Bradley Manning: 35 years.

[Sol]

So, no doubt most of you have heard of the WikiLeaks case of the ~700,000 secret cables released by Bradley Manning (see http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/2 ... 88126.html and http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-08-21/s ... il/4903854)

After his sentenced was reduced from 120 odd years down to 96 max and finally settled to 35 years, do you think this is the right thing to do? Should he be punished at all? Should he be praised by everyone? While it is easy to think of freedom of speech yada yada yada, they do have their reasons for keeping information like this internally, and I sure know if some people found out secrets about you and posted it around the media, you wouldn't like it either .
That being said, in regards to some accounts like torture/abuse, if partaking members were not punished is another story, although this is war, what do you expect fair rules, accurate kill counts? Hah.

Anyway, point is think about this without the media hype, consider yourself in a similar position (of some accounted records). If you wanted to have a private conversation with a friend regarding your girlfriend/boyfriend, it doesn't automatically make it your partners right to have a copy of the conversation, while it's their right to free speech, it's also your right.

So 35 years = espionage (700,000 leaks)?

IMO, he shouldn't have been sentenced of espionage, it doesn't really fit, his intentions were obvious. Endangering the lives of others perhaps. He could have taken a better path to release them though.

Sort of on topic, but another interesting point:

[Imperius]

i think you mean Chelsea Manning

[Legendary Apophis]

Why should NOT that be punished?

It's not releasing one or two documents, you repeated yourself the number, 700k. For crying out loud!

[Juliette]

Pops, he informed the world of America's screw-you-all attitude by releasing 700,000 files of evidence of bloody war crimes.
If he would have released personal files of the president or whatever, nude pics of his daughters, fine.. that would be worthy of punishment.
Giving the world evidence of the USA's absolute disregard for human rights, any law, a "do whatever the hell we want"-attitude, etcetera.. the man is a hero.


As for his sexuality, who gives a flying poo?
Three years of imprisonment and army psychologists convincing you you are a woman and you should be disregarded because of that would be enough to send any man into the nuthouse. And if you tell me "omg but he said it before that time!", what evidence do you have? I can send emails from the past as well.. surely the USA can use their pull with FB to add messages to timelines and whatnot. Stakes not big enough for that? Oh, but they are. If the provider of the files is made to look unreliable, so will the files suffer in credibility.



Endangering others, I agree with. Then again, if you are a soldier for a corrupt and morally bankrupt regime, you take that risk professionally.

[Sniperwax]

When you illegally download classified documents from the US military it doesn't matter what you do with them after or what the documents contain you are a traitor. It really is that simple.

Decapitate the traitor and each and every one of his domestic supporters in my opinion. I love me a good deterrent or two for the next traitor to think about pre-betrayal.

[atok]

if anyone thinks any country is squeaky clean they have mental problems he is a traitor to his country and should be dealt with accordingly 35s year is to short should be life or the death penalty end of in my opinion

[Sol]

Giving the world evidence of the USA's absolute disregard for human rights, any law, a "do whatever the hell we want"-attitude, etcetera.. the man is a hero.

I think the world knew that already , evidence won't really change much (hence the pic).
While it certainly does bring about some different sides of the US government, I think 700k cables/documents is a bit overkill for 'proof', I would hazard a guess and say you could do it in a handful.
Although, if I were to do it, would only a few released = only a few years? If it still meant 35 years then yes I would have gone for an all or nothing .

[Legendary Apophis]

Pops, he informed the world of America's screw-you-all attitude by releasing 700,000 files of evidence of bloody war crimes.
If he would have released personal files of the president or whatever, nude pics of his daughters, fine.. that would be worthy of punishment.
Giving the world evidence of the USA's absolute disregard for human rights, any law, a "do whatever the hell we want"-attitude, etcetera.. the man is a hero.

I wouldn't have said otherwise if a Russian soldier provided Wikileaks tons of classified documents about Tchetchenia war, he would still be a traitor to his army, not saying I would applaud the infos provided neither do I applaud the behaving proven by leaked documents, but if countries let their own troops provide information on that scale without consequence...

Of course people from other nations consider he shouldn't be condemned, but well to a different matter with different issues, same goes for Snowden from a US point of view versus outsiders point of view (and the US would likely welcome him if he was Russian and revealed info from FSB spying).

[Melisandre]

Agreed. That's only fair.

[Brdavs]

Biggest winner here and in the Snowden case is China. 2 decades of moaning about their espionage, surveillance and dissident crackdown down the drain.

Zero leg to stand on when criticizing them and this will be pointed out to every western diplomat raising any issues in the foreseeable future.

[Loki™]

Manning showed the same **Filtered** you attitude and disregard for human life as USA when he released all that info.
Besides Assange is an ass so he should have picked a better outlet.