There are filters in military email servers to flag emails that may violate OPSEC, but nothing like what the article describes. As a microISV and a Sailor, I wouldn't dream of putting everything I post through any military channel. Bottom line: this is an unpractical regulation and it won't last long.
God damn it. "Soldier's."
Fine, I'll go hire someone to write for me.
It won't be a popular opinion but all content in a war zone needs to be carefully filtered, while "we shot three arabs today" won't cause my trouble "we shot three arabs in Baghdad today" might do so. Hence anything going in or out in any form must be checked to see if it gives their operations away.
Soldiers are much like prisoners, they have some freedoms, but at the end of the day you're on someone else's time and in a place and they make all the rules, both good and bad. If you sign up (or get sent there) you play by the rules ment to keep everyone safe.
I like muppets.
for the military.
The original poster acts as though this is some new super-secret nefarious plot to keep secrets from the American public. The simple truth is that there has always been censorship of personal correspondence from war zones. This was true of WW2, Korea and, for all I know, of the Civil and Revolutionary Wars. Nobody likes it, least of all the poor junior officers who have to censor letter after letter, but it's a basic military necessity.
It's the military, not the cub scouts. Get over it.
"Man is nothing without the works of man" -- Helvetius
Pushing preview plus proofreading prevents provoking punctuation problem posts.
If they don't have a rule against it, when someone blogs something that truly is damaging the Army won't be able to do anything about it.
So, in typical bureaucratic fashion, they effectively outlaw the practice.
And it's not just the US Army that does this. This is no different than some large corporation setting a policy that you can't load personal software on company computers, or schools putting in censoring tools.
It's CYA in case something goes wrong - the top management can then point to a rule they made.
A military organization functions well due to its tightly controlled command structure, like a hive of ants. Whether or not the military should be doing X or Y is irrelevant to the issue - the actions of everyone in the hive must be controlled and purposeful.
If you don't like it, pretend to be crazy, gay, or commit a crime, and get out. THEN write your book.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Military censorship of all troops' correspondence is not exactly new.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
When I was in, back in the day, I'm willing to bet there were restrictions in place that could be applied to personal correspondence and telephone calls. Sounds like they're just updating the rules to keep up with the times. It's also not too surprising to me that the rules would be posted somewhere not everybody could read them, there'll be notes sent out to remind everybody about the new policy.
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
When I was in the Army we were often told, "We're here to defend Democracy, not to practice it." OPSEC (OPerations SECurity) is vital to both mission success and protecting soldiers lives. I'm an complete nut when I comes to the first amendment, but combat soldiers absolutely DON'T (and shouldn't) have that right.
-Peter
Consider the average soldier. Don't get me wrong, I've served my time too, but let's be honest here, there are more than a few that don't think past the next meal. Can you see a blog entry like "bleagh, again another boring patrol down road $somewhere at 1130 tonight, can't they come up with something new"?
Loose lips and all that.
Of course this will be used to keep them from telling any news of events that don't run so lovely to keep the spirit on the "home front" up. I doubt, though, that this is the main concern. Those news get out, this way or another, because some of those soldiers will and do come home, and there ain't much that could keep them from talking.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The members of the United States armed forces are out there fighting to protect our rights, such as the First Amendment that provides for free speech. Yet, they themselves are prohibited from enjoying that right?
When I was still in elementary school in Taiwan back 15 years ago, I remember the Nationalist government still sent out propaganda booklet, even to school children, teaching people that "Protecting information from Communist spy is everyone's responsibility".
One of the story I remembered is as follows:
Mr. Smith was sent to battle, and he sent a letter once a week to Mrs. Smith to tell her that he's safe. Mrs. Smith's friend would always asked for the stamps on the letter because she was a stamp collector. It turned out that Mrs. Smith's friend was actually a spy, and was able to use the information from the postage stamp (it's usually stamped with the date & location that it's sent) to track Mr. Smith's troop and killed them.
The point of the story is, soldiers could have unknowingly leaked sensitive military information on the blog.
B'ut we's like's ap'ostrophe's!
-M'ike'
I'm sorry; I don't know what I was thinking!
Despite the absolutist language, the guidelines' author, Major Ray Ceralde, said there is some leeway in enforcement of the rules. "It is not practical to check all communication, especially private communication," he noted in an e-mail. "Some units may require that soldiers register their blog with the unit for identification purposes with occasional spot checks after an initial review. Other units may require a review before every posting."
... the service is really a mess these days. When I was in (1989-1997, including service in Desert Storm) it was generally understood that one of the great strengths of the American military, as opposed to most other countries' militaries, was our the general American-ness of the way we talked with each other and with the civilian world. Soldiers (in the generic sense: soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines) were expected to bitch, quite loudly and often in public, when something wasn't working right. Because that's how things got fixed. Yeah, we were supposed to work through the chain of command, if possible, but everyone including the chain of command knew that wasn't always going to work. And this understanding, and the bitching that it allowed, was what led to constant improvement in tactics, weapons, logistics, and everything else that keeps an army fighting.
In other words, if we like you, say anything you want. If you don't, we're going to dig through every single thing you do when your hands touch a keyboard and find something to hang you with.
This is going to sound like standard old-soldeir grumbling, but
Now it seems like things are going more toward a Soviet model. Absolute obedience, top-down flow of information, shut up and do what you're told every single time; running the entire military like basic training. Well, guess what? Saddam Hussein's vaunted "fourth largest army in the world" was trained and equipped on Soviet lines, and we went through it like a hot knife through butter. Analysis after the end of the Cold War strongly suggests that if the balloon had ever gone up, the same thing would have happened on a grand scale in Europe. Authoritarian armies can win wars (Nazi Germany was just as authoritarian as the USSR, of course, but the German army was surprisingly flexible) but the cost is terrible -- as some German general is supposed to have remarked after the war, "We killed four of theirs for every one of ours they killed, but there was always a fifth Russian." Yeah, you can win wars like that, but (unless you're as bug-fuck insane as Stalin) you don't want to.
Also? Shit like Abu Ghraib flourishes in an atmosphere of secrecy. Now, I'm not going to claim with 100% certainty that there was no abuse of prisoners in Desert Storm; there probably was. I can say that, if it had been widespread and systematized as it clearly is in Iraq, as a medic I would probably have known it was going on. And I never saw anything like that. We took better care of Iraqi prisoners than their own army did, which is one reason so many of them were so quick to surrender. Keeping things open is the best way to ensure that everybody plays by the rules, and that in turn can reduce bitterness after the fighting is over and keep us from having to fight more wars in the future.
I look at those kids over there now, kids like I once was, and it seems to me they have more to fear from their own chain of command than they do from the enemy. That's fucked up.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
This rule won't effectively change anything. It's just another way for the military to hammer people who have a bad attitude. On the rare occasion someone actually does deserve to get railroaded, it will have served its purpose, but it won't change anything in the long run. It will limit people from posting random shots of Sadaam Hussein hanging and shit like that, but for the most part it will be business as usual.
The UCMJ has a huge number of laws used to keep "discipline and order" within the military ranks that would be considered a bit extreme for "normal" society. (Adultery is often cited as a way to punish someone who can't be caught for other problem issues as is "conduct unbecoming".) This is just one more.
"Growing old is inevitable; growing up is optional."
A friend of mine is finally on his way home after a tour in Afghanistan. He got a myspace account and started blogging almost immediately after he got there. He was usually able to make a post every few days or so, and often updated his profile with new pictures. This is a blog that ranged from collecting winter supplies and stuffed animals to hand out to children in the villages while they were on patrol (with pictures to show the conditions), to talking about how their convoy was hit by a roadside IED/RPG/etc. He more than once mentioned how much easier his blog made it to deal with PTSD, especially as word of mouth led to him getting literally thousands of readers, and also a 3-part interview with NPR. If it's something that makes the stress easier to deal with, making it overly restrictive, or nearly impossible to post will not help anyone.
Armies which require their soldiers to behave like ants are at a considerable disadvantage against armies which expect their soldiers to behave like well-disciplined people. There's a difference.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Soldiers are government property. GI stands for Government Issue.
They really don't have any normal 'human' rights, certainly not while on active duty.
Not that I care one way or another, but thats what the law is, in a nutshell.
JUST - ADD - S
Man, I hate how we're overrun with all these language princesss that think they're better than everyone else.
In public debate, transparency and freedom of speech are paramount to maintaining the security of our liberties. Free speech is a crucial aspect of ensuring that a free society remains free.
But on the battlefield, the public debate has already ended. The security of society and its liberties is dependent upon the ability of military to do their job, and this requires that many things be kept secret from the enemy.
When I was in the military, all of us understood that an unrestricted flow of information to the public was a Bad Thing(TM). Speech has consequences, and updating the reg to include email and blogs is to be expected. Quite frankly, I'm surprised it took so long.
Most soldiers will tell you this is a matter of common sense. When I was in, we had only occasional access to email, and even then it was understood that we shouldn't put anything in an email which could be used against us or the Army.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Restrictions on what soldiers can say during wartime are nothing new. "Loose Lips Might Sink Ships" was a WWII slogan the gov't created.
