all right, daniel, what do you make of julian assange. he said the nearest analog of what wikileaks has done is your release of the pentagon papers. do you agree? >> i see what he sees. there hasn't been an unauthorized disclosure of this magnitude since the pentagon papers 39 years ago. i've been waiting for it for a long time. there should have been the pentagon papers of iraq and a lot of other places. and i wish there had been pentagon papers of afghanistan earlier than this. but bitter laetter late than ne. the war is still on. congress is being challenged to vote $33 billion in a war where the opponent we're fighting is stronger than it's ever been before. the analogy to the war i was helping to expose is very close. >> larry: how do you respond to the white house's assertion that this leak puts u.s. forces in danger. >> you know, the people who put u.s. forces in harm's way, 100,000 men and women in afghanistan are the last two administrations, but particularly this one. the last administration, particularly this one, with a decisi

efforts wiki leaks founder julian assange says he hopes the information will help change u.s. war policy we can see that some material has potential. human rights reform and this is one of those cases so we put in a little bit of extra effort to try and get to the truth. so the united states a spends more than three hundred billion dollars on the war in afghanistan a conflict that has claimed the lives of more than one thousand u.s. troops and still the lead comes at a particularly bad time for this white house as it struggles to maintain support for an unpopular war amid growing questions about the third. besides being war has the potential to be very harmful to. those that. you know our military those that are cooperating with our military and those that. are working to keep us already rumblings on capitol hill indicate that the leaks may indeed affect u.s. war policy the chairman of the senate foreign relations committee john kerry issued a statement saying that the leak raises serious questions about the reality of america's policy towards pakistan and afghanistan it will

. >> reporter: julian assange the head of wikileaks which posted the documents on the web hopes researchers will mine them for a real picture of the war. this new trove covers six years of war in afghanistan through kind of reports both accurate and inaccurate every commander receives at his morning briefing. >> small arms fire and rpg. >> reporter: for instance, this report of the first use of the heat-seeking surface-to- air missile against an american aircraft. a weapon that would cripple u.s. air power if the taliban ever got them in large numbers. most of the reports document what is already well known. for years the u.s. has not had enough troops in afghanistan. resulting in this record of a remote outpost calling for help as they are nearly overrun. we are taking casualties. enemy in the wild. the afghan government has been corrupt and inefficient. according to this document, "the general view of the afghans is that the current government is worse than the taliban." american air strikes and commando raids have killed too many civilians. this report describes a raid that was intended

. >> reporter: in what appears to be an attempt to build a criminal case against julian assange, the head of wikileaks, defense secretary gates asked the director of the f.b.i. to join the investigation. >> the battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potentially severe and dangerous for our troops, our allies, and afghan partners. >> reporter: the documents reveal the names of afghans who provided intelligence to the u.s.; their lives are now in danger. and their exposure will send a chill through anyone else thinking of helping >> will people whose lives are on the line trust us to keep their identity secret? >> reporter: the documents also provide a road map to the american military's tactics. this, for instance, is a moment- by-moment log of what u.s. troops did after specialist bowe bergdahl was captured by the taliban. and the damage could get worse. >> it could be a substantial, additional number of documents and we have no idea what their content is, either. >> reporter: assange is still free to hold press conferences, but bradley manning, the 22- year-o

. >> reporter: the founder, julian assange said u.s. involvement is illegal. the leaks detail how pakistani intelligence allegedly helped the taliban and how the anti-american jihad was allegedly still being advised recently by former isi commander general gould. u.s. forces doubting they can win. separately, a claim that a nato rocket killed 52 civilians. all threatening support for president obama's plan to escalate the wa ar. >> there's minimal support from the american people for a long campaign. >> all of that information out in a public way has the potential to do harm. >> reporter: secrecy, tough to protect in modern warfare. i'm steve handelsman, nbc news, washington. >> the main leaker is believed be to be a 22-year-old army intelligence officer from maryland. >> just ahead, imagine riding through the drive-through in this. we'll show you who's behind this whacky invention. >>> up all night in oakland. we'll take you to the coliseum where you can join hollywood a-listers shooting a move about the a's. >> and police think they have a the people who kil

