Um, I Think It's Time for a Thread on WikiLeaks

I don't know if you're being facetious, but I think it's okay if people voice concern that apparently WikiLeaks did not redact all the names of sources in the WikiLeaks documents and those sources are, at least acc to Zabihullah Mujahid, going to be killed.

:) I was being a little facetious

So we've gone from "This is isn't anything new/This won't change anything" to "Wikileaks could have blood on its hands" in less than a week. Wonder if Wikileaks is on their way to being named an enemy combatant.

Ismael on this thread has always been clear about his concern for the safety of the sources.

Thanks. I did start out mostly concerned about the implications for military/policing operations there, because who'd talk on the basis of anything other than 100% confidentiality? At least you can make a coherent argument against that, or that openness is more important, even if I'd consider that naive.

It was only when I read details of a few specific leaks that I realised that actual individuals might be traceable and got gravely concerned. Whatever your position on transparency of govt activities, I don't see how you can be in favour of publishing in that sort of detail and maintain normal human sympathy.

Not for one fucking minute did I think WL would actually be publishing people's names and addresses. I'm horrified by how this is panning out.

TONY JONES: Well, not according to the Pentagon. They're accusing you of revealing the identities of Afghan informants and putting their lives at risk. Afghan's president, Karzai, agrees with that he says 'the breach is extremely irresponsible and shocking.' Your response to those comments.
JULIAN ASSANGE: Well we have yet to see clear evidence of that. I mean the London Times is also making this allegation today and in a quite disingenuous way, for example they mention some informers' names they say they had found and with a headline Afghan informer already dead, but when you actually read the story what you see is in fact that individual that they're mentioning died two years ago.

So there's a little bit of media manipulation occurring here. In terms of the Afghan government, it's in their interests to sort of play up the irresponsible, irresponsibility of the United States that they say has been involved in sort of collecting and permitting this data to release, be released.

Now we contacted the White House as a group before we released this material and asked them to help assist in going through it to make sure that no innocent names came out, and the White House did not accept that request.

http://jotman.blogspot.com/2010/07/white-house-or-wikileaks-to-blame-for.html

We have no reason to doubt that Julian Assange was telling the truth about the request.

Really? None?

I can think of a dozen reasons why to distrust his account (motive - it passes the responsibility for any leak, his account which suggests he was himself trying to cut down on names + stuff and never mentioned collaboration with the White House before, a good reason not to want to speak to the WH; because they were considering trying him under espionage laws, etc, etc) but the primary reason to distrust it is since when would the White House give up an opportunity to censor classified information? If I believe anything about executive power, I believe that the moment someone called to say, "I have a leak, do you want to look over it and tell me what I shouldn't leak," they'll be all over that.

those really aren't reasons not to take his word on that imo - reason not to take his word on it would be "evidence that he is lying"

Well, let's say he's no more trustworthy than any other public figure (which Assage is now, whether he likes it or not).

Skepticism is good all the time imo. This doesn't pass the smell test. You'd have to believe that the government either a) didn't think a single document in those 90,000 documents (including the 15,000 he himself is sitting on) wouldn't be a risk to anyone, or b) that they felt any risk in all those documents (including the 15,000 he's sitting on) were worth making this guy look like an asshole, or c) that they thought that he'd somehow censor the most dangerous documents all on his own, and only allow a few dangerous documents out that would make him look like an asshole.

I mean, all three possibilities are pretty insane. I think it's more likely Assange felt he could weed out any problems on his own, got in over his head, and now wants to blame the White House for not working with him.

Mind you, if he said, "I wanted to speak to the WH, but because their position on me has been so antagonistic I didn't feel comfortable doing so," I'd be way more receptive to sympathizing -- or at least understanding his POV. But claiming he actually asked the WH to help and they totally ignored him sounds like absolute bunk.

not to me - bureaucracies not returning calls that turn out to be important isn't exactly an unheard-of situation, is it?

Here's more of the interview, btw:

JULIAN ASSANGE: Yeah that's right. Not, of course we did not offer them a chance to veto any material, but rather we told them that we were going through a harm minimisation process and offered them the chance to point out names of informers or other innocents who might be harmed and they did not respond to that request which was mediated through the New York Times who was our, acting as the contact for the four media groups involved in this.

http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2010/s2968342.htm

I feel very confident in saying that the NYT did not agree to act as a liaison between between Julian Assange at the White House.

I can completely imagination a brokered negotiation like that going like this: "We need complete yea-or-nea power before we agree to look at what you've got, because if we don't have that and we look at what you've got, people will be able to legitimately claim that we gave our OK to the release of the information." "Well, I'm not going to give you blanket ability to censor, I have the right to publish it; if you would like to look at it and work with me to censor names that might be placed in harm's way, that's what I can do." "We refuse to look at it unless we are given blanket ability to censor/redact" - seems like ass-covering 101

He's not even saying that's what happened tho. He's claiming the NYT was representing him at the WH.