Wow... proper use of the word "loose" on slashdot!
Lose = not win
After reading this I checked the blog Living Intentionally (www.findingmytelos.blogspot.com), a valued source of unedited opinion from a soldier serving in Iraq. Sure enough, gone.
That is a loss. He did not mince words about what he saw. Here is how he is quoted in Parapundit's blog:
What I object to is what the Iraq war has become, and the fact that great Americans are dying on a daily basis for people who do not appreciate or understand what we are doing. Make no mistake, many people from this culture know the words to use when talking with Westerners....words like freedom, democracy and human rights. When the Westerner leaves the room these words cease to have meaning. They do not speak this way with each other. They mutually recognize that using these words is part of the expected hussle. There is a Westernized elite who own the concepts and desire to live within the framework, but they have no power here, and their desire is to get a US visa as quickly as they can and move to Detroit.
There is nothing in this culture that gives it a framework to understand the notion of consensual government for the common good, outside one's self, kinship or tribal structure. This truth works itself out in this culture in a way that is very masochistic to Western eyes.
Any individual, minimal cooperation we receive is due to perceived self-interest. It's not about appealing to a higher good, or humanitarianism, or sense of wider duty. It's about finding where your interests coincide with the individual, at that moment in time. Creativity in shameless dissembling, if resulting in benefit to one's self, is respected and admired.
I've heard it said that the desire for freedom beats in the heart of every person. This is probably true. But the desire for freedom for one's neighbor, independent of one's own self-interest, does not, and this is the true test, which the Iraqi people have failed.
I worry that we are shedding the blood of America's best on a mistaken assumption about the latter.
or write letters to people? Fox and all their friends are there to tell everyone how well things are going. There soldiers are not qualified to be tellers of things. Too much for the public to misinterpret. If a soldier has a bad day and tells his family about it, why, they could think the whole thing is going badly. Remember, free speech only works when it is approved through proper channels. PS: I assume that any serviceman/woman would know enough not to put operational stuff in a private blog or e-mail.
I yearn for you tragically.
A.T. Tappman
Chaplain, US Army
someone is up against the ropes and to help control the 'hit count' better, controlling how information gets out to the public is a must. After all, lying to the public and then having information from the soldiers contradicting those lies makes one look like a fool.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
I didn't RTFA, but just to repeat what everyone said, it's all about OPSEC.
Coming from the Army Reserve world and working for a major DoD Contractor now, anything we post online and made available to the interweb can be intercepted as some form of intelligence for the [insert enemy here]. Of course, there are also folks in the military (Psychological Operations - PSYOPS) whose daily lives revolve around propaganda and basically, guerrila marketing so that the [insert enemy here] or the folks most likely to be influenced by the [insert enemy here] believe that [insert good guys here] are the good guys.
So, maybe this is just another ploy?
Who is the enemy nowadays anyway? Terrorists? Global Warming? "Rich White Kids"? votefortheworst.com?
yep. yes I did. I went there.
maybe we just need an Iraqi Minister of Intelligence telling us that there's nothing to see here?
semper ubi sub ubi
My Aunt is married to someone in the Armed forces. She is living in the states right now but not to recently she got back from Germany. She has a myspace account and she post things about her husband all the time. So what you are saying is that she cannot post these without the approval of a military superior right? Can she get in trouble for anything that she posts in her blog even though she isn't inlisted but her husband is? This is sort of confusing to me.
"...though many of the people affected by these new regulations can't even access them because they are being kept on the military's restricted Army Knowledge Online intranet."
BS. Every soldier, family member, or Army civilian has access to AKO. If a member of a soldier's family does not then all the have to do is put in the request and it doesn't take very long at all.
Secondly Army regulations can only apply to people directly working for the Army. This means soldiers and Army civilians. The families are not held by these same regs, although a family member blogging something stupid could threaten a security clearance for someone. If you want something to apply to the general civilian population other than government employees then you have to get Congress to pass a law to cover it.
I just figured someone who actually knew what the hell they were talking about should chime in here. And the reason for the regs changing is that soldiers were putting SBU (sensitive but unclassified) information on blogs so that family back home could see it and not thinking about the fact that so could the rest of the world (including hostiles in the area). The Army fully understand soldiers wanting a connection to home, but they also realize the dangers in not controlling information.
Example: A soldier posts something about a family member back home in whatever town they came from. Maybe they were even thoughtless enough to mention where this person works, goes to school, whatever. Now any terrorist that wants to doesn't have to target the soldier, they go to the family's house back home where most people assume it is safe and kill them in the middle of the night. You can imagine what even one or two incidents like this do to moral in the field.
This is not some big conspiracy theory as I'm sure many people here will immediately cry out about.
Far too easy to give away something that could compromise the security of a unit or a mission -- even if unintentionally. Taking this sort of precaution just makes common sense. The military is likely far more concerned with this type of a scenario than some soldier giving away some horrible conspiracy that everyone in the military is in on (in most part because these types of things would be impossible to hide and if they do come out are fringe exceptions rather than the rule). Most of the blogs out there from troops are of a personal nature or in fact shed light on the fact that things are really not going as badly as is portrayed in our media here.
However, as someone else mentioned, it's probably not going to be too realistic to enforce in the long run.
Joining up,even if drafted, they lose a lot of basic freedoms including free speech. I could understand if their C.O.'s didn't want a blog post accidentally revealing the location of a group of soldiers somewhere but most of this is probably done so nothing "bad" is said about whats happening over there or our current administration.
Let's not forget, this comes from the same people that didn't allow the footage of how many and when coffins/caskets were being brought home from Iraq to American soil. When you have to cover up how many are dying in the war you are "winning" then a few censored blogs isn't that far a stretch.
Aw Frell this
Seriously, how far will the Bush administration go down the road of trashing basic American values? Did they sleep through civics class?
I have some very conservative friends who are so embarrassed by what "their guy" is doing that I have stopped talking about politics with them - no need to rub their noses in it. BTW, I voted for Bush in 2000 - I made a bad mistake, but I am willing to admit it.
My wife and I watched Bush on TV yesterday. It seems to me that he plain outright lied about the appropriations bill that he vetoed. He kept nattering on about the bill not funding the troups while in fact the bill in some cases provided more funds than he asked for (e.g., veteran's benefits).
Bush is so much worse than Nixon. Can he really believe that his actions our good for our country? (And the world?)
Bush is so bad he even makes the Democrats look pretty good.
I feel so sorry for all of those that are stupid enough to enlist in the first place.
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
Shame on you, Wired.
Civilians cannot be prosecuted for violating Army regulations - period. Saying the reg applies to contractors and family members is one of the best examples of journalistic disingenuousness I've seen in quite some time.
The Army can take action against a contractor up to and including cancelling the contract but they cannot take any action against an individual contract employee except to escort that employee off the installation and have him prosecuted by an agency that *does* have law enforcement capability - they also can't prevent family members from doing anything but can impose administrative sanctions against the family member. The Army has no law enforcement power against American civilians.
Simply put a civilian cannot be prosecuted for violating AR 530-1. There are other laws that *do* apply to civilians, but this ain't one of them.
we see things not as as they are, but as we are.
-- anais nin
An OPSEC review is different than making sure no "bad news" leaks out. There are more details than those of upcoming operations that are useful to the enemy... Suppose somebody innocently mentions where he's based in one post, then mentions that he eats lunch with a bunch of officers every day in another, and then posts a picture of himself eating at his preferred table in a third post... Spending an hour skimming a blog could provide interesting details and target opportunities to a mortar team, and they don't even have to be that smart to put all the info together. Or suppose that somebody mentions how his drinking buddy happens to be the guy in charge of the Stryker motor pool... A guerilla force with the internet skills of the average lovelorn teenager can Google names and look for them on MySpace, then start to develop a roster of people, places, and duties that would be incredibly useful for disrupting base operations. I've read plenty of milblogs that have passed the OPSEC inspection that were critical of the administration and command decisions, so I don't think they're filtering opinions, just operational details. I sat down and read Colby Buzzel's book My War in a couple of days. He writes about the entire process of going from unknown blogger to known potential security risk. Even after discovery, though they hassled him a bit, the military put very few real restrictions on him. As fashionable as it is to demonize the administration and Pentagon these days, this is really a non-story. Considering how popular camcorders, computers, digital cameras, and various audio recorders are among the troops... there won't be too many things that aren't exposed in time anyway.
Someday a real rain is gonna come...
Secrecy can't be compromised. Haven't you people even seen "The Unit"?!
One wonders if the publicity caused by the major strip willingness to publish soldiers story had something to do with this. The other reason is to protect soldiers from themselves. Some young people have a need to gain attention by publishing even detail of thier lives, such as bondage photos torturing a prisoner.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Firstly, on topic, may I say it's always seemed odd to me that servicemen in a conflict zone are allowed to blog or use plaintext emails. It's a wide open security risk. Much as I disagree with this dumb war of agression, a soldier should give up certain rights when they sign up in order to protect themselves and other people serving along side them. So why has it not mattered until now?
