The military prosecutors were overly punitive in their efforts to get Bradley Manning convicted of aiding the enemy. I am glad that the judge acquitted him on that charge. He will be doing at least 15 years in prison, possibly more, and that is a more than an adequate deterrent to future leakers of classified information. I think it’s actually excessive as far as justice is concerned. Manning has already endured mistreatment and imprisonment, and the stress of having to be a defendant against a very hostile government. I hope some future president considers commuting some of his sentence.
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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People probably died as a result of the stupid way that information was leaked. So I’ve got no problem with 15 years. I’m not saying he should have gotten more (because I don’t think there was intent to get people killed); just that it feels just.
Who died? Do tell!
Namir Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh.
Yes, I’ve seen the video and posted a diary back when it was released – Never-ending Cover-ups.
Parallax asserts that people died as a result of the leak, I’m curious as to who they were.
I said people probably died. That stands to reason given the scope of the document dump and what was disclosed. We’ll never know for sure.
I think this article gets it right:
http://www.policymic.com/articles/45767/bradley-manning-trial-yes-he-is-guilty-yes-he-should-be-puni
shed
The article makes the point that Jonathan Pollard was imprisoned for life for leaking secrets to our ally, Israel. That was just and I don’t ever want to see Pollard released. But if he was prosecuted, then why wouldn’t a guy who leaked secrets that our enemies got to see serve his time too?
Pollard, like Manning, thought he was serving a greater good. The main difference is most of us disagree with Pollard’s ideals and we largely agree with Manning.
Had the leaks been targeted so that our government was embarrassed and our dirty laundry aired without aiding our enemies, I’d be far more sympathetic to Manning. But he wasn’t cautious at all. He was grossly negligent to the point of criminality.
Bradley Manning was not leaking the information to the Isreali government as Jonathan Pollard was doing, he was leaking the information to you so that you could decide as an informed citizen in a democracy the appropriateness of your government’s action.
He was leaking it to a newspaper so that everyone could see it. This includes those who are trying to kill our people.
Very much like Daniel Ellsberg.
I know Mr. Ellsberg is an advocate for Bradley Manning, but the two cases are very dissimilar.
That was a very focused compilation of information that included a very candid and pessimistic estimate of our chances of success in Vietnam, and the assessment was very negative and contrary to the public statements of the government. In other words, the report said that we could not win.
While Manning exposed some things that were being denied by the government, including crimes and even what could be rightly classified as murder, he did not reveal anything as fundamental to U.S. policy as a negative assessment of the war. What he revealed also lacked focus. If Ellsberg had released footage of the My Lai Massacre, but also all State Department correspondence over the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, that might have been more equivalent.
Also, the proof is in the pudding. Ellsberg’s leak helped end the war. Manning’s leaks probably reduced the transparency of the government without having any obvious salutary effect on U.S. policy.
“I said people probably died.“
That would never stand up in a court of law.
They were on an assignment from Reuters.
How was their death a RESULT of the leak?!
Take a look at this quote from Jeremy Scahill:
Read more: What Is in Bradley Manning’s Leaks, Anyway? | The Nation
Any the counties the people on the CIA payroll were betraying would not have known either. Just because we don’t know if anyone was killed doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen, because there was information released that could justify killing people.
That’s the huge problem of doing secret and nasty things. Makes people want to get revenge.
A question was asked. I provided the best answer I could.
Now, if Jeremy Scahill could use the internet to identify people on the CIA payroll and then go find them, so could an assassin. So, the leaks could very well have caused someone to lose their life for the crime of assisting the U.S. Government.
If you want to argue that the U.S. Government deserves to have its assets liquidated, then make your case.
Did the prosecution back up their claim the leaks caused a loss of life?
I honestly don’t know the answer, or if there were secret deliberations and such. Seems to me that the question of if these leaks caused deaths can be determined by looking at the prosecution’s case, no? They made part of their case in secret?
If the prosecution confirms that someone killed in Afghanistan was correctly identified by the leaks, they are telling the assassins that they have good information.
I don’t think that was alleged at trial, but I don’t know one way or the other.
I think your question is basically a way of changing the subject.
When it comes to criminal culpability, exposing people to danger is a problem even if they don’t come to harm. In most places, being exposed as a CIA contract agent is not good for your health or your future freedom.
I’m saying that if you fund an agency whose job it is to murder based on information provided by shady characters on behalf of American nationals in a country who are in the business of screwing over the country, there might be a little blowback.
And that maybe being the Pinkertons for exploitive US-based transnational corporations is not what the government should be doing with the taxpayers’ money.
