Wikileaks To Publish Remaining Afghan Documents

Albanach writes "WikiLeaks spokesman Julian Assange has been quoted by the Associated Press as stating 'the organization is preparing to release the remaining secret Afghan war documents.' According to Assange, they are halfway through processing the remaining 15,000 files as they 'comb through' the files to ensure lives are not placed at risk."

Related news: Reporters w/o Borders join criticism

[e065c8515d206cb0e190]

Open letter from RWB secretary general to Wikileaks founder [rsf.org]
At least it seems Julian Assange heard previous criticism.

Re:Related news: Reporters w/o Borders join critic

[Anonymous Coward]

this has been covered elsewhere, and it's basically crap.

a: the information was already out there and b: the gov't was supposed to release it via FOIA but has never done so. We're talking a 3+ year old FOIA request. Oh and c: that particular article has been covered before.

This is just straight up bullshit criticism because guess what? Assange is doing a better job than other news reporters because he's, you know, actually reporting news!

Re:Wikileaks isn't balanced in it's coverage

[jgtg32a]

While I do agree with what you are saying Wikileaks doesn't do anything, they just sit around waiting for the phone to ring. So they can't leak what they aren't told.

>I'd love to see what happened if they leaked 15,000 documents on Israeli operations in the West Bank or posted data on Israeli positions in the Golan.
He would be dead.

Re:Related news: Reporters w/o Borders join critic

[FriendlyLurker]

Reporters w/o Borders is a blatant propaganda front for the US Government. Proof & References: "Reporters Without Borders Unmasked" [counterpunch.org]

"Reporters Without Borders seems to have a geopolitical agenda" [onlinejournal.com]

"Source Watch: Reporters Without Borders" [sourcewatch.org]

Reporters w/o Borders are also trying to trap potential leakers and activist bloggers in their thin veil: https://encrypted.google.com/search?num=100&q=Reporters+Without+Borders+shelter [google.com]

Re:Good.

[mcgrew]

I support ONE war and no occupation. Our sole mission in Afghanistan should have been to remove the Taliban, period. We should have gone in, kicked ass, and left it in shambles. BTW, we still haven't found Bin Laden. Getting him should have been job #1.

We had no business whatever invading Iraq. The first gulf war, yes, but not the second.

Re:Sounds like a job for...

[HungryHobo]

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Category:Israel [wikileaks.org]
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Category:Russia [wikileaks.org]

There's far less there than the hundreds of entries for the UK or the thousands for the US but wikileaks leaks whatever it gets and if more US citizens are interested in that kind of activism then more US material will end up on there.

Re:save lives by exposing military tactics....

[ClioCJS]

You seem to be as one-dimensional in your thinking as the people that started this war. And then you put words in my mouth -- a hilarious attack strategy also usually only used by idiot conversations. You're a funny man. It's quite easy to google what ClintJCL (me) thinks about the war:

http://delicious.com/clintjcl/warinafghanistan [delicious.com] - The collection of links about the war, all of which are also integrated into my blog [but easier to read them on delicious].

You shouldn't make accusations against people (me) when those people can easily prove your accusations wrong. It just makes you look like a silly ideologue. Not everything is black and white.

Re:Related news: Reporters w/o Borders join critic

[Anonymous Coward]

You really do have an axe to grind with Wikileaks, huh? Since you have such a unique user name, I Googled it to see what it was a reference to. Didn't find any answer to that question, however I did find that someone with this username has posted the same message (not this one) over a hundred times to different websites. Which branch did you say you worked for again?

Re:Who has died from the release of the documents?

[Nadaka]

Last I heard there are 3 confirmed informant names, 1 dead beforehand, one was a double agent for the taliban and the status of the last one is unknown.

Re:My favorite feature of this round of Wikileaks.

[Anonymous Coward]

The archive is a 75MB 7-zip file, which uncompresses to 3.5GB of HTML.

$ grep -irl khalifa *
event/2007/05/AFG20070503n733.html

Just one hit for the word Khalifa, and it doesn't refer to Khalifa Abdullah. Whether or not he was an informant, he's not named in the original leak.

Re: save lives by exposing military tactics....

[cmdahler]

You're talking about two totally different things. An overall truthful reporting of general events in a war theater is fine and necessary. Revealing operational strategies and troop movements, etc., is what espionage is all about. Two completely different sorts of information. One is necessary for everyone to know, the other is absolutely necessary to keep secret so your fucking troops don't get killed every time they head out to engage the enemy. Are you seriously arguing that revealing operational plans and strategies for your enemy to read is necessary? Believe me, I want YOU running the opposing side in our next conflict, you'll make things so easy for everyone on our side by telling us what you're going to do and how you're going to go about it, the war will be over in about 2 hours. Get your head out of your ass and figure out what you're talking about before spewing nonsense like this.

