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a low in welcome to cross talk on peter lavelle hero or traitor these are among the labels to describe bradley manning and his alleged involvement in the weekend leaks release of hundreds of thousands of classified state department cables can he get a fair trial in the us and what is the future of whistleblowers. can. start. to cross-talk bradley manning's alleged involvement in the release of classified cables i'm joined by seton motley in washington he is the president and editor in chief of less government in oklahoma city we have james brown i'm he is the co-chair of the military law task force of the national lawyers guild and in berkeley we cross to bob he is a peace and justice activist and a commissioner on the peace and justice commission of the city of berkeley gentlemen this is crosstalk that means you can jump in any time. i want and i very

much encourage it but first let's have a look at some of the issues surrounding p.f.c. bradley manning. the case of with the with suspect bradley manning today it's the first step in a legal process that could end with a life sentence for a u.s. soldier accused of leaking a trove of military and diplomatic documents private manning who turned twenty four tomorrow is to peer in a court martial in maryland amid intense debate over the merits of the allegations believing that. having done the right manning was apprehended in iraq in two thousand and ten on suspicion of giving without permission thousands of classified documents to the whistle blowing website we can leaks the documents were subsequently published worldwide and led to the controversial revelation of diplomatic and military secrets including possible war crimes for the last eighteen months the soldier has been held in pretrial detention much of it in solitary confinement under conditions that have drawn the attention of amnesty international and the american civil liberties union i have actually asked the pentagon whether

or not. the procedures that have been taken in terms of his confinement are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards they assure me that they are in response pentagon has assured that the conditions are appropriate given the seriousness of the charges but the growing list of manning supporters insist on the contrary saying the conditions are out of proportion to the accusations and recently more than fifty european parliament members moved an open letter to the u.s. government questioning the whistleblowers treatment in custody and the justification for possibility of the death penalty and life in prison proceedings against many are expected to last around five days followed by a decision of whether the case will proceed to trial russia china may for cross talk our team. ok second if i go to you in washington first is manning a freedom of information idealist or a national security threat. you know well if he's as you said allegedly if he's

done what he's been accused of doing he's a national security threat you know it is not his job to make that decision that's not how the military works and how top secret information works and i would if he's guilty of all these things i would certainly want to live a life sentence if not in fact the death penalty ok that's pretty strong there james if i go to you in oklahoma city how do you stand on this is is manning a national security threat and should he go to prison for the rest of his life if the allegations are correct and we don't know if they are yet but if they are i believe he's a whistleblower he deserves protection he revealed information that showed that the u.s. troops committed war crimes he gave accurate information he lee allegedly leaked showed accurate counts of civilian casualties which had previously not been reported that information important the american people deserve that information the world deserves that information bob what do you think about this i mean it's interesting is that it since the release of these cables the u.s.

government has said well you know the the they're not that bad they're just an embarrassment i mean no major secrets released and anyone in the press corps covering these illegal wars could have found a lot of this information out of the actually the weekly leaks just confirmed a lot of things that people already knew. right if bradley manning did what he's accused of he's definitely an american hero and this one is a certain you mentioned top secret nothing bradley manning allegedly released was classified top secret now daniel ellsberg good point during the time of the pentagon papers everything he released was top secret and yet what ok let's analyze his analyze is lesser way sees me less or less or that's lesser classification secret like it's not his fault and they're usually hundreds of thousands and it's not his call to have access to the same thing if you're a twenty one year olds now is a call to make a evidence of your government committing war crimes we told them at nuremberg we told the germans that they had

a duty to not obey illegal orders it was over that point what he tried is not all done here so a man is a us not bradley manning is called a may ok the us constitution by binds us to international treaties and us law so if he is guilty of what he is accused of he was trying to uphold the constitution ok see it in you when you have an answer go ahead yes the one who authorized the private in the army to release this information how do you think the president of yemen feels when bradley manning outed the fact that he's helping americans against al qaeda you think you think he's thrilled about that release if you want to get in a ticky tack of whether or not it's top secret but the president of yemen may very well end up dead because of bradley manning for helping the united states against a terrorist enemy who wants to destroy us how is that helpful how is that upholding an ideal actually go ahead bob actually the government has admitted it oh let's go to bob there's nobody has been harmed by anything released by by wiki leaks that at