It’s similar principle to my response to StuxNet. Conducting a major infrastucture attack through cyberwarfare is not the smartest move for the most cybervulnerable country on earth. Why are we cybervulnerable? We let our private infrastructure companies handle their own defensive cybersecurity while the NSA is trying to get the people information out of their databases and insisting on having backdoors in the IT hardware and software.
It’s mindless security uber alles. DoD and the intelligence community know what’s best for us when actually they have made a hash of it over 65 years.
Are we safer than when Harry Truman signed the National Security Act of 1947? Now think about why that might be.
Yeah, Booman, so? Betraying one’s country is not just a bad thing if one’s country happens to be the United States of America.
Your American exceptionalism rears its ugly head yet again.
Future president commuting some of his sentence? Not likely.
The worst crime was that the Army gave this very troubled and very low level soldier access to so much classified info without any checks. He will never get off for their ineptitude. And he did in fact willingly and knowingly give away massive amounts of classified info. More than he even understood. It was willful recklessness beyond whistle-blowing. it amounted to self absorption. That has to be punished. Sorry, but that is the call I would make. And 15 years might be the right amount.
My problem is this: I wish I lived in a country where the punishment fit the crime. I want to be able to think that this young idiot should be sent away, because he committed a serious crime, and when you commit a crime, you are punished.
But I can’t think that, because I don’t live in that country. At a time when our elites are permitted–or encouraged–to violate the law with impunity, it’s really tough for me to have any respect for the law. This should strike me as a fairly reasonable outcome. Instead, I’m disgusted.
True that.
But Manning could or should have known that before hitting the send button.
Yes, I agree. There’s no doubt in my mind that Cheney, Libby, Yoo and others should be breaking rocks. But the fact that the rich and powerful can get away with murder doesn’t mean that everyone should have license.
I’d rather see Manning serve his time and then work to bring others to justice if possible. We know that our system is far from perfect. People can and do get away with stuff. All we can do is work to make it as just and fair as possible.
That’s like saying, “Yes, we know that white folks deal and use illegal drugs as much if not more than black folks, but just because they get away with it, that’s no reason not to lock up all those black folks that are disproportionately targeted, caught, prosecuted, and convicted by an unfair judicial system.”
Yes. This.
I disagree. First, it’s not codified in law that rich and powerful folks get a free pass. It’s just that our system is far from perfect. And it’s not always the rich. Sometimes poor folks get away with stuff. It’s the nature of society that justice is flawed. Second, our drug laws are insane and idiotic. Prohibition is counter productive. Our laws against espionage are not without merit. It’s legitimate for our government to keep some secrets. Yes, much that was leaked should not have been withheld to begin with. But there was also much that should have remained off limits.
So, while I agree that it’s BS for African-Americans to face unfair, discriminatory laws and sentencing, and it’s BS that the rich and powerful can sometimes evade justice — that doesn’t mean all leakers should get a free pass. It’s BS whenever anyone, rich or poor, evades justice (e.g. Zimmerman). But it’s life that our system is imperfect and the way to fix it is not to move in the direction of anarchy.
It’s not codified in law that whites get a free pass. It’s just that our system is far from perfect. And it’s not always whites. Sometimes black folks get away with stuff. It’s the nature of society that justice is flawed.
But it’s flawed in such a way that preferences one group over another.
The analogy is a good one. Does Manning deserve punishment? Unlike (I think) Marie2, I think yes. Does a black guy selling crack to preschoolers deserve punishment? I think yes. So the analogy holds: “Just because we know that a disproportionate number of white folks get away with dealing and using illegal drugs, that’s no reason not to lock up all those black folks who are found guilty of the same thing.”
Right? Sure. And even if in every individual case we’re doling out precisely the right punishment (!), we are still participating in a deeply discriminatory justice system.
I agree with much of what you’ve written but want to make one distinction. Of course anyone dealing crack to preschoolers should be in prison. But there are a hell of a lot of non-violent drug offenders who harmed no one but themselves. Our prisons are overflowing with inmates who really ought to have received treatment rather than time. And it’s far more likely that a black man winds up in jail for drug use than a white guy doing essentially the same thing. This is B.S. and it needs to change.
You’re right. Every single time, you’re absolutely right. The fact that the rich and powerful get away with colluding with drug cartels doesn’t mean that a guy in street gang has license. The fact that the rich and powerful get away with ordering war crimes doesn’t mean that the shmuck who committed them has license. The fact that the rich and powerful leak what they want, when they want, doesn’t mean that a dumbass should have license to leak what he wants. The fact that the rich and powerful commit perjury without consequence doesn’t give everyone else license. The fact that the rich and powerful destroy trillions of dollars in wealth and steal people’s houses doesn’t mean that my neighbor has license to burn my money and steal my bike.
