Compiling the WikiLeaks Fallout

Now that the world has had some time to process the quarter million diplomatic documents published by WikiLeaks on Sunday, the media landscape is rife with reactions, threats, and warnings. Some US lawmakers have complained loudly and at length, saying that "WikiLeaks is putting at risk the lives and the freedom of countless Americans and non-Americans around the world." Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the leak "not just an attack on America's foreign policy interests, it is an attack on the international community." The Guardian points out that it's not the media's job to protect diplomats from embarrassment, and other US officials seem to agree, focusing their wrath instead on the security practices surrounding sensitive information. The Pentagon and other agencies are looking at ways to tighten security, promising increased internal auditing and banning the ability of systems containing classified information to connect to thumb drives or other removable media. Meanwhile, few officials seem to be commenting publicly on the contents of the leak, which are sure to cause diplomatic problems around the globe.

Comments

Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Anonymous Coward]

But they sure do hate Wikileaks. What's the difference?

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Shining Celebi]

Release of private communications among humans proves to be embarrassing and damaging. News at 11!

It doesn't matter what you're talking about, if you just mass released all the private documents and communications of any group of individuals, any organization, you're going to cause a lot of trouble, hurt, embarrassment, and potentially serious problems limiting their effectiveness when "scandal" breaks out. Everyone can find scandal in something, because most people hold higher standards to others than themselves. It's like the old If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him.

There's a such thing as responsible disclosure, and Wikileaks blew it. They're irresponsible. We do need to know about wrongdoing, yes. But there's a huge difference between reporting and disclosing serious wrongdoing and just throwing hundreds of thousands of documents at the world and saying here, read this! I don't know what agenda Wikileaks really has, but it's not a good one.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[snl2587]

The Pentagon Papers were published to expose wrong-doing, which is the entire point of whistle-blowing and what's supposed to be the reason Wikileaks exists in the first place. These leaks have nothing to do with whistle-blowing to protect the people from the government, but instead hurt the government's efforts to legitimately help it's people remain on good terms with allies.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Scareduck]

This reading utterly misses the fact that the Pentagon Papers were commissioned and released during the Johnson Administration. I very much doubt that LBJ or many Congressional Democrats at the time favored the release of those papers.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[mcgrew]

If you were talking about communications between private citizens I would agree, but these leaks are about our own government. This is supposed to be a representative democracy, and our government should have as few secrets as possible.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[DanTheStone]

Their agenda seems to be government transparency.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[unity100]

there can be responsible disclosure, in matters in which people HAVE responsibility. a group in an administration that grabs people worldwide, kidnaps them, tortures them, and says that they are doing this 'for freedom', deserves NO responsibility regarding disclosure of their matters.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[MyLongNickName]

Why should a diplomat's views on the quality of leadership of another country become public info? If everything he says become public knowledge, then the diplomat has to severely censor what he is going to say. For the life of me, I cannot figure out how the public benefits from this release of information

I supported wikileaks up until now... the information they shared this time makes me think they really jumped the shark.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[nschubach]

It's called "being political" for a reason.

We hire politicians to be upfront and honest. We don't hire them to be two faced.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Nadaka]

It's called "being political" for a reason.

We hire politicians to be upfront and honest. We don't hire them to be two faced.

Those last two sentences do not seem to fit actual politics at all.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[mcgrew]

If everything he says become public knowledge, then the diplomat has to severely censor what he is going to say.

Severely censoring what he says is a diplomat's JOB. It's said "a diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday, but never her age." It's also said that "a diplomat is someone who can tell you to go to hell and make you look forward to taking the trip." These diplomats should be more careful; it is, after all, their jobs to be careful.

If wikileaks can get this information, what makes you think foreign spies can't? The public benefits from this info by making the diplomats more careful about what they say and who they say it to.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[krazytekn0]

uh... is that supposed to be a joke?
Sorry but.... you may want to think you vote for the upfront and honest politician but it is the two-faced one who is best at appearing upfront and honest because he has enough money from as many sides of the same coin as possible.
We hire politicians based on thinly veiled marketing campaigns, and then they go and hire their buddies from law school. It has nothing to do with honesty.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[gknoy]

I would imagine remaining on good terms with allies would be served well by speaking civilly and nicely about them in all communications. If you call the Prime Minister of Elbonia a power-mad idiot behind his back, you clearly don't respect him ... and diplomacy without respect sounds challenging. Similarly, if Country X's feelings are hurt because it became public that they asked us to do Mean Things to Country Y (or Z), perhaps they should have thought more heavily on that before making the request/suggestion.

I guess the overall lesson is that we (and governments) should endeavour treat others (in our actions writings, speakings, and perhaps even thoughts) in a manner which would not embarass us if done publically. If you don't want to read it on the front page of the New York Times, you are better off not saying it. Expecting mean things said secretly to stay secret is always unwise, but the lesson is even more poignant now when it's easier to publish than ever before.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[jfengel]

That its dealings can entail shady backroom secret agreements so long as the public is well-served.

Is it possible for it to be otherwise?

These cables are the government equivalent of a little white lie. That is, you do much the same with your own internal monologue. You self-censor to be polite, and that politeness is (as Miss Manners says) the grease that keeps the gears of society turning. Nobody expects you to be "transparent" in your dealings with everybody; if you actually called every asshole an asshole, you'd be pretty busy.

Governments aren't individuals, so the analogy is not entirely apt (sorry if I'm stealing your schtick there, BadAnalogyGuy) but I think it's still illuminating. Internal decision-making processes should not be completely beyond the reach of oversight, but having complete uncensored access to every impolite or ill-phrased thought is going to make everybody cranky most of the time.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[MyLongNickName]

We hire politicians to be upfront and honest. We don't hire them to be two faced.

Huh? Whut? Diplomats have to be two faced to a certain extent. Should a diplomat tell Mugabe that he is a festering idiot who is destroying his country? Or should he be polite while keeping superiors up to date on what is going on in Zimbabwe? Should a diplomat chide Russia for how it is backing organized crime, or should he keep his ear to the ground and let superiors know what is going on.

Your "upfront and honest" policy might work in your makebelieve land, but not in reality.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Monkeedude1212]

Why should a diplomat's views on the quality of leadership of another country become public info?

Isn't that kind of their job?

Randomly speaking... I'm a Canadian...

Isn't the Canadian Ambassador in.. oh lets say France...

Isn't it his job to inform me on his views on the quality of leadership in France?

Witholding that information from me shows that some arm of the Canadian Government isn't acting on my behalf.

Now, whether the citizens of France should have access to it or not - thats a whole different story - but the debate comes down to whether you think its better that none of the public knows, or everyone knows. Me, given the way governments have operated in the past, I could use a little transparency, even if it destabilizes the global community a smidge.

If Relations with France and Canada go sour, it's not going to trigger a War.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[nschubach]

It's really a shame, isn't it? I'm agreeing with you, but without leaking "secret" under-doings that politicians and those working with the government is doing... how do we really know that the marketing they did for their election/hire was honest?

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

These leaks have nothing to do with whistle-blowing to protect the people from the government, but instead hurt the government's efforts to legitimately help it's people remain on good terms with allies.

Wikileaks is not an American organization. It is international. It doesn't have a duty to help the US government do anything.

One of the big disclosures in this set has been middle-eastern war-mongering against Iran. Almost all of the countries in the region have been secretly lobbying the US to attack Iran while publicly grandstanding on the opposite. Anyone in a free country that has been paying attention already knew that this was happening to some degree, but it wasn't publicly documented. Now it is and consequently the citizens of those middle-eastern countries are much better informed about what their leaders have been doing -- look at the state-controlled media there and coverage of this wikileaks disclosure has been extremely sparse - even al-jazeera which has built its reputation on being independent of government control has made little comment on the leak, presumable to protect their host government of Qatar. But the info is spreading via facebook and other social media because unlike the typical rumors and conspiracy theories that dominate middle-eastern discussion, this stuff is nearly indisputable.

So part of it may suck for the US government, but that's not the case for the rest of the human race.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[medcalf]

If that were so, then where are the leaks from China, from Germany, from Russia, etc? Or is it only US government transparency? That would be an odd agenda for a group of Europeans led by a South African Boer.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[snl2587]

Look, I'm in favor of government transparency as much as the next guy. Transparency in where tax dollars are spent. Transparency in record-keeping. Transparency in lawmaking. Basically, transparency in anything that remains domestic.

But despite my desire for a transparent government domestically, diplomacy is different.

In a perfect world, everyone could get together, talk about their differences, and get along. But in the real world, countries often hate one another, and even factions within them. Diplomacy, in all its subtlety and secrecy, is often the only thing keeping away the hounds. The back-room scheming just sort of comes with the territory but, ultimately, it's done with the intent of keeping the people the government represents safe within the global community. I see it as a necessary evil.

In order for the government to do its job, some things must remain secret. Diplomats must be able to communicate in private in order to adequately and frankly assess situations so that the government can form its global policies. I don't see you screaming on the forums for the release of troop movements for the next month, do I? Yet diplomatic action can easily be worth a thousand days' worth of troop movements.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[captainpanic]

If you were talking about communications between private citizens I would agree, but these leaks are about our own government. This is supposed to be a representative democracy, and our government should have as few secrets as possible.

Completely agree.
The government represents the people they govern. Transparency shouldn't be a problem.