this point and you must be so bad to garnish your that's all garbage have gone to the pacts to pakistan taliban. got to pakistan and had the money turned around and given to pakistan the. then in afghanistan to fight u.s. troops i think the american people want to know that and whoever released that is a hero ok but james if i go back to you and you didn't answer my question about yemen for answering my question about yemen how are we going to get allies to help us if you want to help them by a private first class is going to help them for helping the united states. gentlemen you know hillary clinton has already admitted you know and gates secretary of defense gates also. what has been released the cables were embarrassing but they have both admitted that there has been no risk to national some of their own and embarrassing for the yemeni president faces if you should at the hands of all right gentlemen gentlemen ok just your hand is embarrassing for

james in oklahoma city you want to jump in they're going to have about one hundred thousand people have been killed due to the illegal war there i would gentlemen i'd like to go to james we have all james is also a guest on the program james go ahead that's. the fundamental one of the issues that keeps coming up scene keeps arguing that is a private first class at least in this matter what gives him the right to a leak this the truth is that every soldier every rake has not just a right but a duty to stop work crimes whenever possible nuremberg principles and make this very clear it doesn't matter what his rank is certainly it's been at the top the generals know so someday if you choose generation it's very very likely that high ranking officers possibly presidents could stand to stand trial for war crimes trials that future may come but right now the one guy that will not be standing trial charges for trials and that is p.f.c. bradley manning so you don't you want to be as bad as mattingly and you you you you accuse me of improperly using top secret i think you're blatantly abusing the war

crimes what he released was damaging to national security was damaging to our allies not just not just yemen but any ally that's helping us for instance jordan and other countries that are helping us against the terrorist threat and by outing one you're damaging our relationships with all of them and that's that to me is a war crime james go ahead. if you want evidence of war crimes all you need to do is do a google search look up on youtube a colossal murder you can see in the video what us troops slaughtering innocent civilians from several hundred feet up in the air it's there you can see it see it with your own eyes and that we would not have the information that worked for bradley manning bob do you want to jump in there is an issue for you to video yeah i do thank you not only is collateral murder evidence of atrocities war crimes but it's not an aberration it's typical of what soldiers have told us what happens

every day in recent years if you're going to tear gas canister you didn't god doesn't want to hear him say i mean how do you know that it didn't contract is the person who is going to talking. go ahead by not making any sense because i was talking go ahead please don't interrupt me. there are there are many videos besides the collateral murder footage from both afghanistan and iraq that show atrocities and war crimes we know that soldiers called in an airstrike to cover up evidence of shooting point blank five month old to seventy year old people families with their hands handcuffed behind them and shot in the head the airstrike was covered in called in to cover the the evidence of the shootings. so is it was a silly demand so is the military chain of command private first class to wiki

leaks or is there a chain of command to which you should have well here to which you should have reported which he didn't do well i mean if i could jump in here see what are you doing here gentlemen here she didn't i mean i mean but that's the whole point of this isn't it i mean he would never been allowed to release this information because he'd gone through the chain of command that's how do you zero that's why he made it very hard to believe and we know well how do you how convinced are you are that it would happen it's very strange i mean you know because i thought i was in her i don't think i had a good ninety nine percent of the military are war criminals and i think if you reported it up the food chain they would have dealt with it properly and it wouldn't have damaged international security interests you're saying the military is going to you're saying the missing gentleman i'm sorry said did you say had no choice so i listened went to the merry ways please please by please bob just as a teaching you're saying the military can police itself. yeah let's give it a chance about bradley manning did not give it a chance and he did not give it an opportunity and he bypassed it all and damage

international security for our troops and our allies even though the president even the secretary of state says it's not the case for all we know he may have the obama secretary of state keep that in mind for all we know at this point he may have ok i don't know what bradley manning shared with screen and we don't know all right bob john before we got to the planning is bradley manning supposed to have gone to his superior to say that iraqis were being turned over for torture and was told to shut up go back to his desk so if that happened he had no choice but to obey a higher law saying simon said i'm here and i want to launch isn't torture would just take a tap to double tap to the head is that what you're saying that's obama solution to not waterboarding is a double tap in the head and drone missile you know we're not is that that or the bomb i think you have to say gentlemen i mean john we're going to go to a short break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion on bradley manning stay with arcane. and.

