Just arrived in Ghana after a journey complicated by the snow in the UK. A few meetings this morning, then some thoughts on Wikileaks, Chilcot and the so called complicity in torture inquiry to come.
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Angrysoba, this isn’t going to “cripple diplomacy”. It’s a one-off leak, better security procedures will be established; two and a half million people had (have?) access to this stuff. What it will do is make lots of people more cautious, which may be a good thing.
It’s also shown up who is pro censorship, pro assassination, contemptuous of the rule of law, etc.
And it’s not just any country, it’s the US. With its wars, rendition, dodgy deals and alliances, any break in US secrecy that disrupts US spin is bound to be popular.
Glenn,
Thanks for the run down on what Wikileaks has taught us!
Angry
Re: ” If Assange is guilty then why not the NYT, the Guardian and Der Spiegel?
…According to Assange, the Pentagon has been trying to build a case for saying Assange is guilty of espionage but they have been unable to do so yet.”
Well here’s something one of the lawyers, Larry or Courtenay Barnett might help us with.
However, beside things like Britain’s Official Secrets Act, which would surely cover those passing secrets on to the public as well as those purloinging them, there are general laws against sedition, etc. which must be applicable if national harm has been done, as many allege. Therefore, part of the argument for Wikileaks being some kind of exercise in cognitive infiltration (i.e., an intelligence operation) is the fact that no legal action to stop publication of the stolen classified docs has been taken.
That the MSM is playing the central role in selecting material for publication from the stolen cache (material which, surprise surprise, confirms everything the warmonger press has been telling us for years) — the NY Times acting in consultation with the Government — is a further reason to consider Ruth’s hypothesis that the release of information via Wikileaks is a government operation.
That Hillary Clinton seems to approve of Wikileaks notwithstanding that the leak of diplomatic cables has been deemed a black eye for the State Department supports the same case.
Contrary to Angry’s assertion, I do not think and did not state that “if something is illegal it should be immediately apparent,” which is why I said it would be useful if one of the lawyers who sometimes write here would comment on the legal implications.
However, it is reasonable to suppose that a deliberate breach of official secrecy can cause harm to the state, and in that case the overt act(s) giving rise to the breach of secrecy may amount to sedition or treason.
That governments appear to be conniving at the Wikileaks leaks suggests that they are intended to serve the interests of the state, not to damage them.
“Therefore, part of the argument for Wikileaks being some kind of exercise in cognitive infiltration (i.e., an intelligence operation) is the fact that no legal action to stop publication of the stolen classified docs has been taken.”
Alfred, “cognitive infiltration” is not, as you think, the wilful spreading of disinformation. The idea is that in certain closed-off areas of the blogosphere where everyone furiously agrees with each other that the government controls everything and did 9/11 and the Jews killed JFK, there is the fear that people will start to do dangerous things based on their loony fantasies such as gunning people down at Holocaust memorial museums, flying planes into IRS buildings, starting a suicide cult etc… Cognitive infiltration is the idea of going into these circles and saying, “well, are you quite sure that’s exactly right?” to disrupt the confirmation bias they are used to.
I have said before that such things are unlikely to work and in fact they may be illegal. Besides, if “cognitive infiltration” were ever unmasked it would be utterly counter-productive as all the tinfoilers could start saying, “See? See? See? Everything IS run by the security services!”
Anno,
“Today I heard an absolute-total dumbo economist on Peter Day’s World of Business programme on the World service, state that in future our economy could progress without any increase in energy consumption, but purely through human ingenuity.”
There’s nothing dumbo about that. Energy use efficiency has been increasing in the industrial economies since the construction of the first steam engine. Yet even now many processes are absurdly inefficient. Why for example does your average north American office worker need a 200+ horsepower mobile living room with leather armchairs to haul their arse across town to the office every day? Obviously they don’t. Most other major energy uses are equally and pathetically inefficient: home heating, which mainly consists in heating the outdoors, through drafts and poorly insulated structures, lightbulbs, snap peas flown daily from Kenya to London, etc., etc.
“What! We humiliated a whole society and we didn’t even need our cut of the oil to keep our bankrupt economy going?”
We didn’t need the oil, India and China do, as they come up to our living standard. We could have let Saddam develop Iraq’s oil, but that would have given him the means to build the second most expensive military establishment in the world, which was intolerable to the empire.
Now that Iraq is under puppet administration, oil output is rising to 12 million barrels a day, or about $300 billion worth a year, most of it going to the Government of Iraq for uses which one hopes will benefit the people of Iraq.
“Angrysoba, this isn’t going to “cripple diplomacy”. It’s a one-off leak, better security procedures will be established; two and a half million people had (have?) access to this stuff. What it will do is make lots of people more cautious, which may be a good thing.”
