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re: Wikileaks is a threat to American National Security
Posted on 3/10/17 at 6:57 pm to Iowa Golfer
Posted on 3/10/17 at 6:57 pm to Iowa Golfer
Wikileaks used to be pretty cool years ago. You could go on their site and search through everything in their archives (they might have made it available again earlier this year). I used to go on there to read all the crazy docs they had on Scientology and other crap.
Around 2010 there was a split among Wikileaks principals and that's when Wikileaks started going downhill. It soon became all about Julian Assange and the organization became a shell of what it once was. Good explainer here.
Around 2010 there was a split among Wikileaks principals and that's when Wikileaks started going downhill. It soon became all about Julian Assange and the organization became a shell of what it once was. Good explainer here.
This post was edited on 3/10/17 at 6:58 pm
1
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:00 pm to Magician2
quote:
If your wife was cheating on you
You wouldn't want to find out from some random person who has proof?
You'd rather just continue with your merry little life. Nice
What a stupid analogy.
This is why most of you think Snowden is a hero.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:02 pm to Decatur
Interesting. I remember that scientology stuff. Earlier this winter I checked out some of their property in Clearwater Beach. Those dudes have a lot of money. As in a lot.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:03 pm to MrCarton
quote:
Wikileaks doesn't owe any government any sort of loyalty.
I am well aware of this and want the leakers prosicuted to the full extent of the law with regards to treason as that is what this is. Regardless of my favorable opinion of bringing this shite they do to light.
quote:
WikiLeaks is a whistle blower organization. They don't hack anything, they just publish information from people who do. Not everything they have was "hacked" either. I'm sure plenty of Pols and Government workers use WL to meet an agenda.
Yeah. I know as does almost everyone else around here
I was being curt for the purpose of being expedient.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:05 pm to Iowa Golfer
At some point Assange became friendly with the Russians, including getting a TV show aired on Russia Today.
Former Wikileaks people point to an association he has with an individual named Israel Shamir who has acted a cutout with the Russians.
Former Wikileaks people point to an association he has with an individual named Israel Shamir who has acted a cutout with the Russians.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:13 pm to Iowa Golfer
Former Wikileaks member James Ball has had some interesting things to say on this matter:
LINK
quote:
I joined WikiLeaks last November as a staffer for a three-month stint. Culture shock came just a few days in, when Julian Assange gathered core staff and supporters at Ellingham Hall, a manor house owned by the Frontline Club founder and WikiLeaks supporter Vaughan Smith.
Around the dining table the team sketched out a plan for the coming months, to release the leaked US diplomatic cables selectively for maximum impact. Phase one would involve publishing selected – and carefully redacted – high-profile cables through the Guardian, New York Times, Der Spiegel, Le Monde and El Pais. Phase two would spread this out to more media organisations.
But clearly a large volume of cables would remain, of little interest to any media organisation. Several at the meeting – myself included – stressed these documents, which would probably number hundreds of thousands, could not be published without similar careful redaction. Others vehemently disagreed.
Johannes Wahlström, Swedish journalist and son of antisemitic WikiLeaks activist Israel Shamir, shouted: "You do realise the idea of not putting ALL of these cables up is totally unacceptable to people around this table, don't you?"
Julian took Wahlström's their side. One way or another, he said, all the cables must eventually be made public.
quote:
WikiLeaks is not a conventional organisation. It has no board, no governance, and no effective rules. In such a febrile environment, and with Julian so central to the organisation's ability to function, it's not hard to see how such decisions came to be seen as correct.
So I decided to grit my teeth and carry on. Dismay mounted, however, with the arrival of Israel Shamir, a self-styled Russian "peace campaigner" with a long history of antisemitic writing. Shamir was introduced to the team under the pseudonym Adam, and it was only several weeks after he had left – with a huge cache of unredacted cables – that most of us started to find out who he was.
Press enquiries started to trickle in. A little research revealed his unsavoury history, but I was told Julian would be unwilling for WikiLeaks to publish anything critical of Shamir. Instead, shamefully, we put out a statement simply distancing WikiLeaks from him.
There followed even more damning allegations. Shamir had been seen leaving the interior ministry of Belarus, an eastern European dictatorship.
The next day, the country's dictator, Alexander Lukashenko, boasted he would start a Belarusian WikiLeaks showing the US was funding his political rivals.
Scores of arrests of opposition activists followed the country's elections – but Shamir wrote a piece painting an idyllic picture of free, fair, elections in a happy country.
Human rights groups demanded answers, amid fears that Belarus may have received material from the cables. No answers were supplied. Julian would not look into the matter.
For an organisation supposedly devoted to human rights, the apparent lack of concern when faced with such a grave charge was overwhelming.
My trips to WikiLeaks' HQ became far less frequent, and I attempted to leave the organisation early. This was refused. I was cornered for several days and asked to sign a gagging agreement.