So we've gone from "This is isn't anything new/This won't change anything" to "Wikileaks could have blood on its hands" in less than a week. Wonder if Wikileaks is on their way to being named an enemy combatant.

― Beach Pomade (Adam Bruneau), Friday, July 30, 2010 4:15 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark

this is a complete non sequitur. it's still true that wikileaks didn't uncover much that was really new. they did reveal more detail &c &c -- anyway, that's something to debate which is kind of completely fuckin' separate from the question whether they put lives in danger.

i really wonder what the NYT told assange, what the NYT told the WH (if anything), and what the WH told the NYT in response, and what the NYT told assange about that!

there are a few steps there that assange may not really know anything about, even if he's been told one thing or another about it.

this whole affair seems fucking stupid and counterproductive imho

well he's claiming several things - I'm not addressing whether the NYT had been talking to him and with the White House, whatever, I don't know. I'm talking about the claim that he had offered the material to the WH. I can conceive of several scenarios in which that would happen and they would refuse to look at it or even answer him in any way once they knew what he was claiming to have, depending on the wording with which he approached them. them having any interaction with him means they run the risk of people reporting "WH complicit in leak." that's clear, isn't it?

yeah they wouldn't even touch it or talk to him, no doubt!

forgive the analogy, but it would be as if a thief came back to you and said, ok, which of your wife's earrings would you like back? it'd be harder to claim you were robbed afterward...

are you being sarcastic - I have a broken sarcasm detector

no

Smithy, imho I think that is silly. It only makes sense if there really are no stakes to this information getting out. First of all, you'd have to think that the government bargaining over leaked items would sound like complicit behavior -- which makes no sense! Of course the government wants to minimize the damage from leaks, that's self-evident, I'd think. Second, you'd have to believe that not only are they afraid meeting with him would look like complicit behavior, but that they think the political fallout from that appearance is worse than compromising informants in Afghanistan, soldiers, the probability of working with anyone ever again (because who would want to work with the US government in Afghanistan if their information is going to be leaked)... essentially this would be one of the most short-sighted decisions in the history of executive power. Unless you believe Obama secretly wants to undermine the war and is just using this as an excuse to do that.

Not to mention, and this comes from my gut, reading the interview it's really hard to see him as a trustworthy figure. He sounds very confused (actually shades of Tommy Wiseau ran through my mind while reading the interview).

TONY JONES: So, how many of the reports that you put on Wikileaks went onto the site without you actually knowing the detail of what was in them?

JULIAN ASSANGE: It's fair to say that only two per cent have been read in precise detail and the rest have been hived off using these classification systems.

Now, I presume what your question is getting to is what, how did we split off the 15,000 that we have not yet released because we think they need further review to understand whether there might be innocent informers' names in there.

So after reviewing several different types of material we saw that it was really these threat reports and then some other classifications that contained information about informers, so those were all hived off.

Mordy OTM

hived off? what kind of phrase is that?

How about the CIA memo a year or two ago about how to take down Wikileaks? Why wouldn't they want to let WL shoot themselves in the foot in order to get them out of the way?

First of all, you'd have to think that the government bargaining over leaked items would sound like complicit behavior -- which makes no sense!

You honestly think that if the government had bargained with this guy over this stuff, Fox News et al wouldn't take that info and run all the way down the field with it?

Adam, can you link me to an article or copy of that CIA memo? I don't remember seeing it.

every GOP candidate this fall would have (succesfully) used "the Obama administration negotiated with the very people who leaked classified information" - right now, it's WikiLeaks putting soldiers in harm's way. Any cooperation from the admin, of any kind, would have meant "Obama in bed with the guy who leaked sensitive info." NAGL in an election year. obv this is just guessing at how this dude's story might be true (though we'll know soon enough; the NYT should confirm or deny their engagement with him, I'd think, and since he's claiming everyone was in on the process, it should be clear enough) but "our position is we do not return this guy's phone calls no matter what" does not seem like an unlikely scenario to me

And Smithy, again, you'd have to believe that a political calculation re: Fox News would trump completely undermining any credibility the US might have among US-sympathetic individuals and communities in Afghanistan. After this, you'd have to be willing to put your life at risk to ever speak to the military in Afghanistan again. This severely undermines US actions in Afghanistan -- putting aside whether that is or isn't a good thing, certainly the Obama administration doesn't think that's a good thing.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/barrett-brown/cia-state-department-appa_b_512050.html

Apparently that memo was leaked by (lol) Wikileaks. Sounds fishy, yes, and skepticism in the case WL is definitely healthy. But it seems like there's a lot more skepticism towards WL than the US Gov't in these matters.

That's not fair. I'm not believing a US account over a Wikileaks account.

From March NYTimes

To the list of the enemies threatening the security of the United States, the Pentagon has added WikiLeaks.org, a tiny online source of information and documents that governments and corporations around the world would prefer to keep secret.

