Just KILL the MESSENGER, right, MSM!?
"Soldier in video leak case faces more charges; Military alleges he downloaded classified cables" by Steven Lee Myers, New York Times | July 7, 2010
BAGHDAD — An American soldier in Iraq who was arrested on charges of leaking a video of a deadly US helicopter attack here in 2007 has also been charged with downloading more than 150,000 highly classified diplomatic cables that could, if made public, reveal the inner workings of US embassies, military officials said yesterday.
And thus expose CIA agents, right?
The full contents of the cables remain unclear, but according to formal charges filed Monday, it appeared that Private Bradley E. Manning, 22, a soldier working at a remote base east of Baghdad, had gathered some of the most guarded, if not always scandalous, secrets of US diplomacy....
With the charges, a case that stemmed from the furor over a graphic and fiercely contested video of an attack from a US helicopter that killed 12 people, including a reporter and a driver for Reuters, mushroomed into a far more extensive and potentially embarrassing leak.
Oh, THAT is why he is getting charged.
Related: Occupation Iraq: Boston Globe Rewind
The charges cited only one cable by name, “Reykjavik 13,’’ which appeared to be one made public by Wikileaks.org, a whistle-blowing website devoted to disclosing the secrets of governments and corporations. The website decoded and in April made public an edited version of the helicopter attack in a film it called “Collateral Murder.’’
In the cable, dated Jan. 13, the US deputy chief of mission, Sam Watson, detailed private discussions he held with Iceland’s leaders over a referendum on whether to repay losses from a bank failure, including a frank assessment that Iceland could default in 2011. (The referendum failed, but negotiations continue.)
Also see: The World's Free Speech Sanctuary
Although hardly sensational in tone, the cable reveals a complaint over the “alleged use of Icelandic airspace by CIA-operated planes’’ by the Icelandic ambassador to the United States, Albert Jonsson, who is described as “prickly but pragmatic.’’ Such are the sorts of assessments that diplomats go to great lengths to keep private.
Especially since it involved RENDITIONS and TORTURE!!!!
WikiLeaks has not acknowledged receiving the cables or video from the soldier, Manning, who worked as an analyst and whose case has been the subject of vigorous debate between defenders and critics. Manning, who served with the Second Brigade of the 10th Mountain Division, based at Contingency Operating Station Hammer, was arrested in May and transferred to a military detention center in Kuwait after military authorities said he had revealed his activities in online chats with a former computer hacker, who turned him in to the authorities.
Manning now faces an Article 32 investigation, the military’s equivalent of a civilian grand jury, into charges that he mishandled classified information “with reason to believe the information could cause injury to the United States.’’
That investigation could lead to administrative punishments or more likely, given the gravity of the charges, a court-martial.
Officially he has been charged with four counts of violating Article 92 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice for disobeying an order or regulation and eight counts of violating Article 134, a general charge for misconduct, which in this case involved breaking federal laws against disclosing classified information.
Related: Obama Defends Dick Cheney
'nuff said, 'eh, readers?
But they are charging the kid for this?
The formal charges suggested an extensive effort by military investigators to scour the official and personal computers he used, in order to trace the recipients....
Because the investigation continues, military officials here would not elaborate on the case against Manning, or on his alleged motives. The US Embassy did not respond to a query. One senior commander speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the investigation, said, “It appeared he had an agenda.’’
Just like the government and their agenda-pushing newspapers.
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POTOMAC, Md. — With his custom-made “humanist’’ dog tags and distrust of authority, Bradley E. Manning was no conventional soldier.
Ostracized by peers in Baghdad, busted for assaulting a fellow soldier, and disdainful of the military’s alleged inattention to computer security, the 22-year-old intelligence analyst styled himself a “hactivist.’’
Yesterday, the Army charged him with multiple counts of mishandling and leaking classified data and putting national security at risk.
Manning had already been suspected of leaking a classified video that shows a group of men walking down the street in Iraq before being repeatedly shot by Apache helicopters.
In a series of online chats in late May with a fellow computer enthusiast, Manning said he had leaked a staggering 260,000 classified diplomatic reports, along with secret video of US service members killing civilians, to the whistle-blower website Wikileaks.org.
Whether or not Manning was the source, Wikileaks posted in April video clips shot from a cockpit in 2007 of excited, laughing US troops gunning down a group of men.
We call that "liberation" over here, and I suppose it is.
They have been "liberated" from their lives and families.
It was later learned that the group included a Reuters news photographer and his driver. An internal military investigation concluded the troops acted appropriately, despite having mistaken camera equipment for weapons.
Any other conclusion would lead down a war criminal road the AmeriKan military does not want to go.
You see, when we DEFEND ISRAEL we are ALSO DEFENDING OURSELVES, AmeriKa!!!!!
The case has drawn comparisons to Daniel Ellsberg’s leak 40 years ago of the Pentagon Papers, a top-secret history of the Vietnam War.
Yeah, EXCEPT the New York Times and Washington Post MISSED THIS ONE!!
It was left to WIKILEAKS this time!
There can be NO GREATER ILLUSTRATION of AmeriKa's MSM failure than THAT!!
Remember, America, the SAME PAPERS ALSO LIED YOU INTO WARS in the FIRST PLACE!
And it has bolstered perceptions that the Obama administration, despite a stated policy of open government, is as determined as its predecessors to keep secrets.
Some CHANGE, 'eh, America?
Manning’s online confidant, former outlaw computer hacker R. Adrian Lamo, reported their chats to US authorities in late May, partly out of concern, he says, that national security was at stake.
Manning’s military defense attorney, Captain Paul R. Bouchard, did not return calls and e-mails. The Army said a military version of a grand jury hearing will determine whether Manning should face a trial by court-martial.
Manning is a slight, boyish-looking 22-year-old from Crescent, Okla., population 1,400. His Facebook page shows him smiling, with stylish, upswept hair.
Growing up in a house he shared with his parents and older sister, Manning had a sharp intellect and an interest in science, history, and computers, said Jordan Davis, a boyhood pal. He said Manning also was determined at a young age to join the Army.
Manning’s family members declined interview requests.
Davis said Manning trained in Arizona, where he learned how to compile intelligence reports. Such reports help the military determine changes in enemy capabilities, vulnerabilities, and probable courses of action.
According to partial chat logs Lamo shared first with Wired.com, Manning started communicating with Lamo on May 21, a couple of weeks after he was reduced in rank from specialist to private first class for assaulting another soldier.
According to the chat logs, Manning’s turning point came when he watched Iraqi police detain 15 people for printing anti-Iraqi literature that turned out to be a scholarly critique of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.
“After that . . . I saw things differently,’’ he wrote. “I was actively involved in something that I was completely against.’’
Manning wrote he had copied onto CDs “possibly the largest data spillage in American history’’ while listening and lip-synching to Lady Gaga’s “Telephone.’’
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The thing was already on the way down when he got there.
Also see: Gates orders top military officers to get clearance for interviews
Oh, because of the McChrystal flap?