Re: save lives by exposing military tactics....

[jbssm]

Do you actually know how many names where published in the previous part of the leaks of informants? You don't probably so I'll tell you. 3, only 3 names where present. 1 was already dead, 1 was a double agent for the Taliban. The 3rd I couldn't find info.

Re:Only 3 leaked informant names

[jbssm]

Here: http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread598661/pg1 [abovetopsecret.com]

Mind you, this is the ONLY thing you can read, that actually HAS any numbers. Just check all the propaganda around and you see it's just "maybe putting in danger, countless lives", etc. None of those US newspapers, none, mentions any numbers. Says a lot about how uninformed or tendentious are the journalists writing those articles.

Re:Mr Assange: Remove the grid-squares!!!

[ArbitraryDescriptor]

Secret classification is one step up from Sensitive (SSNs, addresses, phone numbers, etc...) and it isn't very well controlled.

False. "Sensitive" but Unclassified -> Confidential -> Secret -> TS/SCI

Secret can get people killed. That it clearance is handed out to degenerates is a failure of the investigators, not evidence that Secret material is harmless.

Re: save lives by exposing military tactics....

[dan828]

Actually, what whistle is being blown here? So far as I can tell, this is only the release of day to day operations material, and not something detailing corruption or war crimes. As such, this whole affair appears to be nothing more than to provide intelligence information to the enemies of the US and nothing more, and really, pretending that lives are not at risk from a massive leak of day to day tactical and operational information is disingenuous on your part.

Re:Are these leaked by the CIA as well?

[arcade]

Bullshit.

The following reportkey's contains the word heroin:

085EBDBE-44AC-4B69-BD68-6ACBDC7F303A, 0997BB03-05DE-4333-8DB8-B6B294860BB3, 0AFD9624-5385-40D1-820E-3BCC5875D3CE, 0C5270C0-C878-4C5F-971F-F545F99EFC3B, 0DB7339A-3CD5-4F23-AD93-D39D1D3E85C3, 14624345-66AC-4CBA-9CC6-B1B7816871E4, 1A431C27-D0B7-41A4-9BD7-44B88F255A3C, 21C96EE0-5BB2-4211-9D7F-852D562B291D, 2336679A-4474-495C-94D7-DDFB9D9E5CA4, 24140060-568D-48C3-81F5-FF2906F0B860, 3098F34F-35B3-48C1-B524-AE2DA2514615, 31882ED5-30C1-42FD-A288-B7CAC732C163, 326C1B4A-9AC6-4F57-BA60-1445BD027026, 34DB98F3-B46F-B212-83C82C12876D9863, 3CE2AF7C-03F0-414D-8EF6-E70D764481EB, 3FBC5755-4FD7-4A91-8557-DAD751D825DD, 4033C459-CCA5-47E8-A22C-A18093BC34E7, 42AB48EE-66FA-4043-AD73-CBFFA549A49F, 46BBCF13-497F-4224-A231-447E6CFC6A28, 48858DFD-1517-911C-C59320A73C1C6937, 51927BA3-E615-4C08-B874-BD2D49A88DED, 51B02B2B-5A6E-4E61-94E0-794DDF4C5646, 5405FE5B-4232-4CA5-8F6A-F21049C9F977, 5729CD0D-9EEB-4C3C-A496-95877F875931, 589217D7-B503-4E09-83F1-0ABC99A08467, 5D2677CE-AAAB-4CE3-A684-6A78A765EBCB, 6C2606D3-BAC7-3EC8-798B20AF02664547, 6DF7BFAD-EE20-B1FF-24757F9988F7D373, 6F87D3E0-3645-423F-B994-579D2A8A573F, 702F9D37-B6D5-4B7B-91A5-33951B30F740, 70DDA1D3-5BA4-495D-B2C1-30132C420685, 71427053-7A36-45CF-A498-471CC27B95D7, 74B99BD5-BE65-44A6-A720-5883D33727B1, 75A5AA60-5642-41EE-83A5-45FF8433A6E9, 76337C58-D161-41CA-AE71-77D85EC97558, 76736C89-7A4A-46C5-BD7F-D28DEB6DEB1B, 792B369A-C4D9-2355-AC0699D271B2FD94, 7FEA5C37-40E9-4202-8350-C97CF6B40B90, 8075A67D-1372-51C0-591BEE82266E07B9, 8625FBFB-C642-427D-A855-0935041CBE3D, 8B920769-FFCD-484E-9818-C8D1715BAD73, 8EDE456A-362B-4DF7-9B9B-9CF0ABC23130, 9266D46E-6525-49C0-9B69-E1CEB9A69DC3, 97323DFC-1FF1-4784-8A50-C53348C71FB9, 9945A843-E57C-4E3D-B3E8-62B6EB2B9318, 999B68F7-B657-446E-BC51-FA7FA2E1EEAA, 9B247A03-A5AE-47E4-A568-71C3628FDEF9, 9B7E6C2D-1771-439D-82C9-A5D296F958DA, 9B8D4B0D-1E02-4970-8F3D-84DB7F426545, 9E9E9507-1A17-4AEF-936A-07438853C297, A40C160B-EC6E-4563-ABB6-B8136018EEE5, A99F8EAF-CD9E-B8D2-D24DF88D6A4C9EF5, AC83AE62-601D-44B0-9535-8FBFA7EAD0FD, AE6D9D2D-7E52-4F36-A232-3BA2FA5B88C0, B1500EC2-E483-763E-1A72D2DF14DE81CB, B34A1BE3-90C4-43FF-AB75-62475184DB1F, B5DC87C3-1517-911C-C56308A5AD2C767C, B80B8196-B888-41AB-85A4-75C6AD7A7001, B85C601E-79C0-4430-B954-77A210EC721F, B9134F77-1517-911C-C562F137BB3E10E1, C31B23A4-D4E0-48B6-BF30-5E50AAB2CF10, C345A82E-1517-911C-C59797C1BB54A97A, C648889D-BE5E-48F1-84A9-0C3B557B9F24, C9C01DCD-1517-911C-C57FC586810B99CF, caa1782f-dc32-4e84-b9d4-bc6163e4ad20, D01E2BF3-E7E6-4545-BCA8-2CF27A006F8E, D2020275-79E3-4AF4-946A-27B2F75DE1FC, D4B458B2-152C-42FA-9DBB-1D7FBB30425F, D597E896-1517-911C-C53366FE3FB7EE3C, D9AD9F7C-2AEB-450E-AC36-E75257F15874, DE070376-A771-475D-A633-BDDFE9009CBC, E04DEA22-F9F5-43BC-82D5-742BD76E1415, E58A95AF-1915-4180-8902-2D08E138834C, ECFAED10-732F-436D-BFAA-D9D4FD764857, F830B447-65BE-4599-9FB6-EBCB2C883A1F

