WikiLeaks about to hit the fan

From Kidnapping and Torture to Assassination

All of this, [For a description of "All of this", see the quote in Post: # 4,723,005 on page 136 of this thread] and much more like it, is dismissed as of little consequence, and forgotten. Those whose mission is to rule the world enjoy a more comforting picture, articulated well enough in the current issue of the prestigious (and valuable) journal of the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. The lead article discusses “the visionary international order” of the “second half of the twentieth century” marked by “the universalization of an American vision of commercial prosperity.” There is something to that account, but it does not quite convey the perception of those at the wrong end of the guns.

The same is true of the assassination of Osama bin Laden, which brings to an end at least a phase in the “war on terror” re-declared by President George W. Bush on the second 9/11. Let us turn to a few thoughts on that event and its significance.

On May 1, 2011, Osama bin Laden was killed in his virtually unprotected compound by a raiding mission of 79 Navy SEALs, who entered Pakistan by helicopter. After many lurid stories were provided by the government and withdrawn, official reports made it increasingly clear that the operation was a planned assassination, multiply violating elementary norms of international law, beginning with the invasion itself.

There appears to have been no attempt to apprehend the unarmed victim, as presumably could have been done by 79 commandos facing no opposition -- except, they report, from his wife, also unarmed, whom they shot in self-defense when she “lunged” at them, according to the White House.

A plausible reconstruction of the events is provided by veteran Middle East correspondent Yochi Dreazen and colleagues in the Atlantic. Dreazen, formerly the military correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, is senior correspondent for the National Journal Group covering military affairs and national security. According to their investigation, White House planning appears not to have considered the option of capturing bin Laden alive: “The administration had made clear to the military's clandestine Joint Special Operations Command that it wanted bin Laden dead, according to a senior U.S. official with knowledge of the discussions. A high-ranking military officer briefed on the assault said the SEALs knew their mission was not to take him alive.”

The authors add: “For many at the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency who had spent nearly a decade hunting bin Laden, killing the militant was a necessary and justified act of vengeance.” Furthermore, “capturing bin Laden alive would have also presented the administration with an array of nettlesome legal and political challenges.” Better, then, to assassinate him, dumping his body into the sea without the autopsy considered essential after a killing -- an act that predictably provoked both anger and skepticism in much of the Muslim world.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/noam-chomsky/was-there-an-alternative-_b_950216.html

Have you got a huge pile of these on your desk, ready to pump out on a moment's notice, JW?

How does this fit your normal rhetoric?

It is worth adding that bin Laden’s responsibility was recognized in much of the Muslim world, and condemned. One significant example is the distinguished Lebanese cleric Sheikh Fadlallah, greatly respected by Hizbollah and Shia groups generally, outside Lebanon as well. He had some experience with assassinations.

He had been targeted for assassination: by a truck bomb outside a mosque, in a CIA-organized operation in 1985. He escaped, but 80 others were killed, mostly women and girls as they left the mosque -- one of those innumerable crimes that do not enter the annals of terror because of the fallacy of “wrong agency.”

My pile is not as huge as your pile.

Cablegate: When openness and privacy collide
(Dan Tynan, ITworld.com, September 6, 2011)

Julian Assange took the virtual stage at consumer trade show IFA Berlin early this morning, speaking via video from an undisclosed location in England. His stated topic: “The Future of Digital Publicity, Transparency, and What It Means for the World.”

His real topic: The 251,287 US State Department cables that now sit unredacted for the world to download or search from WikiLeaks’ servers.

There is no transcript or Webcast of Assange’s speech. And though I was in Berlin last week (lovely city) to attend IFA, I had to leave before Assange’s appearance. So I can only react to this based on published reports. With that in mind, let me summarize Assange’s speech:

Cablegate: Not my fault. Blame the Guardian and Daniel Domscheit-Berg for this unholy mess.

The problem? It is Assange's fault, at least as much as it is Guardian reporter David Leigh (who leaked the password to the original encrypted file containing the cables) and Domscheit-Berg (who pointed out where the encrypted files could be found). How these documents became public could be called a comedy of errors, if the potential blowback weren’t so tragic.

I like the concept of WikiLeaks. I like having a rogue organization that anyone can use for blowing the whistle on the bad guys – especially one that that can’t be strong armed into silence. But it still needs to respect the privacy of individuals.

I think people have a right to their secrets, provided they aren’t hiding something that’s socially destructive (like, say, a penchant for serial killing). Ditto for governments; the wheels of diplomacy would never turn if everything were on the public record; but we still deserve to know when our governments are lying to us or committing heinous acts. So balance and discretion are required. Unfortunately, those two words appear to be missing from Julian Assange’s vocabulary.

I know there are people out there (like Assange and certain members of Anonymous) who believe complete transparency is the only way to go. But that tramples all over your right to choose what you share with certain portions of the world, and what you keep private.

Think of your relationships with your significant others or your family. Now think how your relationships would be if every single thing that crossed your mind during each day was known to your partner (siblings, parents, children). Maybe the relationships would be stronger; maybe 100 percent transparency is a good thing. Maybe if you strapped wings and a propeller to a swine it would win the Red Bull Air Race. But I very much doubt it.

No dear, that dress does not make you look fat – why would anyone think that?

