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Claimed US Military Wikileaks Source Arrested
svelemor writes "A 22-year-old Army intelligence analyst was ratted out by a fellow hacker, accused of providing the Collateral Murder video and hundreds of thousands of classified State Department records to Wikileaks. He is currently imprisoned in Kuwait."
I can understand this dude getting in trouble for leaking information and such, but kudos to him for getting the collateral murder video out there in the wild.
Living With a Nerd
Well, I've been to one world fair, a picnic, and a rodeo, and that's the stupidest thing I ever heard come over a set of earphones. You sure you got today's codes?
Living With a Nerd
Umm...he released over 250,000 communications memos. Inside those memos there could be a ton of sensitive information outlining troop movements, names of spies, etc. Not to mention that if the foreign governments, agencies or yes, terrorists, have the encrypted versions of these memos, and now have the unencrypted versions, they could find a way to crack our encryption algorithms.
Even if the video never got out, he still released 250,000 other communications memos that have potentially sensitive information in them.
If you're going to do something illegal that you don't want anyone to know you did, perhaps you shouldn't tell people about it on the internet. Whether it was the morally right thing to do or not, leaking it anonymously then bragging you were the source makes no sense and is stupid.
He's putting US Citizen's lives in danger by exposing a cover up by the US Military? Now there's some Dubya bush logic!
From a BBC article with more details from the person who turned him in:
I gave them conversation logs that implicated Special Agent Manning. They were particularly interested in a code word for a major operation.
So you know, in addition to the videos and diplomatic cables he was out and about bragging about this and discussing major operations and their code words. While you might be able to justify the videos, I don't know how you could justify bragging to people about it and discussing current military operations on the internet. That could probably be construed as putting the lives of many soldiers in danger.
My work here is dung.
The military all too often makes things secret not because it is sensitive, but because it would generate bad PR. This is not how a democratic government is supposed to function. If you don't like living in a country with a transparent government, you can always move to places like North Korea.
Honestly, do you think the government he worked for, swore an oath to defend and protect, and that trusted him to properly handle secret documents should give him an award for violating that trust/oath?
You can't on one hand call "leakers" brave heroes for risking severe consequences and then act suprised when their actions have those very same consequences.
History may prove him right or not, but right now his offense is punishable, and he knew it when he did it.
Ken
The first scandal is the usual shit the government does, make a mistake and then cover it up. We've seen a lot of those in this war. We know this stuff happens all the time but the proof of it always hits me in the gut.
The second scandal is that the government is so poor at covering this stuff up that a junior guy like this is able to find the info and disseminate it without any difficulty. Absolutely piss-poor security. Perversely, I expect and demand a modicum of competence to go along with the amoral and evil. I feel insulted when I find out I'm getting screwed over by Mayberry Machiavellis.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
No, you take an oath to defend the Constitution. *BIG* difference.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
If you think there has ever been a war where civilians didn't get killed, you are kidding only yourself. So if you say that no civilian deaths are every ok at all, then that is to say that no war is ever ok at all, including a war of defense. If you are ever ok with a war, well then civilian deaths WILL be a part of it. The military can and should (and does) work to minimize it but mistakes happen, collateral damage happens.
This is clearly true, but in the terms of the 'collateral murder' video, it is totally off-topic. Nothing in that video is collateral, it is direct and intentional. To stay on topic you'd need to say...
If you think there has ever been a war where civilians didn't get murdered, you are kidding only yourself.
If you were confused as to what all the controversy was up until now, that ought to clear it up.
Also remember the issue of the war being just and the actions of soldiers are separate matters. If you feel this unjust and the costs are not worth it, your beef is with the civilian government. They set the mission for the military, the military just carries it out.
This is almost completely true. However, citizen soldiers are expected to retain a shred of humanity at all times. Others in the past have claimed that they were 'just following orders' and it didn't work out so well for them either. And I'm not just talking about the obvious, but also the rape camps in Bosnia, Japanese internment, torture, abductions, and dozens of other examples of shameful behavior and even atrocities committed by sanctioned military personnel. The point here isn't that all soldiers are monsters. Clearly this is not the case. The point is that when monsters are discovered amongst the ranks they need to be removed before (more) senseless violence occurs. The men in the 'collateral murder' video are (or were) an example of this. They lost their ability to evaluate targets and gave in to the urge to get a higher score than the other helicopters in the unit.
This is never acceptable.
Now, you are correct in that it is and will always be a failure of command. And as members of a democracy, this discourse actually is a function of the civilian government. We're congregating and discussing our political views.
If you feel this unjust and the costs are not worth it, your beef is with the civilian government.
One final point, there is only ONE government, and it is entirely civilian. The military is not some sort of aristocracy that is immune to the will of the people. It answers to the executive branch, which answers to us. So telling civilians that they aren't in a position of authority to deal with issues like this is a symptom of the problem, rather than any actual fact.
You talk about transparency and democracy, but you blithely dismiss the fact that the asshole who "declassified" this data violated the laws and policies established by his own democratically elected government and the bureaucracy that the same democratically elected government put in place to prosecute this war. Furthermore, when he thought he found criminal conduct, he had an alphabet soup of agencies that could independently investigate and prosecute the people he turned in. The FBI, Army CID and DoD Inspector General, to name a few.
Did he contact agents from any of them? No. Did he even contact a member of Congress to try to hold an official investigation? No.
He decided that he and he alone was the authority to make that call.
