8 ms·

There is no record of any individual being physically harmed, but the leaked diplomatic cables were highly embarrassing, hurt the interests of the US, and were

There is no record of any individual being physically harmed, but the leaked diplomatic cables were highly embarrassing, hurt the interests of the US, and were completely unjustified. They weren't exposing malfeasance or war crimes. They should not have been released. Manning did it wrong, Snowden did it right.

dragonwriter 10y ago
> Manning did it wrong, Snowden did it right. AFAIK, both Manning and Snowden released large quantities of information without reviewing all of it in detail for public interest vs. potential harm, and released it not to the public but to third parties that managed public release. The difference is that Manning released it to Assange and Snowden released it to more responsible journalists.
- hendersoon 10y ago
  Yes, that is completely correct. Snowden released his information to journalists who carefully vetted each item for newsworthiness with the participation of the US government. Then that data was parceled out over many months, so it would remain in daily news cycles and continue to generate commentary over that time, staying in the public's mind. Manning gave her data to Wikileaks, who posted it online in its entirety.
  - lern_too_spel 10y ago
    When did The Guardian or the South China Morning Post vet anything with the US government?
    - stevehb 10y ago
      The Guardian ran everything by the US government first before publishing. Every responsible journalist does. They're looking for a response or comment to the story, to make sure they didn't get anything wrong, and to see if there's a any reason to withhold details (a reason beyond "It's classified so don't"). In fact, in Greenwald's book No Place to Hide, he describes how they held off publishing for several days while waiting for a response from the government. Greenwald was so frustrated with the delays that he considered quitting the Guardian and going on his own. I think that's the idea that eventually turned into The Intercept.
      - lern_too_spel 10y ago
        If that's the case, how did they get almost everything wrong? Reading the original stories on The Guardian, I couldn't find any response from the US government. Why did you ignore the SCMP entirely?
- nickpsecurity 10y ago
  "The difference is that Manning released it to Assange and Snowden released it to more responsible journalists." Sort of. They're more responsible in the general sense but also foreign journalists receiving U.S.'s spying capabilities on foreign persons. The aiding and abetting concept is quite appropriate given they published all kinds of NSA attack strategies & subverted companies while the foreign attacks & companies... including in their own countries... didn't get the same treatment. Both attack and defense on the other side got a great boost while U.S. companies simultaneously lost market share. Quite a bit of damage giving stuff foreigners shouldn't know to foreign journalists. I might be happier if there was a Snowden in all 20+ countries involved in economic and industrial espionage. Instead, it was just what mainly two (U.S. and U.K.) were doing outside the many eyes partnership that extends to Europe. Quite asymmetrical.
  - gjjrfcbugxbhf 10y ago
    This is wonderful FUD and misdirection. I will bookmark to use as a reference for when I want to careful discredit someone.
    - nickpsecurity 10y ago
      Your comment is simple trolling. Most nations in the Snowden leaks spy on each other with humans and hacking. Only a few had their tools leaked by Snowden. Others, with spy & surveillance programs still running. immediately used that as political and economic leverage. That leaks damaged one set of countries while giving others benefits is a fact. The real question is whether there is a greater good to that damage justifying it. I think there was for the domestic leaks but not the foreign ones outside a few. Far as that few, the Belgacom attack is a good example where taking down allies' telecoms over bullshit could have consequences for America past the usual info collection the spies do. Americans should have a conversation about that kind of thing before those acting on our behalf do such acts.
- general_ai 10y ago
  >> The difference is that Manning released it to Assange and >> Snowden released it to more responsible journalists. As we all know by now, it's illegal to read the leaks unless they're on CNN. "Responsible" journalists from CNN told us as much.
jacobush 10y ago
Snowden also had hindsight of sorts, "don't release it to Assange" was probably pretty obvious.
- hendersoon 10y ago
  Absolutely. Whether you attribute his superior strategy to learning from Manning's mistake or his own native intelligence, there's simply no doubt that Snowden leaked his data in a more effective and less damaging way.
  - mcv 10y ago
    He learned not just from Manning, but also from Thomas Drake and other NSA whistleblowers before him.
DonHopkins 10y ago
The fact that the US murdered innocent civilians was highly embarrassing and hurt the interests of the US, not the fact that Manning leaked that information itself. Punish the murderers, not the messengers. The only people were actually harmed were the innocent children and journalists on the receiving end of US machine guns.
- mcv 10y ago
  This exactly. Governments do need to be held accountable for secret crimes, secrecy should not be allowed to enable continuing those crimes. Exposing them was necessary, even if it was illegal. I do think Manning was naive and sloppy for handing the whole thing over to Assange, though in her defense, Assange seemed fairly reasonable and responsible at the time. It's only after this enormous leak that he seems to have gone mad with power.
  - wallace_f 10y ago
    I can sleep a lot better tonight having read this thread of thoughts after some of the awfulness I just read over at reddit. With this issue there is a remarkable degree of misinformation, as well as fascist ideology supporting the the surveillance state. These neverending, unechecked powers undermine civil rights and allow human rights abuses to go continue. And it's all wrapped in this package of 'a good liberal just supporting the good guys like Obama and Hillary that evil Assange is trying to destroy.' Assange is far from perfect, but I cannot understand how people do not fight back in solidarity with outrage against human and civil rights abuses.
    - grandalf 10y ago
      > I cannot understand how people do not fight back in solidarity with outrage against human and civil rights abuses I think there is a very sad aspect of human nature which makes humans bow before power.
      - zemanel 10y ago
        It's called mortality :) people have X years to live and try to make the best of it and not everyone is ready to sacrifice that time for doing the right thing.
harry8 10y ago
Manning intended to remain anonymous. Snowden always intended to take personal public responsibility for his whistleblowing. They did it different, different tools for different purposes. Comparing them like for like is not a good comparison.
- hendersoon 10y ago
  Snowden took personal responsibility for a single reason-- so the news would talk about the leaks, rather than the effort to find the leaker. He didn't want the conversation to be about Edward Snowden. He was largely successful.
crpatino 10y ago
When you go around doing reprehensible things, you deserve humiliation and embarrasment. More over, if some of those reprehensible things you did, you happen to have done to your own allies, it means they are entitled to have second thoughts about whether they will want to continue aligning their interest to yours, or if they should be more assertive in the future to compensate for the cost of doing business with you. So, you can keep shooting at the messanger all you want, but any bad outcomes comming out of this, you brought to yourselves.