wikileaks founder, 39-year-old australian julian assange, acknowledges that he has an agenda. >> we hopeelease of this material will result in significant reforms in u.s. and allied policy in afghanistan. >> reporter: traditional media outlets don't talk that way. but then wikileaks is completely unlike traditional media. for instance, newspapers often consult governments before publishing potentially damaging secrets. >> i think it requires a lot of judgment on the part of people who are gatekeepers. >> reporter: wikileaks released its afghan war diary with no consultations. and there's another key distinction. back in 1971 when the nixon administration tried to stop the "new york times" from publishing the pentagon papers, classified history of vietnam, the public had the paper's history and reputation as a measuring bar. wikileaks is anonymous. >> we're moving towards a society in which no secrets are safe. even though there is a need for some secrets. and to some extent, we're just going to have to get used to that. >> reporter: the press used to describe itself as a gatekeeper decid

television journalism this i think it's one of the lessons for us journalists and we can leak founder julian assange says he believes there is evidence of war crimes in the documents released on his website r.t. washington produce a far off before she says he regards exposing human rights abuses as part of his mission. many governments would be really frustrated when there is an organization that can't be traced to any one country that publishes information that governments don't want seen and of course this is part of julian's mission that's you know his entire quest in life is to eliminate bad governance and hold corporations and governments accountable for violations of human rights and other so-called human rights abuses he essentially runs this entire website from his backpack he's always on the move when we had him here in our studios a few months ago when the collateral murder video came out he went straight into the green room and started doing all of the work on you know we can weeks and it didn't didn't waste any time with that and so the web site and this entire new i guess a rino of jour

wikileaks founder julian assange could soon find himself at the heart of a criminal investigation. >> the battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potentially severe and dangerous. >> reporter: defense secretary robert gates hasn't ruled out asang could be a target after his website posted more than 70,000 secret papers. gates has asked the director of the fbi to join the investigation. the army is also trying to track down whoever downloaded the afghanistan war documents. officials are looking closely at private bradley manning, who's been charged with leaking other materials to wikileaks. the 2 2-year-old is being proved from a prison in kuwait to a brig at quantico. he says he didn't put anyone in danger by leaking the document. top military officials say that's not the case. >> they might already have on their hands the blood of a young soldier or that of an afghan family. >> reporter: along with exposing military tactics, they show the names of afghan informants. their lives are in danger. >> will people whose lives are on the line trust us to keep their ide

the secret documents were released by the whistleblower website wikileaks and its founder, julian assange. >> the real story of this material is that it's war. it's one damn thing after another. it is the continuous small events, the continuous deaths of children, insurgents. >> reporter: many of the documents tear the cover off pakistan's alleged secret support for the taliban. the u.s. has long complained to pakistan that its intelligence service, the isi, was working with the taliban, but today's release provides shocking and specific new details. even as pakistan accepted billions in u.s. aid, the documents suggest isi officials conspired with taliban leaders to plan attacks against american forces in afghanistan. former isi chief hamid gul was reportedly deeply involved in the taliban operation. in an nbc interview today, he fired back. >> i deny it vehemently, outrightly. it is fictitious and fabricated. >> reporter: at the white house today, press secretary robert gibbs called the allegations old news, and insisted pakistan has stepped up its efforts to eliminate safe havens and dr

say more than ninety thousand documents is something quite extraordinary what happened was that julian assange the founder of wiki leaks released this information ahead of time to three nice papers one here in london the guardian one in germany and also to the new york times they then looked at that information and assessed what they wanted to write about and whether the information was genuine and he then held a media conference. and talked about it and one of the things that he said was he was pressed by journalists on war crimes whether he thought there was evidence of war crimes hair and eventually he said that he felt that it was for a cool it's of course to decide what constitutes a war crime and whether this did but he's looking at the documents that he has seen felt that there was evidence of war crimes having been committed during this war some of these documents are about civilian deaths going on reported. to pick out one that says that he. was difficult to do that he said it's the continuing. war that we don't necessarily know about when you read about him in these places that only

