The Russians call it Kompromat – the use by the state of sexual accusations to destroy a public figure. When I was attacked in this way by the government I worked for, Uzbek dissidents smiled at me, shook their heads and said “Kompromat“. They were used to it from the Soviet and Uzbek governments. They found it rather amusing to find that Western governments did it too.
Well, Julian Assange has been getting the bog standard Kompromat. I had imagined he would get something rather more spectacular, like being framed for murder and found hanging with an orange in his mouth. He deserves a better class of kompromat. If I am a whistleblower, then Julian is a veritable mighty pipe organ. Yet we just have the normal sex stuff, and very weak.
Bizarrely the offence for which Julian is wanted for questioning in Sweden was dropped from rape to sexual harassment, and then from sexual harassment to just harassment. The precise law in Swedish, as translated for me and other Sam Adams alumni by our colleague Major Frank Grevil, reads:
“He who lays hands on or by means of shooting from a firearm, throwing of stones, noise or in any other way harasses another person will be sentenced for harassment to fines or imprisonment for up to one year.”
So from rape to non-sexual something. Actually I rather like that law – if we had it here, I could have had Jack Straw locked up for a year.
Julian tells us that the first woman accuser and prime mover had worked in the Swedish Embassy in Washington DC and had been expelled from Cuba for anti-Cuban government activity, as well as the rather different persona of being a feminist lesbian who owns lesbian night clubs.
Scott Ritter and I are well known whistleblowers subsequently accused of sexual offences. A less well known whistleblower is James Cameron, another FCO employee. Almost simultaneous with my case, a number of the sexual allegations the FCO made against Cameron were identical even in wording to those the FCO initially threw at me.
Another fascinating point about kompromat is that being cleared of the allegations – as happens in virtually every case – doesn’t help, as the blackening of reputation has taken effect. In my own case I was formerly cleared of all allegations of both misconduct and gross misconduct, except for the Kafkaesque charge of having told defence witnesses of the existence of the allegations. The allegations were officially a state secret, even though it was the government who leaked them to the tabloids.
Yet, even to this day, the FCO has refused to acknowledge in public that I was in fact cleared of all charges. This is even true of the new government. A letter I wrote for my MP to pass to William Hague, complaining that the FCO was obscuring the fact that I was cleared on all charges, received a reply from a junior Conservative minister stating that the allegations were serious and had needed to be properly investigated – but still failing to acknowledge the result of the process. Nor has there been any official revelation of who originated these “serious allegations”.
Governments operate in the blackest of ways, especially when it comes to big war money and big oil money. I can see what they are doing to Julian Assange, I know what they did to me and others (another recent example – Brigadier Janis Karpinski was framed for shoplifting). In a very real sense, it makes little difference if they murdered David Kelly or terrified him into doing it himself. Telling the truth is hazardous in today’s Western political system.
KingofWelshNoir,
Re: “Instead of reading Voodoo Histories, why not read the words of John Farmer the senior counsel to the 9/11 Commission who claimed that what the public and media were told by military and government officials ‘was almost entirely, and inexplicably, untrue.'”
My dear fellow, you are too naive by half. I tried introducing John Farmer’s book in evidence on Craig’s 9/11 thread a couple of times but was mercilessly trashed.
Voodoo is all that most people here believe. And if they don’t, and have the temerity to show it, disciplinary action by Commissar Clark or others follows with speed. That’s my experience, anyhow.
Take my advice, believe that the Towers fell down, as Craig says, because the steelwork wasn’t bolted together properly.
If anybody wants to drag 9/11 stuff up yet again, there is a whole thread for it. If anybody wishes to quote Craig Murray on the subject, I suggest they include his request to keep it there.
KingofWelshNoir: if John Farmer trashed his own report as lies, it follows that we can’t trust what he says about it. Therefore the official 9/11 report should be accepted.
Alfred,
that article was by Tom Burghardt and first appeared at antifascist-calling.blogspot.com . However, it is based on four documents, two of which (I think) were first published at WikiLeaks; you will find the documentation and sources there.
You certainly weren’t “mercilessly trashed” by ME for citing Farmer on the 9/11 thread – I consider it relevant evidence. I’m very much an ‘undecided’ on 9/11, though I do acknowledge that buildings can fall down, and I regard that exclusive focus as a distraction from matters that can be argued more effectively, such as the excellent post at September 8, 2010 2:33 PM.
And this encapsulates my problem with your argument technique. By constantly picking highly extreme starting points, you divert attention AWAY from easily demonstrated and incontrovertible matters that would be more productive.
Abe Rene,
check your logic. Just because a liar lies does not mean he’s stated the truth!