I'm not talking about the little issues where it's being disclosed that some people cheat on their wives... that indeed wasn't necessary to disclose (and it'll be forgotten soon).

But I am talking about the way deals are being made behind all our backs. The reasons why governments don't keep their promises.

We either accept websites and media that try to disclose the tricks of the governments... or we just accept that we all get screwed by big institutions such as a government.

The main reason why governments are so displeased now is because they misbehaved all those years, and we can now find out about it. And I'm sorry if a few lives are at risk now. Millions die in wars which are going to be discussed because of these leaks. A few lives are a small price in the big scheme of things.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[ThePhilips]

I supported wikileaks up until now... the information they shared this time makes me think they really jumped the shark.

Why? The move tells me that the WikiLeaks is truly independent and doesn't withhold information because they judge it to be interesting or not.

I want to judge myself whether the information is interesting or not.

I sincerely hope that WikLeaks heralds the return of the good ol' mass media which is reporting news as they come, not providing interpretations (or exaggerations to make it looks like news).

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[nschubach]

It depends on what your goal is... if it's about furthering peace, you should damn well be upfront.

"Hey there Billy... throwing that down the well might not be the best thing to be doing considering that the owner has an itchy trigger finger."

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[poetmatt]

with the lack of honesty even within our country, people are understandably pissed about the lack of honesty outside of our country too.
The issue here is: if people were honest, we wouldn't have this kind of shit to deal with.

If Mugabe's government policy is a fucking joke, say it. Get it out there. Negotiations fall from it? Well, the problem isn't our diplomatics then, the problem is his country by and large. Think other countries wouldn't support us for bold-faced honesty? Think again.

It's a lot harder to spin things against someone when they're being brutally honest.

after all, we're building up Dubai as the next superpower. It's not like they're going to kiss our asses once they get there. Whose fault is it for the shit we've already stepped in? Twofacing isn't going to fix that. When people talk about the world as sunshine and rainbows while it's fire and brimstone, there is a bit of an issue with two facing.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[nschubach]

Maybe your bill isn't the best thing to be selling if you have to lie to get it in the box.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Surt]

One might argue that the Canadian diplomat to France's job is to secure the best relations between your two countries, for example, perhaps promoting trade that results in more/better paying Canadian jobs.

What if that requires ass-kissing the French leadership?

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[snl2587]

It's funny: WikiLeaks was originally a place for whistle-blowers to leak only what was necessary to expose wrong-doing. That was when the organization wasn't controlling the release of information.

Suddenly, it's become a RapidShare for U.S. government database dumps, one which they make a conscious decision to enable.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[ShaunC]

If that were so, then where are the leaks from China, from Germany, from Russia, etc?

Ask the Chinese, the Germans, the Russians, etc. who presumably haven't sent anything too interesting to Wikileaks.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[The End Of Days]

People who are abusing their powers will suffer. People who do dirty deeds and want clean hands will suffer. People who believe that their position protects them from personal responsibility will suffer.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[gtall]

Diplomats are not politicians, they are not elected. They are supposed to give uncut views about their foreign circumstances. If every view is going to be made public, they won't bother telling Washington anything but what Washington wants to here and is neutered to the point of being useless.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[dafoomie]

If you can't speak frankly and candidly in your private, secret, and classified communications with the government you represent, how are you supposed to do your job? How do you give your government good information and an accurate assessment of the situation on the ground? If your impression of the President of Afghanistan is that he's corrupt and paranoid, your country needs to know.

Suggesting that we extend political correctness into classified communications is completely absurd. The expectation is that these documents will never see the light of day until they're only relevant in an historical context.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[thehostiles]

You're not hearing about those because you don't speak the languages spoken in any of those countries.
Wikileaks is a primarily English website. It's no surprise that you'll hear more about the US leaks on English news networks.

Not to mention that in China, your family would be incarcerated if you pulled a stunt like this. Not so much in the US.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[lgw]

Politics is the opposite of honesty. And it's the easiest thing in the world to spin things against soemone who's being brutally honest.

Most of international politics is about leaders looking for ways to appear strong to appear strong and uncompromising to their own people (so that they remain as leaders) while in fact making good and useful compromises for the betterment of those same people. Pride matters a lot, and so much of politics is finding a way for someone to give in while saving face. Honesty can destroy peace - in fact it usually does.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Hatta]

If you think the entire populace should be aware of all the non-critical-military/intelligence-ops of the government, then you want a direct democracy.

Yes, what's your point?

The government in a representative democracy is ostensibly there to represent our interests.

FTFY.

We have a right to know whether it is doing so or not.

Agreed!

A government whose every daily operation is exposed to the public spotlight will be completely ineffective in representing anyone's interests.

First, this assertion is offered without any support whatsoever. I don't buy it.

Second, a government that is completely ineffective in representing anyone's interests is preferable to a government that is effective at representing the interests of a small powerful elite at the expense of everyone else, which is what we have today.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[DarthVain]

I agree. If you don't want to be called on doing or saying evil shit, guess what? Stop doing or saying evil shit.

I will go one further. All this wah wah wah about the stuff being released. Well who's fault is that? If this is so HIGHLY sensitive and secret information, how the HELL did 250,000 documents get leaked then? Perhaps rather than crying like a baby, they should take a hard look (and I am sure they are now) about their own internal security and how these communications are sent/stored. I mean if some asshole sitting in Sweden with a bad hair cut can get a hold of this information, just imagine what your enemies have access to!

That said, while some of the information is embarrassing (more so for the actual leak than content I think) and somewhat interesting, most is pretty common knowlege so far as I have seen. Just the the fact than an official said it out loud somehow makes it more offensive I guess. I mean is anyone surprised that the US thinks there are ties in the Russian government to the Mob? Really? Gasp! That royals sometimes behave inappropriately? No!

I mean it was interesting to hear about some other mid-east countries urging the US to attack Iran, but then again Iran hasn't exactly the "play nice" attitude, so not all that surprising. Also it was interesting to see that US has talked to China regarding a plan should North Korea implode, but again considering the unstable state of that country over the years, as well as China and US relations, it is also not all that surprising.

All the gaffs? Well people say stupid things, particularly when they think it is in confidence, politicians probably more than most. I say bring it on. Get some of this stuff into the open and stop passing mean notes in class calling your neighbor a poo head, as sooner or later the teacher might just grab it and read your ill though words to the rest of the class and they might not think it so witty.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[qmaqdk]

Welcome back, agent Kagura. I guess operatives such as yourself don't have time to rewrite previous comments. We understand.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[qmaqdk]

I think you mean "where are the leaks from China, from Germany, from Russia, etc, lately?". Check their previous leaks.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[mcgrew]

Actually, I'd like to see the Constitution amended to where after the President signs a bill, it doesn't become law until voted on by referendum, say, in an annual election.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Kagura]

I think I am entitled to have an opposing opinion, just as you are entitled to have yours. Don't be rude to people you don't know, even if you aren't face-to-face with them.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[owlnation]

If you were talking about communications between private citizens I would agree, but these leaks are about our own government. This is supposed to be a representative democracy, and our government should have as few secrets as possible.

I agree. That's the irony on all of this. These "secrets" of "national security" aren't secrets to any other government. They know all about the supposed secrets of all other governments, pretty much. They all have spies, most of them have spy satellites, they know what's going on. None of this will be news to them.

Things that are State secrets, things of "National Security" are generally just things that governments don't want their own citizens, or the citizens of other countries, knowing about.

If any government truly believed in democracy they'd be a lot more transparent than they are. With the technology currently available it would be relatively simple to have openness and transparency, as well as democratic accountability, in any Government that was truly representative of its people.

Of course, I do not expect to ever see that in my lifetime. If anything, it's far more likely that all Governments will use that technology to spy on, and restrict, its citizens more and more.

It's almost as though the UK, the US, Australia and China have been experimenting collaboratively to see how best to use the Internet for citizen-control -- using the excuse of pedophilia, terrorism and copyright theft as the mechanism.

Branding wikileaks as a "terrorist organization" is just another convenient little Reichstag's Fire to use against the freedom of citizens.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Bahumat]

As a non-american, I will continue to financially support Wikileaks (to a modest $20 a year, they're part of my christmas charity allotment), because while you may see this as damaging to american interests, I see it as furthering the interests of the entire world. I too, have looked through a good chunk of the released documents, so far. What I found allotted to "The stuff we already knew, but here's the details" of america's dirty laundry. Meh.

Long live wikileaks. I *do*, however, hope their next big releases focus on other countries, not just the USA. The current amero-centrism of wikileaks major releases is rather disappointing, but is probably more the result of opportunity than it is country-specific targeting.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Bigjeff5]

Look up the word "Diplomacy" please.

You may have noticed that "Diplomacy" and "Diplomat" are extremely similar.

It turns out, a "Diplomat" is a person who engages in diplomacy.

A diplomat's job is diplomacy. The purpose of diplomacy is to improve the relationship between two parties.

In other words, you're an idiot.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[b0bby]

The Economist summed it up well, I thought:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/11/wikileaks

"At this point, what WikiLeaks is doing seems like tattling: telling Sally what Billy said to Jane. It's sometimes possible that Sally really ought to know what Billy said to Jane, if Billy were engaged in some morally culpable deception. But in general, we frown on gossips. If there's something particularly damning in the diplomatic cables WikiLeaks has gotten a hold of, the organisation should bring together a board of experienced people with different perspectives to review the merits of releasing that particular cable. But simply grabbing as many diplomatic cables as you can get your hands on and making them public is not a socially worthy activity."