the head of wikileaks, 39-year-old australian julian assange, who has been outspoken against the war, told "the today show" he blamed the military. >> every week, another 100 or so people are killed in afghanistan and that number is increasing. so, we shouldn't let these rumors about whether there are additional names in there or not, which may be serious or may not be, eclipse the bigger problem. >> amateurs like wikileaks either don't care or don't know how to protect sources and how to protect lives. >> reporter: the pentagon is going through all of the documents, as well, and local commanders will certainly try to do what they can to help those afghans who are at risk. but diane, because of the massive amount of reports, there's no guarantee they can get to the people in time. >> get to them and to their families to get them to safety. thank you, martha. >>> and now, a milestone in the oil spill in the gulf. it is now 100 days. 100 days filled with images we'll never forget. the loss of life on the burning rig. those first pictures of helpless birds. the dead turtles in the sand.

spoke to two experts currently in ghana stein from the global aids hiv vaccine enterprise and julian assange a doctor who questions the official h.i.v. aids seery. and nobody could give me the paper. in the way scientists. are asking for it since the seventy seven to use the other thing it is doesn't exist any. shows if the existing how you do it and especially the situation use the full of different. western countries so-called western countries and the so-called development cost in countries in africa so our services americas' and so on. so it is it doesn't fit in the norm of virus disease because viruses. can make very few things they are not so intelligent to do so many things it doesn't fit in a viral cause ok let's thompson is the best what's your reaction to that yeah. well a couple of points the first one to raise the bar has never been isolated well that's simply not true. it's been molecularly cloned using d.n.a. cloning technologies it's been sequenced literally thousands of times from different individuals infected with the virus. simply isn't true to say it's never been isolated

julian assange has the whole world buzzing over the leaked secret documents about the war in afghanistan posted on his website, wikileaks. today president obama said he's concerned that leaked battlefield information could jeopardize troops or operations. but he said the disclosures don't change the war strategy. >> the fact is, these documents don't reveal any issues that haven't already informed our public debate on afghanistan. >> reporter: and strong reaction from admiral mike mullen in baghdad today. >> i really am appalled by the leak, condemn the leak, and i believe that there's potential there to put american lives at risk. >> reporter: i asked assange about that. does that concern you at all? >> well, whenever we release material exposing embarrassing actions or abuses of crimes by an organization, there's always an attempt to underplay it or distract from the message. though we believe in fact that the strength of this material is that it's from people on the ground. >> reporter: assange is clearly an advocate and opponent of the war. wikileaks' mission publishing secrets. from

it's a shame to say the rest of that interview with we could leaks founder julian assange right hereon our city. over seventy people have been detained and later released after trying to hold a bond rally in central moscow the rally in moscow have been found as a motor sport display had already been approved for the site of triumph fire in a square which is set protesters have been given the option of four other locations around three hundred reporters weren't home to cover the event more than the estimated two hundred demonstrators opposition groups have sought to rally at the square on the last day of each month with just one a day symbolically in reference to the russian constitution's thirty first article which guarantees the right to peace was soundly also at an opposition rally i think peter spoke of all the protests in ten different regions past without incident. and here is a snapshot of other stories making headlines right now around the world the death toll from the worst floods in pakistan for a decade has reached eight hundred the united nations says of one million people

his head but spoke to expose currently again alan burstein from the global vaccine and rise and julian assange doctor who questions the official hiv aids. and nobody could give me the paper. he is isolated in the way scientists. are asking for it since the seventy years since the seventy's the other thing is that there exist doesn't exist any paper that shows if a chevy is existing how it is doing a special situation to use their data is a fully different thing as in the western countries so-called western countries and the so-called developing cost in countries in africa. south america and so on so it is it doesn't fit in a normal virus disease because viruses only can make a very few things they are not so intelligent to do so many things it doesn't fit in a viral cause ok let's see mr best in that what's your reaction to the. well a couple of points the first point to win races has never been isolated well that's simply not true the virus has been isolated it's been molecularly cloned using d.n.a. cloning technologies it's been sequenced literally thousands of times from different individua