we'll get to the. science technology innovation all the latest developments from around russia we've got the future covered. download the official location your i phone on my pod touch from the i choose i'm still. one

life on the go. video on demand i'll tease mine gold costs an r.s.s. feeds now in the palm of your. question on the dot com. can you. please. welcome back to cross talk i'm curious about the amount you were talking about the bradley manning case. please. please. ok seat and i go back to you in washington i don't want everyone to be beating up on you including myself ok but you know one of the interesting things is that we can weeks they didn't release information to of to an enemy government to

a terrorist group and release it to the media and the washington they the new york times the new york times let me finish the new york times i think was the guardian and your spiegel they were all part of it too should they be put on trial as well for releasing this information i mean they're just as culpable not just bradley manning. your know it because we want america we have a first amendment once they get the information they're aware of they can print it if i want they shouldn't but the new york times did i mean they did finish the time certainly time and time again is put national security at risk to run a story but we have the first amendment that's the there is not a first amendment and to speak all in germany but we have a first amendment here the fact of the matter is you want to bypass bradley manning who some reason for all this i mean he released information he absolutely had no right to release and he should be if he's guilty i think certainly sort of life in prison and at the very least ok james if i can go to you i mean there's ample

amount of evidence that bradley manning should have never been in the position that he was put into while he was in the military because of his psychiatric background and we number of people around him have been. been reprimanded and even lost their job i mean isn't the military just as much as responsible for what happened here because he certainly was they wouldn't give him a gun because they didn't trust him with it so they gave. you know you're giving him all this access to information i mean isn't the military culpable as well here . well i mean that in a way yes but i would argue that that i don't want to focus on bradley manning the sanity issues because i think arguably he did the most sane thing a person can do in a horrible situation he stood up for what is right he found a way to push back against against unthinkable atrocities and he pushed back that i think is really point we have to come back to and then to say that bradley manning is not going to get a fair trial in our current court system and there's really three main issues that

i see there that relate to that one is the issue of unlawful command influence president obama has already pronounced him guilty on camera he can't get a fair trial unlawful command influence often court martial get kicked out of the ground secondly we have major major major violations of article thirteen of the uniform code of military justice in that bradley manning was effectively tortured for months after months after months of being locked in solitary being denied clothing it just completely and excusable finally bradley manning will be denied a jury of his peers we know that because in the military the system of justice which has a lot of good aspects the one thing that is atrocious about it is that you were never tried by a jury of your peers you instead tried by a jury hand picked by the convening authority high ranking military officers or if you're enlisted you can request enlisted but guess who they're going to pick they're a high ranking handpicked noncommissioned officers in other words the jury is here and picked the people bringing the charges that is unconscionable ok and because of

that we know we know bradley manning so i can get a fair trial ok james if i'm going to see james is describing a kangaroo court. well what he's describing isn't a pluggable to a military tribunal and in a court martial trial you don't get a jury of your peers it's not a constitutional civil trial first of all second of all he's disease dismantle the definition of the term torture just like he's demand to dismantle the term war crimes. being in solitary confinement is not torture especially considering the guy is a set of and they want to keep him away from other people as much as possible which i sort of understand given the fact and third i want to point out i love the fact the other part of his defense is is he a hero or is he violently insane you know i think i don't think it's i always say if i only play and say no ok we haven't gotten that far yet ok ok we touched in the head and therefore once again you're bypassing culpability for manning by saying

he's touching the head it's a military's fault it's the press his fault the fact of the matter is he did this if he didn't do this none of the others to you're trying to. guilt would that would be in this discussion ok. maybe we should be put on trial to bob what do you how do you feel about all of this do you think manning's way to get a fair trial i passing manning again well we can't leaks was the conduit come out of the secret is that. if you know who is going to buy a big side of manning hadn't done what he did wiki leaks would have had nothing to publish ok bob go ahead and in berkeley ok i want to follow up on what james said about do command influence. everybody should be clear. we're talking about a jury of career military officers all of whom want to advance their military careers and how could they hear the evidence and possibly say not guilty when the commander in chief when their boss has already said quote he broke the law unquote

it's impossible that. any writing that i just laid there and i don't have time isn't running down the entire military and. as evil war criminals and capable of properly judging they're going to i really cross if you want to and i don't blame the military except bradley manning in this conversation everybody in the military is guilty to you except bradley manning believe in due process we're talking about now don't go in there not evil ok this is a court martial this is not a constitutional a billion drop a back seat and i mean i guess what really makes them look to be about military we'll see if i can go gentlemen please constitute lease gentlemen you know i never met a constitutional military law says no punishment before trial he's been punished for nineteen months now before trial ok seat and i mean really what's at stake here is ok i can see how you want to punish bradley manning ok because he didn't follow the chain of command but really what's what is really what hurts the military so much

