Was Julian Assange Involved With Wiretapping Iceland's Parliament? 167
An anonymous reader writes "Wired reports that the chat logs between Bradley Manning and Julian Assange that were used as evidence in Manning's trial have made it onto the web, at least briefly. One of those logs contained something very interesting on page 4, which was picked up on by the News of Iceland, which reports, '"Jesus Christ. I think that we have recordings of all phone calls to and from the Icelandic parliament during the past four months". This text can be found in documents that the US military published on its website and is said to be part of the conversations between Julian Assange and Bradley Manning. According to the documents, Assange claims to have phone call recordings from Althingi, the Icelandic parliament, but this is the first time that the existence of such data is mentioned publicly. ... According to Icelandic laws, it is required to inform the person you are speaking with if the phone call is being recorded. Given that the parliament is not violating laws it is clear that Assange or his associates would have to have installed recording devices or wiretaps in the parliament.' — What makes it even more interesting is that Wired also reports in this recent story: Someone's Been Siphoning Data Through a Huge Security Hole in the Internet."
Install wiretaps? (Score:5, Insightful)
Eh, why do you think Assange et al need to install anything? They just got the logs from the evil-doers... I wonder who that might be?
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not everything sent to wikileaks was published and if there's something wrong with wikileaks it's that. but it's been pretty widely known that they didn't publish everything(just like everything leaked by snowden hasn't been published as a dump).
maybe they should have from the get go gone with torleaks instead! or better yet freenetleaks..
'course (Score:1)
'course if everything sent to WL is printed, it's accused of being unprofessional and putting lives at danger. If they don't print everything they get, they're accused of picking on the USA. Now it appears that not printing everything means that anything else that turns up is because WL were the criminals doing it.
I wonder what the doubling up on the "WL prints everything, therefore evil" accusation will be...
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>And then you realize that they've pretty much concentrated on the US and you question wether that's because they never ever got anything from other countries or wether that's what they wanted to do.
Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that we're still very much the "leader of the free world", politically if not morally. Where we go we tend to pressure our allies into following, so anyone who doesn't like the path being set has one obvious target.
The beginning of NSA's diversion campaign ? (Score:5, Interesting)
Ever since the Snowden's leak started some months ago to appear I've been awaiting for NSA's counter-strike.
I believe this is it.
I have the feeling that this "news" is a set-up. It's designed to accomplish 3 missions at the same time:
This may be the start of NSA's worldwide diversion campaign, to shift the focus away from NSA to Assange.
By "leaking out" Assange's "wiretapping news" online, for just a couple of hours, followed by a sudden removal of all evidences, NSA is betting that the dog and pony show would piqued the interests of many.
The fact that the Wired magazine has that piece of "news" covered so prominently means that NSA's tactic is working very, very well.
Not only Assange has become a really "evil dude", people will no longer believe all subsequent disclosures from whistle blowers, no matter who they are.
And that plays into NSA's hand --- for people won't believe any more news from the Snowden files, no matter how damaging they are.
Re:The beginning of NSA's diversion campaign ? (Score:4, Interesting)
Ever since the Snowden's leak started to appear some months ago I've been awaiting for NSA's counter-strike.
I believe this is it.
This is not the first counterstrike. Scotland Yard and GCHQ of England tried it once - They tried to link Edward Snowden to pedophiles, even Slashdot covered that story ~ http://slashdot.org/story/13/11/07/038216/edward-snowden-leaks-could-help-paedophiles-escape-police-says-uk-government ~- and that attempt failed so goddamn miserably.
But I concur, this time it's different. This salvo is very well planned and executed, and they even have their planted agent(s) inside Wired Magazine to do the heavy lifting for them. From the look of it,.the whole thing has panned out nicely for NSA and the government of the United States of America.
But this is the first salvo. More will come.
Brace yourself !
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they even have their planted agent(s) inside Wired Magazine to do the heavy lifting for them.
Please know that Wired has nothing to do with the "Assange did Parliament" stor
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Police try to link everything to pedophiles or terrorists.
Or rape.
diversion campaign fail (Score:3)
This salvo is very well planned and executed
Well planned and executed diversion campaign??????
As a purported diversionary tactic, this fails miserably:
(1) Nobody outside of Iceland cares if Iceland's parliament's phones were tapped.
(2) Nobody outside of Iceland pays attention what people inside of Iceland care about.
If this is a "diversionary campaign," it's the worst diversion ever. They would have diverted more attention if they planted a story claiming that wikileaks tapped Miley Cyrus's tweets.
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Oh please, that's utterly ridiculous, the NSA needs a diversion campaign like an Eskimo needs an AC system.
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But how would their diversion campaign get any airtime over Miley Cyrus' twerking and other attention whoring, the various Obamacare debacles and debates over the treatment of chimps and whales (while people are being slaughtered in Syria and various African hellholes?)