so stay tuned to see the rest of that interview with we could leaks founder julian assange right hereon aussie. over seventy people have been detained and later released after trying to hold a banned opposition rally in central moscow the don't stray show law school had been banned as a virtual school display had already been approved for the size at trim find their square their sources said protesters have been given the opinion the option of four other locations around the three hundred filters were the event more than the estimated two hundred demonstrators opposition groups had sought to rally at the square on the last day of each month with that five day such a wild days i should say the days of seeing balik reference to the russian constitution as the sense of first article going to being the right to peaceful assembly also rests at an opposition demonstration in st petersburg all the other person protests in ten different regions past without incident. right now is a snapshot but other stories making headlines right now around the world the toll from the worst floods in pakista

and i stay with us to see the rest of that interview with we can leaks founder julian assange right here on r.t. well time now to have a quick look at other stories making headlines around the world at this stage of the day the death toll from the worst floods in pakistan decades has reached eight hundred million people are being affected by the waters triggered by monsoon rains with some one hundred thousand stranded in remote villages daily to roads and bridges and hampered rescue efforts a state of emergency has been. expected to continue throughout the weekend. hundreds of protesters an indian administered kashmir killing two and injuring five demonstrators tried to set police camps on fire and threw stones at officers for other activists were shot dead during protests against indian rule on friday over the last six weeks twenty three being killed by government forces muslim separatists in kashmir or been fighting for an independent state or to merge with pakistan for more than twenty years now. but of course has rocked southeastern iran a day after another quake in the country's nor

this specific dossier it's not clear where this came from and julian assange discuss where these nineteen thousand documents came from but we can assume that that comes from some sort of inside source mainly because in april there was a similar video which do not sons of wiki leaks on his website which shows apache helicopters essentially gunning down to reuters cameramen on the streets of baghdad now someone has been arrested and charged with that and he was. only twenty two years old a military analyst he was working in iraq he's been charged with that but he hasn't it's not been suggested to me has any connection with bin is going to six weeks because we're not the only ones who want to know where these things come from the pentagon is of course very concerned to know what has happened here and in fact requested to meet with enough staff outside who knew absolutely who can talk to know about it he so far hasn't wanted to meet with them. and it right there to some in afghanistan the revelations themselves don't come as much of a surprise but as afghan m.p. delta saw tons or told us what

katchadourian of the new yorker about his recent profile of the wikileaks organization and its founder, julian assange. plus patchwork nation looks at what economic troubles in the suburbs may mean for democrats' prospects in the midterm election. all that and more is on our web site, newshour.pbs.org. gwen? >> ifill: and that's the "newshour" for tonight. on thursday, we'll turn our attention to the economy and whether government stimulus efforts are working. i'm gwen ifill. >> lehrer: and i'm jim lehrer. we'll see you on-line and again here tomorrow evening. thank you and good night. major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

. >>> reporter: wikileaks founder julian assange could soon find himself at the heart of a criminal investigation. >> the battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potentially severe and dangerous. >> reporter: the defense secretary robert gates hasn't ruled out that assange could be a target after he posted 70,000 military records. gates has asked the director of the fbi to join the investigation against assange. the army is also trying to track down whoever downloaded the afghanistan war documents. officials are looking closely at private bradley manning, who has already been charged with leaking other materials to wikileaks. the 22-year-old is being moved from a prison in kuwait to the brig at quantico, virginia while the investigation continues. assange and his source say they doesn't put anyone in danger. top military officials say that's not the case. >> the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or of that an afghan family. >> reporter: along exposing military tactics, the documents reveal the names of afghan informants. officia

chairman of the joint chiefs of staff bluntly assessed the harm he thinks wikileaks and its founder julian assangeave caused. >> mr. assange can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing, but the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an afghan family. >> reporter: pentagon leaders have ordered new security measures to safeguard information. as for safeguarding the troops, a u.s. military task force has so far spent billions of dollars to counter the continuing threat of roadside bombs. >> suarez: for more on the i.e.d. challenges facing american troops in afghanistan, we get the views of two veterans who have extensive experience dealing with them. todd bowers is a staff sergeant in the marine corps reserves. he served two tours in iraq and one in afghanistan last year. he's the deputy executive director of iraq and afghanistan veterans of america. and retired army colonel peter mansoor was a brigade commander in iraq and wrote a book about his experience, "baghdad at sunrise." he served as executive offi