Well, I'm glad this war is over. And it is effectvely over. We are rather distracted by "silly season" stories like 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0, but in the real world there are two very significant events going on.
(1) There's a real groundswell happening for impeachment, regardless of how much the media puppets try to bury it, it's happening now.
(2) Bush just vetoed the withdrawal motion. He just shot himself in the head.
To see what this means study Vietnam, Korea, Afganistan (for the Soviets), study the closing year of WW2 or any situation where the occupiers are locked in a war of attrition against a determined resistance. The resistance fighters wait, they hold back and hit from time to time, but never all out. They wait until the time is right when the occupiers are worn down and tired, but most importantly they wait until domestic opposition is strong. In an unjust war the fifth column is the most important ally that the overwhelmed and occupied country has.
Now the war has little support from the people of Europe and the USA, those who still support it are in a tiny deluded minority. With impeachment in the air Bush is digging himself into a trench for the last stand and I think it's about to escalate into something truly nasty. I would not be surprised to see US and Iraqi casualties go through the roof this summer. That is what they don't want us to see or hear about. Expect some serious lockdown of the media as we move into the Iraq endgame.
Soldiers have always been restricted from including certain information in their correspondence and communications. Mail has always been subject to censorship. Censors were looking for any info that could identify the soldier's mission, unit, deployment and capability. Radio communication has been monitored for strict adherence to communication security. In fact, the Army Security Agency (ASA, know affectionately as "buddy fuckers"), continuously monitors radio communications and compiles statistics about the possible deleterious effects of accumulated breaches.
..." (MARS operator cuts connection and warns soldier that he CANNOT tell her where he is! MARS operator crosses room to flip a switch.)
It makes sense that the newer methods of communications would need monitoring for the same reasons. It is not possible to depend on the individual soldier to be discrete. Case in point: In 1967 I was a volunteer MARS operator in Nha Trang, Vietnam. During the Jewish High Holidays we were bringing in troops from the field, and some of them would come to the MARS station to make "phone patches" to the States. Amateur Radio operators like Barry Goldwater and others would take our radio connection and "patch" into the phone line for a collect call to the soldiers' desired connection. Strict rules were: No Last names, no units, no locations, no military references whatsoever. Even the soldiers had trouble remembering to say "over" in order to allow the other party to respond. One conversation, typical of the type, went like this:
Soldier: "Hi, Mom." (pause) "Over."
Mom: "Hi, Josh." (pause) "Over."
Soldier: "It's good to hear your voice. Over"
Mom: "It's good to hear you, too. Where are you? Over"
Soldier: "I'm
Mom: I didn't hear you. Over."
Soldier: "I said I'm in Nha Trang for the High Holidays. Over."
(At which time the call is terminated by the MARS operator (who rushes back to the set too late to cut off the restricted info), the Ham operator in the States, and the ASA issues a gig to the MARS operator for not controlling the communications.)
Really, how many times can you tell someone that this info is damaging to the mission?
I have no doubt that there are Intelligence operators from many countries sifting through the internet looking for information on the training, capabilities and especially weaknesses (remember the "too light" armor on the HumVees?) of our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"The mind works quicker than you think!"
A lot of Slashdotters apparently don't know or conveniently forget that there's this little thing called the Uniform Code of Military Justice that effectively says, "You are no longer granted all of the freedoms that are granted to non-military personnel under the U.S. Constitution." The ability to say whatever you want is one of those lost freedoms once you sign on the dotted line.
But, hey, if it gives people the excuse to start spouting their holier-than-thou dogma about censorship, let's just let them do it and get that frustration out of their systems, 'kay?
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
This is not like a license agreement on software. These are the rules under which you agree to act when you volunteer to become a soldier. Just because the technology has changed doesn't mean the underlying concerns have changed. In the 40s, your wartime communication home was sometimes passed through a censor who would retract out parts, with a blade. Today, it's a lot easier to get communication home through technology than sitting down with pen and paper - I know as a decent typist, I won't even bother writing out an address on an envelope if I'm at home with my printer. The fact that this communication is easier combined with the fact that soldiers are (as they always have been) somewhat careless with the information they give out and most critically combined with the fact that some communication home is inherently far more public than the standard "letter home" means that information security is a a considerably different, and much more specialized task than it was in the days with a censor's office with a room full of people with black ink and razor blades.
Most of these soldiers are young, and many are eager, and often aren't allowed or capable of seeing the bigger picture. As a six year veteran and a free speech purist, I understand the issue from both sides. For me, though, whether or not this is an obstacle to free speech is secondary to the point that these are rules you voluntarily agree to when you enlist.
If this was an issue of trying to punish soldiers for speaking out against a war, I'd have a lot more sympathy with the soldiers. But wartime operations really do entail some careful security considerations. Our intelligence services have often been criticized for not being interested enough in information which wasn't secret. Generally speaking, our enemies in guerrilla-style ground operations have no reservations in making use of information that's freely out there, and it doesn't get any more free or "out there" than a guy with a blog.
This is a case of the Myspace generation failing to understand that everyone on the internet isn't just using it for social purposes. A friend and I once made a month-long project to figure out how much information we could find out on one particular person with a public website, within the limits of the law, as an illustration of the difference in mindset between the more security-conscious paranoid types common in the 80s BBS scene versus the people who were coming up in the age where having your personal information and photographs and writing as public as possible was becoming the norm. We didn't end up publishing what we came up with (it would have been a gross violation of privacy), but it was highly educational, and a more than a little troubling.
The kid responsible for inadvertently putting so much of his personal life on the web, through a myriad of pages, comments, posts, etc. is probably old enough to be in the military right now. It puts things into perspective for me.
As an officer currently serving, I can tell you that these rules are very rarely, if ever, enforced. Many Soldiers see this is as more of a legal catchall - similar in principle to the "conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman" charge that can be leveled against an officer for just about anything, but is only used in practice when an officer does something that is obviously against the spirit of the law/UCMJ, but not the letter. The 1st Amendment / free speech angle doesn't really apply here, since all Soldiers are volunteers, and thus voluntarily signed some of their freedoms away when they joined up. I realize that may sound draconian and less than ideal to some of you, but that is the reality of the situation w/rt military discipline. As one of my old instructors once told me, "We're here to preserve democracy, not practice it."
Various rules of that sort have existed for a long time. I recall while I was there in 2005, there was a big push for to make every soldier reveal if they had a blog or personal website. Evidently, somebody had been posting more detailed accounts of the action as it happened on his blog than he was recording in the official duty log. So there are obvious cases where, yes, this is a problem. But before discounting the average discussion forum as immaterial to foreign intelligence, you never really know who is reading your site. Our site had a fellow who began posting insurgent propaganda (our filters worked) which served as a wake-up to us that our own news/discussions had garnered attention we weren't aware of. But we made our own users aware of it with an OPSEC Awareness post to serve as a reminder.
When you understand your disbelief in other gods, then you will understand my disbelief in yours.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Well, I for one am not going to be accusing you of being a spelling nerd.
For example: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=233075&cid =18951775 any blog post or comment could contain sensitive information. This is never good while troops are in harms way. While it might seem somewhat draconian, this is one of those times when it is likely to be a matter of life and death to one or more people. Loose lips sink ships and all that.
On the other hand, it does inhibit forms of free speech. Its always hard to strike a moral balance in such cases when life and death are in the balance. In the past all mail was filtered and censored during times of war. This is nothing really new as far as I can tell.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
Easy fix:
Do not allow women to divorce men.
If you disagree with that then you are an enemy of all men.
It has always been this way, of course they may have specifically defined blogging but communications security
is nothing new in the military that includes all branches.
Got Code?
How many boxs should I order?
This is the way it's always been. Blogs are the bit that is new. It's called OPSEC - operational security. Once, while on a mission in the Republic Of Korea, I caught hell for telling my girlfriend back in the states what city I was in over a non-encrypted voice line.
Uncle sam owns your ass when you sign up. If you don't like it, leave. We have a 100% volunteer militiary. They are more than happy to show you the door if you don't like it.
I'd say that is rather orthogonal to the issue at hand.
But, hey, if it gives people the excuse to start spouting their holier-than-thou dogma about censorship, let's just let them do it and get that frustration out of their systems, 'kay?Can we agree that creating military rules and using them to discourage military personal from providing unclassified information to other Americans and to discourage them from espousing political opinions that are are disliked by the incumbent political party is unethical, detrimental to the US, and thoroughly opposed to the American ideal of free speech?
This regulation is obviously unenforcable in general. The military does not have the manpower to police every communication by every military officer and family member. Why then, would such a rule be created? The only plausible explanation I have is so that they have a way to bust anyone who says something they don't like as a way of punishing people for saying any arbitrary thing they don't like and as a way to discourage members of the military from speaking their minds. Do you have a better explanation?