The Pentagon assessed the danger WikiLeaks.org posed to the Army in a report marked “unauthorized disclosure subject to criminal sanctions.” It concluded that “WikiLeaks.org represents a potential force protection, counterintelligence, OPSEC and INFOSEC threat to the U.S. Army” — or, in plain English, a threat to Army operations and information.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/18/us/18wiki.html?_r=1

LOL and this

Perhaps the most amusing aspect of the Army’s report, to Mr. Assange, was its speculation that WikiLeaks is supported by the Central Intelligence Agency.

Wikileaks has since deleted the file that they claim was leaked by the CIA? http://file.wikileaks.org/file/us-intel-wikileaks.pdf Or maybe moved it? I'd like to read what the memo actually says.

xp to Mords - I don't think any admin thinks there is any matter more important than its party remaining viable in the next election. Lest anybody accuse me of maligning Obama's admin in particular let me be clear, it's not about that. But I do think a sitting admin asks itself "what does this to to us" i.e. the admin's/party's prospects for fall in every instance, and that that is always the first matter of business.

you'd have to believe that a political calculation re: Fox News would trump completely undermining any credibility the US might have among US-sympathetic individuals and communities in Afghanistan. After this, you'd have to be willing to put your life at risk to ever speak to the military in Afghanistan again. This severely undermines US actions in Afghanistan -- putting aside whether that is or isn't a good thing, certainly the Obama administration doesn't think that's a good thing.

this is totally OTM. sad you guys think that Obama would rather fuck up this war you guys think he is so fond of - facilitating the deaths of US servicemen, Afghan collaborators, etc. - rather than irritate Fox News. It's not like Fox News is dying for ammo to use against Obama or anything, they just make shit up if they have to!

I can't find the memo anywhere btw, gonna keep hunting, but this is an excerpt from it I found on a website:

"The identification, exposure, termination of employment, criminal prosecution, legal action against current or former insiders, leakers, or whistleblowers could potentially damage or destroy this center of gravity and deter others considering similar actions from using the WikiLeaks.org Web site'" >> Not allowing Wikileaks to shoot itself in the foot by leaking dangerous info that leads to people dying, but drying out the info at the source.

Ok, found it here, reading now:

http://file.wikileaks.org/file/us-intel-wikileaks.pdf

"Fox News" is shorthand for conservative spin control of the admin actions, and if you think that's not always WAY up front in the admin's mind -- well, then we disagree!

I mean feel free to contend that nobody gives a shit about media narrative or that there comes a point at which principles outweigh it, but I mean, evidence seems lacking to me on that q

How about the CIA memo a year or two ago about how to take down Wikileaks? Why wouldn't they want to let WL shoot themselves in the foot in order to get them out of the way?

Yeah, so the memo definitely doesn't say this. It's basically about trying to suss out Wikileak sources so that Wikileak's promise of absolutely anonymity is undermined and sources in the future are more wary of leaking information. It's not like a document full of various ways of trying to undermine Wikileaks, it's about trying to plug leak holes in the government (and much of the document is spent trying to figure out what department(s) the leak is coming from by analyzing the leaks that have already come out). It's actually a really interesting read, imo, but is not the kind of intelligence document you hear about once in awhile which airs a bunch of crazy ideas for how to get something done. It's about trying to find who is leaking information to prevent future leaks. After reading it I'm very skeptical that the government would allow him to publish documents that undermine the war effort just to undermine Wikileaks -- even more than I was before reading it. For one, it's logically not sound; they released the document because -- as they write many times -- they feel like Wikileaks undermines the war effort. Why would they let him undermine the war effort so that later on he couldn't undermine it moreso? There's a huge logical fallacy in there.

there are so many advantages (media narrative and otherwise) to the admin looking at this stuff prior to its release - would allow them to redact stuff, would allow them to get an advance idea of where the leak came from, would allow them to coordinate a response ahead of time, would allow them to minimize the damage to operations on the ground in Afghanistan, etc. That you think the administration is SO AFRAID of the rightwing media spin machine that they would overlook all these advantages is just... I dunno, J0hn yr a sharp a guy but I think yr judgment is seriously clouded here. Obama's certainly aware of the media narrative and their need to control it, but they give those idiots ammo EVERY DAY and hardly shy away from controversy. I just don't know what you're basing this judgment on, other than vindictive bitterness.

Mordy, how have you the time to compose these long posts continuously?

Web sites similar to Wikileaks.org will continue to proliferate and will continue to represent a potential force protection, counterintelligence, OPSEC, and INFOSEC threat to the US Army for the foreseeable future. Sensitive or classified information posted to Wikileaks.org could potentially reveal the capabilities and vulnerabilities of US forces, whether stationed in CONUS or deployed overseas.

I'm actually secretly Artificial Intelligence, Alfred.

btw the administration's handled this shrewdly: let the national security guys like Gates and Jones wag their fingers while the Oval Office affects disinterest.