I think it does Snowden a disservice. He was very careful about exactly what information he leaked, and who he leaked it to.
Manning just seemed to bulk download info and release it directly to an organisation he knew would widely disseminate it without examining it. In theory what he did was better than Snowden, but in practise he endangered a lot of lives.
As I said, the point of comparison matters. I offered one, you brought up another; both of that kinda beats just saying "they're different" without also mentioning on what they're being compared on, which is what the post I replied to did. Or why they even have to be compared, for that matter.
What exactly was Bradley Manning trying to whistleblow about? It seems more like he just released a huge amount of classified data arbitrarily. Its hard to say that that is not treason.
> What exactly was Bradley Manning trying to whistleblow about?
Seen collateral murder [1]?
> Its hard to say that that is not treason.
Really? It's so easy to kill the messenger. Not to bring in the emotional aspect of this typical power structure vs. single human issue here, but then treason would be the last word I'd want to use for the guy who uncovered killing of innocents and wrong doings of some (I think most soldiers are not trigger-happy rather good people who love peace) stupid crazy soldiers in our army (who should be behind bars instead!).
Let's not forget that we pay the bills for all this.
When wars happen there is collateral damage and innocent people will be in the crossfire. We all knew this. We also already know we are fighting wars on behalf of oil companies like we always have. A lot of America's power has come from the exploitation of other countries, this is how America has functioned for at least 100 years. None of this is really unconstitutional but it is immoral.
When you join the military you are pretty much agreeing to proactively aid in this whether you are aware of the reality of America or not. Lots of information about how the US behaves is readily available.
He just released tons of classified information with very vague intent because he didn't like what the US does. This was not really a whistle blower situation because we basically already knew this stuff was happening and it isn't unconstitutional. We voted for the Iraq war because the populace is not really very smart. It is what it is though.
"I read more of the diplomatic cables published on the Department of State Net Centric Diplomacy. With my insatiable curiosity and interest in geopolitics I became fascinated with them. I read not only the cables on Iraq, but also about countries and events that I found interesting.
The more I read, the more I was fascinated with the way that we dealt with other nations and organizations. I also began to think the documented backdoor deals and seemingly criminal activity that didn't seem characteristic of the de facto leader of the free world.
Up to this point,during the deployment, I had issues I struggled with and difficulty at work. Of the documents release, the cables were the only one I was not absolutely certain couldn't harm the United States. I conducted research on the cables published on the Net Centric Diplomacy, as well as how Department of State cables worked in general.
In particular, I wanted to know how each cable was published on SIRPnet via the Net Centric Diplomacy. As part of my open source research, I found a document published by the Department of State on its official website.
The document provided guidance on caption markings for individual cables and handling instructions for their distribution. I quickly learned the caption markings clearly detailed the sensitivity of the Department of State cables. For example, NODIS or No Distribution was used for messages at the highest sensitivity and were only distributed to the authorized recipients.
The SIPDIS or SIPRnet distribution caption was applied only to recording of other information messages that were deemed appropriate for a release for a wide number of individuals. According to the Department of State guidance for a cable to have the SIPDIS [missed word] caption, it could not include other captions that were intended to limit distribution.
The SIPDIS caption was only for information that could only be shared with anyone with access to SIPRnet. I was aware that thousands of military personel, DoD, Department of State, and other civilian agencies had easy access to the tables. The fact that the SIPDIS caption was only for wide distribution made sense to me, given that the vast majority of the Net Centric Diplomacy Cables were not classified.
The more I read the cables, the more I came to the conclusion that this was the type of information that should become public. I once read a and used a quote on open diplomacy written after the First World War and how the world would be a better place if states would avoid making secret pacts and deals with and against each other.
I thought these cables were a prime example of a need for a more open diplomacy. Given all of the Department of State cables that I read, the fact that most of the cables were unclassified, and that all the cables have a SIPDIS caption.
I believe that the public release of these cables would not damage the United States, however, I did believe that the cables might be embarrassing, since they represented very honest opinions and statements behind the backs of other nations and organizations.
In many ways these cables are a catalogue of cliques and gossip. I believed exposing this information might make some within the Department of State and other government entities unhappy. On 22 March 2010, I began downloading a copy of the SIPDIS cables using the program Wget, described above."
What exactly is unconstitutional that he is whistleblowing about here?
I don't know if it's unconstitutional for the State Department to pressure the German government to not pursue the 13 CIA agents who were responsible for the kidnapping and torture of an innocent German citizen,[1] but I think it's disgusting and I'm glad Manning leaked this info.
That said, I don't think he should have leaked as much as he did.