Bradley Manning: 1000 Days and No Trial?

[georgephillip]

The more I look at the WIKILEAKS event the less I believe it.

I'm beginning to think this might be the world's largest disinformation campaign.

"For more than a year, O’Brien has been one of a handful of journalists who have had access to the pretrial hearings of Bradley Manning, the young man accused of providing WikiLeaks with documents that revealed government wrongdoing.

"Because of the trial’s significance, the hearings are held away from public view in a soundproof room inside Fort Meade in Maryland—a nerve center for the U.S. government’s global intelligence activities, and officials are doing everything they can to keep the details of the case to themselves.

“The U.S. government is conducting this trial in obscurity,” O’Brien said in a telephone conversation. 'They want to manage the message coming out of Fort Meade.'

"The press in general has no access to more than 30,000 pages of filings related to the trial, nor a transcript of the legal proceedings, she said. So over the year of her involvement, O’Brien has spent as many as 15 hours a day transcribing the hearings herself."

Alexander Reed Kelly: Truthdigger of the Week: Alexa O?Brien - Truthdigger of the Week - Truthdig

Of course, the secrecy is necessary to preserve our "freedom."

 

[georgephillip]

If I made military secrets public I would certainly deserve it and so does he. What makes what manning did even worse is that he didn't even think he was doing the right thing. He wasn't exposing some kind of wrongdoing. His boyfriend found a tighter ass and manning wanted the whole country to pay for his hurt feelings.

The military classifies war crimes as secrets, and your solution is to execute the messenger?
Where did you get the idea that you are free?

I don't think that killing the enemy is a war crime. It is what the military is supposed to do.

Millions of innocent Muslims have been maimed, murdered, displaced, and incarcerated by the US military in the last decade. Whatever his motives, Manning did his part to ensure those paying for the war crimes know of their existence.

 

[Katzndogz]

And the decisions made as to the conduct of military operations belongs to - Wait for it, Wait for it. TADA, PFC Bradley Manning!

Don't you feel more secure already?

 

[Katzndogz]

The military classifies war crimes as secrets, and your solution is to execute the messenger?
Where did you get the idea that you are free?

I don't think that killing the enemy is a war crime. It is what the military is supposed to do.

Millions of innocent Muslims have been maimed, murdered, displaced, and incarcerated by the US military in the last decade. Whatever his motives, Manning did his part to ensure those paying for the war crimes know of their existence.

Okay, start with this. Millions of muslims have been maimed, murdered, displaced or incarcerated since military operations began a decade ago. I don't care. This is what war is like. There are no wars in which no one gets killed. That's sort of the point of waging war in the first place. So no matter how many millions there are, it certainly wasn't nearly enough because they are still willing to fight.

 

[Circe]

Okay, start with this. Millions of muslims have been maimed, murdered, displaced or incarcerated since military operations began a decade ago. I don't care. This is what war is like. There are no wars in which no one gets killed. That's sort of the point of waging war in the first place. So no matter how many millions there are, it certainly wasn't nearly enough because they are still willing to fight.

No............I don't think that's what is going on at all.

What is going on is social work wars, in which we pretend to be the Muslims (or Vietnameses', in days of yore) newests bestest wittle friendsies. And are there only to help them, we say. They don't ever seem to believe this, for some reason, and keep trying to expel us from their country, which leads to, you know, unpleasantnesses like deaths and stuff, which is what Manning betrayed and what we don't want to get around.

Because it disturbs this new (and disastrously failing) idea of security colonization in which we move troops into Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and totally rebuild their failing societies from the bottom up, in our image. Kindly, of course. Giving candy to the native kids, all that. Never anything like SHOOTING them, unless we absolutely can't help it for self-defense, of course. Manning blew all that apart. Or would have, if anyone was so silly as to believe it in the first place. Since the Wikileaks came out and the world broke its jaw yawning, I'd say no one was that silly.

I suppose this stupid idea of social-work repair-them wars came from our successful replacement of Germany's and Japan's constitutions with something like ours after WWII.

The big, crucial difference, of course, is that first we TOTALLY defeated both Germany and Japan. We are trying to replace the governance of these little countries without actually defeating them or even really fighting them, by pretending we are there for their own good -----------

Wow, is this not working.