Now don't get me wrong. I understand the constitutionality of this and am not opposed to reasonable censorship of the military for purposes of security. This, however, seems more like a way to stifle dissenting opinions and prevent the american people from being accurately informed than an actual attempt at security. As such, I think it is a bad idea and the people involved should be demoted and or kicked out of office as that punishment applies.
You spelled princesses wrong!
That is quite an entry.
I can certainly understand why public indications of low morale would be a problem since it is the object of the resistance to induce this and providing them with measures of their success might be useful to them. But, to me this is water under the bridge and should go into the lessons-to-be-relearned file. The main effect on morale is reduced support for the war at home and this is a result of obvious incompetence. Secretary of Defence Gates now has an even weaker hand to play as the President chooses divisive politics over unity that could boost morale and so we see this kind of panic response that can only lead to worse problems.
Maybe you should ask one of the Flandereses.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
"A July 2006 estimate of the total Iraqi population is 26,783,383.
Seventy-four percent of Iraq's population are Arabs; the other major ethnic groups are the Kurds at 22-24%, Assyrians, Iraqi Turkmen and others (5%), who mostly live in the north and northeast of the country. Other distinct groups are Persians and Armenians (possible descendants of the ancient Mesopotamian culture). About 25,000-60,000 Marsh Arabs live in southern Iraq."
You were wrong.
Did you perhaps think we were talking about Iran which breaks down as
"The main ethnic groups are Persians (51%), Azeris (24%), Gilaki and Mazandarani (8%), Kurds (7%), Arabs (3%), Baluchi (2%), Lurs (2%), Turkmens (2%), Qashqai, Armenians, Persian Jews, Georgians, Assyrians, Circassians, Tats, Pashtuns and others (1%)."
Regardless, not to nitpick, but you should have checked before incorrectly nitpicking.
Their's is not to reason why,
Their's is but to do and die While it's questionable whether the new regulations are any more conducive to actual operational security, when it's essentially your job to kill other people and to be killed when necessary the military really has to make sure its soldiers stay in the right frame of mind. It's a tough call if you ask me, but censorship may be necessary.
However, you also swear to adhere to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which during your tenure as a soldier, sailor, or airman, specificaly denies you a whole shedload of rights that a civilian commonly enjoys. IIRC, only the Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments are still yours to exercise (almost) fully. The rest are either restricted heavily, or gone entirely for you. You basically suborn yourself (and are protected by) the UCMJ.
To make it even worse, even years and/or decades after you get out of the military... if a crime or fatality springing from gross negligence happened during your enlistment or commission, or was due to something you did or did not do, and there's strong evidence that you might be at fault? the US Military has the perfect right to recall you to active duty for long enough to get court marshalled for it. As an example: If I had ever screwed up on one of the aircraft I worked on nearly 16+ years ago, and it leads to a pilot or bystanders or etc. getting killed? Well, they get to drag me back into the USAF and make me testify (and possibly face liability or charges) before a board of inquiry. In such a case, it would prolly be done to determine whether or not it happened due to gross negligence or if it was something that couldn't have been helped, or...? Pretty good incentive for making sure you do your job right and document the crap out of your work, isn't it? It gave me some very tight work habits that carry through to this day.
As to your original topic... while yes it is censorship, it also managed to teach such things as discretion, tact, and consideration. Between the reminders and instruction, and reading real-life cases concerning how certain inmates at Leavenworth got there? It was enough to sober up even the rebellious kid that I was at the time. I don't think there were too many other areas in life back then that could've given such lessons in such a stark, certain, and very easy-to-grok format.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
As someone from the military, I've seen people respond in /. forums and say they were from the military. One noteable thread about IA had one supposed Army IA contractor talking about their issues and included something that had the guy been telling the truth would have led him to, as a minimum, interview with the Army's investigative services. Its stuff that the IA community would know in general, you could pick up an many SANS conferences, but its also stuff the Army says, you don't need to be telling.
Before anyone cries "rights", when you join the service, you agree that you lose or have limited right to some speech. Depending on your position, you may have a lifetime restriction on what you say or write without prior approval or review. It's the hard facts of national security.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
It isn't that hard.
Shouldn't they be looking out for terror? ok, ok. That's easy to say from this side of the lake but they must have more important things to do than worry about insignificant blogthings.. You're in a war. Write it down. If it's interesting after the war, publish it.
Then again I suppose this could apply to any blogger.
sometimes, nothing.
When you enlist or you are commissioned as an officer in the US Military forces, you sign paperwork that waives some of your "normal" civilian rights. Recruits and commissioned officers submit to a new bill of rights known as the "Uniform Code of Military Justice." The UCMJ is very clearly an abridged form of your rights as a US citizen. Sailers, Airmen, Marines, and Soldiers, while under contract to serve, understand this. This is not to say that the UCMJ is overly restrictive or oppressive--it's just not as wide open as your rights as a civilian (and it should not be).
Much like other laws in the states, they are not always enforced but the rules are there. Military personnel have voluntarily sacrficed their normal civilian freedoms as part of the terms of service. I don't think it's fair to cry foul if the military wants to censor communications. We might not agree with decisions from the White House, Capitol Hill, or the Pentagon, but people wearing those uniforms are bound by duty and oath to honor and obey their orders.
Cpl Catdevnull
USMC 1987-1991
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
The ones I feel sorry for are the officers (like I used to be) who get stuck with this. If one of the troops wants a blog post approved, the choices are:
- refuse outright and hope he isn't mad enough to get even in a career-killing (or worse) way
- use best judgement and get burned by anyone, anywhere in the military/government who doesn't like it, now or at any point in the future, for any reason real or imagined
- Pass the buck and get in trouble with superiors who don't want to be part of Choice 1 or 2 either.
Oh, and "approving" personal email (if they try that) is going to be pretty ugly too - that affects families back home that are used to communicating regularly, and can't be silenced nearly as easily.However, the main reason that the military has suddenly changed its censorship rules is that soldiers in Iraq simply write the truth about Iraqi society. The truth is a bloody, violent civil war. This truth then convinces Congress to pressure the military to leave.
Since the top leaders in the military want it to stay in Iraq, they simply cannot allow bad news to be publicized.
So, the bottom line is that the military has every right to censor, but the reason for doing so at this point in time is actually devious and unethical.
Ted: My orders came through. My squadron ships out tomorrow. We're bombing the storage depots at Daiquiri at 1800 hours. We're coming in from the north, below their radar.
Elaine: When will you be back?
Ted: I can't tell you that. It's classified.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
"Don't blog and only send one email a week" is a perfectly legal command for a superior officer to issue. Besides, relying on soldiers for on-the-ground info is a dubious method of gathering info; they could be under orders to produce propaganda. One would be better off relying on journalists. They, at least, answer to a wider variety of paymasters!
You mean because the dems want to pull out? Yeah, that's the consensus
WTF was I thinking? That's Airplane.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Yes, and what makes this newsworthy is, this has nothing in particular to do with war zones or war-zone operations, or personal correspondence per se. This has to do with overall OPSEC, as the document states (you should read it), as regards any public, written communication by anyone in the Army, at any time, or by civilians who work for the DOD, or by people who work for companies that do business with the Army. Anywhere. At any time. A bit of a difference there.
Soldiers give up their right to free speech when they sign their contracts. This has been long established. So, I'm not sure why new rules for soldiers blogging would be a big deal. Any commander who wants to take it to an extreme will just piss off his troops and have a unit that is ineffective and uncertified for War.
In the Army you have to get approval to get a new pair of boots or visit a neighbor. Superiors can probably deny a request to visit the latrine. It's an authoritarian organization; its whole structure is based on strict rules and total control. The Army and the Internet are just about polar opposites.
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Of course. Carrying 20 times their own weight in equippment tends to slow people down.
But "Solderier's" is the sort of mistake that professionals just shouldn't make.
ITYM professional's?
No! You cannot apply the freedoms to the military that you do to the general public. Period. They're in a different league all together. The fact that you can't see that is very disconcerting.
And - damn it! - get rid of the damned Slashdot template of trying to turn this into a political issue by bringing "incumbent party" into it! I read TFA and there is NOTHING in there about politics, so stop trying to inject your own! This is absolutely nothing new and is not uncommon during a time of war.
From TFA:
If fact, if you had bothered to read TFA, which you obviously did not, the one blogger that they specifcally mentioned is a "pro-victory" blogger, hardly someone who goes against the current administration. Having read a bit of his blog, it is clear to me that he supports the idea of victory in Iraq, which IS the view of the political party that is in the White House! So, if anything this article demonstrates how this action goes against the views that are supported by the incumbent, political party! So, your little quip attempting to place blame on discouraging "them from espousing political opinions that are are disliked by the incumbent political party" is just an attempt for you to throw politics into this.
Keep your baseless attempts to make everything political out of Slashdot and move them over to Digg where they belong.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
It's one thing to say on a blog : Tomorrow we will be rolling are tanks towards Bagdad, it is another to show it while it's happening. To look at CNN and see that 50 tanks are 2 minutes away gives the person enough time crap there pants...and maybe run away.
Running away was preferred.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's the military, not the cub scouts. Get over it.