Then don't sell it as a clean war. The whole "smart weapons make a war clean" drivel is bullshit. That's the beef I have with this whole crappot that's cooking down in the middle east now. We get told that our boys are there to make the place safer, we go there to protect and bring them peace and justice, we don't shoot civilians and we only defend ourselves when those bad, bad terr'ists want to keep us from bringing those poor people freedom and democracy.
Right? Ain't that what we're being told time and again? And that these people are so incredibly happy that we're there, that we kicked that madman Saddam out and that we're now protecting them from becoming the next terrorist slaves?
Take a moment to ponder this: You're living in a country with a loonie as the dictator. He's far from a benevolent dictator and you're kinda suffering from his quirks and whims, but you adjust to it, somehow. Then suddenly people come from some sort of promised land, where everything is wonderful. You don't know really a lot about this country, but everyone who talks about it (hushed, of course, since, well, they once were your buddies back when you had that war with your neighbor, but since they became some sort of enemy for your dictator... but most people still consider them pretty cool guys and they know that they're insanely strong and well armed) knows that these people know what they do. They have gone to other places too and usually it went well for them. And somehow also for the places they went to, so they gotta be really cool. Somehow. Ok, they invaded your country, but, be honest, the people from the promised land just kicked the loonie from his seat, what side would you root for.
But somehow these guys ain't what you expected. You know, you kinda expected them to come, put a cool government like their own in charge and go again. Just like they did before. But they don't go. And you're far from having that sort of 'free' government they enjoy. Instead, their awsome firepower circles above you and drives through your streets, they stop you for no appearant reason and search you, treat you like some sort of criminal. Ok, there are some people who still fight them, so it's kinda understandable... but you never did anything against them! Hey, you really liked the idea that they come and kick out that dictator. But now, everything took a turn for the worse. Instead of knowing that you can't do or say this or that, you could now suddenly get shot! Suddenly one of their awsome firepower machines opens fire at you and you're dead. It happened to your uncle Franky. Your cousin Bill is missing now, they said those guys took him 'cause he happened to hang with the wrong people. He was just there to smoke some pot, but they didn't believe him.
How long 'til you stop thinking these people are really cool?
How long 'til you start fighting them?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
FFS This isn't "Informative" it's being a "Troll."
This perp is in the military- there is absolutely no need for the "2006 military commission act." He VOLUNTARILY put himself under the UCMJ.
If you think there has ever been a war where civilians didn't get murdered, you are kidding only yourself.
As an aside, I believe that the above is also literally true, unfortunately. One of the reasons that war should be avoided unless absolutely required is that murder, rape, and other terrible crimes will almost certainly occur on both sides, no matter how much you hope they wouldn't.
C//
While I like the idea on a visceral level, the "only veterans can judge" thing could never work in practice. There would be far too much room for abuse and collusion, just like the "blue line of silence" shown by police officials towards internal corruption. This is the real world, and not Starship Troopers. A jury of randomly selected ordinary citizens is shown the evidence, and determine if a supposed crime was an accident, negligence, or willful action. That's the system, and it needs to be applied here.
That's really the problem. See, a lot of people in the USA were against going to war in Iraq. Not only is it NOT a defensive war (something I would be okay with in any circumstance except where my own govt. was as psychotic as North Korea, say) but it was sold on a total lie (WMDs). Well, when that didn't pan out, the justification for the war morphed into, "well, he was a really bad guy. Plus we'll be welcomed as liberators!" And when that didn't pan out, because surprisingly enough not everyone welcomes having their country decimated and thrown into near civil war, it morphed again into "We'll only kill the bad guys, so it's fine."
Everyone who was against the war anyway still knew this was false, but it's enough to shift the tone of the national debate. If you've got a military leader on one side of the table saying, "we have high technology, and will only kill bad guys," it's hard to say you think they should stop anyway. Either you're questioning the effectiveness of the military, which will automatically bias some people against you, or you're saying they shouldn't even kill bad guys, which will bias even more.
This kind of documentation is vital simply to remind each and every person in the country that, as you said, there is never a war where civilians don't get killed. Not just because we forget, but because our leaders were, for a while, actively trying to convince us otherwise.
Slashdot needs a "-1, Wrong" moderation option.
The Urban Hippie
Please cite your own relative level of training and experience, and how you would have done a better job than the gunner in discerning the difference between civilians and insurgents dressed as civilians. Bear in mind that a) some members of the group were visibly armed with small arms, and b) they were approaching a US position on the ground.
For extra credit, discuss the gunner's proven unwillingness to fire on targets which he could positively discern were civilians. (credit for finding this goes to kidgenius)
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
It may not be enough to end wars unfortunately, but it's going to change the way the military does business.
It already has. Now the military routinely classifies things that would reduce the public's desire to go to war, such as the bodies of dead soldiers returning from Iraq. It also ensures that embedded reporters report only the stories they want (anything else would endanger operational security).
See, the lesson that a lot of military guys learned from Vietnam wasn't "Never get involved in a land war in Asia.", but instead learned "Never let the public know what's actually involved in fighting a war."
I am officially gone from
It's easy to tell the difference between a tripod and an assault rifle from your desk when you can freeze the image and look at it closely.
Now do that in a moving helicopter when you are dealing with a dozen other things, lights flashing around you, noises, the ever present danger of being shot out of the sky.
"The great uncertainty of all data in war is a peculiar difficulty, because all action must, to a certain extent, be planned in a mere twilight, which in addition not infrequently—like the effect of a fog or moonshine—gives to things exaggerated dimensions and unnatural appearance."