David Aaronovitch’s “Voodoo Histories” is not a compelling book. A columnist for the Times his crudentials[sic] are already tainted. Scepticism always cuts both ways. I refer to the debunking before formulating any ideas. David Aaronovitch reminds me of tomk’s caustic rationality trying hard to find better sourced and a more reliable evidence only to end up with simulated models unable to reflect the real world, let down by scholarly strings that fail to impress and make reading a difficult process.
“You certainly weren’t “mercilessly trashed” by ME for citing Farmer on the 9/11 thread”
Not by you, but Tomk, who takes up about half the space on the 9/11 thread, told me, among other things, that John Farmer was “pulling turds out of his pants.”
And Clark, I’, not too interested in the “easily demonstrated and incontrovertible matters”. In this duscussion I am interested in the hazard that a phoney leaks site would pose for genuine, conscientious leakers of state secrets. What you seem unable to grasp is that if a leaker trusts a fraudulent intermediary, they may get fitted up in a sports bag. You, Suhayl, and some anonymous wimp won’t address those arguemnts.
I agree with you empirical approach to Wikileaks. Lets ‘s see what they’ve published . Is it important? Does it serve to minimize the risk of war, Assange’s avowed objective. I don’t think so. But you don’t appear inclined consider the evidence in that light.
Just like a bad smell, the same old arguments are trodden out.
There are inexplicable facts not accounted for and they all have to do with the administration/agencies and their reaction/non reaction to these facts surrounding the preps for this action.
Too much was known in advance about the high jackers to make out that it had hit America in surprise, thats a lot of BS.
I’m not quiet clear who helped whom at what time, but somebody in a hundred years will figure it all out and puts a time line to it.
My suspicion is, after what I read and researched for my dissertation, that people knew for quiet a while what was to happen, ignored the signs for it and let it happen for their own reasons and interests.
How far back this was planned is anybodies guess, but the Bojinka plot was known of since the early 1990’s.
So at least they could not say that they did not see this one coming.
Clark: logical diversions aside, it is not the person who is a self-proclaimed liar by implication, but other people, the elected representatives, who are telling the truth about who was responsible for 9/11.
“I am interested in the hazard that a phoney leaks site would pose for genuine, conscientious leakers of state secrets.”
Albert, you may have a point, but
If someone leaked something important to Wikileaks, and it was censored or withheld by them for no good reason, or some other use was made of it, surely that would immediately discredit Wikileaks and make them useless to whistleblowers from then on?
I don’t know how the US authorities cottoned on to Bradley Manning, but it was my understanding that it was possible for people to send Wikileaks stuff anonymously so that not even *they* could name the whistleblower — which appears to make them safer for people to use than, say, going public by contacting a newspaper.
You might say that anyone can send something anonymously to a newspaper or TV channel, but who’s going to decrypt it? I understood from an interview with Assange on TED talks, that this is what they need money for – to employ experts to decrypt and verify where possible.
I said originally that I’m 50/50 as to whether Assange is legitimate or not. I remain that way for now.
Abe,
Dublin went all sushi and skinny latte during the Celtic Tiger. Nobody talks about soda bread, it’s not ‘fashionable’ doncha know.
Omigod, I did it again. Alfred, sorry. I don’t even know an Albert!
Dreoilin: Dublin sounds interesting. What are the Chinese restaurants like (is there a Chinatown?)
Ps. Same Q about Indian restaurants.
Police raid PRQ, host to Wikileaks and Pirate Bay
http://members5.boardhost.com/medialens/msg/1283967849.html
“I am interested in the hazard that a phoney leaks site would pose for genuine, conscientious leakers of state secrets.”
This is a far cry from the “the weak will go to the wall, that’s just the way nature works” exponent of earlier threads.
Lots of Chinese and Indian restaurants, Abe, from excellent-sit-down to takeaway-mundane. No Chinese Quarter as yet but in recent years there has been a Chinese New Year celebration/carnival.
I was kidding about the soda bread, but most people tend to buy it in the shops now, instead of making it at home.
Dreoilin:
Thanks for the correction. I do sometimes respond to the name Albert, but with at least a slight sense of resentment. The name makes me think of dowdy old Queen Victoria and her mate.
Re: “If someone leaked something important to Wikileaks, and it was censored or withheld by them for no good reason, or some other use was made of it, surely that would immediately discredit Wikileaks and make them useless to whistleblowers from then on?”
Not necessarily. I know nothing about the intelligence racket, but it is supposed to be a dirty game. C.S. Lewis’s “That Hideous Strength” published in 1945 brilliantly, it seems to me, imagined the modern world in which nothing happens by chance, the media are controlled by the same group, politicians are concerned not with politics but only power (Tony Blair, for example) and the people understand essentially nothing.
