Manning Testifies About His Torture; Was It Aimed at Turning Him on Assange?
Saturday, 01 December 2012 11:08
By Paul Jay, The Real News Network | Interview and Video
<http://truth-out.org/news/item/13086-manning-testifies-about-his-torture-was-it-aimed-at-turning-him-on-assange>
Bradley Manning: Prisoners of Conscience
NYT and AP Launch Operation Amnesia
By Chris Floyd
December 02, 2012
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33192.htm
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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article33193.htm
Bradley Manning: A Tale Of Liberty Lost In America
The US does nothing to punish those guilty of war crimes or Wall
Street fraud, yet demonises the whistleblower
By Glenn Greenwald
December 01, 2012 "The Guardian" -- Over the past two and a half
years, all of which he has spent in a military prison, much has been
said about Bradley Manning, but nothing has been heard from him. That
changed on Thursday, when the 23-year-old US army private accused of
leaking classified documents to WikiLeaks testified at his court
martial proceeding about the conditions of his detention.
The oppressive, borderline-torturous measures to which he was
subjected, including prolonged solitary confinement and forced
nudity, have been known for some time. A formal UN investigation
denounced those conditions as "cruel and inhuman". President Obama's
state department spokesman, retired air force colonel PJ Crowley,
resigned after publicly condemning Manning's treatment. A prison
psychologist testified this week that Manning's conditions were more
damaging than those found on death row, or at Guantánamo Bay.
Still, hearing the accused whistleblower's description of this abuse
in his own words viscerally conveyed its horror. Reporting from the
hearing, the Guardian's Ed Pilkington quoted Manning: "If I needed
toilet paper I would stand to attention and shout: 'Detainee Manning
requests toilet paper!'" And: "I was authorised to have 20 minutes
sunshine, in chains, every 24 hours." Early in his detention, Manning
recalled, "I had pretty much given up. I thought I was going to die
in this eight by eight animal cage."
The repressive treatment of Bradley Manning is one of the disgraces
of Obama's first term, and highlights many of the dynamics shaping
his presidency. The president not only defended Manning's treatment
but also, as commander-in-chief of the court martial judges,
improperly decreed Manning's guilt when he asserted in an interview
that he "broke the law".
Worse, Manning is charged not only with disclosing classified
information, but also the capital offence of "aiding the enemy", for
which the death penalty can be imposed (military prosecutors are
requesting "only" life in prison). The government's radical theory is
that, although Manning had no intent to do so, the leaked information
could have helped al-Qaida, a theory that essentially equates any
disclosure of classified information - by any whistleblower, or a
newspaper - with treason.
Whatever one thinks of Manning's alleged acts, he appears the classic
whistleblower. This information could have been sold for substantial
sums to a foreign government or a terror group. Instead he apparently
knowingly risked his liberty to show them to the world because - he
said when he believed he was speaking in private - he wanted to
trigger "worldwide discussion, debates, and reforms".
Compare this aggressive prosecution of Manning to the Obama
administration's vigorous efforts to shield Bush-era war crimes and
massive Wall Street fraud from all forms of legal accountability. Not
a single perpetrator of those genuine crimes has faced court under
Obama, a comparison that reflects the priorities and values of US
justice.
Then there's the behaviour of Obama's loyalists. Ever since I first
reported the conditions of Manning's detention in December 2010, many
of them not only cheered that abuse but grotesquely ridiculed
concerns about it. Joy-Ann Reid, a former Obama press aide and now a
contributor on the progressive network MSNBC, spouted sadistic
mockery in response to the report: "Bradley Manning has no
pillow?????" With that, she echoed one of the most extreme rightwing
websites, RedState, which identically mocked the report: "Give
Bradley Manning his pillow and blankie back."
As usual, the US establishment journalists have enabled the
government every step of the way. Despite holding themselves out as
adversarial watchdogs, nothing provokes their animosity more than
someone who effectively challenges government actions.
Typifying this mentality was a CNN interview on Thursday night with
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange conducted by Erin Burnett. It was to
focus on newly released documents revealing secret efforts by US
officials to pressure financial institutions to block WikiLeaks'
funding after the group published classified documents allegedly
leaked by Manning, a form of extra-legal punishment that should
concern everyone, particularly journalists.
But the CNN host was completely uninterested in the dangerous acts of
her own government. Instead she repeatedly tried to get Assange to
condemn the press policies of Ecuador, a tiny country that - quite
unlike the US - exerts no influence beyond its borders. To the mavens
of the US watchdog press, Assange and Manning are enemies to be
scorned because they did the job that the US press corps refuses to
do: namely, bringing transparency to the bad acts of the US
government and its allies around the world.
Bradley Manning has bestowed the world with multiple vital benefits.
But as his court martial finally reaches its conclusion, one likely
to result in the imposition of a long prison term, it appears his
greatest gift is this window into America's political soul.
Glenn Greenwald is a columnist on civil liberties and US national
security issues for the Guardian. A former constitutional lawyer, he
was until 2012 a contributing writer at Salon. He is the author of
How Would a Patriot Act? (May 2006), a critique of the Bush
administration's use of executive power; A Tragic Legacy (June,
2007), which examines the Bush legacy; and With Liberty and Justice
For Some: How the Law Is Used to Destroy Equality and Protect the
Powerful.
© 2012 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies.
All rights reserved.
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