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EthZee Since: Oct, 2010
#126: Nov 30th 2010 at 5:24:33 PM

So... what does that mean for the people who have downloaded the information from Wikileaks? For the researchers and journalists who read it and put it in the news?

DasAuto Sapere Aude from Eastphalia Since: Jul, 2009
Sapere Aude
#127: Nov 30th 2010 at 5:25:44 PM

Well, the Wikileaks guys and thier servers are not in America, so US law doesn't apply to them.

The guy who stole the information? Not such luck. cool

Now if you excuse me, Starfleet is about to award the Christopher Pike Medal to my dick.SF Debris
Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#128: Nov 30th 2010 at 6:04:23 PM

It's in possession of information it is not legally entitled to.

You said «stealing and releasing». The first verb is inaccurate.

I think that it's unambiguous that whoever leaked the documents is boned. Not so sure about Wikileaks. This reminds me of the Pentagon Papers and the New York Times back in the day.

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
silver2195 Since: Jan, 2001
#129: Nov 30th 2010 at 6:20:50 PM

I suppose this particular release might be legal under the Pentagon Papers defense that there's no actual probable national security issue, although I think some other Wikileaks leaks are less defensible in that regard.

Currently taking a break from the site. See my user page for more information.
JackMackerel from SOME OBSCURE MEDIA Since: Jul, 2010
#130: Nov 30th 2010 at 6:41:36 PM

^ Then all the more reason to call him a terrorist.

hahaha

oh wow

First off: He's Australian, second off, he doesn't actively steal them, he receives leaked documents and posts them on the interwebs.

Half-Life: Dual Nature, a crossover story of reasonably sized proportions.
Thorn14 Gunpla is amazing! Since: Aug, 2010
Gunpla is amazing!
#131: Nov 30th 2010 at 6:59:51 PM

He did not steal the information, he published information he was given by someone else which is legal in Sweden make asking for extradition impossible.

Unless the US wants to start a diplomatic incident with the European Union.

Tell me when he blows up a group of people, then I'll call him a "Terrorist"

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#132: Nov 30th 2010 at 7:03:36 PM

You could just say that they're not terrorists because it's not their intent to induce terror.

edited 30th Nov '10 7:03:46 PM by Tzetze

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
pvtnum11 OMG NO NOSECONES from Kerbin low orbit Since: Nov, 2009 Relationship Status: We finish each other's sandwiches
OMG NO NOSECONES
#133: Nov 30th 2010 at 7:24:56 PM

^ Point. Obnoxious and highly irritating to politicians and security consultants and whoever else is affected by this? Yes. Terrorist? No.

Happiness is zero-gee with a sinus cold.
Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#134: Nov 30th 2010 at 9:28:32 PM

It's about the same as catching a fence with a bunch of hot merchandise.

JackMackerel from SOME OBSCURE MEDIA Since: Jul, 2010
#135: Nov 30th 2010 at 9:29:00 PM

Security threat? Maybe, but like everyone said, he's not a terrorist unless he's actively attempting to murder civilians.

Half-Life: Dual Nature, a crossover story of reasonably sized proportions.
Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#136: Nov 30th 2010 at 9:31:34 PM

It's about the same as catching a fence with a bunch of hot merchandise.

Information isn't legally treated the same way as physical objects. If it was, anybody who had read the documents would be a criminal, since they in a real sense have the information.

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
JackMackerel from SOME OBSCURE MEDIA Since: Jul, 2010
Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#138: Nov 30th 2010 at 9:44:14 PM

If it were me I would say that it isn't illegal until he actually starts endangering national assets, meaning if he was leaking informants, undercover agents, information sources, and other sensitive information by name. Until he starts doing that all I can do is just think that what he is doing is rather slimy, but not necessarily illegal.

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#139: Nov 30th 2010 at 9:46:24 PM

Well, if you have privileged access to some information and you're not allowed to tell anyone, that's obviously prosecutable. I think that it's a bit more ambiguous if it's a divulging sources thing like that, but it's the same basic principle.

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#140: Nov 30th 2010 at 9:58:18 PM

Yeah, and I think that's where the contention is here.. If you can't find and punish the person who leaked it, what do you do to set a precedent and stop the problem if you can't punish the publisher?

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#141: Nov 30th 2010 at 10:00:44 PM

If you can't find and punish the person who leaked it

That's a pretty big assumption, I mean, they found the other guy. And you improve security.

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
JosefBugman Since: Nov, 2009
#142: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:12:49 AM

So the guy in charge of wikileaks is being blamed for essentially "handeling stolen goods". I think this is really going too far, I could understand being much more upset over the troop numbers in Iraq but this? This is gossip for petes sake, get a sense of proportion.

Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#143: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:16:48 AM

It isn't what it is Josef, it's the fact that regardless of how benign the information is, it's classified. That's what I'm trying to explain to all of you...