 

[georgephillip]

So how many more Vietnamese, Afghan, and Iraqi civilians have to die before we "actually defeat them?"

 

[Katzndogz]

So how many more Vietnamese, Afghan, and Iraqi civilians have to die before we "actually defeat them?"

As many as it takes. That's what Victory is. It's how every war is won and peace enforced. Today it's imagined in some kind of delusion, that we can fight until they just change their minds. It's a fallacy and a stupid fallacy at that.

 

[georgephillip]

"I was reminded of my visit with von dem Bussche, whom I was interviewing for The Dallas Morning News, by the 70th anniversary of the execution of five Munich University students and their philosophy professor who were members of the White Rose resistance movement in Nazi Germany.

"The BBC last week interviewed the 99-year-old Liselotte Furst-Ramdohr, who hid leaflets for the group in her closet and helped make stencils used to paint slogans on walls..."

"The six White Rose members managed to distribute thousands of anti-Nazi leaflets before they were arrested by the Gestapo and guillotined..."

"The White Rose has been lionized by postwar Germans—one of its members, Alexander Schmorell, was made a saint by the Russian Orthodox Church last year, and squares and schools in Germany are named for the resisters—but in the BBC interview Furst-Ramdohr curtly dismissed the adulation of the group.

“At the time, they’d have had us all executed,' she said in speaking of most Germans’ hatred of resisters during the war."

She's talking to you, Katz...

Chris Hedges: Rebels Stand Alone - Chris Hedges' Columns - Truthdig

 

[Katzndogz]

"I was reminded of my visit with von dem Bussche, whom I was interviewing for The Dallas Morning News, by the 70th anniversary of the execution of five Munich University students and their philosophy professor who were members of the White Rose resistance movement in Nazi Germany.

"The BBC last week interviewed the 99-year-old Liselotte Furst-Ramdohr, who hid leaflets for the group in her closet and helped make stencils used to paint slogans on walls..."

"The six White Rose members managed to distribute thousands of anti-Nazi leaflets before they were arrested by the Gestapo and guillotined..."

"The White Rose has been lionized by postwar Germans—one of its members, Alexander Schmorell, was made a saint by the Russian Orthodox Church last year, and squares and schools in Germany are named for the resisters—but in the BBC interview Furst-Ramdohr curtly dismissed the adulation of the group.

“At the time, they’d have had us all executed,' she said in speaking of most Germans’ hatred of resisters during the war."

She's talking to you, Katz...

Chris Hedges: Rebels Stand Alone - Chris Hedges' Columns - Truthdig

Surely! This is what war is. You don't let the enemy live, and you certainly don't let them propagandize. I would expect nothing less. No one would. Should the Germans have let the resistence continue? Why? Because they want to be fair?

What balderdash.

 

[Circe]

So how many more Vietnamese, Afghan, and Iraqi civilians have to die before we "actually defeat them?"

They've already defeated us.....you surely must have noticed?

In every case we've given up and are coming home.

Pretty poor way to run a railroad......

 

[Circe]

So how many more Vietnamese, Afghan, and Iraqi civilians have to die before we "actually defeat them?"

As many as it takes. That's what Victory is. It's how every war is won and peace enforced. Today it's imagined in some kind of delusion, that we can fight until they just change their minds. It's a fallacy and a stupid fallacy at that.

That's it: a delusion is going on. We are pretending to fight a war, when actually it's something else entirely, something that isn't working or we wouldn't always be coming home with the job not done.

I think it's the "World Policeman" issue partly: we're SUPPOSED to put down wars at least in reasonably important places --- the Congo and Rwanda don't count, of course.

But more importantly it's that aggressive warmongers tend to attract a lot of opposition: look at Hitler. He moves against this and that and, well, several places, and pretty soon the whole world is marching against him and Germany loses yet another war, because they keep starting them, and that makes them dangerous so people band together to put them down like a rabid dog.

We don't want people taking that attitude toward us, so we pretend we aren't REALLY making war, we're just HELPING them. Policing them, like. We're trying to have a war while pretending we aren't.

