Bradley Manning to be Sentenced for Espionage

[XLFD]

Bradley Manning's potential sentence could hinge on the perceived damage his leaks caused the U.S. government and his motives for releasing the sensitive material.

His fate rests with a judge who will begin hearing arguments Wednesday at Fort Meade, near Baltimore, in the sentencing phase of his court-martial which could take weeks.

He faces up to 136 years in prison for 20 offenses, including espionage, theft and computer fraud. He was acquitted of the most serious charge, aiding the enemy. The judge, Army Col. Denise Lind, announced her verdicts Tuesday.

The following op-ed expresses some of the difficulties in this case and how it is difficult to figure out whether he is a heroic whistleblower or a villainous turncoat.  More likely his actions fall somewhere in between, but ironically, since the public does not have the access to all the facts of the matter, it is likely we can never properly evaluate the situation. 

 

 

Pfc. Bradley Manning, who provided classified government documents to WikiLeaks detailing, among other things, America's undisclosed policies on torture, was found guilty of espionage on Tuesday. The verdict comes on the 235th anniversary of the passage of America's first whistle-blower protection law, approved by the Continental Congress after two Navy officers were arrested and harassed for having reported the torture of British prisoners.

How have we gotten to the place where the revelation of torture is no longer laudable whistle-blowing, but now counts as espionage?

The answer is that government has not yet come to terms with the persistence and transparency of the digital age. Information moves so fast and to so many places that controlling it is no longer an option. Every datapoint, whether a perverted tweet by an aspiring mayor or a classified video of Reuters news staffers being gunned down by an Apache helicopter, will somehow find the light of day. It's enough to make any administration tremble, but it's particularly traumatic for one with things to hide.

That's why they tried to throw the book, and then some, at Manning.

Prosecutors cast simple Internet commands known to any halfway literate Internet user (or anyone who used the Internet back in the early '90s) as clandestine codes used only by hackers to steal data. That Osama bin Laden could download these files off the WikiLeaks website (along with millions of other people) became justification for classifying the whistle-blowing as espionage, an act of war. And Manning is just one of a record seven Americans charged with violating the Espionage Act in a single administration.

But prosecuting those whose keyboards or USB sticks may have been technically responsible for the revelations is futile. The more networked we become and the more data we collect, the more likely something will eventually find its way out. After all, a security culture based on surveillance and big data cuts both ways.

Moreover, harsh reaction to digital whistle-blowers only increases the greater population's suspicions that more information is being hidden.

In this one leaking incident, Manning exposed allegations of torture, undisclosed civilian death tolls in Afghanistan and Iraq, official orders not to investigate torture by nations holding our prisoners, accusations of the torture of Spanish prisoners at Guantanamo, the "collateral murder" video of Reuters journalists and Iraqi civilians as U.S. soldiers cheered, U.S. State Department support of corporations opposing Haitian minimum wage, training of Egyptian torturers by the FBI in Quantico, Virginia, U.S. authorized stealing of U.N. Secretary General's DNA -- the list goes on.

These are not launch codes for nuclear strikes, operational secrets or even plans for future military missions. Rather, they are documentation of past activity and officially sanctioned military and state policy. These are not our secrets, but our ongoing actions and approaches.

A thinking government--a virtuous one, if we can still use such a word--would treat this as a necessary intervention. Things have gone too far. But ours is a government in "present shock": an always-on, always-connected population puts the administration in a state of perpetual emergency interruption. It's not the phone call at 2 a.m. for which a president has to be prepared, but the tweet at 3, the Facebook update at 4, the YouTube video at 5, and on and on.

In such a crisis-to-crisis landscape, there's no time to implement or even articulate a "grand narrative." A real-time, digital world offers no sense of mission or opportunity to tell a story. There's no Cold War to win. No moon shot to work toward. There are just emergent threats, one after the other after the other. Things just exist in the present, one tweet - or, actually, many tweets - at a time.