You’re right. Every single time. But it makes me sick.
I agree with this completely, and I share your frustration.
His time spent should definitely count towards his sentence, probably with a multiplier for the abuse.
Judge has granted 112 days already for the abuse.
.
Yes, no hope for the sitting president!
Shouldn’t that be “cleared of the most serious charge” and not “strongest charge?” Given that the prosecution failed to define “the enemy.”
Because a democracy is strong when we don’t know what our government is doing in our name? That it’s not for us to know about Abu Ghraib, “Collateral Murder,” and collusion with economic hitmen, both domestic and foreign, in other countries? Bush/Cheney etal. continue to live their lives of wealth and privilege while the anti-Bush/Cheney etal. get locked up for decades. Screw that.
Lt. William Calley was convicted of murdering 22 people in the village of My Lai. Manning has already been incarcerated years longer than Calley was. Calley wasn’t locked up and subjected to inhumane treatment from the time of his arrest to his trial. He went to Leavenworth for one month after his conviction and lived under house arrest at Fort Benning for three and a half years. Don’t understand those that think Manning’s crimes were several times worse than those of a mass murderer.
Couple of false arguments there.
Point is that the USA considers fingering war criminals as worse than the war crimes. Hence, 15 years for Manning and one month for Calley.
The way Calley got off was sickening. Equally sickening was the way those higher up in the chain of command managed to pin the whole deed on him. The reaction to that is in part why Calley got off. That and racism and jingoism. The whole thing was appalling.
Point is that the USA considers fingering war criminals as worse than the war crimes.
You know that the Calley trial took place forty years ago, right?
The war criminals in Scott Beauchamp’s unit were sentenced to life.
Robert Bales, who murdered 16 Afghans in a killing spree, plead guilty and got life in order to avoid the death penalty.
.
.
Great that our President knows his priorities! He too needs to abide by the rules of the military establishment. The military court knows the rules and their justice is just as blind as the civilian courts.
This isn’t quite the whole story is it? I think we should make the distinction that Calley was originally sentenced to life in prison. The rest is another story.
15 years for 22 murders? With that standard Manson should have been released a few years ago. (And no, society cannot allow people like that to live free.)
There are probably more efficient and effective ways to get State Dept personnel to stop engaging in nefarious, embarrassing, and/or illegal activities than posting all their communications on the internet in real time.
You think?
This was never a good case for people who want more sunshine. It was a great case for people who want more compartmentalization.
People should try harder to understand this case on several levels simultaneously.
But formulations like, “Important person A deserved a harsher penalty, therefore Manning should get a small or no sentence” really have no logical basis. It strikes at the heartstrings, but this is a national security case and also one that most Americans think should be dealt with harshly.
In my opinion, deterrence is pretty important in this case. But I also look at the kid and I know he’s not a bad kid. I know he was mistreated. And I’m inclined to be lenient. If I could decide it, I’d give a fairly harsh sentence and then commute it after a two or three years. He’s paid enough, and all we really want to do is make it clear to anyone else who is thinking of doing a massive document dump that it’s not going to end well.
The problem, BooMan, is that most of the people defending what Manning did are actively opposed to 1, 2, and 6, and consider #3 to be a highly desirable outcome.
OK, if it is a national security case that should be dealt with harshly (which I don’t necessarily agree with for reasons relating to the Pentagon Papers case, which had the real effect of showing that two American Presidents and a bunch of generals had been knowingly lying to the public)–then deal with Gen. Cartright with the same harshness. Put him in a tiger cage for three weeks. Send him to Quantico for three months, putting him in solitary and stripping him naked. Then give him 112 days credit for that and stretch out the trial process for three years with failed delivery of discovery documents. Try him with some secret evidence. Demean his character and in the closing arguments call him a “traitor” over and over again. And claim that he was showboating for approval from the media.
Or do bad things just happen to privates and PFCs? Does rank still have the privilege of impunity?
On General Cartwright, he ought to have his day in court. And he probably will. He shouldn’t be treated the way Manning was treated. Manning shouldn’t have been treated the way he was treated.
3, You have a lot of sensitivity for the civil servants who work in the Foreign Service and other roles in the State Department. In one sense, that is admirable. Too few understand exactly what these folks actually do for a living. And the media so romanticizes the diplomatic corps that it misses the day-to-day operations of briefing incomeing nit-wit members of Congress about the potential political pitfalls in a country, the current desires of the host government, and so on. Of handling the inevitable requests from US corporations for special pleading with the host government, and so on. What I said was an analysis of open source (i.e. public) reports of damage. That would be a typical scholarly activity not many years ago; it seems that the scholars in universities have gotten fat and lazy on their government, corporate, and foundation support. But really, for you, it comes down to “Our reputation was damaged.” Well, to the extent that the truth came out about what was locally being whispered, you have a point.