I think that releasing Secret material can be in the public interest, but if it is not revealing wrongdoing of some sort not all workings need to be fully public. The problem of course is how do we know if we can't look at everything...

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[nofx_3]

How do you intend to elect a politician if they lie to you? Shouldn't you know how your elected representative feels about certain issues so you can vote for the person who will represent you properly? If politicians can just lie to get elected, not do anything beneficial to you while in office, and then cover up everything they do or so or vote on in the name of protecting security or some other bs, won't you just vote for them the next time when they lie to you? Politicians need to be accountable for EVERYTHING they do while representing you. If they communicate in any way in an official capacity, you as their electorate have a right to know what they are doing and saying for YOU.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[TheDarAve]

Because you're mistaking Diplomats for Politicians. They aren't the same. Diplomats are supposed to provide a "public face" to that country's government while being brutally honest with their own. Diplomats have more in common with company spokesmen than politicians. Basically what Wikileaks did is damage all of our "brand spokesmen" at once. There will probably be a huge diplomat shuffle as a result of this to restore the "brand image".

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[melikamp]

This should a huge level of irresponsibility on the part of WikiLeaks for releasing the entire database rather than incriminating files.

This "database" was leaked not by Wikileaks, but, for all we know, by a US government employee. May be Bradley Manning, may be someone else, we don't know for sure. But it was not leaked by Wikileaks, and, chances are, not only to Wikeleaks.

These files were not published just by Wikileaks. In fact, because of the DDOS, they were initially published by papers like NY Times and Guardian. They actually released the info to public first this time. Why are you singling out Wikileaks? And for what? For an activity in which major journalistic outlets share willingly?

Take your head out of your anus.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[TheDarAve]

What else is going on in Bizzarro world?

Iran solves world hunger and supports the Chinese in peacefully convincing most of the middle east that Democracy is the way to go while denouncing the constant threat of nuclear war in Europe the Swiss keep threatening with their Swedish rockets.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[dwillden]

But this isn't about politics, it's about international diplomacy, which requires them to be two faced. You cannot negotiate effectively if you just lay all your cards out on the table for everybody to see. You build a knowledge of your diplomatic opponents, as they are building one of you. Then you both sit down and based on your knowledge you gradually share more info in return for their equal sharing in return. Quid Pro Quo, not here is everything we have, want and need; pretty please agree to something slightly beneficial to us in return.

Our leaders can't respond appropriately to international issues if they don't know the background, opinions and likely responses of their global counterparts. As the GP said this isn't about unearthing a wrong doing, it's about trying to castrate the US in international relations.

And as the GGGP by Shining Celebi said. This isn't what whistle blowing is for, revealing wrongs. It's about Assange's vendetta against the US's international policies, and his inappropriate attacks on the ability of the US to operate in the international realm.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[AlamedaStone]

I think I am entitled to have an opposing opinion, just as you are entitled to have yours. Don't be rude to people you don't know, even if you aren't face-to-face with them.

An opinion is one thing, but you're just copy-pasting a block of text anywhere you can. That sounds more like astroturf propaganda to me.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[TheEyes]

You look at their record. It may surprise people to know that the entire legislative agenda for the US Government is online, and has been for years. You want to see what your elected officials are doing? Look it up. Be informed.

This release from Wikileaks does nothing to create more openness in government. Nobody benefits from hearing about some diplomat's opinion about another country; all this does is annoy people. There's no deeper truth to be gained here, like there was from the release of the Pentagon's papers (which revealed some disturbing problems with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan); it's all just gossip.

Unfortunately it's also dangerous gossip. Example: the biggest bombshell in this data is the fact that--surprise!--nobody likes Iran, even the other Arabs. We all pretty much knew that already; nobody said it because it would just hurt its ruling party's feelings, and that's probably not a good idea considering Iran already sponsors suicide bombers and militant extremists around the world. Iran's prime minister is already frothing at the mouth and calling for more violence against the West as a result of this release; how much more money will be going to the Taliban and Al Queda because of that?

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[techsoldaten]

The roll call, minutes and activity on the floors of Congress are only the public expression of what goes on in Washington. Saying that this tells you what your representatives are doing is a major leap. Openness would be served better if politicians put their calendars online as well as details about who is funding their travel schedule, which is not open.

In regards to WikiLeaks, I agree with the point that wholesale document releases like this do little to create openness. I always pictured a leak as a bit of information that is released to correct something that is going wrong behind closed doors, this is more like a flood. The thing about having open information is that people need to be able to understand it, and the sheer volume of documents coming out means only a researcher is really going to be able to deal with all this.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[sycodon]

Consider North Korea.

Just about everyone considers NK to be a violent, unstable, despotic regime that cares nothing for its population and is run by a paranoid, incompetent and self aggrandizing blowhard that probably likes 12 year old girls (or boys) and is generally someone who would have a good time partying with Hitler.

Now, try to hold some kind of diplomatic talks with them after saying that to his face.

I would bet that if you thought your boss an ignorant jackass, you wouldn't go ahead and tell him that before you sat down for a quarterly performance review.

Your third grade sensibilities regarding truth, while quaint, if taken to heart by any administration are dangerous.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[leehwtsohg]

Iran isn't an arab country.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Serious Callers Only]

These leaks have nothing to do with whistle-blowing to protect the people from the government, but instead hurt the government's efforts to legitimately help it's people remain on good terms with allies.

Are these not examples of wrongdoing?

* Wrongly kidnapping German citizens, and then threatening Germany over it - http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53702
* Collecting credit card data at the UN - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/29/un-reacts-us-embassy-cables

If so then by your definition I'd say this is definitely whistle-blowing, particularly so if you include the earlier leaks about the Iraq war.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[clarkkent09]

You should read the leaks and then see if they are damaging to American interests. My impression so far is the exact opposite. What are the biggest news here:
 
Pakistan has a less then adequately secured nuclear material and US is trying to secure it but Pakistan is refusing.
Arabs hate/fear Iran just as much as Israel does and are urging US to attack it but US is being the one who is cautious.
North Korea has supplied long range missiles (capable of reaching Europe) to Iran.
Lots of silly stuff about Gaddafi's mistress, Berlusconi's partying and Putin being an alpha-dog and "Batman" (he will enjoy that).
 
  Find one thing that is seriously damaging to US interests. Even previous leaks about Iraq will only validate that war when the dust settles and historians total up the score and it is realized that if the war was avoided and international sanctions (which killed more Iraqis than the war) were kept up forcing Iraqi's to starve as well as live under a dictator, the civil war would still be likely the moment Saddam was weakened enough to encourage Kurds and Shiites to rise up. In the end far more Iraqis would have died and Iran would end up being in control of Iraq (minus Kurds) which would be a disaster for the whole region. If these documents didn't get leaked anyway, the US should have leaked them on purpose.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Mr. Slippery]

Let's say he thought the French president had BO and was lazy....There is no reason to ever mention it in public though. It doesn't really help you at all, and it's one of those polite things everyone publicly pretends hasn't happened.

And the release of these cables isn't really going to change that. It might make for an awkward social moment here and there, but nothing policy-changing, exactly because everyone will publicly pretend it hasn't happened.

On the other hand, learning that the U.S. is instructing diplomats to engage in espionage against U.N. officials, or that our "friends" in Saudi Arabia are pushing the U.S. to attack Iran -- Americans need to know that. If the price is an awkward moment in the receiving line at some diplomatic function, it's cheaply got.

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[Mr. Slippery]

I have glanced at the documents on the WikiLeaks cable release pages, and I can categorically say that these documents should not have been released.

I've been following the excellent coverage at The Guardian, and I can categorically say that they should have.

These documents are far too strategically damaging to the U.S. and its public/not-so-public allies to have been revealed in bulk.

The strategic interests of the U.S. government, the ruling investment class, and the military-industrial complex, are not the interests of the people of the U.S. or of the world.

Wikileaks should be exposing corruption, wrongdoing, and illegality.

And these cable do that. They show that U.S. diplomats were directed to engage in illegal espionage against United Nations officials.

More than that, this leak helps us Americans know what the hell our government is doing around the world. That's vital for any democratic nation. Wikileaks is giving power back to the people.

However, deciding to release all classified information you can get your hands on is not whistle-blowing.

But that's not what happened. All of the Wikileaks releases have been redacted. You might think they should have redacted more thoroughly, fine; but the fact that they did some redaction makes it impossible to claim that they decided to "release all classified information you can get your hands on".

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[paedobear]

Mod parent up - the fact Iran isn't an Arab country is a significant part of why the Arab states all hate the place (they even tried to wipe out the Iranians a few hundred years ago, did about a good a job as the Nazis did to the Jews, and the Iranians certainly haven't forgotten)

Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers

[blahplusplus]

"Honesty can destroy peace - in fact it usually does."

Who's to say that the peace was worth saving? This idea that conflict should always be avoided may in fact be counter intuitively harmful.

Had time?

[2.7182]

I don't really think one day is really enough time to process these documents.

Re:Had time?

[TommydCat]

The real question is after many other countries digest the content, will there be any retaliation/action/bad stuff by the documented actors? Somehow I don't think foreign interests will give the US State Department a pass on this if it involves said interest.

