The only reason Assange is still free is because everybody knows the documents will leak unfiltered the moment he is arrested.
Just because some lunatic at AEI (AEI: the morons that got us into this mess in the first place) says the FBI should kidnap Assange from Iceland doesn't mean that it's actually US policy to kidnap people who post embarassing things on the Internet.
As for pointing fingers, Wikileaks is assumed to have access to documents about private companies. Any minor player could be blamed for any evil that reaches him and his close associates that, by now, must be known by everybody interested.
The world is not a spy novel, but Assange is not safe. He is one border away from being locked up forever.
These posts all read like bad spy thrillers. You can make up anything at all about what "documents" Wikileaks might have, and what forces might be lined up against him. The fact is, 5 years from now, probably the only fallout for him is that he'll have a hard time getting past customs in the US.
The number of people here who's entire understanding of the world comes from spy novels and geopolitical thrillers is just utterly dumbfounding.
Remember the Iran-Contras thing? Extraordinary rendition?
Don't tell me governments always play by the rules, because they don't.
Specially when they can play the "national security" card.
I believe that Governments should play by the rules, and that there are even pretty solid rules governing actions in places like Afghanistan that have not been well followed. I also agree that Governments have not been playing by the rules post 9-11 and would like to see that change.
But there's a high degree of speculative cloak and dagger fantasizing going on around here (often called conspiracy theories) by people here who are probably too young to remember Iran-Contra yet think they have a keen understanding of the complete capabilities and limitations of the ability of NATO nations to conduct a war and apparently have decades worth of foreign policy experience. The amount of absolute nonsense spewed out here regarding expectations of everything from intelligence capabilities to the ability of us to negotiate with loosely non-aligned states with no government to the ability of a military operation to contain collateral damage is not just unrealistic, I've seen statements here that are beyond absurd.
There seems to be a body of people here that think that not only is absolutely perfect security possible (in the sense of the ability of an intelligence apparatus to contain secrets), but that NATO possesses magic super weapons that can not only automatically determine who terrorists are in a civilian population, but can strike them down with pinpoint accuracy in a crowd of people without mussing the hair up of the guy sitting next to the target drinking his chai while teleporting out the tea-house owner and his family who let us know that some Taliban asshole was sitting in his store plotting to rape, murder and intimidate the local townspeople into following some misguided plan to install a global Caliphate. And that all this can be done in a half-hour time block with commercials.
And then, based on this fantastical narrative, when these absurd expectations aren't met, think that it's a massive failure on the part of NATO and that they should just throw in the towel and let Afghanistan fall back into governance under the Taliban because obviously the whole thing has been a big failure. Clearly the "good guys" have chosen not to use their super weapons and teleporters to secure the battlefield and there must be some vast conspiracy why that is.
I'm sorry, but I simply can't entertain this kind of moronic nonsense.
Can't argue with that
> while teleporting out the tea-house owner and his family
We have to assume the Pentagon knew what documents Manning leaked from the moment they apprehended him. With that info at hand, they had a couple weeks to arrange protection for informants whose names they could assume would be disclosed.
This is an asymmetric war. It's impossible to win.
If not, spies have it really easy.
So even if they can be above the law in theory, they would attract the wrath of the public in practice.
Anyway, the fact that that guy from the defence has put on a very serious looking and almost mean face just makes you think of kids in school saying give me back my hat.
The govt simply need to ensure that Manning 2.0 does not happen. They can do that by making sure that the rest of Manning's life is very unpleasant.
Assange has already alienated so many people that I don't think he will be getting as much leakage in the future.
For example, if a Sgt in the Army has documents which state that the Army is improperly disposing of munitions and they are poisoning a local towns water supply. It is unlikely he would now go to Wikileaks - they are an organization which may have put him in danger, put his friends in danger and leaked classified documents to the world during a time of war.
That was pretty dumb, IMHO. Like I said a couple weeks back, leaking sensitive information about recklessness/corruption/incompetence in a military operation is very serious business and you a) cover your tracks very well, b) tell nobody about it (not even family) and c) don't brag about it to a crazy stranger.
You may consider leaving a sealed letter to be opened after your death. But you'd better hide it well. I am not aware of any governments that would honor a seal in a matter of national security.