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Norton
Social climber
the Wastelands
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Dec 24, 2010 - 12:17pm PT
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Correct. The private took an oath. If he leaked secret documents he violated that oath there is no getting around it. I am entirely sympathetic to the mission of wilikeaks at this point. However, I am entirely unsympathetic of the effort to extend freedom of press to an enlisted man who violated military law.
DM
Dingus got it right.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Dec 24, 2010 - 01:10pm PT
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You guys are absolutely clue-less and you will be found to be absolutely wrong.
You take an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the US. You do not take an oath to hide corruption. Do you know anything about UCMJ?
Do you know anything about the Nuremberg trails and what we learned from them?
Once again . . .
"I will obey the orders . . . according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice."
War Crimes and Corruption and the hiding of them is against regulations and the UCMJ.
Your moral compasses are on free float mode. You have no moral compass if you can not see the truth of the matter.
Whistle-blowing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower
Department of Defense Whistleblower Program
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Department_of_Defense_Whistleblower_Program
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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Dec 24, 2010 - 01:52pm PT
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klim, seems like you mentioned that you're a fan of web tarpley. i suggest a little background reading from him on the subject of patsies.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Dec 24, 2010 - 02:21pm PT
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Ron,
Do you have selective GOP/Rethuglican memory?
PFC Manning (if he did indeed do it,) is accused of leaking the video footage of our soldiers commiting War Crimes from an attack helicopter.
Do you recall the video footage of the attack from the helicopter where we machine guned down 2 Rueters News Agency personnel, civilians, and recuers in a van along with children?
Do you recall the gunman begging to open fire as though he was playing some computer video game? Do you recall someone telling the gunman also to continue to fire, continue to fire, continue to fire.
Do you recall any of this? Or is it a fairy-tale to you?
Collateral Murder ( http://wikileaks.org/ )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLqqQeveT6E
Wikileaks Collateral Murder in Baghdad WARNING: Graphic Footage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Lt_DfYKH0Q&feature=related
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WBraun
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 24, 2010 - 02:55pm PT
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Ron Anderson
It's interesting how you easily "gloss over" everything.
No wonder Crowley thinks/says you're stupid.
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Norton
Social climber
the Wastelands
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Dec 24, 2010 - 02:58pm PT
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Ron, what is this about somebody named Julie "proved" that viable WMD
were indeed found in Iraq after our invasion?
Seriously, who is this Julie person and what does she have to do with negating the entire military NOT finding WMD in Iraq?
Just asking you to point me to this source, because I don't recall reading
anything like this.
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jstan
climber
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Dec 24, 2010 - 03:19pm PT
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People commonly attempt to maginalize those with whom they disagree. JAPS, KRAUTS, GOOKS, INSURGENTS. It makes them less than human and permits us to make any decision we please. Without worrying over what we have become.
It is a good practice, provided only one is perfectly willing to exterminate the specie entirely. Down to the last person.
And the extermination is actually carried out.
By themselves nuclear weapons won't allow us to do this without personal effort.
You have to go in and dig each and every one out.
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Norton
Social climber
the Wastelands
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Dec 24, 2010 - 03:21pm PT
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Thanks Ron, now I know who Julie is.
But getting back to my question.
You said Julie proved that WMD were found in Iraq after our invasion.
I was not aware that wiki leaks proved this.
Again, help me out if you would, I thought I had read all the wikileaks,
and don't recall reading what you are alleging.
Ron, can you show me the link or source
where you got this information?
Thanks
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Dec 24, 2010 - 03:58pm PT
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Ron, all I can tell is that you are without moral judgement.
Your conscience must be seared.
How many Iraqi civilians have been killed in this illegal war?
Estimates are over 100,000 + civilians.
Did Iraq pull off 9-11? NO.
What is the real death toll in Iraq?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/mar/19/iraq
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Norton
Social climber
the Wastelands
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Dec 24, 2010 - 04:02pm PT
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It not just the death, torture, and outright murder that our invasion is
directly responsible for in Iraq.
It is also the horrible fate of some two MILLION Iraqis who were forced
under threat of torture or death to abandon their homes and seek asylum
outside of Iraq.
Our actions drove these people out of their homeland.
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Norton
Social climber
the Wastelands
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Dec 24, 2010 - 04:10pm PT
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Ron, again.
Please point me toward your credible source that shows "Julie" proving
that WMD were found in Iraq after our invasion.
You know, real operative WMD that could have been used AGAINST the United States, the way we were "sold" to be so afraid of as the reason to invade.