The following contain the word poppies:

08B03CBC-A0B8-4B22-9BEC-09BB589C88E1, 12FEE382-DB4B-4A4E-8F6B-160953DEB718, 26541EEF-10CC-4D13-9518-D0B457F9FDF1, 3102DA76-C26A-452A-BB0E-DDE91428862D, 3C74BA46-0DC9-4694-AFA5-76C9B21A8545, 401F94A4-B92E-43F1-8A2C-3217C569EA30, 40BCCFF1-C3D1-4297-96E6-B4BB0010749F, 41FC44F0-AF88-4B7C-84DE-FF35FA218FF6, 5707EF6F-9839-441C-A4DC-E9CDE7862D56, 598AD256-5C10-43CF-9DE5-541A2FBBC25C, 606F0E2D-1372-51C0-595A814CDB4F748C, 61095407-2D82-4D89-88E9-DC489E6A8B36, 65BAB1D8-0D82-411D-B7B6-2C73B1AAF9C1, 686BE7C8-2C9E-4295-BC67-61FEC5F41E21, 6FA1B83F-2224-4009-AF6B-909472D9D0A2, 87C0C51F-72FA-422A-889A-484220D1D332, 899F034A-189D-4C79-9F72-7D8E59B144FF, 8E19F68C-B5CA-47BB-A595-95C8CBD3F517, ABF96546-CA86-45DE-B07D-FCCC01617B5C, AE364C04-D80E-45A6-89CE-AF663A656E08, B0B7236C-224A-4D55-9000-23BC448A19DD, B1992001-1E35-426A-BE92-BD404E1D986C, B69BD780-9F95-435E-99BA-A869D5E509B6, B819BE35-0488-4EAD-AC28-47807151F013, BE3616F8-1372-51C0-591E95F957F6E2A4, C0A657DA-0464-4ED8-857E-5B5CDD392CFA, CEAD2F0A-1670-46EF-A5BE-1181FA321C4A, D635B163-F37F-40B3-9FD4-931DF9DCD958, E097A4EE-3DBB-4A68-9CA0-822A68F8BA44, EBB3BCFB-77A0-4795-9316-CD5C1A1

This is misinformation.