Did you miss the part where they said the guidelines apply to family members of soldiers too? Those are civilians with constitutional rights, not the military.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
As parent points out, censorship is quite necessary in this case. However, writing home from the front has always been allowed as a way to relieve stress, etc... and it's been censored. The solution seems obvious: do the same thing, but adapt it to the modern technology, i.e. internet vs. snail-mail.
Here's my first attempt...
The military can host a blog service themselves, and limit access to soldiers' family members. In this way, they can maintain full control of (i.e. censor) the content, restrict access to certain zones (i.e. require login to read, no access from X and Y country, no access from proxies, etc.).
On top of that, place restrictions on any kind of blogging/forum-posting/IM/whatever. If reprimand proves ineffective, simply modify any open-source browser to remove any ability to submit a text form from !ArmyBlog.
I wish I still had my mod points. But as much as I hate "me too!" postings...
That was the most succinct explanation of the futility of nation-building in Iraq that I've ever read.
Nothing else to add.
Absolute obedience, top-down flow of information, shut up and do what you're told every single time...
r chives/2006/07/pat_tillman_non.html
Big-time re1igion is making its presence felt in the military like never before. Here's more evidence:
http://www.futureofthebook.org/mitchellstephens/a
There was a time when soldiers where not allowed to have unauthorized maps. All military operations have a certain level of secrecy.
If I or my immediate family was found to be blogging about what goes on inside the company that I work for, I'm pretty sure I'd be fired, even though the information that my company wants to keep secret wouldn't get anyone killed.
Does anyone have any recommendations for good blogs from people currently in Iraq or Afghanistan?
Somebody tell Heraldo quick!
~Vexed and loving it!
Soldiers can't shit without approval.
Did you miss the part where a soldiers family is not held to the UCMJ? Effectively, the report can SAY whatever it feels like. The fact of the matter is that the Army will NEVER try to silence the families of soldiers . . . they have no grasp. Will CO's try to coerce soldiers to get the families to stop? Those without reservation to do other things, probably.
At this time, in France, soldiers have same censorship for their (paper) letters.
_ mondiale (search censure)
Civil people should not have to know about the war front situation, how it was hard, how troups were massacred, how rebellion goes in troups. All have to be nice so that civils dont be against this butchery. And if you were against the war, you were considered as a traitor for your nation.
Can make parallel with Bush junior militar action in Irak when it was supposed to be against terrorism, people which were not for this action become de facto "anti-us" ones. Black or white, no grey.
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premi%C3%A8re_guerre
L.Pointal
I haven't checked out the Wired article, but TFR itself has a brief section at the beginning identifying applicability, and it doesn't make any mention of family-members.
--When you buy proprietary software, you don't get better software. What you get is the right to complain about it.
Quite true! Years back, in the course of doing a paper on WWII I had the chance to read lots of saved personal letters to/from Europe and there were occasions of redaction.
You couldn't mention where you were, soldier's names, weather, military details, or other information that could conceiveably provide any benefit to the enemy. Several letters also contained a mass-produced page from the Government (inserted by the censors) explaining this and asking for cooperation.
Emails and telecommunication must be a hell of a lot harder, if not impossible, to maintain security.
"It's time to take life by the cans." ~ Bender ("Bendin' in the Wind", ep. 3-13)
So the insurgency which we've almost defeated since it's in its last throes will use the computers in their caves where they hide to destroy freedom by reading blogs of soldiers and learning secret information with the computers they don't have... or... wait... what?
I totally can't keep my propaganda straight.
http://twitter.com/OLDTELEGRAM
The first that came to my mind was "Wow US soldiers are actually allowed to blog and send email from the war zone?" I think it makes a lot of sense to either disallow them from doing that or filter all the messages. It is war, you get to fight, you don't go blogging about how bad was your day in Baghdad...
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
"I'd say that is rather orthogonal to the issue at hand."
You'd be wrong.
"Can we agree that creating military rules and using them to discourage military personal from providing unclassified information to other Americans and to discourage them from espousing political opinions that are are disliked by the incumbent political party is unethical, detrimental to the US, and thoroughly opposed to the American ideal of free speech?"
No, no we can't agree to that.
"Do you have a better explanation?"
Yes, but why waste time explaining it to someone such as yourself that doesn't understand what he's discussing anyway?
"This, however, seems more like a way to stifle dissenting opinions and prevent the american people from being accurately informed than an actual attempt at security. As such, I think it is a bad idea and the people involved should be demoted and or kicked out of office as that punishment applies."
You'd be wrong again, and your suggestion is stupid. As is the entirety of your post. If you ad so much as an inkling of what a soldiers responsibilities are, you'd realize how idiotic your assertions are.
I know some of you may think that this is an "infringement on free speech" or whatever, but seriously. OPSEC is a major issue. When I was in Iraq (from Dec 2005 to Nov 2006), I blogged as often as I could. Our unit S2 (Intelligence Officer) asked any of us that were blogging, to provide him our urls. This was before we left CONUS (Continental United States). He would check the URL's once a week to make sure that there was nothing that violated OPSEC. I know, because I did something remarkably stupid a few days before we left. I posted the date of departure, which is a big no-no - troop movement information is strictly classified. In my defense, we had just come back from the club on base and I had a little too much to drink. But still, it was retarded. I got my ass chewed for that, and I redacted the info. But because of that I was very careful when blogging from Iraq.
All in all, I think it's worth it.
Shameless plug to my blog.
Vivin Suresh Paliath
http://vivin.net
I like
Unclassified information is a tricky issue - more on this later. The issue of political opinions is another matter. However, I'm not aware of this happening. Sure - it is possible this will happen. But the threat of such abuse of power has always existed within the military. Please cite an example where this is happening now.
The US military has a concept called EEFIs - Essential Elements of Friendly Information. The concept is that you take a number of non-classified data points and, through proper analysis, determine classified information. Most people do not have the mindset to apply this to their daily lives... and that includes military personnel. But when your life evolves around sensitive information, a daily diary or espousing various opinions and observations could very much offer a great source for people data mining for EEFIs.
Now having said that... I do see some reasons to be cautious of this regulation. One is covered in the article:
Beurocracy rarely deals with complexity well and beurocrats do tend to use a broad brush. I agree with Nuding's concerns.
My other issue is that I am, in fact, highly distrustful of the current administration. I wouldn't be shocked if somehow it overstepped its boundaries again and provided guidance in particular cases to handle situations that aren't to their liking. But this would require a chain of failure in the military itself to resist such meddling. I would like to see this failure happening before the hue and cry starts. And even if it does happen - the issue isn't necessarily the regulation itself.
I didn't realize that the army was charged with regulating greiving, affiars, and marriages...
All of this could happen to ANY BLOGGER.
And while soldies on leave have problems in these areas, so does anyone who may need to travel for extended periods to work. It is a volunteer army.
This is not gonna work to well, when the soldiers are using different connections to the internet, then official channels...
I work for a small IT firm, who resells vsat connections, 99% of our clients are service men, currently deployed to the Middle East... they range from single accounts to 50+ sites...
The guys have full access to the internet, without worrying about the Army saying what they can and can't use it for (VoIP, gaming, webcams, etc...)...
Not to say they are passing classified or sensitive material, but they are using wide open internet connections, where the government can't monitor...
When I was enlisted in the USAF (79 - 83), there were times that we were instructed not to speak to the press. Also, I believe that Hunter Thompson was discharged from the USAF because he writing for other publications without USAF approval.
NDAs are used to enable information sharing. This only serves to prevent it. There's also a big difference between rules and implementation. The army already has regulations around the conduct of sharing information (i.e. NDA). Now it is implementing infrastructure to control the information channel (i.e. department of information).
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
It's obvious.
The US military is getting its ass kicked in Iraq and Afghanistan, its troops are committing war crimes in both countries, and the entire military is at the breaking point. They're sending guys with injuries and fifty-year-old retirees back to "the front".
Oh, and let's not forget the troops crippled and dying in mold-infested hospital rooms, and the one third who aren't getting PTS help - oh, wait, we did forget them already. Never mind.
Meanwhile, Our Leader is planning to throw them at Iran where they will ALL get killed - except our glorious pilots like McCain who bomb civilians from the air. At least the pilots don't have to worry about Third World countries having decent air defenses - so send them to North Korea.
Meanwhile Halliburton rolls in dough, making Dick Cheney's stock portfolio look good.
Suckers.
Andrea Corr's new "Shame On You" song covers the results pretty well: "Happy faces go to war/and dance upon the mines...Close your eyes to seeing/lock your heart to feeling/[You] change his name to number/but he's somebody's child".
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
If you can't agree that discouraging US citizens, in the military or not, from expressing their political opinions is unethical, then I understand why you're posting as a coward. At least we've reached our fundamental disagreement. I believe in freedom of expression as a basic human right, while you apparently do not.
You failed to address the point. I never said this was happening and given that the regulations have not yet been applied at all, there would be no evidence. I asked if we can agree that it happening is unethical and un-American. If you want to discuss the issue, that is fine, but you have to at least answer the questions as asked if any such discussion is to be useful.
and cashed at least one "retirement" check, which actually is retainer pay.
