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Very sad. So the guys who murdered innocents in another country using machine guns sitting on top of a helicopter are yet to be tried. While the guys who stood

Very sad. So the guys who murdered innocents in another country using machine guns sitting on top of a helicopter are yet to be tried. While the guys who stood up for humanity and true spirit of serving forces for good is sentenced 35 years. And I know a lot of people would troll me on this opinion itself.

eli 13y ago
I agree it's sad. I'm not personally a big Manning fan, but that feels like a stiff sentence. (By the way, I think a lot of people would disagree with you. That doesn't mean they're "trolling" you.)
- thex86 13y ago
  > I'm not personally a big Manning fan Can you elaborate why? I am interested in hearing your point of view because maybe I just have one side of the story.
  - eli 13y ago
    Sure, but I really only have a few quick minutes so this might be a little scattered. There are some interesting things in some of the cables he leaked (it's going to be great for historians). There were even a few troubling things in there that probably deserve investigation.... but the vast majority of the cables were, at most, embarrassing. They strained foreign relationships and embarrassed allies & various diplomats by name. I don't know if anyone was hurt or killed over them, but I think it's at least plausible. For what? Were there any documents that Manning had access to that he didn't try to take? The indiscriminate nature of what he took makes me seriously question his motives. What specifically was he blowing the whistle on? I admit that whistleblower protection sucks in the military, but he didn't even try to go through the proper channels. I agree the US overclassifies documents and is too secretive. I agree we need more transparency and I certainly agree we need better whistleblower protection and oversight...But I don't think that gives everyone with access the right to unilaterally declassify whatever they want without penalty. The military can't work like that. No organization can work like that.
  - venomsnake 13y ago
    What Manning did was stupid. And while I agree that 35 years is harsh (mostly because I don't believe in prison terms above 5 years) he leaked a lot of stuff, not all of it related to warcrimes. The 1.5 gigabyte unecrypted file is in the torrents so you could take a look to see what is inside - if it is legal under your jurisdiction. Also WikiLeaks didn't released all cables that he gave them against - so he failed on that front too. He also didn't make a dead man's switch that he could leak additional material in case he is captured or convicted - that to use as bargaining chip. He called himself Bradass83 as a nickname and approached a hacker on im program. So - he leaked too much, too nondiscriminatory, failed to it properly and was behaving amateurish.
TylerE 13y ago
I think, for Manning, it has to be considered a victory, considering he was facing up to 90 years, and the gov't asked for 60. He could be out on Parole as "soon" as 2025.
- davidjgraph 13y ago
  I think it's earlier than that. The article mentions the time he's already served and a deduction for poor treatment in custody. That comes to nearly 4 years, itself. I'm not sure if has to serve a minimum of (35-4)/3 or (35/3) -4, but I suspect it's the later if common sense is applied (which is often not the case).
- monsterix 13y ago
  The question is: Why should he be in prison at all? and why the other three murderers in the army who were exposed in the 'collateral damage' video be left free outside untried? The question is why would someone end up leaking state secrets at all?: Hint: Those secrets are about wrong doings!
  - nsxwolf 13y ago
    So did you actually watch the video of the "three murderers" and think critically about it, or were you swayed by the heavily editorialized subtitles and its sensational title?
    - monsterix 13y ago
      Let me ask this question to you instead: Did you think critically about the crime and figure out the murderers at all?
      - nsxwolf 13y ago
        I'm not convinced I see a crime committed. From what I saw and heard, I don't believe three crew members woke up that morning and decided "let's kill some civilians today". Remember "mens rea"? We HNers all seem to think that's an important concept, except apparently when it's people we don't like (US military).
dubcanada 13y ago
I can go kill a few babies in cold blood and get out in less then 10. But releasing documents that are private... well now that's just not very nice.
- rwmj 13y ago
  I'm fairly sure if you killed "a few babies in cold blood" you would not be out within 10 years.
- hnal943 13y ago
  That says more about our society's dehumanization of children than anything else.
kevincennis 13y ago
I totally understand that sentiment, but at the same time, the whole concept of classified information breaks down pretty quickly if you start saying it's okay for people to exercise their own judgement and break the rules. There are always paths to responsible disclosure. From what I understand, many of them are pretty badly broken, and we certainly need to fix that. But ultimately, you really don't want to set a precedent of "well, if you leak something and you really believe in your heart that it was morally justified, then we won't send you to jail." Anyway, I know this is going to be an unpopular opinion here, so I shall now let the sea of downvotes wash over me.
- Torn 13y ago
  It's a fair enough opinion, the problem is that there's no public input on whether leaking is justified - those in charge will say it isn't and that's that.
  - jmduke 13y ago
    One of the main reasons the court system exists is to make sure public input isn't part of the process, no?
- revelation 13y ago