julian assange is the founder of wikileaks. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> since releasing the leaked reports you said, "our primary concern with people being potentially harmed had to do with afghan informants and that is why we held back some 15,000 reports for a detailed review." this morning the london times said they have found the names of dozens of afghans credited with providing detailed information to u.s. intelligence. what is your reaction to that? >> we're still reviewing that report by the times to see if it's credible. we spent quite a bit of effort on pulling out 15 threat reports that may have mentioned that for a detailed review. they will not be published until they are reviewed. this report by the times, i really can't comment on it too much. i have seen the allegation. we take these things seriously and we are reviewing it. >> is the 90,000-plus documents, only 2,000 have been reviewed by you in depth. how do you know what you put out there? >> well, the reports themselves have particular classific

we also impressed upon the source, julian assange, the importance of doing the same and mr. assange said he was withholding 15,000 documents to go through the same type of redaction. >> your report reaches a stark conclusion and you said "this ground level picture of afghanistan afghanistan is in many respects more grim than the official portrayal." >> that's right. what this does, it gets right down to the soldier level in many ways. these are raw intelligence reports being filed by commanders on the ground. intelligence analysts, as events are breaking, whether they be firefights, drone attacks, secret operations, what it does, it portrays a detailed picture of the events going on on the ground. as you referred to in particular, the incidents involves the pakistani spy service, the isi, reinforcing many suspicions that american policymakers and intelligence analysts have held for several years. >> one of the points the white house made in their release last night is that this is not new information. it covers 2004 to 2009, that many of these problems were addressed after t

so when we sat down in london with wikileaks' founder julian assange and asked what drives him, his answerin its own right a just cause? >> depends on the bastards. real bastards are people who have power and abuse their power to afflict people who are weaker than they are. >> reporter: the "bastards" are the architects of the war in afghanistan. wikileaks released 92,000 classified military reports spanning six years, exposing afghan government corruption. pakistani support for the taliban. and most alarmingly, what assange says is evidence of possible war crimes by u.s. soldiers. >> it's pretty clear that at least some of these are war crimes. >> what do you say to those who say military leaders, government leaders, that you've just handed the taliban their biggest propaganda victory? >> well, not so. people who commit war crimes or similarly abusive actions, they hand the enemy propaganda victories. >> reporter: the documents caused a storm in washington. to opponents of the war, further cause for withdrawal. to the white house, outright dangerous. >> it, besides being against the law,

guest: well, "the new york times" is an entirely separate entity from wikileaks and julian assange. we published the documents separately from wikileaks because we thought they gave valuable context, texture, and the real, ground-level view. and how american soldiers see the war valley by valley in afghanistan. it gives you an up close view, things that goitty on. it is hard to capture, even as reporter on the ground. there is no substitution for seeing what goes on inside the battlefield come inside the government, the places which provide the information for the decision makers. host: are there a lot of reporters and they pakistan who are imbedded? you talked about getting to that detail and how difficult it is. is there a lack of imbedded reporters? guest: pakistan is an entirely different situation to afghanistan. there are no american troops in pakistan -- well, a few that do some trimming. we do sometimes go out with the pakistani army, and the military has been generous in giving us access, but always -- generally, after the fact, and after one or two-day trips, to see pakist

but we just heard from julian assange, the founder, and they decided to give that information to three news out looked -- outlets including "the new york times" in the u.s. but is look at that "the new york times" conversation on how they decided to publish. as a bourse are used by best officers in the pentagon and troops on the field when the make operational plans of repair briefings -- jumping down, talk about the source material, 92,000 documents -- let's start getting your reaction. the first caller is from new york, new york. good morning, jack. caller: thank you for c-span. president eisenhower had a century ago warned us about the military industrial complex. i think we need to return to his wise words and learn from them continuously. 9/11 was the perfect excuse. president bush completely overreacted. to a ragtag group -- small group of bedouin to learn how to fly planes and brought us into the war in afghanistan and iraq which i believe it's good to turn out to be the greatest blunder in u.s. history. president obama needs to be a stand-up guy and stand up president and get u