I'm all for the "information wants to be free" mantra, but when it can come to a considerable cost to others, the disclosure can't wipe their hands completely of responsibility. Airing a politician's dirty laundry is one thing, but releasing documents that may have names of people that may be endangered unawares should be handled with some discretion.

I really don't like being on this side of the argument.. :-(

Re:Had time?

[unity100]

I'm all for the "information wants to be free" mantra, but when it can come to a considerable cost to others, the disclosure can't wipe their hands completely of responsibility. Airing a politician's dirty laundry is one thing, but releasing documents that may have names of people that may be endangered unawares should be handled with some discretion.

considerable cost. like the one below ?

Clashes with Europe over human rights: American officials sharply warned Germany in 2007 not to enforce arrest warrants for Central Intelligence Agency officers involved in a bungled operation in which an innocent German citizen with the same name as a suspected militant was mistakenly kidnapped and held for months in Afghanistan. A senior American diplomat told a German official “that our intention was not to threaten Germany, but rather to urge that the German government weigh carefully at every step of the way the implications for relations with the U.S.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/29/world/29cables.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp

excuse me, but any country, anyone, engaging in shit like the above, already pre-deserved any cost they are going to pay. people reap, what they saw. the only thing preventing the people in administration from reaping what they sow was that these were being hidden behind secrecy with 'national security' excuses.

and now, they came out, and they are saying that 'its irresponsible'. actually meaning 'inconvenient' of course, since they are those who are responsible for the filth exposed. they wouldnt like it to come out.

Re:Had time?

[Anonymous Coward]

One example? There seem to be many, but what about this one?

"Toby Harnden of the Telegraph notes that one of the released documents names a U.S. informant in the region. The document identifies him as a U.K.-educated engineer from a prominent pre-revolution Isfahan family who once owned a large factory in Iran and is a former national fencing champion of Iran, a former president of the Iran Fencing Association and a former vice president of an Azerbaijan sports association. Harnden aptly asks: How many such persons do you think are out there?"

People don't have to be referenced by their actual name in order to be put in danger. Only enough bits of entropy to plausibly identify them personally.

Re:Had time?

[Random BedHead Ed]

I don't really think one day is really enough time to process these documents.

Yeah, two days is more like it.

Either is far too long when five minutes is enough to visit /. and read uninformed rants about them. Process, shmrocess.

Re:Had time?

[Obfuscant]

Can you give any example of someone who has been endangered by this?

Right. Because we can determine all the negative consequences of releasing diplomatic information in just the one or two days after it was released. As if common sense didn't apply to this matter at all.

As far as I can tell most of the leaks have been pretty tame,

I think finding out that the king of one of your neighbors has asked the Big Devil, Source of All Evil, to assist them by removing your blossoming nuclear capability just MIGHT cause one to hold a grudge, don't you? Especially when one is already publicly calling for the elimination of an "enemy" country and building a capacity to accomplish this, isn't it reasonable to think that maybe the list of targets might have changed a bit since the release?

I'm not saying it is not possible, but thus far I haven't heard of any example that comes even close.

Right. Because, of course, you have access to all diplomatic information and it has been, after all, two days since the release of this information. That proves that nothing bad will happen.

Or are you relying on Wikileaks to provide the information of all the bad things that happen because of their actions, and not try to push the responsibility off on someone else?

The conduct of diplomacy DEMANDS an ability to have frank and candid evaluations of the other parties, so that diplomats can judge and plan. Knowing what the other party's values are allows one to work with them, instead of simply taking pot-shots at trying to come up with a solution. There is no public value in knowing that one diplomat thinks another one is a "stuffed shirt" or that his motives are to avoid certain things, and those evaluations are worthless once the evaluee knows about them. In fact, they are harmful, because there is now an animosity between parties that has to be overcome before any further advances can be made.

Wikileaks went across the line this time. There will be reppercussions, but Wikileaks will not admit that anything they did caused harm. They'll point the finger at others while pretending to carry the high moral ground.

Re:Had time?

[thePowerOfGrayskull]

excuse me, but any country, anyone, engaging in shit like the above, already pre-deserved any cost they are going to pay. people reap, what they saw. the only thing preventing the people in administration from reaping what they sow was that these were being hidden behind secrecy with 'national security' excuses.

Yep - so they should have published that incident. And incidents like it. What about the other 99% of the documents?

The country deserves what it gets? Even when "what it gets" may be setbacks in international relations that damage not only US and its citizens, but can also serve as the spark that sets of far worse than a diplomatic crisis between other nations? The people who supposedly "pre-deserve" are only one party among the many who will pay.

Dumping this data on the world is like that phrase, "Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out." Elsewhere you said that "responsible reporting" can't be a concern when dealing with the evil juggernaut that is the US (paraphrased). I say that you've a very narrow view of "responsible reporting"; and an interesting set of double-standards in that it seems to be OK with you that the fallout from this may be far worse among other nations than anything the US did in the last few years.

Had wikileaks provided only information such as what you saw above, that would go a long way towards justifying their actions. What they did, though, only further shows how their lack of accountability also ensures that they have no sense of responsibility.

Re:Had time?

[grcumb]

I don't really think one day is really enough time to process these documents.

Indeed. Say what you like about wikileaks, but there is probably not a single researcher in International Relations, History or Political Science without a cum-stain in his pants today. Never in modern history has so much information been made available in such a readily accessible format about one point in history. This is, for researchers, a gift that will keep on giving for decades to come.

The thing that impressed me most from my brief perusal of the 200-odd documents released on the first day was the quality of the analysis. The 'scene setter' papers were well-written and obviously well-researched. I suspect that there's more than one junior foreign officer out there with a quiet smile on their face today, because finally the world will see just how good they are.

Yes, I'm ignoring completely the ethics and morality of the situation. That horse is out of the barn, but what a barn it is....

These cables will provide more insight and understanding into American diplomacy than anything else ever has. Just as access to hitherto proprietary source code sometimes unearths dirty secrets, there is a lot of unpleasantness to be found in the cables. I think the longer term result, however, will be that much of what's good about the US diplomatic corps (and there's a lot of that) will assist countless others to improve their own work and that of others.

Re:Had time?

[unity100]

Yep - so they should have published that incident. And incidents like it. What about the other 99% of the documents?

99% of the other documents that are out, show varying levels of filth. there is filth still. and heaven knows how much filth there is going to be yet.

The country deserves what it gets? Even when "what it gets" may be setbacks in international relations that damage not only US and its citizens, but can also serve as the spark that sets of far worse than a diplomatic crisis between other nations? The people who supposedly "pre-deserve" are only one party among the many who will pay.

excuse me, but judging from the amount of filth perpetrated, us is currently the biggest creator of all incidents, causes and issues worldwide. strictest regimes pale in comparison.

Dumping this data on the world is like that phrase, "Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out."

there is no easy way to do this. if, you engage in any kind of filtering, eventually mechanisms that will filter out most of the information will be created by the countries or private interests. shit, should get out, as it is.

it was a long time coming already. there should be no secrets. the time of 'secrets' in regard to military or national security matters, is long gone. now every country knows at precisely what our the sentries of an important watchtower is rotating, thanks to the military satellites. all countries know, who is cabling what to whom, secretly and diplomatically, thanks to the monitoring technologies developed since the electronics age.

so, basically, your enemy knows you, you know your enemy and everyone knows what everyone else is doing.

the ONLY party not knowing what's happening has been the citizens. us. the people.

it was high time that we learned.

Re:Had time?

[unity100]

so, grabbing a foreign country's citizen in some other part of the world and kidnapping it, and possibly torturing it, and then threatening that country regarding arrest of those who did the kidnapping, and then coming up and rephrasing it in a beautified manner, wasnt illegal enough for you ?

with your mindset, i wouldnt what to know what constitutes 'illegal' for you.

Re:Had time?

[unity100]

that was reported YEARS ago, by media because of a lawsuit filed by a rights group. it was 'reported'. it wasnt confirmed. now, the leaks CONFIRM it, officially from u.s. government.

Re:Had time?

[Serious Callers Only]

Yep - so they should have published that incident. And incidents like it. What about the other 99% of the documents?

The country deserves what it gets? Even when "what it gets" may be setbacks in international relations that damage not only US and its citizens, but can also serve as the spark that sets of far worse than a diplomatic crisis between other nations? The people who supposedly "pre-deserve" are only one party among the many who will pay.

Dumping this data on the world is like that phrase, "Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out." Elsewhere you said that "responsible reporting" can't be a concern when dealing with the evil juggernaut that is the US (paraphrased). I say that you've a very narrow view of "responsible reporting"; and an interesting set of double-standards in that it seems to be OK with you that the fallout from this may be far worse among other nations than anything the US did in the last few years.

Had wikileaks provided only information such as what you saw above, that would go a long way towards justifying their actions. What they did, though, only further shows how their lack of accountability also ensures that they have no sense of responsibility.

There's a lot of may be in the above condemnation of wikileaks, but no specifics, yet somehow that turns into a many who will pay. Show us specific documents which put someone in danger please, then we'll talk. The worst I've seen is embarrassing truths aired in public.

