Army Pfc. Bradley E. Manning

[haebyungdae]

This piece of scum that gave Wikileaks that copy of the Apache video and probably gave them those thousands of documents containing classified material should be brought to justice as is mandated by the USMJ. At least three articles, as contained in Part IV of the Manual for Courts-Martial, that come to mind are: 104 - Aiding the Enemy, 106 - Spies, and 106a - Espionage. If he is in fact the person that gave those documents to Wikileaks then he should be tried and found guilty of the aforementioned articles, and punished appropriately, which is death (conviction of article 106 is mandated death penalty, no lesser penalty).

Whether it was him or another piece of scum, the book should be thrown at them, giving him, he/she, or them the most severe punishment possible. Anyone that has worked or currently works within the Intel community should be deeply angered and disturbed by this lack of integrity, and should be more so if such acts go unpunished or punished with a lack of severity.

There's my rant for the day...

[supermanlives22]

you know the stuff he gave does not help the enemy our sop is changing everyday and if it was him he will most likely not get death not siding with him but still the media is making a much bigger deal about this then it really is. its a sting but wont matter in a month.

[haebyungdae]

Yeah I know his punishment will not be death. I am just more worried that it will be too light, to which, if it is, it might send a message to others that it is somewhat okay to do such things. Somebody possibly with a higher clearance, divulging more sensitive information. Any unauthorized release of classified material, regardless of the level of classification, should be treated with the utmost severity. That's what I think at least.

[supermanlives22]

i agree but the problem is security can only do so much like right now if i wanted to i could do the same thing he did but i wont because its wrong and treason and i have no reason to. the only way to stop this would be pat downs and restrictions on computer. the problem here is the info was not that damaging to the usa it was a slap on the hand so the punishment wont be as bad

[Sgt Leprechaun]

He'll def. get time, deservedly so. But those who really follow this stuff know that not much of real value was released. Oh, sure, all those big ole 'secret' stamps make things look cool....but in reality, if you've read the newspapers, or just this site....there isn't much new here.

Anyone that can 'datamine' or even use a simple search engine, with the time and skill, could have put together a trove of documents such as these, all from 'open source' reporting.

In the end, it's not the raw data most of the time that's of value...it's the analysis, and then the 'sources and methods' (as well as the commentary) that is valuable.

The leftwing idiot that RUNS 'wikileaks', who is a big time 'anti-war' nerd, should bear the real punishment. Much ado about nothing, lots of preening about "These are the 'new' Pentagon papers" blah blah blah.

I've got no sympathy for this kid, mind you, but I also think that in the great scheme of things, nothing 'new and exciting' was released.

If this kid (and I don't think he acted totally alone, although it's certainly possible) really had some cool access to neat stuff, he would have released photos of Area 51, Our little space friends, and the proof that 9/11 was really put on by Mossad.

[Beltayn]

The wikileak classified documents are much less sensation than the media has been pretending. Pretty much they just collaborate on what we already knew, that Pakistan sucks as an ally and is split with factions that have multiple agendas, that in this type of warfare preventing civilian casualties is difficult without compromising mission accomplishment, and that our useful intel in Afghanistan is very patchy.

As for Manning, fry the bastard. He's a traitor.

[Integrity57]

Does anyone know if he was paid for giving those files to WikiLeaks?

[ArtyOps]

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/07/29/spain.us.troops/index.html?section=cnn_latest

Here's a story related to that. A Spanish Judge has issued an arrest warrant for three soldiers.

If you look down in the comments someone has posted the link to the Apache videos.

[Sgt Leprechaun]

Like that judge has a clue. No doubt a dedicated leftist tool.

[Siggs]

I think this traitor should do serious time. Like people have said above me most of the information he released was not ground breaking in any way, but it might have endangered our servicemen over there just like what happened with the abu ghraib scandal in Iraq. I'm just disappointed in the leadership or his peers not being able to pick up on this before it got this far...