In the world as imagined by Lewis, a leak to a leak trap would result in the prompt dispatch of the leaker. His message would never be heard, as he would never be heard from again. That is why I think Clark’s view of Wikileaks is fundamentally irresponsible. One may acknowledge that Julian Assange may be the finest fellow in the World, and still recognize that he may not be, and that he may, in fact, represent a grave danger to anyone who engages with him in the capacity of a leaker.
Re: “I don’t know how the US authorities cottoned on to Bradley Manning, but it was my understanding that it was possible for people to send Wikileaks stuff anonymously so that not even *they* could name the whistleblower — which appears to make them safer for people to use than, say, going public by contacting a newspaper.”
First, Bradley Manning apparently boasted of his responsibility for the leaks and was shopped by a pseudo-journalist in whom he confided.
Manning, incidentally, as indicated in links I posted a few meters above, is probably schizophrenic. He may well, therefore, have been considered an ideal channel for a fake leak, i.e., the dissemination of “evidence” to justify continuation and extension of the War on Terror — as I have discussed above. Although only a very junior officer, he was apparently given access to vast amounts of classified data and videotape. Given his delusional state, he might easily have been induced to believe that he was under a moral compulsion to leak this material. He may also have been easily manipulated into giving himself away. In that way, two objectives would have been achieved. First, the propaganda goes out as an “anti-war leak”, and second “proof” of the validity of the leak is provided by the arrest and conviction of the leaker, a person in a position to access the secret data.
Second, Wikileaks secure upload facility may not be secure in the least (a) if Wikileaks is a trap for leakers, and (b) if the secure facility is badly engineered, as was apparently the case. I linked to a story on this above, but cannot find it off hand. Among other things, they could not be bothered to update their security certificate which provides users assurance that they are using a secure link.
Third, a point I have made several times is that it should not be very difficult to leak data without being traced.
Being a non-network person, my idea was a bit crude, i.e., to steal a laptop and a credit card, drive around town to find an unencrypted wireless web link, register the domain name ANTIWARLEAKS.com open an account with an ISP, upload my leak to the ANTIWARLEAKS.com FTP server, email the news media and alternative news sites of the leak, then get out of town, wiping the laptop and credit card for prints before ditching them where they are unlikely to be found.
This may not be a good method, and my outline of it should not be taken by anyone as an incitement to crime. But it seems to me it’s a method that would work, and could therefore be much safer than dealing with an intermediary of dubious integrity.
And if you are considering a career as a leaker, you’d do well to think about you method a lot more than I have.
“You might say that anyone can send something anonymously to a newspaper or TV channel, but who’s going to decrypt it?:
Using my method, no one has to decrypt anything, unless the leaker is leaking encrypted data, in which case he doesn’t know what he is leaking and deserves to be sent to jail!
Re: “I understood from an interview with Assange on TED talks, that this is what they need money for – to employ experts to decrypt and verify where possible.”
Sounds like a cock and bull story to me. If I am a responsible person conscientiously leaking state secrets, the last thing I want is some third party second guessing my leaked data and editing it. What the hell does Assange know about my branch of, I dunno, nuclear warhead storage or movement in the US or UK, for example.
I wonder what’s happened to Craig. Must be over a week.
ingo,
Too much *was* known and that’s the rub, even without the science, the dark corners are illuminated by a few.
In the UK assisted by scale and a past microcosm of paramilitary force of arms and political persuasion, we have begun to grasp how and why the secret services infiltrate extremist groups.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2005/sep/04/uk.Whitehall
We know information gathered is shared with other agencies and in doing so there is a problem; information can and IS exploited to further a main cause deemed to be crucial to a collective interest that is also judged to be central to OUR well being, OUR status and OUR medium and long term objectives.
That official collective consciousness may suit the masses struggling to fulfil their daily lives against insurmountable odds, but to some of us, it is not British and is judged mistaken, counter-productive and simply wrong from our experience of resulting deaths and destruction. It is selfish and deceitful and calls on a duty to expose, by questioning the facts, publishing the evidence and educating our children that ‘official’ is not necessary authenticated, proper, real or true.
This then is the raison d’etre to question the obvious or not so obvious and why the main media tabloids are relegated as food only to fulfil our insatiable appetite for the bizarre and scandalous. The web and wiki have become our tools to prise open closed doors while blogs and commentaries are our playgrounds to catalyse our scrutiny and hone our research.
Alfred: I read ‘That hideous strength’ as part of the sci-fi trilogy of C.S. Lewis many years ago, with ‘Out of the silent planet’, and ‘Perelendra’. There’s a good wiki article on it. I’m surprised Folio haven’t done a fine edition of the trilogy (mine was a paperback with a green woman on the cover). Or perhaps they did, before my time and you know about it?
