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Bin Laden Raid Member To Be WikiLeaks Witness

Posted by samzenpus on from the surprise-witness dept.

the simurgh writes in with the latest in the court-martial of Bradley Manning. "A military judge cleared the way Wednesday for a member of the team that raided Osama bin Laden's compound to testify at the trial of Pfc. Bradley Manning charged in the WikiLeaks massive classified document leak. Col. Denise Lind ruled for the prosecution during a court-martial pretrial hearing. Prosecutors say the witness, presumably a Navy SEAL, collected digital evidence showing that the al-Qaida leader requested and received from an associate some of the documents Manning has acknowledged leaking. Defense attorneys had argued that proof of receipt wasn't relevant to whether Manning aided the enemy, the most serious charge he faces, punishable by life imprisonment. 'The government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the intelligence is given to and received by the enemy,' Lind said. The judge disagreed."

7 of 212 comments (clear)

  1. Surveillance by drinkydoh · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The mass surveillance and mass interception that is occurring to all of us now who use the internet is also a mass transfer of power from individuals into extremely sophisticated state and private intelligence organizations and their cronies like Google. The Pentagon is maintaining a line that WikiLeaks inherently, as an institution that tells military and government whistleblowers to step forward with information, is a crime. They allege we are criminal, moving forward. Now, the new interpretation of the Espionage Act that the Pentagon is trying to hammer in to the legal system, and which the Department of Justice is complicit in, would mean the end of national security journalism in the United States.

    1. Re:Surveillance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Americans, you've got nobody to blame but yourselves.

      No, there is a bit more to it than that.

      Rigged elections, for one.

      The average person doesn't have the power to stop this machine even if
      he or she were perfectly willing to sacrifice his or her life. And frankly, since
      most of the people who live in the US are pieces of shit, why should anyone
      even care. I am an American and I am disgusted by most Americans and their
      selfishness and idiocy. The show will go on, and no one will stop it.

      Here's the REAL bottom line : the world is changing, and no civilized country
      will in reality offer significantly better government or living conditions for
      a middle class person than the US does. The whole world is a cesspool now,
      so you may as well get used to the smell.

    2. Re:Surveillance by feynmanfan1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Also see Jane Harman, U.S. congresswoman, who was taped making a deal with the Israel lobby to influence the "Justice" department on the Lawrence Franklin espionage case. Franklin was found guilty of passing top secret classified documents about U.S. policy on Iran to Israel and sentenced to over 12 years in prison. His sentence was later reduced to only 10 months house arrest. Bradley Manning on the other hand is only accused of handing over secret documents, no top secret ones, to wikileaks and yet is facing far more severe punishment and his motives are arguably to expose illegal acts rather than to aid a foreign power. A clear example of double standards in the U.S. "justice" system.

  2. Re:Smart by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    That makes it a crime

    Covering up war crimes is or should be a much bigger crime.

    Just wait for the veterans to come along and tell us (like they usually do in this discussion), that as a soldier you swear to uphold the constitution, not support cover-ups, that you pledge allegiance to the country, not to the general or even president, and even that you salute the uniform of your superior, not the person wearing it.

    Your suggestions that war crimes should be reported to the people trying to cover up said war crimes and not to anyone else is plain and simple support for covering up war crimes.

  3. Reminds one of the show trials in the USSR by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_Trials

  4. Re:Smart by Sparticus789 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Show me, with citation, what war crimes were committed that were revealed through the Bradley Manning document dump.

    --
    sudo make me a sandwich
  5. Re:Bradley Manning's innocent by moeinvt · · Score: 5, Interesting

    BS.
    His conversations with that douchebag LAME-O were mainly a discussion about his personal moral dilemma. He wasn't bragging about his "hacking skills" one bit. He had access to the information so there was no technical prowess required.
    He recently made a statement in court (which of course the government didn't want the public to hear) that was surreptitiously recorded. You should listen to it.