Wikileaks began on Sunday November 28th publishing 251,287 leaked United States embassy cables. It is basically the prime conversations of the US Government and their foreign activities. Somewhat comparable to the tapes FDR started in 1940. It is undocumented and as Amrit stated in an earlier blog post, it criticized a few countries all over the world.
Out of the 251,287 cables:
15,652 secret
101, 748 confidential
133,887 unclassified
The article I came by about the Wikileaks mentioned that there is actually a punishment for downloading it: the Obama Administration Executive Order, 13526, Section I. 1(4). Red lights should be flashing for government workers and contractors to stay away from the cables. Obama released the order in December of 2009. In addition to government workers, the dean of Boston University Law School emailed students to remind them that "Two big factors in hiring for many federal government positions are determining if the applicants have good judgement and if they know how to deal with confidential/ classified information...thus, reading [the cables], passing them on, commenting on them may be seen as a violation." I got that in my email last week. Just kidding.
So as a warning to you high school seniors who plan on becoming lawyers, don't be curious, because although it is published online, it is still classified.
7 comments:
Wikileaks endangers the national security of the United States. All employees, associates, and founders of the site should be incarcerated and tried with high treason. The punishment of such a violation of national security should be DEATH! It has been too long that unpatriotic S.O.B.'s have divulged sensitive material to American enemies, while hiding behind the First Amendment and the Freedom of Information Act! I'm glad that the site has been pulled down, now only to capture and put down the idiot who started the site!
I completely (and respectfully!) disagree with Tim. I was under the impression that these Wikileaks were just an embarrassment to the US government, and didn't reveal any secret information that, if published, would put America in danger. I thought that several US ambassadors were engaging in morally unethical behavior, but that it wasn't anything truly damaging to national security. According to weeklyworldnews.com, in Wikileaks, "Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is compared to Hitler, French President Nicolas Sarkozy is called an “emperor with no clothes,” Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai is “driven by paranoia,” according to the cables, while German Chancellor Angela Merkel earns high marks as a “Teflon” politician." (http://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/25340/wikileaks-its-a-gusher/) This is hurtful stuff when it comes to foreign diplomacy. Therefore, I could see more justification behind Tim's response if it truly was a matter of national security. However, because it isn't in my view, I think this serves as a good wake up call to America. It can't just have their ambassadors finding out credit card numbers of foreign diplomats just because it's "America". It also shows that the US needs to be more careful about what it says. I was under the impression that many of the cables were American officials talking badly about foreign diplomats, which serves as embarrassment for the US. Thus, unless I am mistaken, I don't think national security is at stake in these instances. I realize that at some point, national security may be at stake, but I don't think, according to what's been published so far, that our enemies have much to work with.
This also reminds me of the Pentagon Papers case in 1971. Tim, would you have sentenced Daniel Ellsberg to death for what he did? His actions did put the nation at risk. Yet had he not published those papers, he wouldn't have revealed the futility of the Vietnam War. In my opinion he was not being unpatriotic. No, I believe this actually showed his patriotism because he was defending the American people by publishing those papers. In doing so, he informed them of the lies that their government was telling them and turned public opinion against the war. This may not have directly led to the end of the Vietnam war, but it certainly helped. And with the end of the war came the end of the slaughter of thousands of troops. In my opinion, Ellsberg did a service to his nation in risking his reputation and his freedom to publish those confidential papers. And I feel the same way about the Wikileaks. I don't think they are as controversial or as significant as the Pentagon Papers, but I think they show a darker side of our government. I think that when our government is acting in an unethical way, we as a people have the right to know.
I do realize that the debate between freedom of speech vs. national security is a controversial and difficult one, yet I don't think, especially in this relatively harmless case, that the individuals who reveal a nation's secrets should be punished to the extremity of death. I do think that it needs to be evaluated on a case to case basis, yet certainly for the Pentagon Papers and probably for this case, I side with freedom of speech.
-Alice Bebbington
While I agree with Tim that Wikileaks is indeed the work of an "unpatriotic S.O.B." that doesn't mean that we should kill people who have committed such crimes. In fact, I don't even think that Wikileaks is going to have a huge effect on international relations at all, so why would such a massive punishment be in order. Even so, this is definitely a crime that should be taken seriously, so criminal prosecution is a must.
^^^Tim calm down man, i feel you, but remember we're being graded on this blog.
I am assuming the original intentions of Wikileaks is to expose government conspiracies of the past, present, and in progress, but based on the description of the the kind of information posted, it's more gossip than finding the truth. This isn't muckraking, this is tabloid news.
besides, sometimes... some things are better left unsaid. It's like talking with someone who you don't like but you got to get along with. you got a whole mess of bad opinions but to save face it's better if you don't share them.
-raymond lim
Wikileaks did exactly what they said they were going to do. Just because the US Government doesn't like the truth being revealed doesn't mean they can destroy the life of Julian Assange.
The US Government has censored and blocked the native US website and as we speak is attacking Wikileaks Swedish servers in order to destroy the documents at the source or replace them.
All the while the US Government is the biggest INTERNATIONAL advocator of net-neutrality and internet freedom. Recently attacking China's famed Great Firewall as being against the innate human rights of the Chinese people. I'm lost as to where the leaders in the US Government lose the parallels between internet freedom abroad and at home. Or is the outspoken advocacy merely a guise for more encroachment of American freedoms at home. Hopefully President Obama will understand that you cannot fight for the rights of people in other countries and subsequently encroach on and violate those rights for your own people.
Long live Net-Neutrality.
Believe it or not, ladies and gentlemen, I agree with Tim 99% (minus putting him to death, as I am opposed to capital punishment. This isn't the dark ages, people). I think that there is a fine line between government accountability and transparency and outright disclosure of all secret information. I am a member of a board of directors, and we have classified sessions in which confidential information is exchanged. If some of that information leaked, it could potentially be harmful to the org. I can only imagine what disclosure of confidential information could do to national security. I think this is very irresponsible of Assange. Should any attacks against the US occur because of released information, he should be tried as a terrorist. And while I disagree with what he did, I have to give him credits for having the biggest cajones in the world and being a Class A badass.
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