dragonwriter 10y ago

> Manning did it wrong, Snowden did it right. AFAIK, both Manning and Snowden released large quantities of information without reviewing all of it in detail for public interest vs. potential harm, and released it not to the public but to third parties that managed public release. The difference is that Manning released it to Assange and Snowden released it to more responsible journalists.

hendersoon 10y ago
Yes, that is completely correct. Snowden released his information to journalists who carefully vetted each item for newsworthiness with the participation of the US government. Then that data was parceled out over many months, so it would remain in daily news cycles and continue to generate commentary over that time, staying in the public's mind. Manning gave her data to Wikileaks, who posted it online in its entirety.
- lern_too_spel 10y ago
  When did The Guardian or the South China Morning Post vet anything with the US government?
  - stevehb 10y ago
    The Guardian ran everything by the US government first before publishing. Every responsible journalist does. They're looking for a response or comment to the story, to make sure they didn't get anything wrong, and to see if there's a any reason to withhold details (a reason beyond "It's classified so don't"). In fact, in Greenwald's book No Place to Hide, he describes how they held off publishing for several days while waiting for a response from the government. Greenwald was so frustrated with the delays that he considered quitting the Guardian and going on his own. I think that's the idea that eventually turned into The Intercept.
    - lern_too_spel 10y ago
      If that's the case, how did they get almost everything wrong? Reading the original stories on The Guardian, I couldn't find any response from the US government. Why did you ignore the SCMP entirely?
nickpsecurity 10y ago
"The difference is that Manning released it to Assange and Snowden released it to more responsible journalists." Sort of. They're more responsible in the general sense but also foreign journalists receiving U.S.'s spying capabilities on foreign persons. The aiding and abetting concept is quite appropriate given they published all kinds of NSA attack strategies & subverted companies while the foreign attacks & companies... including in their own countries... didn't get the same treatment. Both attack and defense on the other side got a great boost while U.S. companies simultaneously lost market share. Quite a bit of damage giving stuff foreigners shouldn't know to foreign journalists. I might be happier if there was a Snowden in all 20+ countries involved in economic and industrial espionage. Instead, it was just what mainly two (U.S. and U.K.) were doing outside the many eyes partnership that extends to Europe. Quite asymmetrical.
- gjjrfcbugxbhf 10y ago
  This is wonderful FUD and misdirection. I will bookmark to use as a reference for when I want to careful discredit someone.
  - nickpsecurity 10y ago
    Your comment is simple trolling. Most nations in the Snowden leaks spy on each other with humans and hacking. Only a few had their tools leaked by Snowden. Others, with spy & surveillance programs still running. immediately used that as political and economic leverage. That leaks damaged one set of countries while giving others benefits is a fact. The real question is whether there is a greater good to that damage justifying it. I think there was for the domestic leaks but not the foreign ones outside a few. Far as that few, the Belgacom attack is a good example where taking down allies' telecoms over bullshit could have consequences for America past the usual info collection the spies do. Americans should have a conversation about that kind of thing before those acting on our behalf do such acts.
general_ai 10y ago
>> The difference is that Manning released it to Assange and >> Snowden released it to more responsible journalists. As we all know by now, it's illegal to read the leaks unless they're on CNN. "Responsible" journalists from CNN told us as much.