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If this is true, then it is the world's lamest, most poorly conceived, ham-handed, overblown, and expensive attempt at domestic political attention diversion I have ever heard of... ...So it's probably the NSA then.
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Assange doesn't publish things that aren't critical of the USA, so we can conclude that it was probably someone else that did it and he didn't give a fuck.
Demonstrably false. Start at the top and work your way down: Information published by WikiLeaks [wikipedia.org]
Some information has been critical fo the US government (please differentiate between the government and the people), but there has been many instances where WikiLeaks have published information that the US government would have been happy to see the light of day (eg Nuclear accident in Iran [wikipedia.org])
Re:Install wiretaps? (Score:4, Insightful)
But it's a lot funnier if the whole summary is already a flamebait, full of unsupported bullshit.
It saves a lot of work for the trolls here in the comments.
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agreed. Why would we just assume that a government entity isnt breaking any laws. That wasnt a safe assumption years ago, and now that we have proof many times over, then I am not going to jump to a conclusion of who placed the mics. We only know that the information was found.
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tagged as dicey (Score:2)
Used to be you could come to slashdot for an intelligent discussion. Yeah, clicks drive revenue, but when all the readers disappear there won't be anyone to click.
No (Score:5, Insightful)
Betteridge's law of headlines [wikipedia.org].
Re:No (Score:4, Funny)
Betteridge's law of headlines [wikipedia.org].
Precisely. Also, consider the source:
This text can be found in documents that the US military published on its website and is said to be part of the conversations between Julian Assange and Bradley Manning.
Maybe it's just me but I'd take whatever the US military says with a metric ton of NaCl.
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This. Next probably: Snowden spotted clubbing baby seals...
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Bradley Manning announces he wants a sex change on his first day in prison...oh wait...
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(first day of his prison sentence...I shouldn't suggest that he didn't spend ages in solitary confinement w/ suicide watch protocol while waiting for his trial)
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I can just see the conversation...
USMil: We have Assange discussing logs of the Icelandic Parliament!!
Slashdotters: Who was he talking to?
USMil: Bradley Manning!
Slashdotters: And did Assange say where he got those logs from?
USMil: Um...Bradley Manning?
Slasdotters: And where exactly did Bradley Manning get those logs from?
USMil: No more questions! This press release is over!
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Question: How or why then does he say he has the logs? At the very least he apparently received them, which would mean he is involved, so Yes.
WTF? By that logic, we were all involved in 9/11. After all, we've all seen (therefore received) the videos of the planes flying into the WTC, so the most of THE ENTIRE WORLD WAS INVOLVED IN IT!!!!!!111!11eleventy!111!
WTF? (Score:3, Insightful)
Assange mentions wiretap records and they assume _he_ did the wiretapping?
Is it not possible, nay likely, that he _was given_ the wiretaps in the Manning data dump?
How exactly would Manning tap all lines into the parliament?
Why would he even try, given that he had friends in that parliament - couldn't they tell him what the scuttlebutt was?
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Manning said he had nothing to do with the logs for the parliament in the chat logs. It was allegedly Assange making the statement. Apparently Assange was multitasking and mentioned it.
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I think this is why he said he would claim asylum in Iceland at first - remember that? - thinking 'I have a nice scoop for the people there on the activities of the NSA'.
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the chat log could have had mentions of other leaks sent to them in it.
and who would wiretap iceland parliament? well depending on the day everyone from banksters to gangsters...
though, come on, they could use just any .txt file they wrote up as evidence and just label it as essential ops for national security. I mean, who's going to testify otherwise. friggin nobody, that's who.
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
The claim has been for a long time, that Manning is not a whistle blower, because he did not only leak the incriminating information, but an unfiltered dump. I.e. he did not read through the data himself.
Then Assange receives it, and while talking to Manning - and presumably looking at the data they are talking about - notices complete wiretapping data.
Why isn't the most obvious explanation that the data Manning sent to Assange happened to contain wiretapping data, and the source of that data (the US government, not necessarily the military, Manning was surprised to find out how much data he had access to) had been doing the wiretapping?
Would anybody be surprised today, if it turned out that e.g. the NSA has been wiretapping foreign governments?
Re:WTF? (Score:4, Informative)
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Okay, you gotta pick one. The US Army is wiretapping foreign governments (Iceland), as well as the NSA (Germany)?? Wouldn't Occam's Razor indicate that the US Army got their wiretapping logs of Iceland from the NSA? Doesn't that seem somewhat more plausible to you? That two branches of the same government would share some amount of information?
Or are you suggesting that Assange was releasing sensitive government information, screwing around with numerous women, and wiretapping foreign governments, and t
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Funny)
Haven't you heard? He can tap any line in the world just by whistling into a payphone!
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If he can find a payphone.
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> Assange mentions wiretap records and they assume _he_ did the wiretapping?
It is their job to make that assumption; this isn't about truth, its about spin and justification of whatever they want to do to him. Truth isn't for when you are talking about your enemy.