This makes it exceedingly difficult to frame our policies and strategies with language and purpose. It's no longer a matter of walking the talk. Without the talk, there's only the walk. We have no way of judging the ethics and intentions of our government except by what it actually does.

Combine this with the transparency that comes with digital technology and our leaders simply have no choice but to do the right thing. It takes more energy to prevent exposure than simply to behave consistently with the values we want to project.

Just as corporations are learning that they can no longer maintain low prices through overseas slave labor without getting caught, a democratic government can no longer maintain security through torture and coercion without being exposed. Betraying our respect for human dignity only makes us less resolved as a people, and less trusted as a nation.

We are just beginning to learn what makes a free people secure in a digital age. It really is different. The Cold War was an era of paper records, locked vaults and state secrets, for which a cloak-and-dagger mindset may have been appropriate. In a digital environment, our security comes not from our ability to keep our secrets but rather our ability to live our truth.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/30/opinion/rushkoff-manning-verdict

[Willy]

Good article. In my opinion there must be a clear dividing line between National security and bad behavior by the Government. In that way we can make a better decision on what constitutes espionage.

[XLFD]

Unlike some of the Cold War (and before) leakers of public secrets, this one is hard to gauge who is right or wrong without actually reviewing the intent and content of the leaker and the leak-ed.  I always fall on the side of Prometheus.

[Dave]

Prometheus was a good movie

[XLFD]

I was using the classical Prometheus, not Ridley Scott's version.  I am sure you remember the Titan (not the missile) who stole fire from Olympus (not the camera) and gave it to humankind, for which Zeus (not the professional wrestler) chained him to a rock and sent an eagle to eat his liver, which grew back daily.  Prometheus, didn't like liver, even with onions, apparently.

[XLFD]

There is hope for the forces of transparency:  Michigan's own Rep. Justin Amash  put fear into the old guard on both sides of the isle when his amendment to "limit the NSA’s data collection and defund the NSA " nearly passed the house by a 205-217 vote. Aye: Democrats 111, Republicans 91.  Today, Rep. Justin Amash (R-MI) and fifteen other Members of Congress filed an amicus brief with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), urging the court to release its "secret" opinions interpreting Section 215 of the Patriot Act. Justin Amash:  “Secret law is anathema to a free country. Congress cannot effectively legislate until it knows what the law is. The American public cannot engage in a meaningful debate about liberty and surveillance until it knows what its government is doing.  We call on the FISA court to release its significant Patriot Act rulings.”

http://amash.house.gov/press-release/bipartisan-coalition-urges-fis... 

When our government is acting so shady, I tend to side with those who shine the light.

[Dave]

I don't agree with everything Amash does but I think he's doing the right thing regarding the NSA. I honestly don't expect the NSA to be completely gone but if it was reined in to a certain extent, that would be a good thing.

[Willy]

I predict that the NSA will play a major role in the downfall of the U.S. The NSA is becoming a covert agency similar to the Soviet Unions KGB.

[XLFD]

Bradley Manning was sentenced to 35 years today.  To me the prosecution didn't make a strong case that the material leaked rose to the level of traitorous conduct.  From the article:  "Prosecutors showed that al-Qaida used material from the helicopter attack in a propaganda video and that Osama bin Laden presumably read some of the leaked documents. Some of the material was found in bin Laden's hideout after he was killed.

Also, government witnesses testified the leaks endangered U.S. intelligence sources, some of whom were moved to other countries for their safety. And several ambassadors were recalled, expelled or reassigned because of embarrassing disclosures." 

http://news.yahoo.com/manning-sentenced-35-years-wikileaks-case-142...

I am sure specificity about certain secrets were not disclosed in this trial, but Manning's motives seemed more for transparency rather than with malice towards his country, at least from my view.

[Dave]

And now for the goofy twist at the end of the story....

Apparently Bradley is no longer going to be known as Bradley, he's going to be Chelsea, a she instead and intends to get hormone therapy in the near future. Really he couldn't of done it at any better time as his transition to a she will probably completely paid for by the taxpayers. Well played Chelsea.