jacobush 10y ago

Snowden also had hindsight of sorts, "don't release it to Assange" was probably pretty obvious.

hendersoon 10y ago
Absolutely. Whether you attribute his superior strategy to learning from Manning's mistake or his own native intelligence, there's simply no doubt that Snowden leaked his data in a more effective and less damaging way.
- mcv 10y ago
  He learned not just from Manning, but also from Thomas Drake and other NSA whistleblowers before him.

DonHopkins 10y ago

The fact that the US murdered innocent civilians was highly embarrassing and hurt the interests of the US, not the fact that Manning leaked that information itself. Punish the murderers, not the messengers. The only people were actually harmed were the innocent children and journalists on the receiving end of US machine guns.

mcv 10y ago
This exactly. Governments do need to be held accountable for secret crimes, secrecy should not be allowed to enable continuing those crimes. Exposing them was necessary, even if it was illegal. I do think Manning was naive and sloppy for handing the whole thing over to Assange, though in her defense, Assange seemed fairly reasonable and responsible at the time. It's only after this enormous leak that he seems to have gone mad with power.
- wallace_f 10y ago
  I can sleep a lot better tonight having read this thread of thoughts after some of the awfulness I just read over at reddit. With this issue there is a remarkable degree of misinformation, as well as fascist ideology supporting the the surveillance state. These neverending, unechecked powers undermine civil rights and allow human rights abuses to go continue. And it's all wrapped in this package of 'a good liberal just supporting the good guys like Obama and Hillary that evil Assange is trying to destroy.' Assange is far from perfect, but I cannot understand how people do not fight back in solidarity with outrage against human and civil rights abuses.
  - grandalf 10y ago
    > I cannot understand how people do not fight back in solidarity with outrage against human and civil rights abuses I think there is a very sad aspect of human nature which makes humans bow before power.
    - zemanel 10y ago
      It's called mortality :) people have X years to live and try to make the best of it and not everyone is ready to sacrifice that time for doing the right thing.

harry8 10y ago

Manning intended to remain anonymous. Snowden always intended to take personal public responsibility for his whistleblowing. They did it different, different tools for different purposes. Comparing them like for like is not a good comparison.

hendersoon 10y ago
Snowden took personal responsibility for a single reason-- so the news would talk about the leaks, rather than the effort to find the leaker. He didn't want the conversation to be about Edward Snowden. He was largely successful.

crpatino 10y ago

When you go around doing reprehensible things, you deserve humiliation and embarrasment. More over, if some of those reprehensible things you did, you happen to have done to your own allies, it means they are entitled to have second thoughts about whether they will want to continue aligning their interest to yours, or if they should be more assertive in the future to compensate for the cost of doing business with you. So, you can keep shooting at the messanger all you want, but any bad outcomes comming out of this, you brought to yourselves.