What do you mean, it’s a one-off? How do you know that there aren’t going to be massive dumps forthcoming? Assange may be the editor of WikiLeaks but he doesn’t make the decision for any other Tom, Dick and Harry who wants to follow suit.
“And it’s not just any country, it’s the US. With its wars, rendition, dodgy deals and alliances, any break in US secrecy that disrupts US spin is bound to be popular.”
Oh, I know why they are popular. They appeal to anti-US sentiment. But I mean that it affects any country that talks to the US. That goes for China too who are making angry noises about dealing with these leaks properly, whatever that means. I know that China is often favourably compared with the US hereabouts and criticism of China is often decried, even by anno, who must know of China’s occupation of East Turkestan, but I wonder how China would deal with their own version of Assange.
Alfred, “Contrary to Angry’s assertion, I do not think and did not state that “if something is illegal it should be immediately apparent,” which is why I said it would be useful if one of the lawyers who sometimes write here would comment on the legal implications.”
No, Alfred, what you said was this:
“Looking into? Making stolen classified documents public is or is not a criminal act. I’d assume that it is. If so, what’s he waiting for?”
Which is clearly pouring scorn on the idea that there could be anything complex about the question of legality of the leaks.
” is not, as you think…”
Angry, why don’t you just say what you think instead of indulging the offensive habit of falsly attributing beliefs to others?
Re: “Besides, if “cognitive infiltration” were ever unmasked it would be utterly counter-productive as all the tinfoilers could start saying, “See? See? See? Everything IS run by the security services!”
But that’s what those you call the tinfoilers are saying now, istn’t it? So in that case your argument is pointless.
There is no Official Secrets Act in the U.S. That was highlighted by the Valerie Plame affair. My (limited) understanding of the UK Official Secrets Act is that a few of the actors in the Plame affair would have been indictable. However, under U.S. law, the prosecution couldn’t come up with anything, other than convicting one of the individuals with lying to the prosecution.
Handing over documents that you obtain as an insider, especially in the military, is another matter of course.
I think angrysoba’s point about Assange being indistinguishable from a traditional news source is extremely relevant, and probably what the matter comes down to. If you recall The Big Lebowski, when Walter said that “the Supreme Court has roundly rejected prior restraint,” he was referring to the New York Times Co. v. United States, which was in the process of publishing the Pentagon Papers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._United_States). That case is fairly on-point.
Plus there’s the matter that Assange is not an American, so he largely escapes espionage laws.
Outcome: there’s really no law with which to indict and convict Assange, so the fact that he’s not been arrested does not indicate that he’s a deep-cover super-secret agent man; rather, the U.S. is correctly applying its own laws.
Angry,
“”Looking into? Making stolen classified documents public is or is not a criminal act. I’d assume that it is. If so, what’s he waiting for?”
Which is clearly pouring scorn on the idea that there could be anything complex about the question of legality of the leaks.”
Bollocks. I said “I assume” clearly indicating uncertainty. If I knew for a fact, I would have simply stated the fact. And I said, “if so,” again clearly indicating uncertainty.
And I further stated that it would be useful to have a legal opinion on the question.
But you seem to be approaching a state of mania so I’ll sign off here for a bit.
“I said “I assume” clearly indicating uncertainty.”
No, it clearly indicates a belief. One without evidential support but that is not something that has bothered you in the past. You were trying to be ironic as if the very notion of having to “look into” the legality of a case were ridiculous.
Only later did you suggest it might be more nuanced than that. However, I will drop the subject now because it isn’t interesting for anyone else.
Angrysoba, (1) I mean, the leak has happened. It is previous conversations with US diplomatic staff that are compromised, not current or future ones. (2) Opposition to the US should not be dismissed as “sentiment”.
Angrysoba, I’d advise you against word tennis with Alfred.
Larry, thanks for your 3:30 AM post.
This domain seems to recieve a good ammount of visitors. How do you promote it? It gives a nice individual twist on things. I guess having something authentic or substantial to talk about is the most important thing.
“If you recall The Big Lebowski, when Walter said that “the Supreme Court has roundly rejected prior restraint,” he was referring to the New York Times Co. v. United States, which was in the process of publishing the Pentagon Papers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Times_Co._v._United_States). That case is fairly on-point.”
Yes, this is a good point. The Pentagon Papers is a precedent that the New York Times will have been very familiar with, of course, meaning that they would know full well whether what they were doing is legal or not.
Now how about desisting with the ugly ad hom jibes that you direct towards Suhayl Saadi. They are often just as obnoxious as the anti-Semitic witterings of some of the other commenters here.
As it happens, I spoke to someone who was once in US Army Intelligence who said it is not that surprising that an army private could get access to the field reports and the diplomatic cables as Manning is supposed to have done. She said that even when she was in the army a number of years ago there was intelligence sharing between the State Department and DoD. Since 9/11 it has become even easier. According to some of the article on this, it is because after 9/11 greater intelligence sharing was seen as necessary to prevent further attacks. The problem as we can now see is that it means more people can release that data.