On General Cartwright, rank apparently does have its privileges still. Likely he won’t be labeled a traitor by the President and the press either. Likely the damage he did will be minimized. And likely the judge will accord his defense team more deference than did the judge in the Manning case. Professional courtesy among the elite.
“Are we so stupid as to think that when the Yemeni government claims credit for drone strikes, that the Yemeni people don’t understand who actually did it?“
If you find anyone who thinks that Lt. Calley’s punishment was sufficient, you let us know.
Do you ever bother to check out your notions? Wikipedia gets basic facts right most of the time.
Perhaps I should have been more clear, since I was talking to you:
That is a story for forty years ago. I was asking if any of the people who find Manning’s conviction appropriate were satisfied with the Calley verdict.
Are you playing dumb, or is this really you doing your best?
I mean, seriously, you read my comment and thought, “A-ha, joe doesn’t know that there were people who defended Callley way back then!”
Really?
Really?
Not that it matters, but folks in Columbus, Georgia, say that Mr. Calley, the jewelry store owner was just attacked by leftists. And Newt Gingrich, who went to high school there (even married his former geometry teacher from there) agrees with that assessment, even today. They’re from the William Tecumseh Sherman, “War is hell” school of thought. Kill that village to save it until they shower US troops with flowers, chocolates, and willing women. Those folks completely forget their ancestors’ feeling about those Hessians.
So when do the slap-happy helicopter gunship jockeys who killed a Reuters correspondent get tried for war crimes?
When do the troops who orders and covered up the Garani massacre, which was leaked by someone other than Bradley Manning per today’s verdict, get tried for war crimes?
The US tried and executed Japanese officers who waterboarded US GIs in World War II. When do the folks who ordered waterboarding at Guantanamo and Bagram get tried?
Acting under color of law did not save the Japanese officers. “I was following orders.” was not an acceptable defense.
We have lost a huge amount of diplomatic power because of the attitude that international law does not apply to the US like we apply it to others.
How much will the exposure of war crimes and government fraud and corruption in the leak of the very large trove of documents be a mitigating factor in the sentencing?
The way Democrats are celebrating this like it’s some great victory over the forces of evil is more than a little disturbing. The forces of evil are what Bush and Cheney unleashed in our name and have never been held accountable for. Until there is a thorough airing and accountability like that that happened in the 1970s, we are little more than a dwindling power defending itself by it pretense of military might and high-tech intelligence capabilities.
Yes, some Japanese officers were convicted for water boarding while others got away with far worse forms of torture, such as cutting people to pieces while alive without anesthetic. You know, life sucks sometimes. It’s often unfair. That doesn’t mean we should condone crime. We (by which I mean we — you and I, people without power) can only do our best to support rational policies and oppose the bastards who take advantage. And there will continue to be injustice for the indefinite future. Sorry.
There’s a recent book that has Japan in a stir. You do understand why those folks got away with it, don’t you? Given the fact of heavy US occupation after World War II.
Yeah, life sucks sometimes, and when it sucks for brown(ish) people on the other side of the earth because the US government decides it needs to suck for them, well, the American people should just suck it up and try to support rational policies.
Bullshit. The brown(ish) people whose lives have sucked and continue to suck at the hands of the US government are real human beings whose lives and goals and desires are not less than those of the American people who “try” to support rational policies as long as they can do so without putting themselves in any kind of disadvantage, let alone actual jeopardy.
The way Democrats are celebrating this like it’s some great victory over the forces of evil
Link?
Lovely!!!
Thank you. At least a tad of honesty and compassion.
#1-“..some future president…”
Right. Certainly not your “peace president.” He’s in the secrets/hidden crimes soup right up to his armpits.
#2-So it comes down to who in the future. The future being say 15 years. Take away a couple of lame duckling O’Quacker’s years and you have 3 terms.
Lemme see…Who is in a position to win both the nomivnation and the presidency in 20016.
Hmmmm…
Could it be…
HILLARY!!!???
Please.
She wuz there when they started this secret tech shit and since becoming Secretary of State she has been using the NSA system to cover her own ass as well as any pol in history ever covered theirs.
Christie?
Please twice!!!