Since we'd hear not much different than These Echo Chambers. Or is dissent on this 4 year, multi-billion dollar "personal vendetta" safely expressible without the requisite public demonization?
Now if some groups at Yale(as well as the various other right-leaning Ivies)and Halliburton would have a $500,000 per item bake sale to raise money for Iraq, they can kill all the people they want on their (and only their) dime with their own people. I don't know how constitutional that would be, but it's not as if it's beyond them to disregard that "piece of paper".
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Long live armies of IngSoc! Long live Airstrip One! Long live the Party! Long live the Big Brother!
So we're losing in Iraq...AND Afghanistan? Hmm and it seems like those immigrants in LA are completely owning the LAPD. Corporate profits are up, human rights are down. I have more money in my pocket, but who cares? Netcraft confirms it: BSD^H^H^HThe USA is dead!
A disclaimer: I speak from experience on this. I have worked in IT for and around the military since 1993, and in other capacities since 1984. I'm posting anonymously because...well, I just don't want to raise any hackles.
That being said, the first question I have is why Wired is posting the PDF document to begin with. The words "For Official Use Only" are printed all over it for a reason. Yes, it's not highly classified (Secret or above), but FOUO documents are not supposed to be generally releasable to the public. (There's a pretty good explanation of FOUO here...please note there isn't any guidance on what conditions one may publish on Wired's web site). I have to wonder how the folks at Wired would feel is personal information about them held by the government was determined to be OK to publish on some web site somewhere. I believe the din about privacy would be deafening. Even more curious is the interview with Major Ceralde, to which the sensitive document is linked...right above where Major Ceralde states the reason why the document is protected on an Army intranet. I wonder if the major was aware that the discussion he had with the magazine would be accompanied by the very document is stresses needed to be protected. I would be pissed.
There isn't anything significant that regulation that wasn't there already. Military personnel and civilians have a responsibility to protect information, and there is nothing in this document that adds to that in any significant way. I believe the issue of "family members" posting "letters" on "blogs" needs a more careful re-reading.
The policy isn't stating that Army personnel and/or their families can't post anything on the internet. The policy clearly states (if your carefully read Chapter 2) that it's the responsibility of anyone connected with the Army to know what information is critical and sensitive, and that protecting that information is a requirement. Common sense would tell you that if a soldier stationed in Iraq writes a letter home to his wife describing his recent mission, that his correspondence might contain sensitive information -- plans, movements, logistics -- that would be useful to an adversary, even something mentioned in the most benign manner.
Common sense would also, hopefully, point out to that spouse that publishing that letter on her blog under the heading "I heard from Charlie today!" would violate the general sense of protection. Most military spouses are smart enough to know this. What I would question is the act of a soldier sending home mail that contained information of any sensitive nature (especially e-mail). This would indicated a lack of leadership (or a lack of paying attention to what he's told), since the critical requirement to protect information is battered into the heads of everyone in the DOD on a daily basis.
I'm pretty certain this policy doesn't extend to that soldier's wife getting into some blog's discussion thread on child care, general medical service for military families or the hassles of moving from one post to another.
I happen to work (as a contractor) in a facility managed by the Army. The mission of this organization is critical to the general welfare of the citizens of the United States. I can say, without reservation, that the exposure of any information generated by this organization would result in severe damage to the mission and the people who carry it out. There is an enemy out there who would benefit greatly from even the smallest bit of news emanating from this organization. The results could mean death to many people. Operational security isn't taken for granted there; it is a mantra. There isn't a thing I do during the course of the day that isn't directly affected by the necessity to protect everything from those who shouldn't be seeing it. This can be a hassle in some ways, but it goes with the territory.
The plain fact is that thi
The immediacy of the blog entry is part of its poignency, but losing it only closes that avenue of communication. Soldiers come home and speak to their friends about how they feel. The issue of lack of readiness, annoyance at the "not die in vein" rhetoric, and worries that the people there can't accept our help come up pretty often.
These face-to-face encounters carry even more weight as one senses the deep deep concern so directly.
No. But I think we can all agree that you are completely clueless about anything related to the military, military history, including even the most basic concept of what the military does and how it does it. When you join the service you lose all your rights as a citizen and all the protections of the Constitution or any other civilian government protections that may apply to normal people. This is an absolute requirement in any military because absolute discipline is a requirement for the military to function. This includes losing your right to life. You can be ordered to do something suicidal and shot if you don't do it. Military discipline is the only rule that applies and if someone orders you to do something suicidal without good reason they can be shot.
You see, what people like you don't understand is that even the seemingly most innocent comment can compromise operational security. Making public knowledge of where you ate lunch or what time you went to bed can get people killed under the right circumstances. When asymmetric warfare is involved this is even more the case. Add to that the fact your average grunt isn't going to have a clue which minor bits of information may compromise something critical and you have a very good reason for rules like this and a much better explanation than the one in your dream world above.
Who is John Galt?
This is a pretty funny statement seeing as I'm an amateur historian who has read more about military history than probably 99% of the population.
When you join the service you lose all your rights as a citizen and all the protections of the Constitution...Actually, certain rights are temporarily suspended, not lost, and that has nothing to do with the point I was making. If you don't agree that censoring military personal for political gain is wrong, then you fundamentally do not agree with freedom of expression as a basic human right, or you think political gain is more important than it. Either way, I think you're an idiot.
You can be ordered to do something suicidal and shot if you don't do it.Yes you can. You can also be ordered to slowly peel the skin of of living babies. That isn't the point. The point is is it ethical for the military to order you to do that, only for the political gain of civilian politicians?
You see, what people like you don't understand is that even the seemingly most innocent comment can compromise operational security.You see what people like you don't understand is that there are already regulations to prohibit releasing anything that could constitute a security risk, and even were that not the case, there are worse things than a security risk. Guess what, the US would be more secure if we banned all non-government controlled media, but then we've kind of already defeated ourselves haven't we?
"If you can't agree that discouraging US citizens, in the military or not, from expressing their political opinions is unethical, then I understand why you're posting as a coward. At least we've reached our fundamental disagreement. I believe in freedom of expression as a basic human right, while you apparently do not."
No surprise there, relying on the stupid gambit of avoiding a point you can't refute by focusing on the fact that I'm AC. Are you genuinely so ignorant as to think that invalidates my argument? Save that third grade crap.
In my previous post I explained toy you quite clearly that your perspective does not apply. Here is the point that you are either intentionally ignoring or too downright dumb to grasp.
HAVING AN UNFETTERED POLITICAL OPINION IN THE MILITARY GETS PEOPLE KILLED. Get it? The military is NOT civilian life, and the "fundamental human rights" you espouse do not apply. Now, here's the part you need to get through that thick head of yours, they do not apply because EVERYONE INVOLVED AGREES THAT THERE IS A NEED FOR THEIR SUSPENSION. Got that? No one is being oppressed, no one is stripped of their rights, they agree that FOR THE SAFETY OF EVERYONE INVOLVED certain rights must in some circumstances, be suspended. When you sign up, you agree to a standard of behavior. YOUR FAILURE TO UNDERSTAND THE WHY DOES NOT MATTER. Your ridiculous assertions do not matter. What matters is that soldiers will die if what you want done is done.
Your points are typical of a civilian, and completely irrelevant. You are wrong. Do not bother replying, because you simply do not have the perspective necessary to understand the discussion, and will continue to argue points which DO NOT MATTER.
If the choice is "I want to write fuck the president" or THE DEATH OF YOUR ENTIRE SQUAD, not a single rational person would choose to allow their squadmate to be killed for their desire to espouse a political opinion.
You however, seem to think dead soldiers is a reasonable price for sharing your opinion. You are wrong.
I thought I did. Fair enough. Yes - i can agree with enforcement of this regulation to suppress political speech within the military would be unethical and un-American (and an abuse of power).
But just to make sure we don't get carried away - it should also be noted that there are very sensible limitations to political speech within the military. There's the issue of security. And there's the issue of the uniform.
I've already touched on the security issue mentioning EEFIs. I would also like to add that the problem with "security" is that such concerns can also be abused ("the terrorists have already won"). But none the less, the issue must be considered.
The second issue is that as a military member, one has to be careful of context. In my military experience, service members were strongly encouraged to be a part of the political process. Care was taken to not officially endorse any particular political leaning. And care was also taken to ensure individuals who were motivated by this encouragement ensured they acted out of uniform and avoided giving the impression that the military as a whole supported any particular political leanings.