When something is considered Secret or Top Secret, it doesn't matter if said information is Obamas favorite brand of basketball shoes, or the deployment information of several middle eastern bases, it's got the damn clearance on it, and leaking anything that has a clearance on it is a big fucking deal to people in the government.

It's sort of a principle thing, if someone is willing to leak Top Secret information that just happens to be harmless, that means they have access to and the moral capability to leak Top Secret information that is vital and not so harmless. The action of leaking classified documents is the problem here, not that any real damage was done by the leak in the first place.

JosefBugman Since: Nov, 2009
#144: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:20:17 AM

But these documents are harmless though, and what you are preposing is (essentially) a slippery slope fallacy. Because if people will give out embarrasingly open diplomatic secrets they are CERTAINLY going to give away state secrets on a far larger scale.

Barkey Since: Feb, 2010 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#145: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:23:15 AM

You need to understand Josef, they will turn you down for a security clearance for things such as a slightly bad credit score, yes, they are that paranoid about it. Sometimes for good reasons. If you'll leak harmless things, then yeah, they are going to rip your clearance at a minimum, and put you in jail at most. Because to them, even the slightest risk of a person willing to leak the important stuff isn't worth taking said risk.

It's a principle. A clearance is a sign of trust. If you have a clearance you have consented to never divulge that information. Ever. Regardless of what it is, until it is declassified. EVER.

I don't know what's so hard to understand about that.. It's like signing a waiver for a job saying you won't do drugs, and then getting popped for weed and saying "Well it's not like it was heroine..."

FFShinra Since: Jan, 2001
#146: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:25:45 AM

It is gossip, yes, but (depending on the particular cables) they have the potential to at the very least make diplomacy more difficult and at most could divulge information that remained secret for a reason.

For example of the latter, the revelation that the Chief Minister of the Punjab (a province in Pakistan and that country's heartland), who is also the brother of opposition leader Nawaz Sharif, gave Jamaat ud Dawa (an Islamic charity that is allegedly a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group that attacked Mumbai) a headsup that the UN was going to freeze their assets, giving the group time to empty out their accounts.

An example of the former would be all the US State Department's view about the coup in Honduras last year, which they publically treated with about as much neutrality as the US is capable of being without ignoring it entirely while privately, they didn't support the coup.

So it depends....

Michael So that's what this does Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: Drift compatible
So that's what this does
#147: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:27:25 AM

It seems to me the only people with a problem here are a bunch of politicians and diplomats who have been caught with their pants down. I'm surprised so many people are so angry that somebody dared expose their leaders for lying.

Karkadinn Karkadinn from New Orleans, Louisiana Since: Jul, 2009
Karkadinn
#148: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:33:43 AM

A periodic leak of 'sensitive' information, especially when it's classified as such without really being such, seems to me to be a healthy thing, in small, controlled doses. Reminds the people in power that there are consequences to not being completely honest.

Of course it's the government's job to prevent such leaks as much as possible, but this would be better addressed at the source of the problem than by issuing a manhunt for a foreign citizen. For example, the person on the inside who actually obtained and leaked this information is apparently motivated in large part by opposition to anti-homosexual stances in the military, specifically, DADT. It then follows that if DADT were removed, there would be one less thing for soldiers to be resentful for and therefore one less impulse for leaking present.

Furthermore, I think Guantanamo must be destroyed.
SomeSortOfTroper Since: Jan, 2001
#149: Dec 1st 2010 at 12:54:04 AM

So responding to a specific issue with a broad, untargeted action against unrelated innocent units performing their duties as expected?

But the bastards were lying! And by lying we mean that a huge amount of the cables seem to be people accurately transmitting stuff they had heard in a frank manner. Which we found out by someone lying!

TheStupidExclamationMark Orbs from In ur cupboard Since: Dec, 2009
Orbs
#150: Dec 1st 2010 at 1:13:33 AM

It's in possession of information it is not legally entitled to.

So is the US government (it's called spying). Likewise a lot of businesses and a lot of individuals...

As for the international warrant for Assange, this is starting to get ridiculous: First the charges are dropped (twice), then he gets sought after anyway, then it appears he actually offered to talk to Swedish justice (with his lawyer present) and those offers were ignored, and now there's an international search warrant for rape allegations (it's not even proven the women were actually raped) of *two* adult people (rather unlike the usual mass-abuse such warrants imply). What's next, shoot-to-kill-on-sight policy? He is revealed as being gay? The two women 'suddenly' turn out to be 13 and now he's wanted for pedophilia?

Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if there were safe-guards in place on Wikileaks that would cause all of the leaked data to be released at once if he were arrested...and that would be hilarious.

"That said, as I've mentioned before, apart from the helmet, he's not exactly bad looking, if a bit...blood-drenched." - juancarlos

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