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healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
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Dec 24, 2010 - 07:31pm PT
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If a few semi-operational WMDs were found, they would likely have been of 80's vintage and of U.S. origin reserved for use on Kurds and Shiites.
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TomCochrane
Trad climber
Santa Cruz Mountains and Monterey Bay
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Dec 24, 2010 - 08:25pm PT
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the basis of conflict is them vs us
we will have conflict so long as we talk about 'them'
the clever idiots go around saying to both sides of two barely distinguishable groups, 'how about you fight them?'
we will have peace only when we discover that everyone is us
perhaps we should ban the term 'them' from the language
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Norton
Social climber
the Wastelands
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Dec 24, 2010 - 11:00pm PT
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Ron, I did.
And I have read all the wiki leaks on Iraq that have been released so far.
I have found nothing at all that justifies the Iraq invasion by the US.
Nothing at all that says Bush did not lie about WMD in Iraq.
Could it be that because you personally believed Bush's lies back in 03
that you still want to believe that somewhere, somehow, there just has to
be something found?
Ron, you said the wiki leaks proved the existence of WMD in Iraq that
justified our invasion. You know, the kind that actually threated us.
Again, show your credible source that you claim proves this.
Seriously, its not that I am saying you are a liar, I just want to read them.
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TGT
Social climber
So Cal
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Dec 24, 2010 - 11:29pm PT
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Email exchange between M. Yon and Sec Gates.
Q: WikiLeaks: Post-WikiLeaks reaction. What's your sense on whether the information-sharing climate and environment created after 9/11 to encourage greater cooperation and transparency among the intelligence communities and the military led to these three massive data dumps?
And how concerned are you now there may be an overreaction to clamp down on information dispersal because of the disclosures?
A: SEC. GATES: One of the common themes that I heard from the time I was a senior agency official in the early 1980s in every military engagement we were in was the complaint of the lack of adequate intelligence support. That began to change with the Gulf War in 1991, but it really has changed dramatically after 9/11.
And clearly the finding that the lack of sharing of information had prevented people from, quote/unquote, "connecting the dots" led to much wider sharing of information, and I would say especially wider sharing of information at the front, so that no one at the front was denied -- in one of the theaters, Afghanistan or Iraq -- was denied any information that might possibly be helpful to them. Now, obviously, that aperture went too wide. There's no reason for a young officer at a forward operating post in Afghanistan to get cables having to do with the START negotiations. And so we've taken a number of mitigating steps in the department. I directed a number of these things to be undertaken in August.
First, the -- an automated capability to monitor workstations for security purposes. We've got about 60 percent of this done, mostly in -- mostly stateside. And I've directed that we accelerate the completion of it.
Second, as I think you know, we've taken steps in CENTCOM in September and now everywhere to direct that all CD and DVD write capability off the network be disabled. We have -- we have done some other things in terms of two-man policies -- wherever you can move information from a classified system to an unclassified system, to have a two-person policy there.
And then we have some longer-term efforts under way in which we can -- and, first of all, in which we can identify anomalies, sort of like credit card companies do in the use of computer; and then finally, efforts to actually tailor access depending on roles.
But let me say -- let me address the latter part of your question. This is obviously a massive dump of information. First of all, I would say unlike the Pentagon Papers, one of the things that is important, I think, in all of these releases, whether it's Afghanistan, Iraq or the releases this week, is the lack of any significant difference between what the U.S. government says publicly and what these things show privately, whereas the Pentagon Papers showed that many in the government were not only lying to the American people, they were lying to themselves.
But let me -- let me just offer some perspective as somebody who's been at this a long time. Every other government in the world knows the United States government leaks like a sieve, and it has for a long time. And I dragged this up the other day when I was looking at some of these prospective releases. And this is a quote from John Adams: "How can a government go on, publishing all of their negotiations with foreign nations, I know not."
To me, it appears as dangerous and pernicious as it is novel."
When we went to real congressional oversight of intelligence in the mid-'70s, there was a broad view that no other foreign intelligence service would ever share information with us again if we were going to share it all with the Congress. Those fears all proved unfounded.
Now, I've heard the impact of these releases on our foreign policy described as a meltdown, as a game-changer, and so on. I think -- I think those descriptions are fairly significantly overwrought. The fact is, governments deal with the United States because it's in their interest, not because they like us, not because they trust us, and not because they believe we can keep secrets. Many governments -- some governments deal with us because they fear us, some because they respect us, most because they need us. We are still essentially, as has been said before, the indispensable nation.