Abe:
“mine was a paperback with a green woman on the cover”
My copy of THS is paperback too (Pan Books, 1955): with a red and black abstract monster on the cover. Curiously, my copy says that it completes the trilogy of which “Out of the silent planet” and “Voyage to Venus” not “Perelendra” were the first two members.
Oh, I see, Wiki refers to “Perelandra” (a.k.a. Voyage to Venus). I’ll look out for that and the green woman.
Thanks for the info.
“The name makes me think of dowdy old Queen Victoria and her mate.”
I realised that I do know an Albert but he’s more of an ‘Albayr’, as he’s French. 🙂
“a leak to a leak trap would result in the prompt dispatch of the leaker”
In that version, nothing could be sent to Wikileaks anonymously, then. Wikispooks has a Secure Anonymous Upload page (but I don’t know how secure that is either)
https://wikispooks.com/anon/anon-ul.html
“Among other things, they could not be bothered to update their security certificate which provides users assurance that they are using a secure link.”
Well that’s sloppy — if it’s true.
“to steal a laptop and a credit card, drive around town …”
(Whereupon you’re going to involve the innocent owner of the credit card … and maybe the laptop even if you dump it.) It would probably be simpler to send a USB storage device in the post.
“Using my method, no one has to decrypt anything, unless the leaker is leaking encrypted data, in which case he doesn’t know what he is leaking and deserves to be sent to jail!”
But the Iraq murder video was encrypted — and had to be decrypted by Wikileaks? (Ok, so that’s what Wikileaks is saying.) The leaker would surely know what it contained, as such a thing would be categorised or listed or labelled somehow. Otherwise, why send it.
“If I am a responsible person conscientiously leaking state secrets, the last thing I want is some third party second guessing my leaked data and editing it.”
No, but I didn’t say “edit”, Alfred.
Anyway, I won’t continue with the discussion, as I genuinely have an open mind on all of this and I do recognise the risks.
Assange has a strange manner … rather ‘hard’ IMO. He comes across as slightly arrogant to me. But time will tell.
I see the blog has slipped over the edge of the world again. Welcome, then, to limbo!
But even in limbo, the watchers continue their vigil, silent unless something falls within their remit… they are with us, day and night, wherever we are, every step of the way through the humasphere. If you listen carefully, you might hear them breathing, you might even be able to pick out their footsteps. The minimal-effort generators, moulding, sculpting, applying pressure at specific points. They are professionals, they are intelligent. They are the watchers. Are you one?
The Twilit Zone, 1960
Hello, can you hear me, Mother ?
WoooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO ???
Stop shouting and give me back my invisible ink.
Alfred,
I am fully capable of understanding your “argument” – but it doesn’t become an *argument* in my book until you provide some *evidence*. That was my point about the invisible fairies at the bottom of my garden that you can’t disprove. It’s not your responsibility to disprove it, you can’t, it’s impossible because they’re invisible. It is my responsibility to prove it, or to at least provide a bit of evidence.
I assume that as a biologist, you accept this reasoning as regards creation vs. evolution. You can’t *disprove* creation. Any discrepancy in creation “theory” can be explained as an act of the creator. however, you can provide masses of mutually supportive evidence for evolution. It is the fact of evolution’s survival, despite how vulnerable it is to contradictory evidence, that makes it so convincing.
So until you provide a bit of evidence against WikiLeaks, your assertion has the same status as a smear.
And quite a nasty smear it is, too, since you keep suggesting that this is what happened to Gareth Williams. But I can argue just as convincingly that Gareth Williams was killed by the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Dreoilin,
yes, the Baghdad helicopter video arrived at WikiLeaks encrypted, as did the Granai massacre video. I believe that WikiLeaks appealed for time on a supercomputer to do the decryption, and presumably got it.
It may be appropriate, at this juncture in this discussion, to complement the words of Criswell that I cited before, with the ones that he reads aloud so well at the beginning of Plan 9 (note the movement of the eyes):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmWq9rr57BA
Clerk,
Very often there isn’t evidence so one has to rely on logic. To me, somebody who has had first hand experience of the intelligence services and knows of the scale of UK government corruption, I believe WikiLeaks has become a CIA/MI6 honey trap.
How very curious… the NTL connection I have at home has declared the CM site to be down all day. Every other site worked just fine. But my backup BT “Internets” connection here returned the CM site without a hitch, and it doesn’t look as if it’s been down at all – post timestamps showing every hour throughout the day.
Will respond to anything pertinent once I’ve worked through the backlog…