  What he leaked was available to 1.5+ million people in the USA. It is not by any reasonable meaning of the word classified, it is the proceedings of a seperate class of society.
  - jmduke 13y ago
    1.5 million people is less than .5% of the population.
  - vonmoltke 13y ago
    Where are you getting that number from?
    - 13y ago
mindcrime 13y ago
So the guys who murdered innocents in another country using machine guns sitting on top of a helicopter are yet to be tried. You're dead on with that comment. The most galling aspect of this entire story isn't that Manning is going to serve some jail time (although that is absurd in its own right), but rather that all of the real criminals are walking away scott free, with no repurcusions for their behavior at all. This will probably prove to be the case with the NSA situation as well. The people who ordered, and conducted, mass surveillance of people they had not business spying on, will never be punished. And no one will be held accountable even so far as losing their job, or being docked some pay. Keith Alexander and James Clapper and their cronies keep getting paid and probably get nice, cushy government provided pensions and the whole bit. Meanwhile, Edward Snowden is forced to hide out in another country, completely removed from his friends and family, and - for all we know - may ultimately wind up in jail right alongside Bradley Manning. Tell me something isn't badly wrong with this picture?
- GVIrish 13y ago
  Eh I think it's a stretch to call the pilot and gunner in the Apache video war criminals. There were US personnel nearby, they thought they made a positive ID on guys with weapons and potentially and RPG in that group and they made a judgment call. They opened fire thinking these guys were insurgents and when others came to help, they assumed the same. Not saying that what they did was right, but I don't think it's a cut and dried case where you can say those guys should be in jail. I don't think Manning was wrong for trying to get that particular story out there, but the indiscriminate nature of his leak is what destroyed his whistleblower defense. If someone worked at Lockheed Martin, and had evidence of bribery of defense officials, but then also leaked 100's of thousands of documents that contain the classified schematics of every single weapons system them make, that guy would rightfully be put in jail. Maybe I'm wrong, but if you're whistleblowing on classified or confidential information, then you should limit your disclosure to what is relevant to the actual wrongdoing.
rayiner 13y ago
Uh, if you actually read up on the helicopter video, you'll see that Assange plays a game of "hide the ball" with what really happens in the video: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike. Specifically: 1) The company had been under fire all morning and the Apaches were called in by a soldier on the ground under attack at the location where the journalists were; 2) Among the group of men the two Reuters journalists were with, there were armed men an AK-47 and two RPG launchers, one loaded (and if you can tell that what the journalists are carrying are cameras and not weapons from the grainy video, in real time, you've got sharper eyes than me); 3) A portion of the tape is missing in which the helicopters engage armed insurgents that are seen running into a building; this portion precedes a section visible on the tape that shows the Apaches firing at the building with a missile. So no, the soldiers in the helicopter should not be tried. If soldiers are in a theater of war, are called in because other soldiers are under attack, and see people with weapons, they should shoot, and that's what happened here. This was not one of those cases like you saw in Vietnam when soldiers just started shooting up civilians with no threat in sight.
- dendory 13y ago
  Yes, especially when they saw the rescuers come and try to save the injured, they just had to kill those as well. How dare rescuers try to save lives! This is war, which clearly means shooting anything that moves is the best policy. </sarcasm>
  - rayiner 13y ago
    It's not just "war" in the abstract. The context of the video is that there is literally a firefight going on nearby in which U.S. soldiers are under attack. The helicopters shot at what appeared to be a group of armed men ("appeared" because some of the men actually were armed) and then shot at a van that appeared to be trying to pick up "bodies and weapons" (according to the soldier who radioed in for permission to engage the van). In the context of a firefight, that means the van is a potential threat--those wounded and the weapons could go back to fighting U.S soldiers. This is not a "shoot anything that moves situation." It's a "if you're called in to the middle of a firefight you resolve doubts in favor of whatever protects other U.S. soldiers." """ Gabriel Schoenfeld, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute said of the airstrike:. It is precisely the presence of weapons, including RPGs, that goes a long distance toward explaining why cameramen for Reuters—pointing television cameras around corners in a battle zone—were readily mistaken by our gunships for insurgents. The video makes plain that in this incident, as in almost all military encounters in both Iraq and Afghanistan, our soldiers are up against forces that do not wear uniforms—a violation of international law precisely because it places innocent civilians in jeopardy. """ Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's never appropriate to second-guess a soldier's conduct in war. But "war crimes" are purposefully malicious actions in the absence of a threat. Not bad judgment calls in response to what you can make out from hundreds of meters away in the middle of a firefight. This is a war crime: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre.