He’s right there with that POS Peter King regarding “Security matters.” Christie lost no time in publicly declaring his fealty to the Intelligence Monster, simultaneously taking a swipe at Rand Paul as well…the only national pol to publicly oppose the NSA/CIA/TSA/ICE/GKWE (God Knows What Else) hydra-headed security apparatus.
So, Booman…what’re you saying? You have some “hope” that an anti-S.S. (Surveillance State) pol; will become preznit in the next 15 years?
Whozzat again?
Besides Rand Paul, of course.
But….OH no!!! He’s the son of a flake, right? It’s gotta be a good DemRat, or even a good RatPub if all else fails. Let’s hear it fer them secrets, folks!!! Without them, how d’you expect people to run this vast criminal conspiracy, eh?
Nevermind.
Don’t even answer.
I’ll be too busy cleaning my nails.
Yore freind…
Emily Litella
Manning had to be punished for violating orders as a soldier and for breaching security. Personally, I think fifteen years, which as I recall is the maximum, is too much, but let’s not argue about that point.
I have to wonder if he tried alternative methods through channels. Perhaps he did. Perhaps I’m being a Pollyanna in wondering if he contacted the IG or the FBI (duh! forget I said that) or the AG (uh! Eric Holder, forget that), White House (Ha! Ha! Ha! as if they cared any more than Cheney). I guess it comes down to the IG and maybe leaking to Bernie Sanders or some other member of Congress instead of Wikileaks. Was Wikileaks the only venue to complain about war crimes? (the UN?) If so, justice is truly dead in the USA.
BTW, I remember swearing to obey all lawful orders of my superiors.
Good point. To the best of my knowledge, a soldier has a duty to refuse unlawful orders.
.
Amnesty International Bradley Manning verdict reveals US government’s misplaced priorities on national security.
“Bradley Manning family statement: ‘Brad loved his country and was proud to wear its uniform’
Well, nobody’s perfect.
People who actively oppose the United States and want to see harm come to it think Bradley Manning is awesome.
Please, don’t stop talking.
Someone releases a tremendous amount of classified material and goes on trial, and gets convicted. I, as an American citizen, am supposed to be satisfied that justice was fairly dispensed, and I, as an American citizen, am supposed to have confidence in that conviction. There is no doubt at all that he was guilty. He seemed, to all appearances, to have a fair and unbiased judge.
And yet I am filled with sadness and melancholy. I have no feeling at all that ‘justice’ is being served. I have no impression at all that Manning was given a fair shake. 112 days off for the abuse, the lack of access to decency for months? 15 years? Sure, maybe in a country that can dispense ‘justice’ with a fair hand. Perhaps in a country that has presidents that take their power of clemency seriously.
But America is no such country, and we continually elect no such people to our presidency, or to leadership positions at all. We are morally bankrupt at the top, at the middle, and at the bottom of our leadership. So it is no surprise at all that some young men break their oaths, and become convicted criminals. It seems like all empires are the same. Even 21st century ones.
How sad.
“We are morally bankrupt at the top, at the middle, and at the bottom of our leadership.“
All I can say is “yes, but the moral bankruptcy does not begin and end with the leadership. On the contrary, when the leadership is chosen by the population, then we must look to the population as the source of both the good and the ill”.
Personally I think we owe a great debt of gratitude to Bradley Manning. I think the article below “Bradley Manning enlisting the Enlightment” eloquently weighs personal responsibility against reponsibities sworn to a National Security State.
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/06/201363125817224213.html
From a comment on Daily Kos, this is what Manning leaked:
THAT’s the issue, isn’t it? Why are we focused on Bradley Manning’s supposed “crimes” and not the horrific crimes of the United States government?
What a steaming load of horse shit.
700,000 documents released, and you’re going to pretend that’s it?
Let’s not even get to how false those descriptions are. You’re actually going to sit and pretend that, to pick one example, the cable from John Kerry saying that the Syrians were close to starting peace talks with Israel doesn’t exist.
I see you’ve not taken the time to check out the cables on the Wikileaks site as to what was a actually released to the public.
The list is not mine, nor is the selection. The commenter there asserts that these are serious crimes and violations of US law and policy that were exposed, as well as other scandalous actions that might better explain why the US has lost credibility with the rest of the world.
If you want to add up the many positive actions exposed, have at it. There were indeed a number of those. But there is a critically lack of public accountability for a US foreign policy that essentially is being driven by a permanent establishment that has a vested interest in perpetuating a lot of unsustainable situations. And those decisions keep coming back to bite. To the response of “no-one-coulda-knowed”.
Yes, it is wonderful that future Daniel Elsbergs and other such courageous individuals will now be “adequately deterred” from letting the American people know how their governments lie to them. (sarcasm alert)