Actually I think this release has done the US good, in that it mainly highlights US diplomats doing a competent job dealing with sometimes crazy situations and reporting back truthfully on the situation as they see it. There are some problematic releases, but then, it'll probably do the US good in the long term to be called out on unacceptable behaviour (trying to get the credit card details of UN officials for example, or trying to bully countries into accepting kidnap/assassinations as SOP). Those particular files are *exactly* the sort of releases the government least wants and would give spurious 'security' excuses for hiding, and yet they are the ones that most need to be brought to light, and the practices stopped, which would be in the long-term interests of the USA.

Re:Had time?

[gtbritishskull]

What line did Wikileaks cross? They did not leak the information. Someone else did (who had access). Do you think that the person who leaked them (who obviously wants the public to know about them) would have burned them all if Wikileaks had not published them? No. That person would have found other ways to publish them. You might have seen them hidden in the back alleys of the internet like Usenet and IRC and anonymous message boards. Other governments (who pay people to find information like this) would have gotten this information eventually. The only people who would be uninformed would be the public at large. You. Me. Well, you may want to stay ignorant, but I prefer not to. You want to blame anything bad that happens on Wikileaks, but the people who do the "bad" things would have gotten this information anyway. All you are advocating is to keep the unwashed masses ignorant and controllable.

Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[jpmorgan]

I'm certain more details will come out as people have more time to go through these documents. But so far what I've found most surprising is how unsurprising these documents are. So the US is spying. Big fucking deal, everybody spies. This isn't news. There's no smoking gun, no festering sore of corruption that this was presented to be.

Is this really a case of 'holding the US to account for its crimes' or just malice, someone's personal agenda to get back at the big bad Americans? So far, it's looking more like the latter. I'm starting to question my former support for wikileaks.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Thelasko]

Yes, most of the information is uninteresting. Such as:

Comments such a description of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Russia's head of state, as playing "Robin to (Prime Minister Vladimir) Putin's Batman,"

However, there are a few juicy tidbits in there. Like the Saudi king asking the US to attack Iran.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[girlintraining]

Is this really a case of 'holding the US to account for its crimes' or just malice, someone's personal agenda to get back at the big bad Americans? So far, it's looking more like the latter. I'm starting to question my former support for wikileaks.

You've been drinking the kool aid a bit heavily. Wikileaks has been careful not to release data that could pose an immediate threat to life or safety. They've been posting things that embarrass the government and affect its public image. And you want to stop supporting them because of this? Wikileaks didn't kill a bunch of brown people in an some country with an unpronounceable name and then pretend it didn't happen. Wikileaks didn't blow away several journalists who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They weren't making comments into the mic, laughing and acting excited that they were gunning down unarmed civilians.

They just told you it happened. Which is something your government (and mine) wouldn't do, and would never do if it had the choice. And all of this has been hidden behind the cloak of "national security". National security only goes so far -- when it is used as an excuse to violate the basic social contract and principles which the government is supposed to be supporting, it is the duty of those who know about this to spread the word far and wide and bring the democratic process into play to fix such systemic problems.

Wikileaks isn't on some quest to destroy the government: It is serving the purpose of saving it from itself, before it becomes completely unaccountable to its citizens and eventually becomes destructive of its own ends.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[gman003]

You're obviously not a lawyer, then. Hell, you obviously haven't even read the Wikipedia articles on war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Has the US government committed acts of genocide, ie. the killing of an entire ethnic group? No.

Has the US government, as a policy, condoned or ordered any of the following on a large scale?

• Murder: No
• Torture: No. Even Guantanamo isn't large enough to qualify as a crime against humanity
• Rape: No
• Racial/Religious/Political Persecution: No
• Enslavement: No

So, that eliminates "crimes against humanity". Now, on to war crimes. While I will agree that several individual actions could qualify as war crimes, you are talking about high-command stuff. So, then, has the command of the US armed forces systematically condoned or ordered any of the following:

• Murder or enslavement of prisoners of war: No
• Murder or enslavement of civilians: No (as with any war, some civilians will be killed in the crossfire, and this, while regrettable, is only a war crime if deliberate)
• Murder of hostages: No
• Destruction of cities, towns and villages not justified by military or civilian necessity: No.

So, then, there is no justification for bandying about charges of "crimes against humanity" or "war crimes" for GWB et al. The most serious crime you could reasonably accuse them of is "crime against peace", as the invasion of Iraq was not, strictly speaking, a defensive military action. However, since such charges are reviewed by the UN Security Council, and the US is on said council (along with two significant allies), good luck trying to convict them.

Lesson: If you're going to accuse an entire government of something, at least check Wikipedia first to see if you're using the terms properly.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Captain Splendid]

And you think Canada is not spying on the US?

I'm sure there's a few Canadians who cross the border to do some price-checking, but other than that...

Seriously, a Canadian Spy Service? Next you'll be telling me the Mexicans have a Police Force!

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[icebike]

The unsurprising facts that the Saudi's were funding most terrorism was as unsurprising as the fact that they fear Iran, and that China hacked Google.

We all knew this, or suspected it. That our diplomats talk frankly among themselves is nothing more than I would suspect.

That there are idiots here on /. that believe this should not be the case is the only surprise I've seen about this whole episode.

What I want to know is how a buck private managed to get his hands on diplomatic traffic. If heads must roll surely the chain of command that allowed THAT should be first to feel the knife.

Why is the military privy to diplomatic traffic at all? Why would it be on a computer entrusted to a private?

Unbelievable.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Monkeedude1212]

I'm upset that the americans are spying on us Canadians, so much for our brotherhood. Spying on allies? Sounds like a deal breaker for me.

I don't know what impression you had that really put us in the state of "Brotherhood" - but honestly I can't see why you are surprised to see this - especially after 9/11 where Canada got a lot of flack for its super-lax (or rather, encouraging) refugee/immigrant policies. Let me put it this say:

If you come from the Middle East, you can move to Canada, claim refugee status, and get your living expenses subsidized plus extra for any children/dependants you might have. If you seem to be part of a visible minority, you might get your education covered. It's easier for an immigrant to live in Canada than a Canadian born citizen - and that is especially scary to the US who has made a lot of enemies - unlike Canada which has managed to remain in this friendly kind of spotlight to the rest of the world.

I would be far more concerned if the US wasn't spying on us. Honestly, while I don't agree with a lot of America's political stances, I can at least trust them to try and keep Canadians in power and keeping an eye out for a surge of Pakistanis moving in, taking up Law degrees, and taking over the judicial state of Canada.

That may sound Racist - I don't actually have anything against immigrants or people coming over here, though it does irk me a bit that they get by on our tax dollars. And I don't mean to single out Pakistan but I have a feeling thats one of the countries the US keeps an eye on, and also has a lot of immigrants to Canada.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[mcgrew]

I interpet that as "with us, or against us."

That's almost exactly George Bush's words: "If you're not with us, you're against us." Oh, and Anakin Skywalker's words, too, in EP3, shortly before becoming Darth Vader.

Bush claimed to be a Christian, but the bible says "he who is not against us is with us." Why would a Christian take a biblical quote and turn it around exactly backwards?

How do you know the Canadian government isn't spying on the US? Maybe your spies are simply less incompetent than ours.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[fishbowl]

So far, Wikileaks has only released the same things with the same redactions as the New York Times has released with the informed consent of the State Department.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Fnkmaster]

They've been posting things that embarrass the government and affect its public image.

Specifically, I think you mean the US government. One thing (not the only thing though) that bothers me about Wikileaks is that it seems to be exclusively, or at least principally, dedicated to embarrassing the US government.

I have no problem with calling out lies told by world leaders - for example, George W. Bush was lying when he claimed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and was working with terrorists.

But I don't think that every diplomatic cable ought to necessarily be public and transparent. Nor do I think that the releases of lots of documents that consisted of basically known facts about the war in Afghanistan combined with details that served no overwhelming public interest need were particularly valuable to the world. Basically, I've yet to be convinced that Wikileaks does more good than harm.

And after the debacle where they foolishly released video under the title "Collateral Murder" they gave up any claim to being an unbiased party dedicated to transparency.

So while I like the idea of accountability and agree that journalists don't always do a perfect job at it, I don't particularly think that Wikileaks is doing a better job.

If somebody can provide evidence to the contrary, I'd love to hear it.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[gman003]

"Crimes against humanity" is a very, VERY serious charge. Not just "serial killer" serious. I'm talking "Hitler"-level evil, the sort of crime that is remembered for generations to come. If you use that term for every politician you disagree with, you're diluting the term.

I'm not trying to shield anyone from justice. I'm just trying to put things in perspective. By all means, accuse the Bush administration of concealing facts, starting a war of aggression, and human rights violations. But "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity", no.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[inquisitive_cherub]

You're drinking kool-aid too, just a different brand. So far, the majority of the leaked documents simply complicate and frustrate the international community's diplomatic efforts. Some of these efforts are laudable, such as dealing with and containing unsavory characters (like Mugabe) or unsavory governments (Iran and North Korea). How does throwing a monkey wrench in these delicate, but necessary, machinations benefit the citizens of the world?

One positive note is the exposure of the pressure applied to the German government to not prosecute CIA agents in a kidnapping case. Perhaps there will be other documents in the same vein. But the scarcity of this kind of exposure highlights my fear: long gone are the days when WikiLeaks was the refuge of the whistle-blower, giving a voice to the powerless in the pursuit of truth, and hopefully, justice. If this were *still* WikiLeaks' core mission, then the latest dump would have separated the chaff (Merkle is a teflon politician, Putin is an alpha dog) and highlighted the documents that detail morally dubious and corrupt government action.