[Anonymous Coward]

The "only 3 names" canard is based on someone literally grepping the records for the word "informant" and then looking for names nearby. However, there are many more names in there, and if you actually READ the records, many of them name people passing information to US forces without them being called "informant" in the text.

If you think the Taliban are going to be using grep, think again, and please stop with this misinformation already.

Re:Only 3 leaked informant names

[Anonymous Coward]

The NYTimes, Newsweek, and a host of human rights groups seem to disagree.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/world/asia/29wikileaks.html?_r=3&pagewanted=all [nytimes.com]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/09/AR2010080903045.html [washingtonpost.com]
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703428604575419580947722558.html?mod=WSJ_hps_MIDDLESecondNews [wsj.com]
http://en.rsf.org/united-states-open-letter-to-wikileaks-founder-12-08-2010,38130.html [rsf.org]

It has stupid numbers derived from stupid process

[Anonymous Coward]

If you look at what the author did, you will see that he merely grepped for the word "informant" in the text. This is stupid, because there are many other records that name people who passed information to the US military who are NOT literally called "informants", but are referred to by their village, position, etc.

Grepping and pattern matching is no substitution for understanding natural text, as anyone who has done natural language processing would tell you.

Re:Only 3 leaked informant names

[dch24]

You'll want to do better than that. Your first linked article says:

dozens of Afghan informants, potential defectors and others who were cooperating with American and NATO troops.

Umm, it sounds exactly like what the GP said: "None of those US newspapers, none, mentions any numbers."

And no, "DOZENS!!!1!!!" is not mentioning a number.

Re:save lives by exposing military tactics....

[blair1q]

Iraq is an illegal war. Not by any international-law measure, but by American law. It was started by a rogue President who lied to the Congress to get the funding to wage it, and who had already transferred men, money, and material there from the legitimate Afghan conflict without their authority.

Re:Good.

[A beautiful mind]

And we said--'OK. Security Council, they're not letting us in.' Nothing. Day goes by--'Excuse me, gentlemen, we're parked out in front of the agriculture ministry. They're not letting us in. We want to do an inspection.' Silence. Nothing.

This quote that you've copied is from an 1999 Frontline documentary [imdb.com], discussing events that happened in 1998 or before. You have to remember that a lot of things happened between the failure of the 1998 inspections and 2003. Operation Desert Fox [wikipedia.org] was one such measure. The guy who said it is Scott Ritter [wikipedia.org], who back in 2002 also stated:

There's no doubt Iraq hasn't fully complied with its disarmament obligations as set forth by the Security Council in its resolution. But on the other hand, since 1998 Iraq has been fundamentally disarmed: 90-95% of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capacity has been verifiably eliminated... We have to remember that this missing 5-10% doesn't necessarily constitute a threat... It constitutes bits and pieces of a weapons program which in its totality doesn't amount to much, but which is still prohibited... We can't give Iraq a clean bill of health, therefore we can't close the book on their weapons of mass destruction. But simultaneously, we can't reasonably talk about Iraqi non-compliance as representing a de-facto retention of a prohibited capacity worthy of war.

There is no doubt that no significant WMD capacity existed in Iraq, we know this for a fact for two reasons: 1. The US military wouldn't have went in if anything like that would have existed. 2. Noone found any WMDs in the past 7 years.

The case for war was thoroughly fabricated [wikipedia.org] by supressing intelligence that didn't agree with the war and magnifying or fabricating intelligence that did. My favourite bits are:

In some cases, Cheney's office would leak the intelligence to news correspondents, who would cover it in such outlets as The New York Times. Cheney would subsequently appear on the Sunday political television talk shows to discuss the intelligence, pointing to The New York Times reportage as corroboration of his view.

The fact that Iraq's foreign minister under Saddam was an agent paid by the French who confirmed that no WMDs existed was completely ignored:

The CIA had contacted Iraq's foreign minister, Naji Sabri, who was being paid by the French as an agent. Sabri informed them that Saddam had hidden poison gas among Sunni tribesmen, had ambitions for a nuclear program but that it was not active, and that no biological weapons were being produced or stockpiled, although research was underway. According to Sidney Blumenthal, George Tenet briefed Bush on September 18, 2002 that Sabri had informed them that Iraq did not have WMD. Bush dismissed this top-secret intelligence from Hussein's inner circle which was approved by two senior CIA officers. The information was never shared with Congress or even CIA agents examining whether Saddam had such weapons.

What did the French get for their first hand intelligence that no WMDs existed in Iraq in 2003? Freedom fries, that's what.

Re:We recognized the legitimacy of the Taliban

[Black Parrot]

The Taliban offered to try bin Laden if the US could provide evidence. We rejected the offer, and invaded instead.