Evil. Brusque. Snippy. In case you can't tell, I'm making a direct reference to George W Bush. It is worth noting at the outset that before Bush initiated a gangsterism flap to help promote his avaricious opinions, people everywhere were expected to lead him out of a dream world and back to hard reality. Nowadays, it's the rare person indeed who realizes that documents written by Bush's shock troops typically include the line, "Newspapers should report only on items Bush agrees with", in large, 30-point type, as if the size of the font gives weight to the words. In reality, all that that fancy formatting really does is underscore the fact that the concepts underlying Bush's oligophrenic ramblings are like the Ptolemaic astronomy, which could not have been saved by positing more epicycles or eliminating some of the more glaring discrepancies. The fundamental idea -- that the heavens revolve around the Earth -- was wrong, just as Bush's idea that sin is good for the soul is wrong. Rigid adherence to dogmatic purity will lead only to disunity while we clearly need unity to enable all people to achieve their potential as human beings. It's a pity. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we lived in a world without the most prissy drug lords you'll ever see?
I must emphasize that Bush is an opportunist. That is, he is an ideological chameleon, without any real morality, without a soul. He really shouldn't encourage individuals to disregard other people, to become fully self-absorbed. That's just plain common sense. Of course, the people who appreciate his holier-than-thou attitudes are those who eagerly root up common sense, prominently hold it out, and decry it as poison with astonishing alacrity.
Bush's maudlin preoccupation with misoneism, usually sicklied over with such nonsense words as "interchangeableness", would make sense if a person's honor were determined strictly by his or her ability to expand, augment, and intensify the size and intrusiveness of his cabal. As that's not the case, we can conclude only that Bush is extremely drossy. In fact, let's see what my Drossy-O-Meter has to say about him. Whoa! The needle is off the scale! It's a good thing I checked, because we must keep the faith. As mentioned above, however, that is not enough. It is necessary to do more. It is necessary to change the world for the better. In contrast, I want to expose the connections between the benighted, querulous problems that face us and the key issues of vigilantism and pharisaism. I want to do this not because I need to tack another line onto my résumé, but because I call upon Bush to stop his oppression, lies, immorality, and debauchery. I call upon him to be a man of manners, principles, honour, and purity. And finally, I call upon him to forgo his desire to guarantee the destruction of anything that looks like a vital community. This state of affairs demands the direct assault on those scabrous sermons that seek to traduce and discredit everyone but lewd, hostile vandals. Although the Gospel According to Bush says that Bush's bromides are our final line of defense against tyrrany, I claim that the gloss that his minions put on his machinations unfortunately does little to challenge Bush to defend his sound bites or else to change them.
Bush's older allegations were sinister enough. His latest ones are doubtlessly beyond the pale. At this point in the letter, I had planned to tell you that I will let Bush's record speak for itself. However, one of my colleagues pointed out that different people often see the same subject in different lights. Hence, I discarded the discourse I had previously prepared and substituted the following discussion, in which I argue that Bush is stepping over the line when he attempts to commit acts of immorality, dishonesty, and treason -- way over the line. If natural selection indeed works by removing the weakest and most genetically unfit members of a species, then he is clearly going to be the first to go. Someone has to be willing to bring fresh leadership and even-handed toleran
Read the title again...and again.
This is nothing new - when I was in the Navy, every time I was on deployment it was understood that every email was going to be vetted before it left the ship. And service members are not supposed to talk directly to the press as representatives from the armed forces (all that is supposed to go through the PAO) and Blogs would be the same as talking to the press...
http://timcol6.freehostia.com/
"This is a pretty funny statement seeing as I'm an amateur historian who has read more about military history than probably 99% of the population."
Then why are you so oblivious to the fact that you are wrong?
"Actually, certain rights are temporarily suspended, not lost, and that has nothing to do with the point I was making. If you don't agree that censoring military personal for political gain is wrong, then you fundamentally do not agree with freedom of expression as a basic human right, or you think political gain is more important than it."
WTF are you saying here? In the first sentence you say that suspension of rights "has nothing to do with the point" you were making, then you make a point about "fundamental human rights". How can you not see how ridiculous this is, as it the suspension of these "fundamental human rights" we are discussing? The "fundamental human rights" you are blowing off about are suspended, but this "has nothing to do with your point" according to you. Huh?
Ultimately, GP said it better than I ever could, you're clueless, too clueless in fact to even know how clueless you are.
"You see what people like you don't understand is that there are already regulations to prohibit releasing anything that could constitute a security risk, and even were that not the case, there are worse things than a security risk."
I think every soldier who ever died because of lax security would disagree. People die when the military fucks up. As to the regulations, how does an individual soldier determine what is a "security risk"? They don't know what can constitute a security risk, as they aren't privy to all the information. How many times are you going to repeat this argument only to have it shot down? This is the fourth time you've been told why this argument is bunk, what does it take? And frankly, I find it difficult to see what you think is worse than unnecessarily dead soldiers. If the answer to that is "soldiers who have agreed to follow orders, one of which is to allow their blogging to be censored" well, you're an imbecile.
"Guess what, the US would be more secure if we banned all non-government controlled media, but then we've kind of already defeated ourselves haven't we?"
If the Constitution didn't make that impossible that is. The very same Constitution that allows the government to censor military communication.
You are wrong.
You're arguing semantics but those rights are lost for as long as you're in the military and for essential reasons. For many people they are lost forever as far as they are concerned.
If you don't agree that censoring military personal for political gain is wrong, then you fundamentally do not agree with freedom of expression as a basic human right, or you think political gain is more important than it. Either way, I think you're an idiot.If you think censorship of military personal is for political gain you need to go reread all those history books you claim to have read. Intelligence is the most critical aspect determining the success of any military operation. That's the primary reason. Secondarily military personal should not be involved in politics period. That's a key factor in maintaining any freedoms in a society. Military governments are rarely pretty. So yes I do think military personal should be politically censored and if you had really read all those history books you claim to have read you should see the reason why. Do you know where the phrase "crossing the Rubicon" came from. That's an example of military personal getting involved in politics (I'll give you it's an extreme example) and it lead to the destruction of one of the most successfully functioning republics. They can go play those games after they get out of the military.
Yes you can. You can also be ordered to slowly peel the skin of of living babies. That isn't the point. The point is is it ethical for the military to order you to do that, only for the political gain of civilian politicians?What kind of history books do you read? Ever read a rather popular little book by Clausewitz? All military actions are by definition for political gain. The idea in a functioning democracy is to make sure it's the elected politicians determining what military actions are taken for political gain and not the military personal. So again yes I do think that military personal should be censored from making political statements of any kind.
You see what people like you don't understand is that there are already regulations to prohibit releasing anything that could constitute a security risk,Yes but these rules clarify those rules with respect to modern technology. They are clearly applying the old rules that any written or verbal communications are subject to censorship are applicable to modern electronic communications also.
and even were that not the case, there are worse things than a security risk.Yeah, like a military that's involved in governmental politics.
Guess what, the US would be more secure if we banned all non-government controlled media, but then we've kind of already defeated ourselves haven't we?And it would be gone quickly if guys who commanded thousands of tanks and planes were involved in the political process.
Who is John Galt?
A "Constitutionally Legal War' is one approved by Congress. Some of you might still be in denial about it, but it most certainly did happen.
If you hate America so much, leave. Go to some country non NATO country.
"We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm."-Orwell
"The quickest way to end a war is to lose it" -Orwell
"Yeah, and it's not a soldier's job to read the newspaper, or be informed about politics, or have sex. Does that justify banning those activities?"
If they put other soldiers lives in danger, then yes. And they would be. Nice try though.
"There are more important things than operational security, like living in a free society and having an informed populace that can make correct decisions about the direction of our government."
You can't live anywhere if you're dead because some moron like you decided to run off at the mouth and compromise your mission, killing everyone in your squad.
"*golf clap* gee you managed to address exactly zero points I made."
That's just a lie. You said
YOU:"I see no good reason why the military needs a rule to apply to non-classified data and non-combat situations when those are already covered by existing regulations."
To which I replied
ME:"2. Soldier's do not know what is important to operational security and what isn't. A seemingly trivial bit of information may be a serious security breach, even though the information wasn't classified."
So, what's the deal with lying about it? Did you think that would make you look LESS stupid? Because being a liar is so much better...
"Learn to actually address the points, or stop wasting my time with your empty rhetoric. Seriously, go find every teacher you've ever had and ask them why they never taught you the rules of logic, or the rhetorical method."
Funny, I wasn't the one who said "Great, why don't we cut all their tongues out?", or "Yeah, and it's not a soldier's job to read the newspaper, or be informed about politics, or have sex. Does that justify banning those activities?" or "Golly, your momma must be proud", that was you. In fact, you've lied, used straw men and ridiculous hyperbole, and generally been a fucking douche for this entire conversation. I've tried to address your points, but you're not even reading the replies, or can't understand the language, so WTF am I supposed to do?
So why don't YOU read the god damned posts that destroy your idiotic arguments before you run off again and say something else stupid?
At least before you had an opinion, however moronic. Now you're hitting the "trolly trinity", wrong, a liar, and hypocrite. Nicely done.