eli 13y ago

I agree it's sad. I'm not personally a big Manning fan, but that feels like a stiff sentence. (By the way, I think a lot of people would disagree with you. That doesn't mean they're "trolling" you.)

thex86 13y ago
> I'm not personally a big Manning fan Can you elaborate why? I am interested in hearing your point of view because maybe I just have one side of the story.
- eli 13y ago
  Sure, but I really only have a few quick minutes so this might be a little scattered. There are some interesting things in some of the cables he leaked (it's going to be great for historians). There were even a few troubling things in there that probably deserve investigation.... but the vast majority of the cables were, at most, embarrassing. They strained foreign relationships and embarrassed allies & various diplomats by name. I don't know if anyone was hurt or killed over them, but I think it's at least plausible. For what? Were there any documents that Manning had access to that he didn't try to take? The indiscriminate nature of what he took makes me seriously question his motives. What specifically was he blowing the whistle on? I admit that whistleblower protection sucks in the military, but he didn't even try to go through the proper channels. I agree the US overclassifies documents and is too secretive. I agree we need more transparency and I certainly agree we need better whistleblower protection and oversight...But I don't think that gives everyone with access the right to unilaterally declassify whatever they want without penalty. The military can't work like that. No organization can work like that.
- venomsnake 13y ago
  What Manning did was stupid. And while I agree that 35 years is harsh (mostly because I don't believe in prison terms above 5 years) he leaked a lot of stuff, not all of it related to warcrimes. The 1.5 gigabyte unecrypted file is in the torrents so you could take a look to see what is inside - if it is legal under your jurisdiction. Also WikiLeaks didn't released all cables that he gave them against - so he failed on that front too. He also didn't make a dead man's switch that he could leak additional material in case he is captured or convicted - that to use as bargaining chip. He called himself Bradass83 as a nickname and approached a hacker on im program. So - he leaked too much, too nondiscriminatory, failed to it properly and was behaving amateurish.

TylerE 13y ago

I think, for Manning, it has to be considered a victory, considering he was facing up to 90 years, and the gov't asked for 60. He could be out on Parole as "soon" as 2025.

davidjgraph 13y ago
I think it's earlier than that. The article mentions the time he's already served and a deduction for poor treatment in custody. That comes to nearly 4 years, itself. I'm not sure if has to serve a minimum of (35-4)/3 or (35/3) -4, but I suspect it's the later if common sense is applied (which is often not the case).
monsterix 13y ago
The question is: Why should he be in prison at all? and why the other three murderers in the army who were exposed in the 'collateral damage' video be left free outside untried? The question is why would someone end up leaking state secrets at all?: Hint: Those secrets are about wrong doings!
- nsxwolf 13y ago
  So did you actually watch the video of the "three murderers" and think critically about it, or were you swayed by the heavily editorialized subtitles and its sensational title?
  - monsterix 13y ago
    Let me ask this question to you instead: Did you think critically about the crime and figure out the murderers at all?
    - nsxwolf 13y ago
      I'm not convinced I see a crime committed. From what I saw and heard, I don't believe three crew members woke up that morning and decided "let's kill some civilians today". Remember "mens rea"? We HNers all seem to think that's an important concept, except apparently when it's people we don't like (US military).

dubcanada 13y ago

I can go kill a few babies in cold blood and get out in less then 10. But releasing documents that are private... well now that's just not very nice.

rwmj 13y ago
I'm fairly sure if you killed "a few babies in cold blood" you would not be out within 10 years.
hnal943 13y ago
That says more about our society's dehumanization of children than anything else.

kevincennis 13y ago

I totally understand that sentiment, but at the same time, the whole concept of classified information breaks down pretty quickly if you start saying it's okay for people to exercise their own judgement and break the rules. There are always paths to responsible disclosure. From what I understand, many of them are pretty badly broken, and we certainly need to fix that. But ultimately, you really don't want to set a precedent of "well, if you leak something and you really believe in your heart that it was morally justified, then we won't send you to jail." Anyway, I know this is going to be an unpopular opinion here, so I shall now let the sea of downvotes wash over me.

