Saturday, December 04, 2010

taking a leak

Today is one of these common occasions when I sit down in front of my computer with only the vaguest idea of what I want to write about and let creativity and spontaneity take over. Usually, when I have a pretty good outline of the post to come, it takes hours to mature the piece into something that can be unchained. Much to my chagrin, starting out clueless is often better.

Today I am clueless. I only know that the post will focus on the recent waterfall of WikiLeaks that is being frantically mopped up by radio stations and newspapers up and down the country and, with much amplification, redispensed over a public that can hardly escape. I'm sick of it. I can't take any more revelations that are blown up to sound as if they come from God itself. I'm sick of hearing WikiLeaks mentioned. But despite the exposure, I'm not sure what to think of WikiLeaks itself.

WikiLeaks made its name in April of this year with the release of video footage taken from an US Army helicopter that showed the gunning down of persons in the street, to put it most simply and generally. With bits and pieces of their equipment scattered all over, two of the victims were later identified as a Reuters photographers. The video caused outraged worldwide, mostly because it seemed at first glance as if the soldiers were carelessly shooting unarmed civilians.

Whether this is what really happens is anyone's guess. The video starts in the middle of the action; it's impossible to say what led to it. WikiLeaks doesn't tell, and doesn't say why. Did they get a longer version that approached completeness? Why weren't the photographers identified as members of the press? Where did the unmarked van come from that drove into the scene, ostensibly to evacuate the survivors? If the video showed anything clearly, it was the fact that war is muddy and complex and impossible to judge from a single piece of evidence, no matter how visual.

After this leak came the Afghan War Diary and the Iraq war logs, both of which exposed examples of questionable behavior of troops in either war, but also listed names of local civilians that helped the US military administrations. They were praised and condemned in nearly equal measure because of this. It was said that lives were put in danger because of the release, though to say that the actions described in the leaks had put lives in danger (and cost countless lives) is probably closer to the truth. The messenger can't be blamed.

Revealing the identities of translators and drivers is harder to justify. These were honorable citizens that had taken their jobs because they needed the money or because they believed in the future of their country as designed by the United States. They were now targets of elements of the insurgency, unjustified by their actions. On the other hand, the moral case for collaborating with an occupying force is rather thin, I would think.

Last week the Fourth Great Leak was issued, and what a bore it was by comparison. A quarter million missives, send to the mothership from embassies around the globe, exposed American diplomats as broadly complying with common stereotypes: dismissive, snide, and condescending. Maybe that's why they made such a splash internationally. But are they worth precious news time? Does anyone need to be reminded that Berlusconi is a brainless philanderer and Putin the godfather of Russia?

The impact of this most recent flood of words is bound to be minimal. All governments have received very similar cables from their own embassy staff. Featuring in the released material is thus not a cause of diplomatic disgruntlement. In contrast, not featuring is because it shows the lack of importance of the absentee. If there is any damage, it's that international politics and diplomacy is demoted to the level of celebrity gossip. A blurry picture of a star in a compromising situation published in the free newspaper confirms celebrity.

In light of that, the buzz around the latest leak is rather disingenuous. On the other hand, classified information, i.e. state secrets have been exposed. These leaks must be plugged. It was apparently one single person that handed all the data to WikiLeaks. How come that person had so much access? What was his motivation? Here, some tough questions have to be answered. WikiLeaks should be thanked for pointing out flaws in the system.

Instead WikiLeaks draws heaps of criticism and aggression. It is perhaps understandable that WikiLeak's webspace host in the US terminated their contract because its servers received such a fury of denial-of-service attacks that it threatened to corrupt other websites' operations. More bizarrely, Paypal has cut WikiLeak's account, ostensibly because its "payment service cannot be used for any activities that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity". I find it very frightening when a payment processing company steps into the judiciary realm and decides what is illegal and what is not. It should be mentioned that WikiLeaks has never (to my knowledge) hacked into any computers to obtain information.

In some ways I'm very much in favor of the concept of WikiLeaks, of free information and transparency. It's a clearinghouse for whistleblowers, a blind rush of air forcing potentially incriminating material from secrecy and the danger of forgetting. Consider that the architects of the Enron failure, Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, met justice only because the inner workings of their fraudulent operation were exposed in emails made available to prosecutors.

I'm tempted to say that targeted leaks are good and avalanches just noise. But who would do the editing? Why would I or anyone trust WikiLeaks to be impartial and free and open? And who says editing hasn't already been done to color the leaks to make a certain point? Julian Assange, the head and mouthpiece of Wikileaks, doesn't provide much comfort in that regard. With Swedish courts going after him because of allegations of sexual assault, one would think it in the spirit of freedom and transparency if he stepped forward to answer these charges and clear his name.

The reason for setting up WikiLeaks was initially to expose "oppressive regimes in Asia, the former Soviet bloc, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, but we also expect to be of assistance to people of all regions who wish to reveal unethical behavior in their governments and corporations." Not cooperating with the judicial system of Sweden doesn't fit into that list without some major contortions, and that's why I'm left with a bad feeling in my mouth.

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