You’re just as handsome (funny, charming) as they day I met you; and that bald spot? Sexy as hell.

Of course I never did any of those things when I was your age, and you shouldn’t either.

And so on. Complete transparency is highly overrated, in my humble opinion. Your mileage may vary.

So the leaks that former Libyan strongman Muammar Ghadafy had a voluptuous Ukranian nurse or that the president of Argentina is apparently off her rocker were interesting in a gossipy way, but they weren’t really newsworthy. Yet WikiLeaks felt no qualms about publishing that information.

Also not newsworthy but much more dangerous: revealing the names of political dissidents, confidential informants, and other anti-government sources who thought they were protected – and now are not.

We will likely never know if bad things happen to these people. The secret police in most countries don’t generally issue press releases, and it’s hard to tweet from a prison cell -- or a grave. So much for 100 percent transparency.

Their blood would be on Assange’s hands. But don’t expect him to admit that.

Also not newsworthy but much more dangerous: revealing the names of political dissidents, confidential informants, and other anti-government sources who thought they were protected – and now are not.

We will likely never know if bad things happen to these people. The secret police in most countries don’t generally issue press releases, and it’s hard to tweet from a prison cell -- or a grave. So much for 100 percent transparency.

Their blood would be on Assange’s hands. But don’t expect him to admit that.

My pile is not as huge as your pile.

We are all losers thanks to Assange.

msolga wrote:

And as to the constant US government response about concerns about the Wikileaks “endangering innocent lives” of informants ...

Where is the evidence of this from the earlier redacted leaks?

Surely the governments which have been saying this from the beginning (of the Wikileaks) would have let us know if it has happened? To “prove their case” against Wikileaks.

the silence is deafening, isn't it

I like the concept of WikiLeaks. I like having a rogue organization that anyone can use for blowing the whistle on the bad guys – especially one that that can’t be strong armed into silence. But it still needs to respect the privacy of individuals.

I think people have a right to their secrets, provided they aren’t hiding something that’s socially destructive (like, say, a penchant for serial killing). Ditto for governments; the wheels of diplomacy would never turn if everything were on the public record; but we still deserve to know when our governments are lying to us or committing heinous acts. So balance and discretion are required. Unfortunately, those two words appear to be missing from Julian Assange’s vocabulary.

Also not newsworthy but much more dangerous: revealing the names of political dissidents, confidential informants, and other anti-government sources who thought they were protected – and now are not.

We will likely never know if bad things happen to these people. The secret police in most countries don’t generally issue press releases, and it’s hard to tweet from a prison cell -- or a grave. So much for 100 percent transparency.

Their blood would be on Assange’s hands. But don’t expect him to admit that.

We will likely never know if bad things happen to these people. The secret police in most countries don’t generally issue press releases, and it’s hard to tweet from a prison cell -- or a grave. So much for 100 percent transparency.

That's a pretty cool idea if you're about taking down the man, but it's not a solution. It does not actually pave the way for "more open forms of government."

1) The previous leaks were redacted, and you must be curious as to why all parties involved when in control of the info and it's publishing felt the need to do so.

In Olga's list of "why we need" WLs, I ask in return, why do we need WLs?

Manning could have given the cables directly to the NYT, Guardian, etc. The appeal of WL was that they boasted that submitting info to them is safe and untraceable. For Manning, his choice of WL provided no such guarantee.

Wiki disclosures at 'odds with press freedom': Hurriyat (M)
(Kashmir Dispatch, September 7, 2011)

In an interesting reaction to the revelations made by whistle-blower website Wikileaks regarding Hurriyat Conference (M) Chairman, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, and other pro-freedom leaders, the amalgam Wednesday said the disclosures were “at odds with the spirit of press freedom.”

While referring to a 2006 leaked cable, in which the then US ambassador to India, David Mulford, allegedly describes politics in Kashmir as “filthy as Dal lake,” the Hurriyat faction has lambasted “American journalists” for the comparison.

The amalgam added that the “terminology used in the Wikileaks disclosures is painful and misplaced, and amounts to violating journalistic ethics.”

“The comparison reflects the arrogant, pretentious and dominating attitude of the American journalists towards international affairs,” it said in a statement issued here.

“The Hurriyat would never accept this insulting American journalistic trickery towards Kashmiris and would soon inform the American press, living in the delusion of domination, about reservations regarding this kind of journalism,” it said.

“While the Hurriyat wouldn’t like to comment on the authenticity of the website (Wikileaks), the revelations published regarding Hurriyat and other political leaders are not only at odds with the spirit of journalistic freedom but also send out an impression as if the US government takes decisions under the influence of others,” it said.

“The fact, however, is that the US diplomats take decisions according to their own discretion and national interests,” it said, adding that while “individuals or groups may have their own opinion, national level decisions are taken by governments. Also, it is the governments which are ultimately accountable for the effects, if any, of these decisions.”

Pertinently, the Hurriyat faction’s name has figured in several leaked cables, with one claiming the amalgam being in favour of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru’s death penalty if he was guilty.

In another leaked cable, the Mirwaiz had allegedly opposed the issuance of passport to the rival Hurriyat faction’s chairman, Syed Ali Shah Geelani.

While in another cable, the amalgam was contemplating contesting the 2008 state elections.