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Bradley Manning Sentenced To 35 Years
An anonymous reader writes with bad, but not unexpected news: "The U.S. soldier convicted of handing a trove of secret government documents to anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks has been sentenced to 35 years in prison. Pte First Class Bradley Manning, 25, was convicted in July of 20 charges against him, including espionage. Last week, he apologized for hurting the U.S. and for 'the unexpected results' of his actions. He will receive credit for three and a half years, but be dishonorably discharged from the U.S. Army."
Read this speech by Chomsky, it is very informative and depressing.
IIRC Wikileaks was initially releasing the documents a bit at a time, working with journalists to, among other things, redact anything that might put anyone in danger. It was only when the US government started attacking Wikileaks on every available front (forcing CC processor to stop taking donation, getting Assange extradited etc.) that the entire thing was made public.
I suspect that if the US government had accepted the leak as fait accompli and honestly tried to work with Wikileaks to redact information that could cause actual harm to informants etc. they could have significantly limited the damage. None of this would have prevented them from prosecuting Manning, btw.
But no, instead of trying to ensure that reporters of leaks (Wikileaks included) acted responsibly, the US government decided that those reporting on leaks were criminals themselves. That is complete nonsense and a dangerous attack on western democracy.
I'm unsure if Manning deserves to spend time in prison for his actions. I am sure that the US government has done things in response to Manning's actions that are way worse.
Yes, bribery of foreign officials is an offence under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Bribery of American officials is not illegal.
Manning didn't release over 10,000 documents. He handed them over to established news organizations who then WORKED WITH THE GOVERNMENT TO DETERMINE WHICH DOCUMENTS SHOULD NOT BE RELEASED.
Convenient how people overlook that very important piece of information, isn't it?