Unsurprisingly, this isn't working. People fight wars because first you have to defeat the enemy, THEN they do what you want. Otherwise, they don't.

 

[FA_Q2]

Okay, start with this. Millions of muslims have been maimed, murdered, displaced or incarcerated since military operations began a decade ago. I don't care. This is what war is like. There are no wars in which no one gets killed. That's sort of the point of waging war in the first place. So no matter how many millions there are, it certainly wasn't nearly enough because they are still willing to fight.

No............I don't think that's what is going on at all.

What is going on is social work wars, in which we pretend to be the Muslims (or Vietnameses', in days of yore) newests bestest wittle friendsies. And are there only to help them, we say. They don't ever seem to believe this, for some reason, and keep trying to expel us from their country, which leads to, you know, unpleasantnesses like deaths and stuff, which is what Manning betrayed and what we don't want to get around.

Because it disturbs this new (and disastrously failing) idea of security colonization in which we move troops into Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and totally rebuild their failing societies from the bottom up, in our image. Kindly, of course. Giving candy to the native kids, all that. Never anything like SHOOTING them, unless we absolutely can't help it for self-defense, of course. Manning blew all that apart. Or would have, if anyone was so silly as to believe it in the first place. Since the Wikileaks came out and the world broke its jaw yawning, I'd say no one was that silly.

I suppose this stupid idea of social-work repair-them wars came from our successful replacement of Germany's and Japan's constitutions with something like ours after WWII.

The big, crucial difference, of course, is that first we TOTALLY defeated both Germany and Japan. We are trying to replace the governance of these little countries without actually defeating them or even really fighting them, by pretending we are there for their own good -----------

Wow, is this not working.

That’s only half true. We did not go into Iraq to ‘help’ them. That is a falsehood. We went in there because they violated a UN treaty. It is that simple.

What we learned from WW1 is that you DO NOT go into a country, destroy it, and then leave without reparations. It sounds logical that you should not pay for a war that others have started and lost until you realize that you have razed the lives of millions and the only thing that they have to focus their hatred and remorse on is you. We set the stage for WW2 when we fucked Germany in WW1. That is why we no longer go in and destroy everything without rebuilding. Terrorism would be a much larger problem if that was how we conducted ourselves.

Unfortunately, Americans are idiots. They fixed one problem but created another because we are not going in a simply rebuilding these nations anymore. We get into the ‘fix’ them attitude that you are outlining where we set up a government that they don’t want or a way of life that they are not willing to accept. With Iraq, all we really needed to do was set up their infrastructure but we are not even doing that. We are far more focused on setting up a western government and that is flat out asinine. Let them set up the government themselves. We need to stay the fuck out of it.

The other problem we have is that by doing this we have idealized war. We have made it into something it is not, helpful or hopeful. I don’t know where that asinine idea came from or how to put it in the grave where it belongs. If Americans actually took time out of their days, put the fucking cheeseburgers down and thought about Iraq we would have NEVER went in there. War means children will be burned to death in their cribs. Families torn apart. Father and mothers will watch their young adults leave and never come home. People will die in the most horrific ways possible. Burned, bleeding, limbs blown off, these are the realities of war. They are horrific to an extent that you cannot imagine unless you have experienced it. PERIOD. I want that to sink in.

YOU. CANNOT. IMAGINE.

That bad. We should ONLY consider war as a viable option in the most dire circumstances. Most that have been to war actually understand this. If you have seen what happens you understand why war is a last resort. You understand why Iraq was a wash because what Kats was getting at is correct: you need to kill and keep killing till the job is done. The American people no longer have that fortitude. They want to go into war and ‘help’ when that is not the function of war. War is not there to help others; it’s there to eliminate them. We are way too quick to declare war and then we are way too slow to execute it and want to pull out far too quickly.

 

[georgephillip]

"A war of aggression, sometimes also war of conquest, is a military conflict waged without the justification of self-defense, usually for territorial gain and subjugation.

"The phrase is distinctly modern and diametrically opposed to the prior legal international standard of 'might makes right', under the medieval and pre-historic beliefs of right of conquest.

"Since the Korean War of the early 1950s, waging such a war of aggression is a crime under the customary international law..."