nicer so much of let me finish a question please is it the cables reveal that the military's involvement in these wars has been less than honorable you have to at least admit that or you believe that the cables or false. does that change a single thing about what bradley manning did no no but i think you're changing the subject to disguise the route of the united states and where does the united states foreign wars and this is the way the military wanted and it's a chilling effect is i want to talk about whistleblowers now never talk about the atrocities that u.s. soldiers commit in foreign wars this is what this trials all about is it was first of all i don't think i think the description of what's what he revealed is way overblown and overwrought and gnashing of teeth and pulling of air second of all this is about bradley manning i was told the segment was about bradley manning and none of this conversation would be occurring if bradley manning had violated his oath to military and violated the law and release these documents period we've had to the other two guests it was certainly bob and berkeley has condemned as evil

everybody in the military except bradley manning bob you want to jump in there go ahead i said anybody was evil don't misquote me you said that you said that they were that they were the he couldn't report to anybody in the military because they all would have covered up war crimes and then you said they're incapable of getting his fair trial because every single you know something. about our officer and his superior didn't want to hear it ok james you want to jump in there for me and also go ahead james. who knows what couple things one is we don't know what bradley manning reported to chain of command he may very well have a pretty ship he may very well of reported the office the inspector general he may have done other things we don't know that so i guess you know i'm assuming that he has done those things but even if he didn't i want to go back to the issue of the jury because because see you've been bringing up this issue that the court martial is not a constitutional civil trial i agree it's not a civil trial because it's criminal but it is still constitutional still bound by

the u.s. constitution and still bound by international norms of international law and my argument was that all they were rats as about international law really dollars were actual general well that's fine but i do my my already on the issue of john i don't know if you're lying or abortion is is you're going to read into laws for abortion i think you're going to international law oh ok you want to go around saying the same words you know i when it comes to you want to pry your shoes which international i don't want to think you know why don't we let you know i mean i find gentlemen who you know you want to know where we are here national yes go ahead james continue with your legal perspective go ahead. but the standpoint of the issue of jury my argument is that the idea of a jury of peers is something from the very beginnings of our nation's history and even going back to back to back to british history the common law tradition we're part of is the idea that you should be judged by your peers and by people that are

disinterested at the very least can we at least agree that the members of the jury pool not be picked by the convening authority picked by another chain of command from or picked randomly from the military why don't we do that but no we have to have a system where the jury pool is handpicked by the accusers that i'm sorry that is a kangaroo court that is not fair that is not just and it has to change and not just for bradley manning the for all the other other soldiers who are facing charges in the military justice system there's a lot of good things about the military justice system as far as right to counsel is much better the civilian world there's a lot of good things i can tell you to but the negative we have to fix the jury ok you should be tried by a real jury if you book a seat and i mean i can ask you a question here i mean there's a lot of commentary that without these weekly leaks and without the key role it legibly because we'll find out later bradley manning's involvement in this is that we wouldn't have the arab spring because and so many people on the ground realised what could be lazy terrible for me let me listen to

a lot of people on the ground realised how much their governments were involved with the united states in committing illegal acts and governments are very very embarrassed again i know how you feel about keeping the focus on our bradley manning but you know he's in the middle of a huge storm ok and a lot of people thank you for the arab spring even though you don't like the idea yeah the muslim brotherhood is taking over in egypt that's fantastic that's democracy you know that's democracy what that's democracy. monkee voting is democracy it doesn't mean it's a good thing if you don't like the outcome don't you know get angry with the concept. why first of all we're republic we're not a democracy what they're doing over there it isn't even for a dictator oh i said i'd go for a constitutional power. i'm asking you what you want to write in the national the international norm for the ok bob i'm going to be the last one here bob has got the last word in berkeley guide. bradley manning filed his conscience we told the nazis the soldiers have a duty to obey

a higher law bradley manning did the right thing if he did what he's accused of doing so the military the knowledge that you ok he's an american i don't mean fascinating conversation we've run out of time many thanks to my guest today in washington oklahoma city and berkeley and thanks to our viewers for watching if you are to see you next time and remember prostate. and you. still. want. it are sometimes you see a story and it seems so for lengthly you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realize that everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harpur welcome to the big

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well kind of a lot of show we'll get the real headlines with none of the mercy or can live in washington d.c. now and i'm going to speak to daniel ellsberg bradley manning enters a courtroom for the first time in the eighteen months of his detention and why the most damning charges against him could result in a death sentence we're going to ask if this kind of whistle blowing really deserves a medal then we've documented to you that in the last ten years more than four hundred terrorism related cases have been prosecuted in our civilian courts but is

the word terrorism being applied.