Little has come out in the traditional press regarding the details of Bradley Manning's trial. There's a reason for that. Once the public looks beyond the ginned-up headlines they just might find the truth: the U.S. government is capable of doing anything to keep their war crimes and other criminal offenses hidden.
Without going into the charges Manning was convicted of, I wanted to reflect upon the ones he was acquitted of, and their validity.
The first of the two bogus charges lodged against Manning was that he supposedly released a video to Wikileaks of an atrocity-by-drone-strike that occurred in the Farah Province of Afghanistan, (detailed here in the NYTs back in May 2009) in which a drone strike killed up to 147 villagers, making it the worst civilian casualty incident up to that time.
The number of civilians killed by the American airstrikes in Farah Province last week may never be fully known. But villagers, including two girls recovering from burn wounds, described devastation that officials and human rights workers are calling the worst episode of civilian casualties in eight years of war in Afghanistan.
(snip)
The bombs were so powerful that people were ripped to shreds. Survivors said they collected only pieces of bodies. Several villagers said that they could not distinguish all of the dead and that they never found some of their relatives.
As it turns out, the Afghan video was never released to the public. It was destroyed by a disgruntled former employee of Wikileaks.
From PressTV:
The US military never acknowledged the full scale of the tragedy, insisting that 20 to 30 civilians had died, along with 60 to 65 militants. They did, however, issue a report documenting procedural errors that could have led to the deaths.
The substance of the video was not at issue in the trial. Instead, the prosecution focused on timing. The charge sheet alleged that Manning had leaked the video shortly after his arrival in Iraq in October 2009. Manning pleaded guilty to transferring the file in the spring of 2010.
During the trial, the prosecution team failed to connect the dots and the judge acquitted Manning of the charge, much like the judge saw through the most serious of the charges Manning faced: aiding the enemy.
Which incidentally brings us to the second bogus charge of "aiding the enemy."
Manning never directly handed anything over to a foreign interest, classified or otherwise, let alone an enemy of the U.S. Any documents that unnamed enemies had in their possession were already in the public domain.
When Adrian Lamo, the prosecution's chief witness, ex-hacker and convicted felon who was one of Manning's confidants early on (and the one who subsequently turned him in to the feds) took the stand; after vigorous cross-examination by David Coombs of Manning's defense team, Lamo was unable to testify that Manning's intention was to aid the enemy. Instead, Lamo's testimony depicted Manning as having had idealistic goals, hoping that bringing government and military wrongdoing into the light would affect change in both entities.
The website TechDirt tells the tale:
The following is part of Lamo's court testimony.
Q. At one point you asked him what his end game was, correct?
A. Yes, I did.
Q. And he told you, hopefully worldwide discussions, debates and reforms?
A. Yes, he did.
Q. And he said he wanted people to see the truth?
A. Correct.
Q. He said without information you can't make informed decision as a whole?
A. Yes, he did.
Q. And he told you to, he was hoping that people would actually change if they saw the information?
A. Correct.
When the cross-examination turned to whether Manning aided the enemy it went as such...
Q. And at one point you asked him why he didn't just sell the information to Russia or China?
A. Correct.
Q. And he told you that the information belonged in the public domain?
A. Yes, he did.
Q. He believed that information was in the public domain and should be for the public good?
A. Yes.
As the questioning became more direct, Lamo became more vague with his answers.
Q. At anytime did he say he had no loyalty to America?
A. Not in those words, no.
Q. At anytime did he say the American flag didn't mean anything to him?
A. No.
Q. At anytime did he say he wanted to help the enemy?
A. Not in those words, no.
Lamo's answers beg the question of exactly which words indicated intent to aid the enemy?
The transcripts of the chats between Lamo and Manning are public. There's no indication Manning wished to aid the enemy. There was the potential for harm to exposed operatives and sources, but that was greatly mitigated by the delay between delivery and publication of the documents, not to mention Lamo bringing this to the FBI's attention after the initial chat session. But the military has chosen to view the embarrassment and inconvenience caused by the documents' release as "aiding the enemy" -- whatever hurts us makes them stronger.
I would posit that only esoterically could the embarrassment of a government aid the enemy. Instead, the airing of a government's wrongdoing can
only strengthen a country in the long run.
In summation, the prosecution of Bradley Manning has proven to be a show trial. The government's intention was to send a message to anyone else who would dare come forward with evidence of wrongdoing, a message that I was brought up to believe only other countries like the old Soviet Union and China would send.
Times have indeed changed.
The website Motherboard has the entire court transcript. But, fair warning, don't read it unless you're ready to shed a tear or two.
It's truly heartbreaking.