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Wikileaks IV: Everything Bad In The World Happens To Bradley Manning
Gosling
Looking Up Soccer In Mongolia Right Now, ProbablyWatertown, WIRegistered User regular
Looking Up Soccer In Mongolia Right Now, ProbablyWatertown, WIRegistered User regular
Drip, drip, drip...
Julian Assange is out on bail in England (and the people's choice for TIME's Person of the Year, although not TIME'S choice; that's Mark Zuckerberg). Bradley Manning is in solitary. And meanwhile, the leaks keep coming. A sample of 18 of the recent offerings, via a run through Google News (EDIT: make that 20):
*Something here about the rising influence of Indonesia.
*Cuba's miffed with Jamaica about them not doing enough to curb drug smuggling.
*Fidel Castro almost died in 2006. Just like all the other times he almost died, except after this near-death he handed off to Raul.
*Also concerning Cuba: the US thinks they'll be insolvent in 2-3 years. We have a history of predicting Cuba/Castro's imminent demise. We haven't been right yet.
*BP had a gas blowout in Azerbaijan in 2008 and narrowly avoided an explosion like that which kicked off the Gulf oil spill. The president accused BP of stealing oil from the country.
*Chevron negotiated with Iran over an oil field crossing the Iraq border.
*Speculation by the US over a potential transition of power in Egypt.
*And while we're at it, let's do Thailand speculation too.
*New Zealand has been spying on Fiji's military.
*China's been feasting on Venezuelan oil.
*The US tried to use Bollywood as a tool to stifle the radicalization of British Muslims.
*The US is miffed at Switzerland for not being anti-Iran enough.
*Watch for a rising insurgency in Peru.
*The Vatican is horrified over all the boy-diddling, but is also worried that Irish efforts to prosecute undermine church sovreignity.
*Ghana's got a druglord problem too. Ghana knew that already, but the leak alleges that no efforts are being made to arrest the ringleaders, just the small-timers. Why? Lack of political balls.
*Uzbekistan: "rampantly corrupt." Which Britain should probably have noticed a bit better, seeing as they had a big ol' trade delegation there last week.
*The US blocked an effort from Spain to lift EU sanctions on China.
*North Korea wanted to host an Eric Clapton concert.
*Myanmar is helping North Korea build a nuclear site.
*Nigeria is pretty much run by Shell.
Pick your favorite and rant away. If you don't like any of these leaks... wait about five minutes. There'll be another.
A NOTE: Please try not to muck up the thread with pages of conspiracy theories and sniping at each other at a time. That's a really good way to not have nice things anymore.
Julian Assange is out on bail in England (and the people's choice for TIME's Person of the Year, although not TIME'S choice; that's Mark Zuckerberg). Bradley Manning is in solitary. And meanwhile, the leaks keep coming. A sample of 18 of the recent offerings, via a run through Google News (EDIT: make that 20):
*Something here about the rising influence of Indonesia.
*Cuba's miffed with Jamaica about them not doing enough to curb drug smuggling.
*Fidel Castro almost died in 2006. Just like all the other times he almost died, except after this near-death he handed off to Raul.
*Also concerning Cuba: the US thinks they'll be insolvent in 2-3 years. We have a history of predicting Cuba/Castro's imminent demise. We haven't been right yet.
*BP had a gas blowout in Azerbaijan in 2008 and narrowly avoided an explosion like that which kicked off the Gulf oil spill. The president accused BP of stealing oil from the country.
*Chevron negotiated with Iran over an oil field crossing the Iraq border.
*Speculation by the US over a potential transition of power in Egypt.
*And while we're at it, let's do Thailand speculation too.
*New Zealand has been spying on Fiji's military.
*China's been feasting on Venezuelan oil.
*The US tried to use Bollywood as a tool to stifle the radicalization of British Muslims.
*The US is miffed at Switzerland for not being anti-Iran enough.
*Watch for a rising insurgency in Peru.
*The Vatican is horrified over all the boy-diddling, but is also worried that Irish efforts to prosecute undermine church sovreignity.
*Ghana's got a druglord problem too. Ghana knew that already, but the leak alleges that no efforts are being made to arrest the ringleaders, just the small-timers. Why? Lack of political balls.
*Uzbekistan: "rampantly corrupt." Which Britain should probably have noticed a bit better, seeing as they had a big ol' trade delegation there last week.
*The US blocked an effort from Spain to lift EU sanctions on China.
*North Korea wanted to host an Eric Clapton concert.
*Myanmar is helping North Korea build a nuclear site.
*Nigeria is pretty much run by Shell.
Pick your favorite and rant away. If you don't like any of these leaks... wait about five minutes. There'll be another.
A NOTE: Please try not to muck up the thread with pages of conspiracy theories and sniping at each other at a time. That's a really good way to not have nice things anymore.
