Wikileaks

By Binh Chung

According to the wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, over 250,000 diplomatic cables have been made public. An overwhelming amount of these cables are marked "secret" or "noforn,"  meaning that the information should not be shared with "representatives of other countries, and 4,000 are marked "secret/noforn." The remaining cables are marked "confidential" or "unclassified," but nonetheless should be kept out of the public eye. The release of these cables is unprecedented in exposing the behind the curtain operations of the United States' relations with the world. Traditionally, the release of such information is not to be published until the involving diplomats are deceased. That way the safety of the diplomats are secured. The most recent publication by the State Department was in 1976.

An internal accomplice in the release of these cables is Pfc. Bradley Manning. Manning confessed to delivering the "260,000 State Department cables from embassies and consulates all over the world" to Adrian Lamo. He was able to obtain these cables by hacking into a military computer system and downloading these files. Since then, Manning has been turned over to the authorities, where he has been charged with "illegally leaking classified information". Awaiting his conviction is a lengthy prison sentence.

Some major news organizations were informed of the leaked cables as early as last may, where they were given advance copies of the content. It was up to the individual publication's discretion in deciding what to publish and review to its audience. What's intriguing is how they have waited until these past couple of days to have their field day. The New York Times launched a series titled "State Secrets" in which writers and editors frequently publish news, opinions, and comments about the released documents. The international press such as Germany's DerSpiegeland Britain's Gaurdian have also frequently updated on this event. 

The reasoning of the press in deciding to publish wikileaks articles is that ultimately, the public will view them anyway. The executive editor of the NYtimes, Ben Keller, claims that "for The Times to ignore this material would be to deny its own readers the careful reporting and thoughtful analysis they expect when this kind of information becomes public."

The intentions of the press are reasonable, and whether you agree with the decision for them to publish or not publish- it does not make much of a difference. The root of the problem lies behind the action of founder, Julian Assange, who made an ambition goal to publicize these confidential document for quite some time.  

At the risk of the "secrecy of diplomatic correspondence," the release of the cables have violated myriad protection laws of the United States and many worldwide.

In a GaurdianQ+A, a former British diplomat essentially states that "An embassy which cannot securely offer advice or pass messages back to London is an embassy which cannot operate." This is the same diplomat who has "helped to coordinate multilateral action against a brutal regime in the Balkans, impose sanctions on a renegade state threatening ethnic cleansing, and negotiate a debt relief programme for an impoverished nation." Fundamentally, all of these were accomplished with the leisure of privacy.

Naturally, his question to Mr. Assange was "why should we not hold you personally responsible when next [to] an international crisis goes unresolved because diplomats cannot function?"

Mr. Assange's answer: "If you trim the vast editorial letter to the singular question actually asked, I would be happy to give it my attention."

The answer is empty and suggests avoidance to the issue at hand.

The moral of the story is, although many scandalous things have been published and reading wikileaks has been entertaining, the State Department has a job and can not continue to do so if their privacy is in jeopardy.