by Juan Cole
[...]
1. Manning revealed the Collateral Murder
video of a helicopter attack in Iraq on mostly unarmed non-combatants
(though some of those struck may have been armed), including two Reuters
journalists, whose cameras were taken for weapons, and children. The army
maintains that the video does not show wrongdoing, but the killing of unarmed
journalists is a war crime, and the callousness of video gives an idea of what
was going on in Iraq during the years of the US occupation. When the Bush
administration asked the Iraqi parliament for permission to keep a base in the
country, the parliamentarians said, absolutely not. The US military was forced
to withdraw from Iraq by Dec. 31, 2011.
2. Manning revealed the full extent of the corruption of
Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidin Ben Ali, adding fuel to the youth protest
movement of late 2010, which translated the relevant US cables into Arabic.
Manning contributed to the outbreak of powerful youth movements demanding more
democratic governance in the Arab world.
3. Manning revealed to
the US and Yemeni publics the
secret drone war that Washington was waging in that country. That the
cables show then dictator Ali Abdallah Saleh acquiescing in the US strikes on
his country probably played into the movement to remove him as president, which
succeeded in early 2012.
4. He revealed that then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ordered
US diplomats to spy on their United Nations counterparts. The UN spy
requests included cables that “demanded detailed intelligence on the UN
leadership including forensic detail about their communications systems,
including passwords and personal encryption keys,” foreshadowing later
revelations of extensive US spying on even allies like Germany via the NSA.
5. His leaks show that then Senator John Kerry pressed
Israel to be open to returning the Golan Heights to Syria as part of a
peace negotiation. This item suggests that Kerry might be more of an honest
broker in the current negotiations than some observers give him credit for.
6. Revealed that Afghanistan
government corruption is “overwhelming”. This degree of corruption,
which has shaken the whole banking system and caused US funds to be massively
misused, is still a factor in our decision of whether to stay in Afghanistan in
some capacity after December 2014. The US public is in a better position to
judge the issue with these documents available.
7. Manning revealed the degree of authoritarianism and corruption of
the Egyptian government of Hosni Mubarak, which was subsequently swept away.
8. Manning revealed that hard-nosed realist, former Secretary
of Defense Robert Gates, was against striking Iran’s nuclear enrichment
facilities because it would only slow their program down slightly, but would
inevitably cause Iranians to be angry and mobilized in the aftermath.
9. Manning revealed that
the Israeli authorities had a secret plan to keep the Palestinian population of
Gaza on the brink of food insecurity and poor health, in among the
creepiest military operations in history: “Israeli officials have confirmed to
Embassy officials on multiple occasions that they intend to keep the Gazan
economy functioning at the lowest level possible consistent with avoiding a
humanitarian crisis.”
10. Manning’s act of courage encouraged hackers to leak
the emails of Bashar al-Assad and his wife, showing their jewelry buys in
Europe and gilded style of life while al-Assad’s artillery was pounding Homs
and other cities with no regard for the lives of noncombatants. In fact,
Manning inspired numerous leakers, including some who blew the whistle on PLO
corruption and willingness to give away most of Jerusalem to Israel, and,
likely, Edward Snowden, who revealed to us that our government has us all under
surveillance.
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