Wikileaks and Iraq: Take 2, What's in a Number?

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

I had you figured out all wrong, Tormund ......... didn't realize that you would be the kind of people who takes face-saving declarations from senior military officials as gospel.

You don't think if the Pentagon could point to real, actual harm caused by Wikileaks' stuff they would be shouting it from the mountain tops?

[Horza]

What are they going to say: "Oh yeah, they've just uncovered a whole bunch of our agents, we'll leave it for you guys to work out who's who - hey here's a clue: my first is in Pashtun but not in Urdu..." ?

[The Progressive]

You don't think if the Pentagon could point to real, actual harm caused by Wikileaks' stuff they would be shouting it from the mountain tops?

The Pentagon has mostly been operating under the "give the good news and/or hide/whitewash the bad news" principle. If you didn't realize it by now, then I guess we shall be looking forward to future posts from you endorsing whatever the hell senior military officials deemed fit to declare.

[Lord O' Bones]

Besides, these are some staggering fucking numbers. People should know.

You guys are missing the point. I'm all for airing our government's dirty laundry. But the crap you guys are so stoked to see exposed is crap you'd have to be a moron to not know in the first place.

While some are running around pointing out the obvious and shouting "see, see, I told you so!" others are looking at the boring stuff being released. The stuff that matters. That most of you don't care about. That gets soldiers killed.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

That gets soldiers killed.

[citation needed]

[Lord O' Bones]

[citation needed]

Not really.

[kungtotte]

Yes, really. That's how arguments work.

[Lord O' Bones]

Yes, really. That's how arguments work.

Fine. Give me a citation to that effect. Or catch up to 1980 standards as far as harmful intelligence gathering.

Either way.

[The Progressive]

[citation needed]

That seems to fall under the broad umbrella of future hypotheticals that may or may not be evidenceed for sometimes and is therefore currently lacking proper citations.

It does present itself (mostly from the earlier posts of SJohn and Ckrisz) as entirely plausible and persuavive though in my opinion.

[Shryke]

Firstly Tormund, if you are still quoting that same article, why don't you actually link to it so people can see all the other quotes from the EXACT SAME LETTER on why this whole thing is a problem.

I quoted just 2 of them directly above you.

Secondly, I don't think Wikileaks is a bad idea, they are just going about their mission in the stupidest and least responsible way possible.

Whistleblowing is a GOOD THING. We need more of it and a site like Wikileaks is a good way to disceminate that information without someone needing to become a target.

The problem is, Wikileaks doesn't do much whistleblowing. Not with these US War documents.

They aren't pointing out any crimes or foul play or what have you that need to come to light, they are grabbing everything they can and then just dumping it all on the internet without regard for what's in there.

Most of it is just mundane shit that blows the whistle on nothing while exposing American operational procedures and endangering people.

If these guys were actually trying to expose crimes, we'd see a much smaller number of targeted documents.

[TerraPrime]

I'm not seeing how the argument that the information contained in WikiLeaks will NOT lead to endangering soldiers work. I mean, how do you prove a negative, anyway?

As far as I can tell, the WIkiLeak documents contain:

1. Some information on operational procedures of the U.S. armed forces (and Allied forces, too, by extension?)

2. This information can be used to circumvent U.S. armed forces, or at worse, to plan attacks on them.

The only tenable argument here is that the risk for (2) is worth it. I don't see how you can argue that there's no risks to U.S. service personnel, or that the risk is insignificant.

Further, I suspect that if the U.S. military can point to an incident to say "Look here, this ambush is a direct result of information gleaned from WikiLeaks," some of the people posting here would not believe it and would instead, perhaps justifiably, cast doubt on how the armed forces come to that conclusion. So, this call for admission and the challenge to produce data to show that WikiLeaks is harmful to U.S. military personnel seem a bit less than genuine.

I would find it a lot more acceptable if, say, a set of WashPo or NYT reporters got these documents and then reported the relevant bits about abuses such as tortures and bits about the running tally of civilian deaths. No problem about that, at all. But the fact that these documents are dumped into public domain, and that they can pose a risk, I find that difficult to accept. Weighing the risk against the gain, I just feel that this is such a scorched-earth tactic to get to the information we need.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

Firstly Tormund, if you are still quoting that same article, why don't you actually link to it so people can see all the other quotes from the EXACT SAME LETTER on why this whole thing is a problem.

I did link to it. Page 1.

I quoted just 2 of them directly above you.

First SecDef says "There have been no incidents" then says "But there could be incidents" despite the documents being around for months nothing has happened. When the docs were released, as the article states, the same guy was saying stuff like "Wikileaks has blood on their hands" which turned out to be BS.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

Also-

Make up your friggin minds about what's in these documents. It's either "This is nothing new, they are just saying what everyone already knows" or "This is top secret stuff. Even reading it will cause Barack Obama's daughters to spontaneously combust".

It can't be both.

[Shryke]

Also-

Make up your friggin minds about what's in these documents. It's either "This is nothing new, they are just saying what everyone already knows" or "This is top secret stuff. Even reading it will cause Barack Obama's daughters to spontaneously combust".

It can't be both.

Actually it can.

The mundane, everyday shit about how US combat operations are conducted and such is useless to the general public and tells us nothing.

But it's very useful to people trying to fight and kill US soldiers.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

But it's very useful to people trying to fight and kill US soldiers.

Show me where and how. This keeps getting said and sounds plausible but no one has actually pointed out anywhere that it's true.

[Shryke]

I did link to it. Page 1.

First SecDef says "There have been no incidents" then says "But there could be incidents" despite the documents being around for months nothing has happened. When the docs were released, as the article states, the same guy was saying stuff like "Wikileaks has blood on their hands" which turned out to be BS.

Yes and then I quoted a bunch of stuff FROM THE SAME ARTICLE, from the same letter being talked about even, that contradicts the picture you are trying to paint.

Selectively quoting a US military source to make your point? I guess you trust them when taking part of what they've said can support your point....

BTW Here's the article:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/10/16/wikileaks.assessment/index.html?hpt=T2

[Shryke]

Show me where and how. This keeps getting said and sounds plausible but no one has actually pointed out anywhere that it's true.

It's already been explained to you several times. I fail to see what's so difficult to understand about the idea that how the US conducts combat operations is useful for fighting them. It lets you now how they behave, how they react, where they go to do what, etc, etc.

[Mack Kilimaro]

I would find it a lot more acceptable if, say, a set of WashPo or NYT reporters got these documents and then reported the relevant bits about abuses such as tortures and bits about the running tally of civilian deaths. No problem about that, at all. But the fact that these documents are dumped into public domain, and that they can pose a risk, I find that difficult to accept. Weighing the risk against the gain, I just feel that this is such a scorched-earth tactic to get to the information we need.

How are we to suppose that WikiLeaks gets 400,000 documents that actual professional journalists can't get? Because WikiLeaks cares (perhaps due to a self-aggrandizing founder) and the American media don't care. It was an uncurious and/or cowed, if not outright propagandist American media that helped to enable the situation that led to the Iraq invasion to begin with (giving rise to an uncurious and/or cowed, if not outright propagandist Congress to officially bless the invasion), helpfully repeating Bush administration claims of WMD in Iraq or terrorists in Iraq or links between 9/11 and Saddam Hussein. There is no longer any reasonable option here. If the American press wanted to get out the dirt on Iraq by now, they would have done so. But to do so they have to admit their complicity in the whole endeavor, which isn't going to happen.

How many times did we hear, "If we don't do X, the terrorists win?" Why is it seven years later that we're still getting this mentality? Why does "support the troops" still mean that you have to believe everything that's said from people who have a vested interest in covering up and/or lying about what's happened over there? Maybe I'm a believer in American military ingenuity. You can't read a news story where they touch on counterinsurgency without the military officer being interviewed saying that the insurgents adapt, then the allies adapt, and so on. This is already going on. I don't think there is an advantage to be gained here because the insurgents already know plenty. We have been over there for a while and I imagine we have weeded out a lot of insurgents who were at the shallow end of the guerrilla warfare pool. And I feel pretty solid in supposing that the American military has been trying to analyze its own tendencies and change things up so as not to be predictable. If they have not, then I have faith they will be able to do so now.

Seven years of blowing up insurgents has also been seven years of collateral damage and that's something that I don't think that most people understand. They may be aware that this is going on at some level, but again you come down to the American media basically having abdicated any responsibility of reporting on the totality of the situation either because it doesn't jibe with their political agenda or because they don't think it will get them ratings or circulation. We've spent something like $750 billion on the Iraq invasion and occupation. Who has gotten rich off this war? It sure hasn't been the American taxpayer, and it hasn't been the American soldier either. There have been 4,744 coalition military fatalities and somewhere over 30,000 wounded. Men and women came home with PTSD. They were stop-lossed into multiple tours of duty. Some came home to broken households. All of this for what? Any attempt to make an honest account of that and suddenly you're not supporting the troops because it's bad for morale, or who knows what. I would say even greater for morale would be not being stationed in a country with a significant number of people who want to kill you.

I am tired of this being our mess. I am appalled that we are still stuck in a morass because of the last president needing to resolve his daddy issues and all of his cronies pushing him along because they and their friends were going to get rich on the whole endeavor. When it comes to this whole business, at this point, after all the years of obfuscation, lies, exaggeration, half-truths, and worst of all, silence, the only thing that can get us somewhere is sunshine on this whole veil of secrecy, as much as is humanly possible. This is true when it comes to all aspects of government, and it is especially true right now.

[Shryke]

Uh, you realise Wikileaks themselves could be the journalists in question right? Or if they'd just shipped them off to a good journalist too. (those still do exist btw)

But they didn't. They didn't look at what they had or what it might say. They just dumped it all willy-nilly.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

But they didn't. They didn't look at what they had or what it might say. They just dumped it all willy-nilly.

Really? Because the New York Times reported that they had a "Team of editors" go through all the info to make sure nothing dangerous was in there.