Supporters were asked to "apply psychological pressure" to encourage me to sign, evidencing a growing cultlike ethos at the centre of the group.
I was disturbed and conflicted. I still found the organisation's aims were in many ways laudable, the financial and legal pressures unjust, and its publishing pattern far more responsible than it received credit for.
I couldn't support its internal culture, its lack of accountability, willingness to lie publicly, and crucially its failure to condemn Shamir. I supported the organisation's principles, but not its methods.
The final straw for me came on Friday. By drawing attention to, and then publishing in full, the unredacted cache of documents, WikiLeaks has done the cause of internet freedom – and of whistleblowers – more harm than US government crackdowns ever could.
LINK
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:15 pm to Azazello
They are doing the job that some in the media used to do.
Forward
Forward
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:17 pm to Navytiger74
quote:
What the heck do you think I've been getting at?
Seriously, I asked a couple posts ago if you thought this. I was so freaking confused
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:19 pm to Decatur
quote:
Leaking, we are told, is a man's business. Israel Shamir, a strong supporter of Julian Assange, has penned an extraordinary piece in defence of the WikiLeaks founder as he awaits extradition to Sweden. The decision to extradite Assange for questioning in relation to alleged sexual offences against two women is, Shamir writes, "a defeat for all the men, and a defeat for mankind".
Assange's situation is not merely the consequence of one man's sexual liaisons, but part of a wider ploy to feminise men in order to make humanity more compliant to political elites. "Strong men are prone to rebellion, ready for sacrifice and primed for action," Shamir writes.
"It is no coincidence that the enemies of Empire are all masculine males, be they Gaddafi, Castro, Chávez, Lukashenko, Putin – or Julian Assange. It appears the men have been targeted for elimination; the working ants need no sex."
Strong men fight abuses of power, it seems, while women are, presumably, expected to support them from the kitchen – or in the bedroom.
If Shamir could be dismissed as merely a crank, his article might even be funny. But his influence over WikiLeaks and beyond is difficult to overestimate, and this relationship make his views more significant – and disturbing.
Shamir has a years-long friendship with Assange, and was privy to the contents of tens of thousands of US diplomatic cables months before WikiLeaks made public the full cache. Such was Shamir's controversial nature that Assange introduced him to WikiLeaks staffers under a false name. Known for views held by many to be antisemitic, Shamir aroused the suspicion of several WikiLeaks staffers – myself included – when he asked for access to all cable material concerning "the Jews", a request which was refused.
When questions were asked about Shamir's involvement with WikiLeaks, given his controversial background and unorthodox requests, we were told in no uncertain terms that Assange would not condone criticism of his friend. Instead, a mealy-mouthed statement distancing WikiLeaks from its freelancers was issued. Still later, when damning evidence emerged that Shamir had handed cables material to the dictator of Belarus – a man he holds in high esteem – to assist his persecution of opposition activists, Assange shamefully refused to investigate.
LINK
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:22 pm to Decatur
quote:
The reason I quit was because of a friend of Julian’s whose activities were unstomachable and unforgivable. That man was Israel Shamir. Shamir is an anti-Semitic writer, a supporter of the dictator of Belarus, and a man with ties and friends in Russian security services. He and Julian—unknown to us—had been in friendly contact for years. It was a friendship that would have serious consequences.
Introduced to WikiLeaks staff and supporters under a false name, Shamir was given direct access to more than 90,000 of the U.S. Embassy cables, covering Russia, all of Eastern Europe, parts of the Middle East, and Israel. This was, for quite some time, denied by WikiLeaks. But that’s never a denial I’ve found convincing: the reason I know he has them is that I gave them to him, at Assange’s orders, not knowing who he was.
Why did this prove to be a grave mistake? Not just for Shamir’s views, which are easy to Google, but for what he did next. The first hints of trouble came through contacts from various Putin-influenced Russian media outlets. A pro-Putin outlet got in touch to say Shamir had been asking for $10,000 for access to the cables. He was selling the material we were working to give away free, to responsible outlets.
Worse was to come. The NGO Index on Censorship sent a string of questions and some photographic evidence, suggesting Shamir had given the cables to Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, Europe’s last dictator. Shamir had written a pro-Belarus article, shortly before photos emerged of him leaving the interior ministry. The day after, Belarus’s dictator gave a speech saying he was establishing a WikiLeaks for Belarus, citing some stories and information appearing in the genuine (and then unpublished) cables.
Assange refused and blocked any attempts at investigation, and released public statements that were simply untrue.
Disturbingly, Assange seems to have a personal motivation for staying friendly with Shamir. Shamir’s son, Johannes Wahlstrom, is apparently being called as one of Assange’s defense witnesses in his Swedish trial. That’s not the only time self has come before principle.