"Wars without international legality (e.g. not out of self-defense nor sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council) can be considered wars of aggression; however, this alone usually does not constitute the definition of a war of aggression; certain wars may be unlawful but not aggressive (a war to settle a boundary dispute where the initiator has a reasonable claim, and limited aims, is one example)."

Iraq was/is a War of Aggression for control of oil resources.
Those who planned and executed the Iraq War are war criminals.
You don't have to personally murder a child before you know it's wrong to do so.
Period.

War of aggression - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Circe]

I think we win reactive wars that someone else starts. We lose aggressive wars we start. I think that's because we dare to fight wars the enemy starts; we don't dare to fight wars we start, not whole-heartedly, for fear the world will gang up on us as a universal enemy, the way they viewed Germany.

Bradley Manning exposed the fact that we are going into places and doing a lot of killing and pushing around and torture and stuff that we don't admit, and our enemies are way too primitive to get the word out to the world.

We need to stop this social-work war model. It isn't working and it is running us into terrible deficits. We borrow all the money from China to fight these stupid, losing wars --- and we pretend we aren't really fighting, we're "helping." Is there a point to all this? I'd say it's all been a big mistake.

 

[pinqy]

"A war of aggression, sometimes also war of conquest, is a military conflict waged without the justification of self-defense, usually for territorial gain and subjugation.

Which is clearly not the case in Iraq. There was no territrory gain nor subjugation.

"Wars without international legality (e.g. not out of self-defense nor sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council) can be considered wars of aggression; however, this alone usually does not constitute the definition of a war of aggression; certain wars may be unlawful but not aggressive (a war to settle a boundary dispute where the initiator has a reasonable claim, and limited aims, is one example)."

Iraq was in violation of the truce and of multiple Security Council Resolutions. That the US and UK did receive formal approval for invasion does not make the invasion a war of aggression since the purpose was enforcement of Sec Council Resolutions. And since Security Council Resolution 1483 specified the roles of the US and UK and other parties in the reconstruction of Iraq, the occupation at least was given legitimacy by the UN.

 

[Circe]

"A war of aggression, sometimes also war of conquest, is a military conflict waged without the justification of self-defense, usually for territorial gain and subjugation.

Which is clearly not the case in Iraq. There was no territrory gain nor subjugation.

Well, no, because we lost the war!! We meant to subjugate and also to have forward power-projection bases there facing Iran. But they drove us out after some ten years. Same thing is now happening in Afghanistan.

Social-work wars were an interesting experiment, but after losing THREE, I think we should recognize that they do not further the interests of the United States.

"Wars without international legality (e.g. not out of self-defense nor sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council) can be considered wars of aggression; however, this alone usually does not constitute the definition of a war of aggression; certain wars may be unlawful but not aggressive (a war to settle a boundary dispute where the initiator has a reasonable claim, and limited aims, is one example)."

Iraq was in violation of the truce and of multiple Security Council Resolutions. That the US and UK did receive formal approval for invasion does not make the invasion a war of aggression since the purpose was enforcement of Sec Council Resolutions. And since Security Council Resolution 1483 specified the roles of the US and UK and other parties in the reconstruction of Iraq, the occupation at least was given legitimacy by the UN.

Hair-splitting. Iraq was a war of aggression, duh. EVERYbody knew this. That's why the Bush administration moved Heaven and Earth to get UN validation. And worked so hard to get the NATO allies involved. We called in the considerable favors Britain owed us, most importantly.

 

[pinqy]

"A war of aggression, sometimes also war of conquest, is a military conflict waged without the justification of self-defense, usually for territorial gain and subjugation.

Which is clearly not the case in Iraq. There was no territrory gain nor subjugation.

Well, no, because we lost the war!! We meant to subjugate and also to have forward power-projection bases there facing Iran.

Since when is allowing elections and rebuilding the country's military either subjugation or territory gain? Yes of course we wanted permanent bases but did not use force to push for them.

We won the actual war but did not put in either our own people nor puppets as rulers. The plan all along was relinquishing to civilian control. A lot of mistakes were made, primarily due to the Bush administration's misunderstanding and mishandling, but subjugation and ownership were never in the plan.

But they drove us out after some ten years. Same thing is now happening in Afghanistan.