Bradley Manning, the Army private sentenced to 35 years in military prison for leaking classified documents, revealed Thursday he intends to live out the remainder of his life as a woman.

"I am Chelsea Manning. I am female," the Army private wrote in a statement read by his attorney Thursday on NBC's Today show. "Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible. I hope that you will support me in this transition."

Manning, 25, was sentenced to 35 years in prison on Wednesday after having been found guilty of 20 charges ranging from espionage to theft for leaking more than 700,000 documents to the WikiLeaks website while working in Iraq in 2010.

"I also request that, starting today, you refer to me by my new name and use the feminine pronoun (except in official mail to the confinement facility)," he continued in the statement posted on the show's website. "I look forward to receiving letters from supporters and having the opportunity to write back."

Manning signed the letter "Chelsea E. Manning."

STORY: Transgender troops serve in silence

Manning faced a maximum of 90 years in prison after his conviction last month on charges of espionage, theft and fraud.

He was convicted of one of the largest leaks of classified material in U.S. history and was at the center of a growing debate over government secrecy.

Supporters of Manning consider him a whistle-blower whose exposures served the public interest.

The government called Manning a traitor who hurt the country.

The judge in the case, Army Col. Denise Lind, announced the sentence in a military courtroom in Fort Meade, Md.

Prosecutors had urged the judge to sentence Manning to 60 years as a deterrent to others who might be tempted to leak secret documents.

"He betrayed the United States, and for that betrayal, he deserves to spend the majority of his remaining life in confinement," Capt. Joe Morrow had said during the sentencing hearing.

Manning's defense had urged the military to sentence Manning, who served as an intelligence analyst in Iraq, to no more than 25 years in prison.

Manning leaked secret documents, which included battlefield reports and State Department cables, to WikiLeaks, which posted them on the Internet.

The U.S. government said his actions jeopardized U.S. interests and exposed informants and sources to danger. Manning's defense attorneys painted him as a an idealist who opposed the war in Iraq.

During his trial, Manning's defense team suggested his struggles with gender identity as a gay soldier were a factor in his decision to leak. His attorneys presented an e-mail to a former supervisor from April 2010 in which he said he was transgender and joined the Army to "get rid of it."

The e-mail, which had the subject line "My Problem," also included a photo of Manning in which he is wearing a blonde wig and lipstick. During Manning's nine-month detainment at the Marine Corps brig in Quantico, Va., following his arrest in 2010, he sent two letters to his counselor using the name "Breanna,'' Master Sgt. Craig Blenis testified at his trial.

In the statement read on Today, Manning thanked his supporters. "I want to thank everybody who has supported me over the last three years," he wrote. "Throughout this long ordeal, your letters of support and encouragement have helped keep me strong. I am forever indebted to those who wrote to me, made a donation to my defense fund, or came to watch a portion of the trial. I would especially like to thank Courage to Resist and the Bradley Manning Support Network for their tireless efforts in raising awareness for my case and providing for my legal representation."

Manning will likely serve his sentence at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas, the only military prison for servicemembers sentenced to 10 or more years, a Military District of Washington spokesperson told the Associated Press. The facility does not provide hormone therapy or sex-reassignment surgery for gender identity issues but does provide psychiatric care, a Fort Leavenworth spokeswoman told Courthouse News.

In the U.S. prison system, transgender prisoners who have not had genital surgery are generally assigned to live with their birth-sex peers, but the military policy is unclear.

www.usatoday.com

[Willy]

 "Supporters of Manning consider him a whistle-blower whose exposures served the public interest."  I think he will be blowing more than whistles during his 35 years of incarceration.

[XLFD]

Funny.  And getting more exposure than he may want in the interest of his fellow prisoners.  

[masonco]

By claiming to be female and being sent to male prison he will either be kept in solitary or file discrimination to be transfered to a female prison where he will still be kept in isolation. Personally I think he thought claiming he is the opposite gender would grant him freedom since there are no prisons just for transgenders