Torn 13y ago
It's a fair enough opinion, the problem is that there's no public input on whether leaking is justified - those in charge will say it isn't and that's that.
- jmduke 13y ago
  One of the main reasons the court system exists is to make sure public input isn't part of the process, no?
revelation 13y ago
What he leaked was available to 1.5+ million people in the USA. It is not by any reasonable meaning of the word classified, it is the proceedings of a seperate class of society.
- jmduke 13y ago
  1.5 million people is less than .5% of the population.
- vonmoltke 13y ago
  Where are you getting that number from?
  - 13y ago

mindcrime 13y ago

So the guys who murdered innocents in another country using machine guns sitting on top of a helicopter are yet to be tried. You're dead on with that comment. The most galling aspect of this entire story isn't that Manning is going to serve some jail time (although that is absurd in its own right), but rather that all of the real criminals are walking away scott free, with no repurcusions for their behavior at all. This will probably prove to be the case with the NSA situation as well. The people who ordered, and conducted, mass surveillance of people they had not business spying on, will never be punished. And no one will be held accountable even so far as losing their job, or being docked some pay. Keith Alexander and James Clapper and their cronies keep getting paid and probably get nice, cushy government provided pensions and the whole bit. Meanwhile, Edward Snowden is forced to hide out in another country, completely removed from his friends and family, and - for all we know - may ultimately wind up in jail right alongside Bradley Manning. Tell me something isn't badly wrong with this picture?

GVIrish 13y ago
Eh I think it's a stretch to call the pilot and gunner in the Apache video war criminals. There were US personnel nearby, they thought they made a positive ID on guys with weapons and potentially and RPG in that group and they made a judgment call. They opened fire thinking these guys were insurgents and when others came to help, they assumed the same. Not saying that what they did was right, but I don't think it's a cut and dried case where you can say those guys should be in jail. I don't think Manning was wrong for trying to get that particular story out there, but the indiscriminate nature of his leak is what destroyed his whistleblower defense. If someone worked at Lockheed Martin, and had evidence of bribery of defense officials, but then also leaked 100's of thousands of documents that contain the classified schematics of every single weapons system them make, that guy would rightfully be put in jail. Maybe I'm wrong, but if you're whistleblowing on classified or confidential information, then you should limit your disclosure to what is relevant to the actual wrongdoing.

rayiner 13y ago

Uh, if you actually read up on the helicopter video, you'll see that Assange plays a game of "hide the ball" with what really happens in the video: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrike. Specifically: 1) The company had been under fire all morning and the Apaches were called in by a soldier on the ground under attack at the location where the journalists were; 2) Among the group of men the two Reuters journalists were with, there were armed men an AK-47 and two RPG launchers, one loaded (and if you can tell that what the journalists are carrying are cameras and not weapons from the grainy video, in real time, you've got sharper eyes than me); 3) A portion of the tape is missing in which the helicopters engage armed insurgents that are seen running into a building; this portion precedes a section visible on the tape that shows the Apaches firing at the building with a missile. So no, the soldiers in the helicopter should not be tried. If soldiers are in a theater of war, are called in because other soldiers are under attack, and see people with weapons, they should shoot, and that's what happened here. This was not one of those cases like you saw in Vietnam when soldiers just started shooting up civilians with no threat in sight.

dendory 13y ago
Yes, especially when they saw the rescuers come and try to save the injured, they just had to kill those as well. How dare rescuers try to save lives! This is war, which clearly means shooting anything that moves is the best policy. </sarcasm>
- rayiner 13y ago
  It's not just "war" in the abstract. The context of the video is that there is literally a firefight going on nearby in which U.S. soldiers are under attack. The helicopters shot at what appeared to be a group of armed men ("appeared" because some of the men actually were armed) and then shot at a van that appeared to be trying to pick up "bodies and weapons" (according to the soldier who radioed in for permission to engage the van). In the context of a firefight, that means the van is a potential threat--those wounded and the weapons could go back to fighting U.S soldiers. This is not a "shoot anything that moves situation." It's a "if you're called in to the middle of a firefight you resolve doubts in favor of whatever protects other U.S. soldiers." """ Gabriel Schoenfeld, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute said of the airstrike:. It is precisely the presence of weapons, including RPGs, that goes a long distance toward explaining why cameramen for Reuters—pointing television cameras around corners in a battle zone—were readily mistaken by our gunships for insurgents. The video makes plain that in this incident, as in almost all military encounters in both Iraq and Afghanistan, our soldiers are up against forces that do not wear uniforms—a violation of international law precisely because it places innocent civilians in jeopardy. """ Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's never appropriate to second-guess a soldier's conduct in war. But "war crimes" are purposefully malicious actions in the absence of a threat. Not bad judgment calls in response to what you can make out from hundreds of meters away in the middle of a firefight. This is a war crime: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre.