Bradley Manning on Trial

US Army Private Bradley Manning is on trial for leaking hundreds of thousands of State Department Cables (from when State messages were encrypted and sent by undersea cable).  Let us not miss the point that these leaks have impeded the conduct of diplomatic business as friends of the United States have been exposed and embarrassed. Think of yourself as a government official in Mexico who tells a lower ranking American Diplomat about concerns regarding a drug cartel in some State in a lower part of the Mexican nation.  Manning leaks and it makes it's way into the local newspaper.  Your boss calls you in and explains that you will never receive another promotion or pay raise.  How do you explain that to your wife?  And the whole time you thought you were exploiting the American to get technical and economic assistance to fight the cartels.

To Activist Charles Davis, writing an opinion piece in al Jazeera, you don't exist, just poor Bradley Manning.

It would be one thing if Pvt Manning was a Whistle Blower, but he is not.  He is someone who is amoral and dumped up to a million documents because it made him feel good, and in the process endangered many lives.  I am not feeling it for Pvt Manning.  Frankly, I wouldn't hire him to sweep floors, for fear he might feel free to dump the sweeping compound down the toilets, clogging them, or worse, getting me in trouble with the Federal EPA.

Mr Davis, in his screed, takes a swipe at Military Justice.  It is an ignorant and uninformed view.

Regards  —  Cliff