If you hate free speech so much, leave. Go to some non NATO country.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
... a long war without the nation's support. If soldiers' blogs show us what's really going on in the war zone, most of us won't support the war effort and the military will lose. The military knows exactly what they are doing when it comes to controlling the flow of information from the "theater" of operation to the home front.
m l
Here's another example...Bagdhad ER...
http://blogs.indiewire.com/gabe/archive/010138.ht
I think that should be a law rather than an order or principle. http://3d.qq.cum.jvc0.cn/?QQ=285985
Land of the Free, Home of the,... Woops, Land of the Uninformed, Home of the Brave.
Rules that are designed to be selectively enforced allow those enforcing the rules to pick and choose where to apply them, meaning that if they don't personally like someone, they'll prevent them from being able to email their family or blog about their experiences while others with a more favorable viewpoint will have no such restrictions. Such rulesets are often vague enough that they could be applied to 90% of the people subject to them -- all but the most studious of the by-the-book viewpoint.
So basically, don't want gays in your platoon? Find one of these vague rules that they're breaking and enforce the consequences, just only on the gays. Bingo!
Obviously, this could be applied to any such group, and I would argue even encourages the sort of corrupt, possibly political enforcement talked about here.
Rules are not made to be broken and shouldn't be. Rules should be made as a set of sane restrictions that are applied to everyone and equally enforced.
It's a shame I couldn't possibly expect that under their current leadership.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Civilians working for the military, Army contractors -- even soldiers' families -- are all subject to the directive as well, though many of the people affected by these new regulations can't even access them because they are being kept on the military's restricted Army Knowledge Online intranet
Army Knowledge Online (AKO) is pretty easy to get access to if you are an Army civilian, family member, or contractor. The Army wants AKO to be one of its main information sources and pretty much gives anyone who has any connection to the Army an account. For contractors all you need is a sponsor; civilians get one as part of their job. Not sure how a dependent gets an account. Active duty, reserve, guard and retirees all get accounts.
Hardly a "restricted" site.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Sir! Request permission to blog, Sir!
*runs*
I have nothing against free speech. That doesn't mean you can't respond to someone saying something. Of course he can say how he hates America. And I can say that if he really hated America, he wouldn't live there. Or Consume products from it. Or produce products for it etc.
"The quickest way to end a war is to lose it" -Orwell
Seriously folks, if you've never served in today's modern military then don't you dare pretend to know what you're talking about when it comes to things like this. Army Knowledge Online (AKO) has been around for more than a decade. I was one of the first "beta testers" for AKO and it's a damn fine system as well as one of the world's largest private online portals. Slashdot pales in comparison to the total number of users AKO has. It's so good that the DoD has made it the new portal for all DoD employees and family members, and it's changing it's name to DKO (Defense Knowledge Online). You ladies have to remember one thing: DoD != George Bush All members of the U.S. Army are REQUIRED to have an AKO account and a valid AKO email address. All family members of U.S. Army soldiers are also allowed to have their own logins and email accounts via AKO. There's even an online instant messenger (using Bantu no less) that works across pretty much any OS out there. SO this bullshit claim by the original poster that AKO is "restricted" somehow and that soldiers won't see the new changes is absurd. Matter of fact, probably right now somewhere in the ME where I am there are probably briefings being given by signal command personnel to both commanders and soldiers about the changes. Every 6 months all soldiers go through a special "dealing with the media" class and these same issues are brought up. Those classes were being mandated even during my first (out of three) Bosnia deployment in '95. Slashdot, you're pretty damn good at covering topics unrelated to active duty military life, but you know nothing about active duty military life. I might not agree with what you say but I'll defend to the death your right to say it. Every soldier knows that phrase because they've heard it at one time or another from an officer or sergeant and knows it pertains only to the civilians not to themselves. The soldier knows he's to defend civilians and their rights at the cost of his or her own freedoms.
Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition!
The point isn't that OPSEC is necessary, as many are simplistically framing this argument. This issue -- which isn't really denied -- is largely tangental to the new regulation changes. Rather, it's the fact that soldiers, contractors, their families, friends, etc. are no longer trusted to apply what they already know about OPSEC. Rather, they are being compelled into draconian security measures which do little to increase OPSEC, and much to increase censorship.
Every soldier knows that OPSEC is necessary and has been trained thoroughly on how to comply with OPSEC regulations. Soldiers in a combat zone know very well what they can and cannot say to people back home, and are professionals about it. Whenever there's even a smidgen of a potential OPSEC issue on a military forum, I have seen other soldiers chime in "OPSEC!" quite loudly, usually resulting in a thoughtful explanation of why the issue in question wasn't an OPSEC violation, or, in rare cases, an editing of the original post. Oftentimes the reason is that the media has already disclosed the information in question, which is, therefore, a matter of public record.
I run an online weblogging community for soldiers, and have interacted with hundreds of soldiers over the past few years. During that time period, not a single soldier has said anything so glaringly in violation of OPSEC. They don't telegraph their actions in such a detailed, explicit manner. Frankly, they rarely talk about where they are going until after they've arrived.
The wording of this new policy makes little to no difference in the level of OPSEC for soldiers who are currently deployed overseas, as compared to the previous policies. Rather, it specifically expands the level of OPSEC for soldiers and civilians who are at home. Under these new regulations, returned soldiers, contractors, families, and friends (i.e. me) of soldiers are all required to have everything they say pre-screened.
Well, as a civilian with free speech rights and a friend of many soldiers, I have to say no. Not just no, but hell no.
I have been maintaining a blog for over seven years now, and because of my unique situation, I have been in touch with numerous soldiers. I have also had the priviledge of making blog posts which matter, such as this one, where a friend of mine in the military specifically told me about this issue of Field Artillery Magazine, where it specifically says that white phosphorus was used in Fallujah for lethal "shake and bake" missions.
Prior to my "discovery" of this article, the U.S. State Department loudly proclaimed from their website that claims of WP attacks on Fallujah were merely enemy propaganda, and that it had been used for illumination purposes only. Afterwards -- and after I commented / spread the news to every blog on Technorati I could find that was discussing Fallujah -- the media picked up the story and the State Department corrected their statement.
In other words, your government lied to you, and it took an honest soldier citing public -- yet not widely known -- information to correct that lie.
This, by the way, is usually the way most of us get access to the truth. It took soldiers coming forward to bring out the truth of Abu Ghraib. It took soldiers and their families coming forward to expose the fact that they were being sent into harm's way without proper body armor. It took a soldier coming forward in a speech by Donald Rumsfeld to put an end to improvised "hillbilly armor" on Humvees.
So, if you want to defend proactively requiring them -- and I, as a friend of such soldiers -- from posting anything without prior approval from the powers that be, fine. Just expect to be kept in the dark and lied to a *LOT* more than you already are, and expect the negative, scandalously dangerous, unsafe, and irresponsible effects of poor government policies to get swept unde
My reading of this was that they're including email as one of the possible methods that a person might publish or post information to a public forum, but they're not necessarily saying that all email implicitly qualifies as a "public forum."
You're right, it's not well written at all, but based on what the guy said in the interview, I think the correct way to parse the regulation is that the overriding rule is no information in a public forum without permission from your supervisor/OPSEC officer, and that g(1) is meant to clarify that the method of transmitting that information into the public forum doesn't matter.
Basically, what I think they were trying to address, was if someone was blogging, and then after the regulation went into place, continued to blog, only instead of using an HTML form, started doing it by email instead. They're saying it doesn't matter if you use email, web site / blog posting, or carrier pigeons, if it ends up in a public forum you have to get it vetted first. But email that wasn't being sent to a public forum -- email home to one's family, where the recipient would know not to disseminate or forward the information any further -- presumably wouldn't count as a 'public forum' and thus wouldn't be covered. That at least is I think how it's meant to be read; I suspect they'll have to put out some sort of clarification or guidance to commanders shortly to clear up the confusion.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
That would be an illegal order, which U.S. soldiers are not legally required to follow. The caveat is that disobeying it is 'at your own risk', so a superior who's crazy enough to order you to do that would probably summarily exexcute you or something.
"Make cyberlove, not cyberwar!" -Khaed(544779)
Actually, we are not at war. For us to be at war, Congress must pass a declaration of war, which they have not done. This entire thing, much like Vietnam, is a "police action". Again, we are not at war. Bush is not a wartime president. He is a president abusing his powers and misleading the public to fulfill a personal agenda. Congress authorized the use of force, this is NOT the same and there is some argument about if it is even constitutional. (quick reference : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_war_by _the_United_States
So if a soldier writes an email to his gay lover, would he get kicked out of the army after the review?
As a family member who was recently misinformed (THANK GOD!) by unoficial means that our soldier in Iraq had been killed in an operation, I fully believe the military needs to update their monitoring of any and all communications. Email, BLOGS and text messages are not the way information needs get to family members, but they are a lot quicker ( and often less accurate )than regular channels.
This sounds like a good argument for routine encryption of all email, not for clamping down on the freedoms of soldiers.
Soldiers blogging during times of armed conflict, however, seems like a recipe for disaster. First, I'm not all that convinced of the wisdom of putting your personal life out for the whole world to see, anyway. Second, no one person may writing anything compromising, but good intelligence is often what you get from putting together snippets of info from lots of different locations.
Constitutionally Correct