More and more, WikiLeaks is conflating 'secret' with 'malfeasance'. Also, it's raison d'etre now seems to be to bloody the nose of the American government more than anything else. And we're all the poorer for it.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Logic Worshipper]

What went on at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib are crimes against humanity. Waterboarding qualifies as "inflicting severe pain and suffering" no matter how you cut it.

Article 7: Crimes against humanity

1. For the purpose of this Statute, "crime against humanity" means any of the following acts when committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack:
(e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law;
(f) Torture;
(i) Enforced disappearance of persons;
(k) Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health.
2. For the purpose of paragraph 1:
(e) "Torture" means the intentional infliction of severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, upon a person in the custody or under the control of the accused; except that torture shall not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to, lawful sanctions;
(i) "Enforced disappearance of persons" means the arrest, detention or abduction of persons by, or with the authorization, support or acquiescence of, a State or a political organization, followed by a refusal to acknowledge that deprivation of freedom or to give information on the fate or whereabouts of those persons, with the intention of removing them from the protection of the law for a prolonged period of time.

Article 8: War crimes

1. The Court shall have jurisdiction in respect of war crimes in particular when committed as part of a plan or policy or as part of a large-scale commission of such crimes.
2. For the purpose of this Statute, "war crimes" means:
(a) Grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, namely, any of the following acts against persons or property protected under the provisions of the relevant Geneva Convention:
(ii) Torture or inhuman treatment, including biological experiments;
(vi) Wilfully depriving a prisoner of war or other protected person of the rights of fair and regular trial;
(vii) Unlawful deportation or transfer or unlawful confinement;
(b) Other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts:
(v) Attacking or bombarding, by whatever means, towns, villages, dwellings or buildings which are undefended and which are not military objectives;

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Beetle B.]

I can at least trust them to try and keep Canadians in power and keeping an eye out for a surge of Pakistanis moving in, taking up Law degrees, and taking over the judicial state of Canada.

Of course, because Pakistanis can never be Canadians, right?

That may sound Racist

Sounds right, except for the "may" portion.

Now give me figures: What percentage of Pakistanis who immigrated to Canada claimed refugee status, and/or got welfare benefits compared to the real Canadians? If you can't back what you say, then yeah, I'll call you a racist.

Re:Surprising in its unsurprisingness

[Omestes]

Torture: No. Even Guantanamo isn't large enough to qualify as a crime against humanity

How many people can I torture before its a crime against humanity?

2? 4? 25? 1,000,000?

How many humans are there in a humanity, for that matter? I would say you need to torture EVERYONE before its actually a crime against humanity. By that reasoning genocide can't be a crime against humanity either, since by definition your only killing one group, and not the whole of humanity (as long as you don't commit suicide when your done, your still golden).

Sorry, torture, period, is a crime against humanity. It doesn't matter if you torture one person or a million.

Also; define murder. Killing civilians for no reason? Then we could consider all of Iraq, and much of Afghanistan, as murder. Even excepting some weak justification for there wars, we still are pretty wanton about our collateral damage.

And what the hell is does "justified by military or civilian necessity" mean? So if there is no real reason to be there, but we send the military anyway, then its fine and dandy.

Your using Bush logic, there are no war crimes unless someone else commits them, though WE can do the exact same things but are justified since we have a good reason, where they, the bad guys, don't, obviously. We aren't evil because we are America, and America isn't evil!

Ordering torture of enemy civilians is a war crime, as is kidnapping innocent people for no reason and holding them for protracted amounts of time without justification (see the German account in the leak, or read many accounts of Guantanamo or field prisons). Also NOT condemning torture, rape, or murder, and not acting to prevent it is pretty much the same thing as condoning it, especially when you know that the chance, opportunity, and environment for it exists.

I may have had an unusual reaction to the leaks...

[Dr. Spork]

I don't know if this happened to many other people, but when I was reading through the leaks, I thought: It's good that my government knows all this stuff and keeps track of it. I think I've grown so used to thinking of the USA as being run by fools that it was actually a bit comforting to see that they actually do research and know stuff. Too bad that doesn't stop them acting foolishly!

But really...

[garyisabusyguy]

FTA "promising increased internal auditing and banning the ability of systems containing classified information to connect to thumb drives or other removable media"

Are the people running this network lost in the eighties, um, I mean sometime before Multix (say the early sixties)?

Wouldn't you think that internal auditing and limiting the ability to copy classified files to removable media should have been addressed decades before this leak occured?

Re:Where Is The Trust Metric

[Em Ellel]

that guarantees the leaks from Wikileaks are legitimate and not some delusional writing from Sarah Palin?

That is my thought as well. The best way to silence WikiLeaks is to leak tons of false data that seems right, let it make a lot of noise, then prove that it is all fake. No one will trust them again - so hearing another major leak right after the pentagon one - makes me wonder just how real is this...

-Em

Hear that bullshit

[unity100]

"WikiLeaks is putting at risk the lives and the freedom of countless Americans and non-Americans around the world."

COUNTLESS they say. countless as in, a few hundred, tops. compared to 66.000+ (official no, unofficial probably higher) dead in iraq, unknown number dead in afghanistan, unknown number lost in the hands of cia, nsa and ice. (even inside usa - http://www.thenation.com/article/americas-secret-ice-castles )

and they come up with long-repeated, surefire bullshit 'putting countless lives at risk' -> vague enough too, you can never calculate how many lives lost and compare it to those who got killed while chasing a wild goose under false pretenses in afghan mountains or iraq plains.

but that's all fancy talk. what they are basically saying, bluntly and in streetspeak is :

"Let us continue doing our filth behind the veil of secrecy by biting the bait of 'risk of freedom and lives'"

.....

Re:Hear that bullshit

[FictionPimp]

Your view of freedom is wrong.

They want us to have freedom from thought, freedom from wealth, freedom from worry, and freedom from anything that doesn't support their lifestyles.

Re:Hear that bullshit

[Xest]

Wikileaks isn't putting anyone at risk, when the US government put this charge forward to Wikileaks, Assange responded asking for an example name of someone who would be put in trouble so they could negotiate over further redacting the documents to protect such people, the US responded stating they wont negotiate over it and to hand it all back.

If anyone is at risk over this the blame falls entirely on the US government, they had the option to ensure the leaks damaged only reputation but not put people in danger and they refused to accept it.

Data portability

[girlintraining]

Having worked for several businesses that have attempted to ban the use of portable media -- it's a pointless endeavor. Anything that connects to a USB port can emulate anything else that can connect to a USB port. I have seen USB flash drives that emulate rewritable CDROMs, etc. And with just a little bit of work, you can use standard HUD devices like mice and keyboards to stream data out at very high speeds to other devices. And nevermind Firewire and it's built-in ability to directly manipulate system memory -- if the port has power, all your memory are belong to us. -_-

There is only one security measure that works in this situation: Air gap. Everything else is window dressing.

if Wikileaks can get this...

[painandgreed]

What I really have to wonder is that if essentially one guy with a website can get this much info, how much do the other nations with active espionage units manage to get?

Re:if Wikileaks can get this...

[MyLongNickName]

What makes you think that another country wasn't behind leaking the info to wikileaks? Do you think wikileaks has a staff that actively acquires the documents?

Re:if Wikileaks can get this...

[pwilli]

The US is probably the only country that combined diplomacy and military intelligence into one network (SIRPNet) that is completely accessible by far more than 100.000 people worldwide. They therefore put usability far above the need for security.

Other countries like Germany have (afaik) relatively small, logically separated intelligence and information networks/databases. Having the right security clearance level is not enough to go around and view all documents of that level, because every request for information is tracked and access has to be confirmed/granted by another person. This is very slow but relatively secure.

IMHO it is a matter of choice. The US system isn't really better or worse than other systems, it just has other priorities. The really important stuff (>= "top secret") isn't available in their network anyway.

Re:Where Is The Trust Metric

[grub]

that guarantees the leaks from Wikileaks are legitimate and not some delusional writing from Sarah Palin?

These were done on computer, not with paper and crayon.
That's all the proof you need.

Doh

[unity100]

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the leak "not just an attack on America's foreign policy interests, it is an attack on the international community."

somehow it suddenly became an attack on 'international community'.

says the secretary of the country that grabbed german citizens in germany and tortured them abroad.

Clashes with Europe over human rights: American officials sharply warned Germany in 2007 not to enforce arrest warrants for Central Intelligence Agency officers involved in a bungled operation in which an innocent German citizen with the same name as a suspected militant was mistakenly kidnapped and held for months in Afghanistan. A senior American diplomat told a German official "that our intention was not to threaten Germany, but rather to urge that the German government weigh carefully at every step of the way the implications for relations with the U.S."

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/29/world/29cables.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp

if, exposing the above filth was an 'attack on international community' what the fuck was going and grabbing german citizens in germany and torturing them abroad ?

filth. nothing but filth. and if ANYone listens to their bullshit about 'risking countless lives and freedom', they will be able to perpetuate that shit. notice - freedom. freedom of grabbing people abroad and torturing, she means, probably.

Re:Doh

[Rockoon]

if, exposing the above filth was an 'attack on international community' what the fuck was going and grabbing german citizens in germany and torturing them abroad ?

Nowhere in the page you linked to is torture mentioned. Not even once.