In neither case were we driven out militarily but rather through the political process and lack of extension by the Iraqi and Afghan governments

 

[Circe]

We won the actual war but did not put in either our own people nor puppets as rulers. The plan all along was relinquishing to civilian control. A lot of mistakes were made, primarily due to the Bush administration's misunderstanding and mishandling, but subjugation and ownership were never in the plan.

I cannot believe you think we won in Iraq. I bet you were one of those people who argued for years that we somehow really "won" in Vietnam, too.

However, I think it is obvious to most people that we lost all three social-work wars: Vietnam, Iraq II, and Afghanistan. In that time frame we WON some other wars ---- for instance (leaving out Grenada and Panama as too small to matter) Serbia in 10 1/2 weeks, total capitulation and put their president on trial. And Desert Storm, which Bush I won hands down very quickly. Serbia was an aggressive war which Clinton, however, was smart enough to actually fight and win, no social-work nonsense. Desert Storm was a reactive war: Saddam moved to take Kuwait and threatened Saudi Arabia, namely, all our oil!! Can't have that, quite seriously. Talk about major national interests. So we pounded him and won big-time.

Bush I's son was a fool to go back for no reason and take a second bite out of Iraq. Reactive wars are the best wars for America to fight, because then we're united about it and fight well.

But they drove us out after some ten years. Same thing is now happening in Afghanistan.

In neither case were we driven out militarily but rather through the political process and lack of extension by the Iraqi and Afghan governments

Given that our war goal is to stay and run both places and have large bases facing Iran and Pakistan, obviously we lost.

When you win a war, you get what you want. When you lose a war, you have to go home, defeated. That's how you tell whether a people won or lost: did they get what they wanted? No, we didn't. We were driven out, repeatedly.

We can only fight quickly and fight well. These ten-year deals we always lose. Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan. If it's not a quick win, we lose. See: WWII.

 

[georgephillip]

"A war of aggression, sometimes also war of conquest, is a military conflict waged without the justification of self-defense, usually for territorial gain and subjugation.

Which is clearly not the case in Iraq. There was no territrory gain nor subjugation.

"Wars without international legality (e.g. not out of self-defense nor sanctioned by the United Nations Security Council) can be considered wars of aggression; however, this alone usually does not constitute the definition of a war of aggression; certain wars may be unlawful but not aggressive (a war to settle a boundary dispute where the initiator has a reasonable claim, and limited aims, is one example)."

Iraq was in violation of the truce and of multiple Security Council Resolutions. That the US and UK did receive formal approval for invasion does not make the invasion a war of aggression since the purpose was enforcement of Sec Council Resolutions. And since Security Council Resolution 1483 specified the roles of the US and UK and other parties in the reconstruction of Iraq, the occupation at least was given legitimacy by the UN.

It's my understanding the US and UK did not receive UNSC authorization to invade Iraq.
It's beyond delusional to believe Iraq provided any legitimate threat to either nuclear power.
Absent self-defense and a UNSC resolution endorsing invasion, the US invasion and occupation of Iraq seems at least as illegal and criminal as those in Vietnam and Korea.

"The legality of the invasion and occupation of Iraq has been widely debated since the United States, United Kingdom, and a coalition of other countries launched the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

"The then United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in September 2004 that: 'From our point of view and the UN Charter point of view, it [the war] was illegal.'[1][2] The Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court reported in February 2006 that he had received 240 communications in connection with the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 which alleged that various war crimes had been committed.

"The political leaders of the US and UK have argued the war was legal, while many legal experts and other international leaders have argued that it was illegal.

"US and UK officials have argued that existing UN Security Council resolutions related to the first Persian Gulf War and the subsequent ceasefire (660, 678), and to later inspections of Iraqi weapons programs (1441), had already authorized the invasion.[3]

"Critics of the invasion have challenged both of these assertions, arguing that an additional Security Council resolution, which the US and UK failed to obtain, would have been necessary to specifically authorize the invasion.[1]"

Legality of the Iraq War - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Wicked Jester]

1,000 days! And he's still alive! What a pity. He should have been executed 950 days ago.

For the crime of reporting war crimes?

No, for the crime of treason.