Just like the government is projecting its sins of warrantless wiretapping onto those like Thomas Drake and Thomas Tamm who tried to stop secret domestic surveillance, and both of whom are in criminal jeopardy. . .
WikiLeaks just released anoither huge cache of secret field reports for Iraq battlegrounds, which evidence information shameful to the government: vast civilian deaths (more than 100,000 Iraqis); detainee torture by America's Iraqi allies (beatings, burnings, lashings and executions); Iran's support of Shiite militias; and our outsourcing the war to private contractors on a scale unknown in American history.
The government told us there were no surprises and nothing new. But the major newspapers around the world have concluded otherwise.
The Defense Departrment press secretary, Geoff Morrell, stated
We deplore WikiLeaks for inducing individuals to break the law, leak classified documents and then cavalierly share that secret information with the world, including our enemies.
I deplore the government for breaking the law, classifying embarrassing or illegal conduct, keeping it secret from the American people, and prosecuting whistleblowers who chose their conscience over their careers, their families, and their very own liberty.
First, how is WikiLeaks "inducing individuals to break the law"? WikiLeaks is not recruiting "leakers." Whistleblowers are going to WikiLeaks--and who can blame them given the Obama administration's unprecedented crackdown on whistleblowers. Obama has brought four leak prosecutions in recent months--more than the past 3 administrations combined . . . yet refuses to "look backwards" at far more severe and clear crimes committed under the Bush administration.
Second, how do we know that the WikiLeaks documents are classified? Only because the government tells us. And given the vast overclassification and retroactive classification that occurred during the Bush years, how do we know if documents are classified properly. (Political embarrassment is not a reason to classify documents.) The fact of the matter is that most of the incident reports are marked "secret," a relatively low level of classification.
Third, if WikiLeaks "cavalierly share[d] secret information with the world, so did the New York Times, the Guardian, Le Monde and Der Spiegel. As the Times noted,
[T]here are times when the information is of significant public interest, and this is one of those times.
While the Defense Department argues that
[T]he period covered by these reports has been well chronicled in news stories, books and films, and the release of these field reports does not bring new understanding to Iraq's past
, the New York Timesfinds that
The documents illuminate the extraordinnary difficulty of what the United States and its allies have undertaken in a way that other accounts have not.
The Washington Post headline states: Secret Iraq War Files Offer Grim New Details.
Who do you believe? The Defense Department or the world's leading newspapers?