That you somehow jumped to this conclusion is evidence that you currently are not thinking straight and need to self-evaluate. Something is wrong with your thinking process and you need to figure out why you completely imagined pretty much the most damning information possible within the link, and how long you have been doing this to your perspective.

Re:Doh

[Anonymous Coward]

He was tortured.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7036051.stm

Quartermillion? How about just 243...

[santax]

They only released 243 cables at this point. http://cablegate.wikileaks.org/

Re:Quartermillion? How about just 243...

[Anonymous Coward]

Right. I've read every cable so far, and have been communicating the important cables that are being overlooked to the media.

This story is being reported wrong over and over again. They keep saying all the cables are released, and not only are they not all released, there are several in the 243 that the media isn't reporting on that are very interesting.

Like the Honduras Cable concerning the coup that contradicts most of what the US Official response was!

Re:Quartermillion? How about just 243...

[santax]

Yeps and the one where the mossad wants to support surgeons and students in Iran to split up the land in 3 parts. It's hard to imagine why this isn't in the media.

Something to hide?

[Teufelsmuhle]

"You shouldn't care unless you've got something to hide."

Isn't that line we always hear from these government agencies when it comes to privacy invasions? I can only assume from the outcry that they must have something to hide.

Re:Can't wait for wikileaks next target

[unity100]

The problem is not america being incompetent in hiding their crimes. It is the fact that they are committing those crimes, while CLAIMING to be fighting for 'freedom' and 'security' of people, even the entire planet.

its lying, and hypocrisy at it best. if it came out that china was killing people on the spot, noone would give much credence. because, they arent actually hiding that they are doing it.

but america was not only hiding, but also LYING about it. this is what people dont like.

I, for one, am glad these cables were leaked.

[blind biker]

I have been saying for a long time, that Israel is far less worried about the Iranian enrichment program, than the Arab countries - and this diplomatic cable leak has proven me right. Arab states have urged the US to destroy the Iranian nuclear enrichment program. Yes, the Muslim brothers. Turns out, there's more animosity between Sunni (Arab countries) and Shia (Iran) than they like to admit. Not surprising, violence between Sunni and Shia kills orders of magnitude more Muslims than West-East conflict.

I find it particularly telling that Saudi Arabia, which has itself a formidable weapon hardware, would be begging the US to do the dirty deed for them. I find it telling, not surprising: Muslim countries would not want to be seen in disagreement, and an air raid on another country's research facilities could definitely be interpreted as a "disagreement".

None of the things I have learned from these leaks surprised me at all. The candid opinion of US diplomats and politicians about some "allies" such as Turkey, is refreshing. Oh, I would love that kind of candor from politicians in every day life!

Re:more is coming from wikileaks... and it good.

[Wyatt Earp]

A strong Russia is good for the world in the long run?

A strong Russia has never been good for anyone or anything other than killing a lot of Nazis.

Oh sure its always good for the noble class in Russia, the Party leadership in the USSR and the oligarchs in the Russian Federation, but for the Poles, Georgians, or Chechens, a strong Russia isn't a good thing.

And how is a stronger China good for anyone other than the People's Republic of China? A strong China is what is keeping the North Korean leadership in power and millions of people in prison camps.

Russia and China have been terrible to the environment, far worse than anything capitalistic industry in the US or Europe ever did.

A resugent Russia with massive industry and natural resources whose population is falling being next to a even stronger China with a booming population is not going to be better for anyone in the long run, eventually they will clash, as they did in 1929, 1934, 1937 and 1969.

All secrets should be released.

[maillemaker]

I'm not a big fan of the "OK government secrets" thing.

I'm pretty convinced that just about every thing that the government tries to keep secret is because it is a morally bad thing that they would be ashamed of if it was made public.

Sure, there are technological secrets, but most of the secrets that they are up in arms about are behavioral secrets.

Personally, think that every government secret that can be outed should be outed, and the people doing the outing should be held harmless. Allow the government to keep its secrets as best it may, but there should be no retribution when they drop the ball and the secret gets out.

For years we have heard "If you have nothing to hide, you should have nothing to worry about" aimed at private citizens. Well what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

Net Loss to Public

[bkmoore]

I wrote some of the classified documents on Wikilieaks during my time with the military. I am a civilian now. Much of what I have written is already available to researchers and journalists from the Marine Corps Historical archive in Quantico, Virginia. The Iraq dump contained many significant events from my battalion, but lacked the commanders' comments or the command chronology narrative to tie the events together and put them into perspective. This information is actually available through official sources. What is on Wikileaks has is actually quite limited.

I have two concerns about the fallout to the leak. The first concern is the U.S. may retroactively classify documents currently available to the public, or be less likely to release documents in the future. This will result in a net loss of access to information to the general public. My second concern is the military may become more compartmentalized and soldiers at the small-unit level may no longer have access to the same amount of intelligence information as they previously had. This would be unfortunate because a lot of the young Marines or Soldiers bring a fresh perspective to looking at the raw information and can often connect the dots and find things missed by back-office analysts.

The public has a right to know what the government is doing as long as it doesn't compromise operational security. Within the government there are people pushing to declassify information and make it available. There are others who would like to make everything a secret until the end of time. This latest leak will push the pendulum towards the secret squirrels. I doubt too many service members will want to follow in Pvt. Manning's footsteps, so Mr. Assange probably won't be getting too much new information. Without people sending him leaks, Mr. Assange wouldn't have much of a web site. If the U.S. were smart, they would put up an alternate web site to Wikileaks which would provide declassified versions of government documents and explain why it is important to balance the public's right to know with the need for operational security.

Really great idea...

[frank_adrian314159]

The Pentagon and other agencies are looking at ways to tighten security, promising increased internal auditing and banning the ability of systems containing classified information to connect to thumb drives or other removable media.

The more you tighten your grip, Gates and Clinton, the more memos will slip through your fingers...

Redefining terrorism

[qmaqdk]

Apparently disclosing the following counts as an act of terrorism according to a certain republican:

* US diplomats spying on UN

* Canadian diplomats asking ExxonMobil and BP to help "kill" U.S. global-warming policies to ensure that "the oil keeps a-flowing" into the U.S.

* Yemen goverment lying to its people on US bombings

* US pressing Germany to not pursue arrest warrants for 13 agents CIA agents. (arrest warrents that the cables describe as "From a judicial standpoint, the facts are clear, and the Munich prosecutor has acted correctly.")

This is stuff that people need to know.

Transparency

[euxneks]

Really, this is fucking awesome. They complain when we the public have secrets, but they claim they need to have their own secrets, look, if you're going to rub my crotch when I go visit my brother or grandma, don't fucking expect any sympathy when you're plotting shit with radical governments and that crap gets out. If you want privacy, give me back mine.

Re: Don't Ask Don't Tell Should Have Kicked In

[nosferatu1001]

Dont ask dont tell is sound?
Really?

Idiot.

Re:Fundamental question

[grcumb]

Over 100k people throughout the federal and state governments had access to these documents. You can't keep things secret when that many people know about them. I agree that any intelligence agency worth there salt had access to all of these documents a long time ago.

if by 100,000, you mean 3+ million, then yes, you're spot on. Here's what the Guardian says about SIPRNET:

The US general accounting office identified 3,067,000 people cleared to "secret" and above in a 1993 study. Since then, the size of the security establishment has grown appreciably.

Re: Don't Ask Don't Tell Should Have Kicked In

[ultramk]

Golly, if only Manning had been treated like Alan Turing and driven to suicide... right? I bet you would have been right there with the needle for the hormone therapy, trying to force one of the most brilliant minds of his--and possibly any--generation into a neat little cubbyhole that doesn't make you feel all icky inside.

You realize that homophobic douchbags like yourself very nearly made us lose WWII, don't you? Do you have any idea how close things were? What would have happened if we hadn't broken ULTRA? ...And that a significant number of Arabic-language analysts were drummed out of the DoD in compliance with DADT, significantly weakening our ability to process and understand the vast quantity of SIGINT and HUMINT gathered on a daily basis?

Manning is a criminal, but leave his fucking sexual preference out of it, troll.

You're fucked.

[copponex]

If this was any country on our shit list, NYT and the rest of the fawning idiots would be praising WikiLeaks for being defenders of Western civilization. Everyone up in arms is not upset that secrets were revealed; they are upset that the truth makes America look bad.

Well, sorry it takes a leak and a douchy sort of guy to make America rethink it's position as the totally incapable, laughable, and incompetent unilateral policeman of the world. If we had stuck to American jobs and trade, we wouldn't have just blown three trillion dollars on two bullshit wars that accomplished nothing except for putting Iran in prime position to run the region when we are economically incapable of projecting our influence there. We wouldn't be in deep shit because we no longer have a middle class and our living standards are dropping for the first time in our history.

The sort of hubris that led us to kill hundreds of thousands of muslims and spend trillions in response to an attack that cost us 3,000 lives and a few billion dollars (besides pussy fair weather patriots abandoning the stock market) is exactly the sort you can find in these cables. If they went back further, you'd find us saying "Hey, Saddam is better than Khomeini! Nuclear Pakistan is better than Marxist Afghanistan! The Shah is better than a sovereign Iran! Millions of dead Vietnamese are better than Marxist Vietnam! Pinochet is better than Socialist Allende!"

Our allies and the electorate need to know: there are no principles at work here. Just some people who have confused the word democracy with American Corporate Interests.

