Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Casiella]

[mod]Also, let's all remember to stay civil and reasonable. This discussion has stayed on track to a remarkable degree thus far, and we'd prefer not to have to lock it.[/mod]

[Z.Sinraali]

While Wikileaks, or more precisely their organizational journalistic partners, have done a decent job redacting names from most of these cables, my own reading through them has picked up several that're highly questionable in terms of a source safety perspective. I'll PM them to anyone who wants to read, but two have names left unchanged, and one has the name redacted but identifying details left in.

But aside from the safety issues and probably more important in the long run is the loss of confidentiality. Even if no one is ever harmed as a result of these releases, the fear will result in sources official and otherwise being less likely to speak with candor or even at all to our diplomats.

My takeaway from all this is that Wikileaks' organizational philosophy appears to deny the existence of any legitimate state secrets. That's something that I simply cannot support, no matter what "good"* leaks they may pass on.

*I didn't put that in quotation marks because I disagree categorically that there are any good leaks, but merely because it's an open question which if any released thus far are.

[Ken]

I don't see The Hague taking this up anytime soon. The US isn't even a signatory to the ICC

Yea, I know... that was more of a 'what if' or 'wouldn't it be cool' than an realistic suggestion.

a categorical assertion that Wikileaks has not scrubbed any identities is demonstrably false

Conceded.  See Ze'ev's post.

this whistleblowing

Whistleblowing should not be confused with theft and unlawful distribution of classified material.  Whistleblowing results in a sudden widespread awareness of tobacco company strategies to keep America's youth hooked on cigarettes or in the revelation of impropriety and corruption among a group of elected officials.  Theft and unlawful distribution of classified material leads to the Soviet Union having nuclear weapons or al-Qaeda receiving a new high value target list free of charge.

You'd think the ones decrying the evil of this whistleblowing would have pointed out examples if there'd been any.

I'm not allowed to read them from open source and I'm certainly not about to try and do so anyway given the only means available to me to access the Internet, but I would happily offer them up if I could.  Maybe Ze'ev can copypaste for you.

...nor have any serious repercussion hit neither the forces in the middle-east or any other people's lives.  As far as we know, anyway.

emphasis added, see below

the fear will result in sources official and otherwise being less likely to speak with candor or even at all

Mizhara, most of the fallout of this will take place within the same classified arena that these leaks came from in the first place: ongoing military and intelligence operations and diplomatic channels.  You aren't going to hear the government say, "Look, this source had his hands and tongue chopped off and mailed to a base in Afghanistan because of Wikileaks."  Doing so would only provoke greater fear of cooperation with the forces and governments involved and worsen the impact of what is happening.  But, hey, psst... that's the sort of thing that happens in the world outside the Internet when a source's identity is compromised.

Wikileaks' organizational philosophy appears to deny the existence of any legitimate state secrets. That's something that I simply cannot support

qft

The US has a vast and powerful federal government that is fond of keeping its security and diplomatic apparatuses protected and their inner workings secret.  Meanwhile, Hollywood is certainly all to happy to portray politicians, spooks, and soldiers as people inherently willing to do things that contradict libertarian values and the basic freedoms outlined in the constitutions of many Western countries, and the last US administration did more than its share in reinforcing that image.  So for some people it may feel right to lay one on the system by offering moral (or even material) support to WikiLeaks, and I imagine it is also a bit thrilling to see the realpolitik that underlies the spin.  But from where I'm sitting, doing so is about as reasonable as watching the LA riots and saying to yourself, "Yea, those people should loot all they want because the middle class was keeping them down anyway.  Man this makes for some good TV...  Glad I don't live in LA."

Well, guess what?  If you live in the West, Wikileaks is looting your security and stability.  But don't worry too much.  There are still people out there happily restocking the shelves and repairing the storefront.