I have a new soccer blog The Minnow Tank. Reading it psychically kicks Sepp Blatter in the bean bag.
Gosling on
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I'm actually surprised Cuba hasn't been more vocal about their complaints about Jamaica.
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
America, prepare for your dried cod prices to go way the fuck up!
Also re. the Shell, Venezuela, and BP stories: Oh right, in the Gulf of Mexico, that thing happened that revealed the thorough infiltration of government regulatory bodies by the petro industry and their simultaneously inept and outrageous behaviour. Whatever happened to that? I can only assume it's been fixed by now.
Nothing bad can come from the spread of American rock n' roll, at least from the perspective of this American.
Also lol BP is sorrrrrrry.
Of course they are most concerned for the challenges to the church, so that's right at least.
Of course, it's not like the North Koreans are against kidnapping famous people, so he could end up in North Korea anyway.
They tried to bury us. They didn't know that we were seeds. 2018 Midterms. Get your shit together.
Except Eric Clapton is English.
lolopinions
They spied on Fiji's tank? Say it ain't so!
Edit: I do realize it's real news and the reasons are political, but I still liked how it's worded...
Are you kidding? We literally sacked our own previous ambassador to Uzbekistan because he kept insisting on bringing up meddlesome issues of us supporting a dictator who made systematic use of torture, and of using bad evidence gained under torture from Karimov's regime.
"Murder in Samarkand" is a good place to start if you want to read up on it, it's basically his (Craig Murray) account of his time as ambassador in Uzbekistan.
And then they move to America to become famous.
In the history class I'm a TA for, the professor mentioned the power of American culture overseas during the Cold War--to the effect of saying, "Who wants to listen to boring music like Tchaikovsky when you've got Mick Jagger?"
Except barely anyone in the class knew who Mick Jagger was. And the few who did pointed out he was English, not American.
Here's a link.
The worlds most populous muslim nation, if anyone is keeping track.
Rising Indonesia is something that has been happening for a long time now, although the main use of such stories seems to be to fuel Australian military paranoia
ok, now I feel old.
And also, I like Tchaikovsky. Lemme tell you, those old guys, some great christmas music. Much better a dozen times than Jingle F'ing Bells.
Right, On topic.
Yeah, I got nothing just yet.
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
No, I'd be shocked and awed if Syria said that they would help Israel against Iran.
But that has as much chance of happening as my losing 100lbs overnight.
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
Its almost like American medias portrayal off all the middle east as a massive Muslim caliphate bent on destroying the west is inaccurate or something.
Not that anyone in any major western media agency would do such a thing but hey
Edit: Actually, nevermind. I misread "governments that are friendly to American business ventures" as "American business ventures". But I still don't think that's the only thing at play. It's not "anti-Iranian sentiment", it's "anti-Iranian Islamic Republic getting a hold of nukes sentiment".
Are you seriously stating that United States and other countries in the region are not anti-Iran?
Hmm, I wonder why they don't want Iran to have nuclear capabilities - oh yeah, it's because they fucking hate eachother.
There is valid reasons for that hate, on both sides, but saying that U.S. and it's allies don't not have anti-Iranian sentiment on official and unofficial level is really reaching for reasons to discredit Wikileaks.
We're not putting pressure on Iran to abandon their nuclear weapons program because we think they have cooties. There are strategic interests at play for the west here. Middle Eastern diplomatic relations being a middle school cafeteria is not what's driving our Iranian policy. Did I just blow your mind?
From the last thread I gathered that, collectively, we don't know much about solitary confinement in a military prison, but..
Is the allegation here that he can't leave his cell and jog/hit the weight room, or that he isn't allowed to do push ups, etc, in his cell?
Won't lie; I'd masturbate furiously every moment I was awake.
What does this have to do with Middle Eastern politics? (Insert your own nuclear missile joke)
I can imagine. I don't follow it at all, but as far as I'm concerned, if you want to know which countries will be growing in importance, look at their population. There are some very populous countries that have almost no international influence, but this is bound to change as time goes on. Nigeria is in this boat as well especially with their oil resources. They've got a long way to go however.
All you did here was turn "anti-Iranian sentiment" into "strategic interests at play". These two statements mean effectively the same thing here; "they're enemies".
The US works against Iran in every way it can. Constant sanctions. Pressure on other goverments and corporations to not deal with Iran. Constant military threats (while occupying two nations that border it, and launching air strikes in a third).