Let's discuss the CRIMES instead

[Steeltoe]

Don't be rude to people you don't know, even if you aren't face-to-face with them.

Maybe best to tell that to diplomats before they are bad mouthing other people behind their backs?

Anyways, I think that is beside the whole issue. The real issues are those instances where diplomats are ordered to get biometric data on leaders, crack their passwords and encryption mechanisms, search briefcases and offices. Stuff like that.

Btw, I tried fixing the moderators giving you -1 Troll all over the place yesterday. No mod points today, and don't have patience for metamod, but I respect your opinion, for the sake of discussion. I just think it's like selling your soul to a soulless entity. Call it a corporation, call it a country, doesn't matter, it makes you blind to the REAL issues here.

Of course, you have to do a little journalism, some work, to get to the bottom of these papers, some real investigation.

There is nothing anti-American going on here. It was just another poor security decision after 9/11, just like Afghanistan, just like Iraq, just like Patriot Act, just like etc, etc., OR these papers were deliberately opened for access to 3 million workers, and are not that important anyways.

Just don't say you were never warned. These cowboys (republicans) had lots of warnings, and ample time, before shooting themselves in the foot.

grudgonomics

[epine]

I think finding out that the king of one of your neighbors has asked the Big Devil, Source of All Evil, to assist them by removing your blossoming nuclear capability just MIGHT cause one to hold a grudge, don't you?

The Iranians are under no illusions about how their nuclear capability is perceived by neighbouring states, whether they read the telegrams in flagrante delicto or not. That being said, of course it's a useful propaganda tool to stir up the average Iranian citizen.

I don't think grudges are amenable to causality calculus. I think your point treads on institutional infantilism. Dang, the insecure table-pounding Iranian leadership is going to bite their soother in half over these harsh and unexpected words. If the leadership holds a grudge over this, they were shopping for grudges in the first place. For cripes sake, 48% of Quebec is seething to escape from totalitarian bondage.

Do we really need to tip toe around the obvious because the spin department of some aggrieved party is going to pull an infantile hissy fit, playing strictly for optics? Interesting how teenagers think of their parents as The Big Devil and how quickly the grudges are set aside at the first sign of trouble (unless mom is Livia Soprano and dad is worse).

On the Iranian front, we're in serious danger of the Peter principle here. Nuclear states will proliferate until some state bites off more than it can chew and warheads start to go missing. Like teenagers, every budding superpower thinks it can handle hard alcohol. America is not going to admit that these states can handle the responsibility, even if they could.

A perfect recipe for bravado and ambulances at midnight, as everyone in the Middle East justifiably fears.

Re:more is coming from wikileaks... and it good.

[Anonymous Coward]

> And how is a stronger China good for anyone other than the People's Republic of China?

How is a stronger USA good for anyone other than the USA?

Answer: it's not, but it's better for power to be spread around among several state actors than to be concentrated in the hands of a single one. That's why transferring power away from the USA to Russia, Brazil, China, and so on is a good thing. It isn't because China is "good", it's because no one should have too much all to themselves, like the USA has had recently.

Re:Transparency

[truthsearch]

Please tell why a diplomat's private communication to superiors about his assessment of Russia's leadership should be public knowledge?

My government's assessment and true opinion of Russia's leadership should be public knowledge. I can not be certain that I'm being represented fairly if I don't know what my representatives are thinking.

All about the balance

[dcposch]

Of course the gov't has a legitimate interest in keeping certain secrets, but at the same time, letting politicians do things without even telling voters about it--let alone taking responsibility--is always going to be abused.

I wish we took a middle route. For example, things could be classified, but with the requirement that they have to be reevaluated every year. Anything the gov't does should be public as soon as it's safe. Currently, it seems like the path of least resistance is to keep anything that's classified secret indefinitely, which is dangerous and wrong.

If classified docs were actually released in a timely way, the government could build trust--if we knew that foreign policy from five years ago was reasonable, then we could be more confident that whatever is happening in secret today is reasonable. As is, we just found out through Wikileaks that Hillary Clinton ordered the state department to spy on a bunch of European diplomats (steal credit card info, frequent flyer numbers, etc). Not long ago, Wikileaks gave us video of American helicopters machine-gunning a photographer in Baghdad; he had been working for Reuters, and some soldiers mistook his camera for "a weapon".

The sad reality: Wikileaks is a necessary institution. It is a blunt instrument, but it is the only effective check we currently have on a government that often hides wrongdoing from us in the name of national security.

Yeah, we don't need to know the truth

[SmallFurryCreature]

Gosh yeah, no need for the public to know that US ally Saudia Arabia is STILL financially supporting Al Queda while at the SAME time urging the US to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities. No need to know. No, let the Saudi's play both sides while keeping the masses uninformed.

But we all "knew" this? Yes, but "we" "knew" so many things. Rumors are one thing, facts are another. NOW it is PROVEN and can therefor no longer be denied. Perhaps THIS time when shady deals with Arab nations are made again, this little bit of FACT will force US senators to be a bit more critical.

The US has a VERY long history of a two or even three-faced foreign policy. Claiming to be pro-democracy yet propping up dictarorships of the worsed kind around the globe. Speaking nice about allies like Holland yet having senate approved invasion plans for allied nations. These documents show what America truly thinks. But we don't need to know. No. We need to be kept in the dark, our masters know best and we should obey blindly.

Re:Yeah, we don't need to know the truth

[lennier]

Speaking nice about allies like Holland yet having senate approved invasion plans for allied nations.

To be fair, WW2 military history - say, the Maginot Line - does show that if you want one country in Europe to be secure against invasion from any other, you have account for your allies themselves getting subverted or invaded. Just because they're your allies now doesn't mean they always will be. That's just sound military planning and one would expect all nations to have plans like that.

Re:Yeah, we don't need to know the truth

[dbIII]

Gosh yeah, no need for the public to know that US ally Saudia Arabia is STILL financially supporting Al Queda while at the SAME time urging the US to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities. No need to know. No, let the Saudi's play both sides

There are many sides although of course manipulative bastards like to attempt to link Al Queda and Iran in our minds. Some bastards in politics even tried to pretend that hunter gatherers in a remote part of Ecuador were linked to Al Queda to justify violent measures.

Re: Don't Ask Don't Tell Should Have Kicked In

[InsurrctionConsltant]

Dear God.

Is... is this a joke? A Gay leaked the files, therefore Gays should be banned from the military? Seriously? This is modded +5?

What is wrong with people. I am fucking sickened.

Re: Don't Ask Don't Tell Should Have Kicked In

[thesandtiger]

Why is arguing against homosexuals being able to openly serve their country so important to you?

I mean, I know a lot of people who are kinda icked out by gay folks, but none of them go to any kind of effort to search out documentation to back up their being icked out or anything; it just isn't THAT important to them. In fact, most of the ones who I know who would preface things like "well, it kinda icks me out" or anything like that are actually in favor of same-sex marriages and repealing don't ask don't tell because they don't really think that would hurt them in any way.

So when I run across someone who seems to really be up in arms about it, I have to ask: why is it important to you?

Full disclosure for me: I work in a major university doing social psychology research and behavioral interventions aimed at reducing sexual risk-taking behavior amongst primarily LGBTQ youth; one of the key things we've found is that LGBTQ youth who are in environments that are less stigmatizing of their orientation and identity tend to behave in ways that are much less risky; I want the kids to play safe, so for me, actively trying to make the world more accepting will help accomplish this. What's your story?

The leak could also start a war.

[Oxford_Comma_Lover]

> People who are abusing their powers will suffer. People who do dirty deeds and want clean hands will suffer. People who believe that their position protects them from personal responsibility will suffer.

And war could start in Korea, as China's position to us (that they are ready to support reunification) could make the dictator over their upset in a way which undermines China's negotiating power with Korea at a time when that power could prevent a shooting war. For example.

I wonder if some of these touchier releases come from having Harold Koh as legal counsel to State, or whether he wrote his note refusing to identify specific areas that could cost lives under protest.

What happened to Freedoms of Speach and Press?

[OldHawk777]

Does the public (A PERSON) have the right to know when: Stupidity rules decision making, Security (TS/SBI+) is used to hide wrong-doing and criminal activity, and/or death, destruction, and economic collapses have far more private-interest, than national security. Wikileaks tells US, EU, RU, CN, Arab and Persian citizens/people how totally fycked-up are their governments.

Wikileaks says that folks are good and gullible around the world, and leaders globally should be held accountable for their actions.

Wikileaks should be protected by The USA Constitution as a great source of truth, because the US and global press/news is totally pwned by dogmatic irrational plutocrats.

Save Wikileaks in the interest of all humanity and integrity in governments, religions, militaries....

Looks Like A False Flag Operation...

[littlewink]

managed by U.S. intelligence. Nothing truly significant has been released with the exception of information boosting the U.S. viewpoint and some interesting perspective on Chinese-N. Korean diplomacy.

One of the strongest indicators that it's a false flag operation is that Assange and WikiLeaks are still alive and kicking. Had he crossed U.S. intelligence, he'd have disappeared by now.

Wrong plans

[SmallFurryCreature]

These invasion plans, approved by the senate, are specific for Holland because it holds the international supreme court. If ever an American is put on trial for war-crimes, the US will invade an allied friendly nation with full military force.

That says a LOT about the US of A.