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Bradley Manning Convicted of Espionage, Acquitted of 'Aiding the Enemy'
crashcy sends word that a verdict has been handed down in the case of Bradley Manning. Quoting:
"A military judge on Tuesday found Pfc. Bradley Manning not guilty of aiding the enemy, but convicted him of multiple counts of violating the Espionage Act. Private Manning had already confessed to being WikiLeaks’ source for a huge cache of government documents, which included videos of airstrikes in which civilians were killed, hundreds of thousands of front-line incident reports from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, dossiers on men being held without trial at the Guantánamo Bay prison, and about 250,000 diplomatic cables. But while Private Manning had pleaded guilty to a lesser version of the charges he was facing, which could expose him to up to 20 years in prison, the government decided to press forward with a trial on a more serious version of the charges, including 'aiding the enemy' and violations of the Espionage Act. Beyond the fate of Private Manning as an individual, the 'aiding the enemy' charge — unprecedented in a leak case — could have significant long-term ramifications for investigative journalism in the Internet era."
NSA wasn't Manning. NSA was Snowden. Manning released diplomatic cables to wikileaks.
Breaking down the verdict by charge, plea and ruling: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/national/manning-verdict/
Only in the vaguest sense? Manning was a soldier, Snowden a civilian. Manning leaked a huge swath of cables regardless of content. Snowden leaked details on a program he thought was abusive. The government involved is the same, but the "system" Snowden would face would be a standard civilian jury. Manning stood in front of a military tribunal without a jury of his peers.
You haven't reviewed any of the material, have you.
You probably haven't even looked at the video they deliberately mislabeled "collateral murder". (which, by the way, is almost certainly clearer for you on your computer than the pilot had on their little 4" screen in the apache)
When that video came out I contacted a guy I know who happens to be an Apache pilot (but who wasn't in Iraq at that time). He quickly pointed out that it was missing a bunch of context because at that time the insurgents had been trying to score an apache kill, so the army was holding apaches back unless there was confirmed need for them (i.e. the ground troops were already engaged with the enemy). So the BS story that there weren't any insurgents around doesn't fly. And for the reporter whose died because his lens looked like an RPG, and he moved like a guy carrying an RPG, he agreeed that it's unfortunate but said with knowledge of what was happening and what the screen showed, he'd have pulled the trigger too.
The American people did vote. They voted for a candidate that explicitly promised the closing of Guantanamo and an end to an unjust war.
Don't forget he also promised to protect whistleblowers.