This is not new either. Remember that Iran was for a long time America's chief ally in the region. The Shah was anti-communist, staunchly secular, and pro US business interests, mostly oil but defense and infrastructure too. When he got overthrown in '79 and replaced with a revolutionary theocracy, Iran and the US had a rather steep decline in relations. Shit went down hard when the embassy was seized, and have basically stayed at near war with each other. When Saddam invaded Iran, the US got to supporting Iraq in order to weaken the Iranians. Under Bush Jr (and almost certainly other presidents as well, not sure if ongoing) covert operations were conducted in Iran, and rebel (read: terrorist) groups given a helping hand.
The US also does its best to restrict Iran's oil infrastructure. Iran has very poor refining abilities, and actually needs to import refined oil, while exporting massive amounts of crude. International deals from countries like Russia and China to improve refining abilities are discouraged. A pipeline deal actually just got signed, taking natural gas from the Caspian Sea all the way to Pakistan and India. It will go through Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, then to Pakistan and India. Right through, you know, a war. Weird place for a pipeline? Yes. But it bypasses Iran, who is very eager to make a deal like that and is willing offer cheaper oil to do so.
Fuck. And then there's Iraq.
Link: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/ucmj2.htm Section 906a, Espionage.
With that said, Manning is lucky he can still complain about not receiving a pillow.
In honesty, he should have been executed right away. The purposeful leak of all the information was not just one incident of espionage, but over ten thousand incidents. This might have been forgivable, or redeemable if it were a mistake, but it wasn't. Doubly so, when he was sworn he, not only did he swear in to defend his country, he also swore to abide by the UCMJ. No one made him do it, it wasn't against his will. He was told about the UCMJ before he joined, and he was warned endlessly about the consequences.
I guarantee you he heard that espionage is punishable by death at least once before he committed himself to the leak. The situation is mostly like telling a guy to not chop off his dick with a machete, and then he does it anyway. Instead of manning (hurr) up and taking punishment for his stupidity, he instead whines about it.
What really pisses me off about this, though, is that there was a thin line between being some epic dumbshit private, and actually being a hero. Instead of going through the information to find some truly heinous incident, he instead chooses to release everything, indiscriminately, and for what? So he could get back at the military for Don't Ask, Don't Tell?
I'm sorry, but I refuse to believe that this guy is a hero or a martyr in any sense. He put the country he swore to defend into political turmoil, put troops that would have otherwise emphasized with him in danger, put any positive spin for the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell at danger, and he went against thoroughly explained orders like an idiot just because he was having tough emotional times trying to figure himself out. I can at least forgive Assange for at least being dedicated to a cause, but Manning is a spineless, emotional kid that made a very, very stupid choice despite everything he had ever been committed to.
Yeah, I'm going to use this argument again.
The government of the US did this to themselves. Manning just exposed the acts. He didn't commit them. If they weren't commited in the first place there would be nothing significant to leak, do you understand that? Manning also hasn't even been convicted yet and he's gone through months of solitary isolation without exercise or even a pillow. If you think that's ok, go and live somewhere else than planet Earth. It's inhumane and it's purely for political reasons. No soldiers were put in danger, there was no crucial strategic information exposed and all the sources were redacted. No one was in any danger, besides the reputations of those that orchestrated the whole mess.
Manning is not a traitor because he didn't provide any useful information to enemy forces. He gave the documents to a journalist group, not a foreign power. It's a bunch of corrupt bastards being called out on their questionable practices and them covering their arses by screaming TREASON.
Okay so you are fine with the rule of law and that whole innocent until proven guilty thing not applying anymore?
I seriously doubt he has the resources to go through hundred of thousand of documents by himself. The sheer size of government has been an effective cover for unacceptable activities. I'm glad this is no longer the case.
And the point is to hopefully bring some actual accountability into government.
I can't argue that, at some point, someone fucked up and gave this guy the information. Manning, bar any demotions, was probably enlisted for one, maybe three years at most before he made this choice, and should have never been handed information that he received. Everyone involved with the mistake should have been charged to some degree, but I get the impression that once again, some officer somewhere is trying to cover his/her ass.
As far as the court case goes, it's mostly a joke. Mostly everything in the military is tracked, and information is not readily lost or unimportant. In honesty, I have no ability or power to say that Private Manning did what he did, but if he did, all the facts are already stacked against him. If he's imprisoned, it's because his commander (indirect or not), authorized it, and a commander has immediate arbitrary force after looking over all the information provided to him. If Manning is in solitary confinement before any court hearing, I believe it's for a very, very good reason.
Lastly, I would argue why Manning is a traitor, I would really love to, however, it would be like a bird explaining how flying works to a groundhog. If you're interested, though, look at the UCMJ. Look at the concept behind OPSEC. Commit yourself to everything that I've committed to, and everything Manning committed to. Realize that we put our signatures on papers that say we are not bound by civilian or American law anymore. If you have any kind of service record, I welcome your opinion freely, but honestly, I'm tired of civilians trying to put reason behind a military matter, without firstly understanding it from a military perspective.