DoD Study Contradicts Charges Against WikiLeaks

Voline writes "Last Summer, after WikiLeaks released 90,000 leaked internal US military documents in their Afghan War Log, Pentagon officials went on a media offensive against WikiLeaks, accusing it of having the 'blood on Its hands' of American soldiers and Afghan collaborators who are named in the documents. The charge has echoed through the mainstream media (and Internet comment threads) ever since. Now, CNN is reporting that after a thorough Pentagon review, 'WikiLeaks did not disclose any sensitive intelligence sources or methods, the Department of Defense concluded.' And, according to an unnamed NATO official, 'there has been no indication' that any Afghans who have collaborated with the NATO occupation have been harmed as a result of the leaks. Will the Pentagon's contradiction of the charges against WikiLeaks get as much play in the media as those original accusations did?"

Comments

Re:Pentagon Reaction Was Self Preservation Mode

[bananaendian]

In what way is your blurb insightful? What was your point? Other than that the Afghan War Diary didn't surprise you or that you think Pentagon is incompetent?

Perhaps as a 'veteran' you could talk about what you think about the actual intel. You know its all online still. Just waiting for people like for your opinion on it ...

I'd rather than listen to such than endless irrelevant ad hominem comments about Assange.

Surely you know Intelligence management is about compromise. Yes you could have only terminal access and no external data connections and limit them to closely vetted people who sign for each access but that would limit the usefulness of the data too much. You cannot put too much restrictions on data access and distribution if you want to use that data widely and frequently. As a result this kind of low level stuff gets 'leaked' all the time: people working on it have it on their laptops, USB dongles, websites etc. They send it via email attachments to research partners, policy interest groups, friends. It just rarely gets into the news cause no one much cares or gets caught. But if this is news to you ...

Re:Hmmmm.

[sildur]

Oh, but does the US still have a real military? I thought it was replaced by mercenaries.