So other nations will continue to deal with us. They will continue to work with us. We will continue to share sensitive information with one another.
Is this embarrassing? Yes. Is it awkward? Yes. Consequences for U.S. foreign policy? I think fairly modest.
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Knave
climber
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Dec 25, 2010 - 12:13am PT
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Parallel to my thinking I found this interesting bit of speculation on Geopoliticalmonitor.com is it a worthy source? I don't know. Another source of interesting questions I found on mediamonarchy.blogspot.com.
Here is the piece from Geopolitical site.
>Almost since its inception, I cast a very critical eye on the Wikileaks project. My first instinct - but more so my intuition - suggested "PSYOP".
I said to myself three things: 1. It’s a front; 2: It is useful to the operant for disseminating disinformation; 3. It is useful for collecting the identities of whistleblowers. As time passed, the universal uncritical acceptance of these so-called “leaks” by Western and World media reaffirmed my suspicions, and the paucity of critical approaches to the entire phenomena underscored my mistrust. (In passing, even the use of the word “cables” is somewhat anachronistic, adding to the mystique.)
To think that thousands of documents that miraculously appear from nowhere with no identifying source (untraceable) become the official sourcebook, "rap sheet" and guide to global politics, become a virtual gossip column and scandal sheet outdoing Murdoch himself has been and remains, in my opinion, extremely SUSPECT.
Should I be wrong, I apologize. But should I be correct, the study of this "Wikileaks" phenomena and (if I am correct) its attendant creators, impostors, actors and accomplices will be in itself history making. In this virtual age of holograms as leaders, where Google is trusted, Wall Street is saving America, and Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin are “Dream Team” candidates for 2012, I don't suppose a Wikileaks deception of this magnitude can make matters much worse (should it be proven a scam).
I think we are seeing a variant of cyber-warfare, not in the sense suggested by the media of Wikileaks targeting Government, but in the opposite sense of the U.S. Government targeting and deceiving the masses. In another sense, and one that underscores the first, is that we are witnessing a 2010 variant of McCarthyism (guilt by association, unproven allegations, lack of due process, etc.).
The U.S. Government has forbidden government workers to view the "cables". Joining this is a U.S. Air Force admonishment. How then can I view my own leaked statements to validate or invalidate them? The Government has barred me from reviewing transcripts of my own words? How convenient - and how Stalinesque.<
Written by (c) 2010 Michael T Bucci, Geopolitical Monitor
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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Dec 26, 2010 - 10:08am PT
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i have suggested that wikileaks could be cointelpro and that manning would be a patsy. a friend sent me this excerpt, from a british newspaper:
The under-appreciated heroes of 2010
Johann Hari
Dec. 24, 2010
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-the-underappreciated-heroes-of-2010-2168227.html#
The endless whirr of 24/7 corporate news ignores the people who actually make a difference
Bradley Manning. The story of the young American soldier who actually leaked the classified documents passed almost unnoticed. If Manning was mentioned at all, it was to be described as an impetuous, angry kid who downloaded the documents on to a CD and leaked them as a result of a "grudge" or "tantrum".
Here's what really happened. Manning signed up when he was just 18, believing he would be protecting and defending his country and the cause of freedom. He soon found himself sent to Iraq, where he was ordered to round up and hand over Iraqi civilians to America's new Iraqi allies, who he could see were then torturing them with electrical drills and other implements.
The only "crime" committed by many of these people was to write "scholarly critiques" of the occupation or the new people in charge. He knew torture was a crime under US, Iraqi and international law, so he went to his military supervisor and explained what was going on. He was told to shut up and get back to herding up Iraqis.
Manning had to choose between being complicit in these atrocities, or not. At the age of 21, he made a brave choice: to put human rights before his own interests. He found the classified military documents revealing that the US was covering up the deaths of 15,000 Iraqis and had a de facto policy of allowing the Iraqis they had installed in power to carry out torture – and he decided he had a moral obligation to show them to the American people.
To prevent the major crime of torturing and murdering innocents, he committed the minor crime of leaking the evidence. He has spent the last seven months in solitary confinement – a punishment that causes many prisoners to go mad, and which the US National Commission on Prisons called "torturous". He is expected to be sentenced to 80 years in jail at least. The people who allowed torture have faced no punishment at all. Manning's decision was no "tantrum" – it was one of the most admirable stands for justice and freedom of 2010.
if you like the way america has been fighting its wars, check out the pat tillman story. i see jon krakauer has a book out on the subject, and i'm wondering whether it'll be his worst.
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