LINK
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:31 pm to Decatur
quote:
WikiLeaks's spokesperson and conduit in Russia has been exposed in the Swedish media as an anti-semite and Holocaust denier; his son, who represents the organisation in Sweden and is handing out stories to selected papers there, has been involved in an earlier scandal where a story he wrote about the supposed Israeli control of Swedish media was withdrawn after several of the people in it complained of being misquoted.
While this does not affect the credibility of the WikiLeaks revelations, it does raise uncomfortable questions for the whistleblowers' organisation.
The two men involved are Israel Shamir, a Jew who has converted to Orthodox Christianity and passionate antisemitism, and his son Johannes Wahlström. Shamir was listed as a co-author of a story in Counterpunch, which suggested that the woman who brought a complaint of rape against Julian Assange was a CIA plant. But he has a longer and stranger past than this would suggest.
According to Magnus Ljunggren, a retired professor of Russian literature at Gothenburg University, Shamir has had at least six different names, among them Izrail Schmerler (as he was born in Novosibirsk, Siberia), Jöran Jermas, Adam Ermash, but is internationally known as Shamir. He has been a Swedish citizen since 1992.
LINK
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:37 pm to Decatur
quote:
While this does not affect the credibility of the WikiLeaks revelations, it does raise uncomfortable questions
quote:Why even go there?
Decatur
There is no question that Manning, Snowden, or Vault7 is a threat to American National Security. Each was/is.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 7:54 pm to NC_Tigah
quote:
Why even go there?
That's the writer's opinion in an article from years ago. I'm just presenting the info he gave about Shamir.
quote:
There is no question that Manning, Snowden, or Vault7 is a threat to American National Security. Each was/is.
Wait, I thought you were in the Snowden Is A Hero camp. Am I misunderstanding?
Posted on 3/10/17 at 8:09 pm to BobBoucher
quote:
I don't mind them leaking shif when it shows our government being corrupt, but when they share stuff that takes away our technology advantage we've gained and jeopardizes our ability tongather critical intelligence, I have a problem with that.
I agree. The problem is no one believes former spooks who talk without backing up their claims with proof. No one believes the old guys who worked at Area 51 that saw aliens. People want the alien bodies or a piece of the spacecraft, and really I can't blame them. Produce a body or a craft and then maybe we can talk.
My point is that some form of proof is needed to let us in the public know what's really going on. There are mechanisms inside the government to "whistleblow" on questionable activity, but it usually never goes anywhere. And even if it does, we in the public are not allowed to hear about it.
For instance, Bill Binney went through all the legal channels to whistleblow on project THINTHREAD being scrapped in favor of a more Orwellian system. Nothing came of it and NSA pretty much told him to pound sand. That's when he went public.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 8:14 pm to Azazello
quote:
Assange claims he is starting a debate about privacy and national security. Why is he not targeting Russia, China, or other authoritarian regimes?
he is
Posted on 3/10/17 at 8:18 pm to CptRusty
quote:
If they are leaking evidence of our government breaking the law then they are doing the citizens of this country a service.
Posted on 3/10/17 at 11:09 pm to Navytiger74
quote:
We can't have democracy without open government. Secrecy is the enemy of good government. Knowing that they are monitored is KEY to our public servants' compliance with the law. That is because power corrupts. Openness and accountability is the only cure for that.
You just made a basic argument against the very idea of state secrets. How silly is that?
I did not. Of course we need secrets. I had a top secret clearance. I know the deal.
But surely you are not arguing a black and white position.
It was that ultimate turd Reagan who said trust but verify. Right?
Posted on 3/11/17 at 12:09 am to Azazello
Sorry, I'm tired of government secrecy. They are proven criminals. It's time to do something new.
Posted on 3/11/17 at 9:17 am to Azazello
quote:No!
Wikileaks is a threat to American National Security
The jack-asses who cannot secure our secrets are a threat to national security.
Whether the receptacle of stolen information is Wikileaks, or the NYTimes, or CNN, or a foreign government is secondary to the problem of IC security incompetency.
Posted on 3/11/17 at 10:10 am to NC_Tigah
quote:So it can't be both? And let's not forget to throw in the whistleblowers themselves. They're hard to spot. Various CI officers are trained to look for indicators of espionage like financial stress, unexplained affluence, general disgruntlement, drastic life changes (divorce, etc), and compromising personal behavior.
No!
The jack-asses who cannot secure our secrets are a threat to national security.
Harder to spot some millennial douche waking up one day and deciding that divulging classified information is an even better hook for attention than posting his latest meal on instagram, apparently. They're so many of them. And some--especially contractors in recent incidents--join the IC.
Or they were already recruited by the time they signed up.
quote:Well the problem with foreign states and wikileaks is that they're much more tactical in their releases. They don't want to just see the world burn. They drive toward a specific purpose and they likely work for people far worse than anyone in our government.
Whether the receptacle of stolen information is Wikileaks, or the NYTimes, or CNN, or a foreign government is secondary to the problem of IC security incompetency.
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