Suhayl:
In regards to South America, it appears that the left have learned some lessons, especially from all the dirty CIA tricks last century. There seems to be a concerted effort to cooperate regionally and protect one another, which was not the case before. This policy is seen in new organisations such as the BancoSur, the Union of South American Nations and the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas. Although the 2009 Honduran coup is very troubling.
RE Wired & Wikileaks:
I would remain somewhat sceptical of any reporting that Wired does on WL. The guy (Lamo) that betrayed Bradley Manning and turned him into the FBI has a very long and cosy relationship with one of editors at Wired (Poulsen). Wired got the scoop on Manning’s arrest and it was Poulsen who reported it. Glenn Greenwald has a long and detailed write up about all the events here: (salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/06/18/wikileaks)
“That’s the first decent test for Cablegate that I’ve seen.”
Another suggests itself: Craig ought to have a pretty accurate idea of some of the stuff that should emerge about Uzbekistan.
Juan Cole has some observations on the legality or otherwise of WL.
preview.tinyurl.com/37cfv96
“Another suggests itself: Craig ought to have a pretty accurate idea of some of the stuff that should emerge about Uzbekistan.”
Yes, that is a good point. Assuming that Mr Murray sent cables to the US State Department while ambassador to Uzbekistan he would surely expect them to turn up in the dump.
A ahocking statistic for consideration by the ConDems.
‘The number of children of working parents who are living in poverty in the UK has risen to an unprecedented 2.1 million, a report has found.
A report for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that while the number of impoverished children dropped overall to 3.7 million, the majority are now from homes where a parent or carer is working, accounting for 58% of the total.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/dec/06/children-poverty-working-parents
I found a good new blogger called Tim Wilkinson. He has recorded a Radio 4 conversation with Jane Garvey and Annie Machon ex MI5 and Christopher Andrew, the MI5 historian. The blogger’s own running commentary on the videos are hilarious.
http://surelysomemistake.blogspot.com/2010/12/annie-machon-v-christopher-andrew-on.html
There are other interesting topics on the site as you can see.
s/b ….tunning commentary on the videos is hilarious.
Something else funny on Radio 4 Today when Naughtie made a Spoonerism on Jeremy Hunt’s name.
http://bit.ly/eza4rv
He is a rich *unt, has personal wealth of over £4m, and had to repay some of his parliamentary expenses.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/labour-mps-expenses/6780793/MPs-expenses-Jeremy-Hunt-to-repay-9500.html
Tim Wilkinson! He’s been blogging for a few years at least. I even got a mention once:
http://surelysomemistake.blogspot.com/2010/08/spurious-retraction-syndrome-or-do-you.html
Vronsky,
Angrysoba,
I thought of Craig’s inside knowledge, too, but he was UK, not US. I thought all the cables were from US diplomatic staff (correct me if I’m wrong), in which case we might find comments about Craig, but nothing he actually wrote himself.
Thanks, angrysoba at 5:58am, I really appreciate it. Your consistent attempts to remain rational and talk about the issues rather than (all of our disparate and largely unknowable) personalities and your drawing a firm line on racism, etc. in these discussions on these boards is important and I’m sure others here would concur. It means a lot to me, thanks.
Suhayl, are you still trying to call me a racist?
Suhayl – I 2nd your comment. it is just because these discussions are important that there are so many nasty smears from trolls whose masters will pay to stifle free speech.
Re glenn’s comment at December 6, 2010 2:10 AM. Like Glenn I too have learnt a lot from wiki-leaks, one item of which can be seen by clicking on my signature. I’ve been impressed by what has come out of wiki-leaks, though I have been amazed about the opposition to the disclosures from certain sections of the media. It could be argued that we should have already known about much of the leaked information from the media, but the fact is we didn’t. Why?? May I suggest that all too often the media gets its scoops spoon fed to it by PR professionals who know how to manipulate them; So that the road ahead for an ambitious journalist today is not to be a good investigative journalist, but rather to toe the line with the right PR people. Indeed such journalists will invariably see wiki-leaks as a threat and seek to minimize its value.
Further to my post at December 5, 2010 9:35 AM
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2010/12/wikileaks-al-megrahi-move-saved-uk.html
“If accurate, the cable is evidence that the British government was clearly supportive of the decision by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill to release Megrahi, the only person convicted of the bombing of Pan-Am Flight 103 and the murder of 270 people. At the time, then prime minister Gordon Brown refused to comment on the decision and insisted the UK government had played “no role” in the release.”
Brown and the Labour Party have consistently attacked the decision to release.
somebody: thanks for the link to surelysomemistake – excellent.
Suhayl Saadi, thanks for the link to metanoia-films.org, and the excellent Psyops video.