Also apparently not commonly known in the USA, Iran offered to help after 9/11, via neutral emissaries since we don't have diplomatic relations. Unfortunately GWB wanted to have an axis of evil more than he wanted to catch the perpetrators, so we not only snubbed Iran's offer, but also chewed out the emissaries for daring to suggest such a thing.

Re: save lives by exposing military tactics....

[carp3_noct3m]

I have actually been analyzing the documents, and thanks to a tip from another /.er, I have found at least 25 names (tip: look in medcap category) So while I have and still am waiting to see some sort of official analysis with hard numbers to come out, I can tell you there are more than 3. I'm a semi-supporter of the leaks (it's complicated), but just thought I'd throw some real info your way.

Re:where's the list?

[Anonymous Coward]

First off, I'd like to ask if you believe that the Taliban could just go off and kill someone in village X and say that "THE LEAKED DOCUMENTS TOLD US OF AN INFORMER HERE" with no basis in reality. If you believe they can, then the Taliban could do a twofold fear based strategy here. Both A: It makes the people of Afghanistan less likely to trust the Americans due to fear that they'll be ousted in leaked reports (even if they really weren't) and B: The American people will hold the gubbermints or possibly Assange as the ones at fault for causing this to happen, making an unpopular war even more unpopular.

Now, let me glimpse through the documents.

USSF FINDS CACHE IN VILLAGE OF WALU TANGAY: USSF CONDUCTED A MEET AND GREET IN THE VILLAGE OF WALU TANGAY. USSF MEMBERS WERE APPROACHED BY A LOCAL BOY WHO SPOKE OF A CACHE IN A CAVE ON A NEARBY HILL. USSF MEMBERS INVESTIGATED AND FOUND A CACHE CONSISTING OF THIRTEEN 82MM MORTAR ROUNDS, SIXTY RPG ROUNDS, FIFTEEN BOXES 12.7X108MM AMMO (85 ROUNDS PER BOX), FIVE BOXES NON-DISINTEGRATING 12.7X108MM LINK, AND ONE DSHK BARREL LOCATED IN A CAVE AT 350107.26N 0705513.00E. USSF CONFISCATED THE AMMO. THE REST WAS BLOWN IN PLACE. [wikileaks.org]

Time to kill the boys of Walu Tangay. ...digging through the website is a pain. Time to check the csv.

IED COMPONENTS SEIZED IN KOWGIANI: USSF WERE ON A PATROL IVO KOWGIANI VILLAGE. THEY WERE ABLE TO MEET WITH THE BORDER POLICE WHO ADVISED USSF THAT THEY HAD INFORMATION ON A SUBJECT CURRENTLY IN POSSESSION OF IEDS. THE BORDER POLICE AND MRF WENT TO THE COMPOUND IVO 42SXD10490032 AND SECURED THE COMPOUND. AFTER THE COMPOUND WAS SECURED THE USSF ASSISTED IN THE SEARCH. ONE SUBJECT WAS DETAINED FOR FURTHER QUESTIONING. ONE RADIO CONTROLLED IED (TWO ICOM RADIOS, ONE MODIFIED AND WATERPROOFED), ONE CASIO WATCH/CIRCUIT BOARD IED, BLASTING CAPS, BATTERIES, AND WHAT IS BELIEVED TO BE SOVIET TNT WERE SEIZED. THE BORDER AND LOCAL POLICE FORCES ARE CURRENTLY LOOKING FOR ONE ADDITIONAL SUSPECT. [wikileaks.org]

Time to terrorize border police in Ivo Kowigani.

Also if these generalized witch hunt type things aren't enough, a short search of the docs for "informant" found me this gem.

** DELAYED REPORTING - REPORT DERIVED FROM CEXC REPORT 09/CEXC-A/2353 ** [wikileaks.org]

HCT was notified by local informant (Sardon Mohammad) of IED parts buried in a walled orchard. Orchard belonged to Mohammad Sediq, but he was not currently living in area. Sardon Mohammad has provided information on IEDs/UXOs at least 2-3 times in the past. C-IED notified of IED components buried in grape field. Informant lead C-IED and security team to location and uncovered components. Informant handled metal pressure plates (externally) when he dug them out of the ground. EOD team destroyed HME on-site and CEXC collected items. Teams return back to FOB. DNA, picture and slap prints were taken of informant and provided with evidence. [wikileaks.org]

I'd sure hate to be Sardon Mohammad! And remember, this is me using a search for a simple term to look for this. Digging through the entire thing with painstaking time might be quite a bit more productive in getting informant's names.