> Is it not possible, nay likely, that he _was given_ the wiretaps in the Manning data dump?
Seems unlikely. I mean, sure it could have happened. It could be something US agents did and she managed to get his hands on, but I don't remember any
Installed by Assange? (Score:5, Insightful)
(fp?)
Re:Installed by Assange? (Score:5, Insightful)
Looks like the US hasn't given up smearing him.
Re:Installed by Assange? (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't follow at all. He wouldn't express surprise if he was trying to eavesdrop on the Icelandic parliament.
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have modpoints, couldn't find the "cheap fud" tag ... /.!
Re:Assange said he likes crushing bastards (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is the people you're linking to that "know him" are only the ones that had a falling out with him and/or are jealous of him.
The problem is there are many more out there that know him and outright praise him.
So your one-sided completely biased post doesn't exactly earn much credibility given that fact.
But you know this, because it's your usual modus operandi isn't it? It's what you do every single time such a subject comes up.
I doubt anyone has a problem with genuine critique of Assange, but seriously dude, you need to learn a bit about objectivity. Taking one-sided views of a person then claiming that's everything that person is is utterly pathetic, I might just as well claim you're a troll based on this and dismiss everything you've ever said or have got to say, but I'm more pragmatic than that, I recognise that sometimes, just sometimes, you have a point. This isn't one of those times.
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Well, that didn't take long. 20 minutes for the first -1. Predictable.
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From your other response to me:
"But frankly, your criticism in this case has little credibility with me."
Why are you now complaining about being down modded? It's not like I didn't warn you that your attempts at character assassination probably wouldn't go down well given that they're entirely one sided and too obviously agenda based.
I don't demand that you to listen to me, or anyone else, I don't demand that my points to have credibility with you, but if you are going to opt to go down that route of ignori
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Re:Assange said he likes crushing bastards (Score:5, Informative)
A reporter worried that Assange would risk killing Afghans who had co-operated with American forces if he put US secrets online without taking the basic precaution of removing their names. "Well, they're informants," Assange replied. "So, if they get killed, they've got it coming to them. They deserve it."
The reporter that attributed those words to Assange is David Leigh. A well known liar [order-order.com], the type of person that breaks contract then lies about it [twitlonger.com], David Leigh also has been called out out by an independent third party journalist for fabricating those words [wordpress.com]:
"However, an independent witness – John Goetz, a journalist with Der Spiegel – states that the events related above are simply not true:"
"“I was at dinner at the Moro restaurant in London, along with Marcel Rosenbach from Der Spiegel, David Leigh and Declan Walsh of the Guardian, and Julian Assange of WikiLeaks. Patrick Forbes asked me specifically if Julian Assange had made the remark “They’re informants, they deserve to die” at the dinner, as has been alleged by David Leigh, and I told him that Julian did not say that at the dinner.”"
David Leigh' s systematic pattern of dishonesty [wordpress.com].
But you know all this already, don't you Cold Fjord. By calling out your FUD with some facts and counter examples you will feebly defend as you have done in your last post by accusing any detractors from your message of being "fans" or part of some cult. Anything other than, you know, actually addressing the facts or providing solid counter evidence.
So now you have been informed that David Leighs account is highly questionably including credible independent third party witnesses, and that David Leigh has a long history of dishonesty on other non Assange related areas - yet I can guarantee you will be back here with the same ferver like agenda, the same libel Assange quote on the next Wikileaks story. No matter how many times we demonstrate some of your more crazy ideas to be false, you persist on repeating over and again the same falehoods - damn the facts and eternally ignore any counter evidence presented. One can see this clearly time and again across many topics only by browsing your post history and the subsequent replies. Rinse, repeat. This is the classical modus operandi of a troll, a shill and a astroturfer. Facts do not matter.
Re:Assange said he likes crushing bastards (Score:5, Insightful)
Look, I am pretty much convinced that Assange is a douche hors categorie. However, that observation changes precisely nothing regarding the info released via WL, such as the epic douchebaggery on the part of, say, the US diplomatic corps and military. It's not like they cancel out or something.
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Look, I am pretty much convinced that Assange is a douche hors categorie
You must not have typed that with conviction since you have a +4 as I write this. Normally Assange's fans will punish any aspersions cast on him rather quickly despite the validity.
... the epic douchebaggery on the part of, say, the US diplomatic corps and military. It's not like they cancel out or something.
That isn't necessarily true. You only have to look at the instances of either misinformation or manipulation to see that. The so called "collateral murder" video was nonsense. The same thing for the claims that Dyncorp was engaged in child prostitution. That was investigated by a State Department Inspector General, IIRC, an
Re:Assange said he likes crushing bastards (Score:4, Insightful)
You must not have typed that with conviction since you have a +4 as I write this. Normally Assange's fans will punish any aspersions cast on him rather quickly despite the validity.
What moderators make of my post says nothing about my typing it with or without conviction. If I am not convinced of something I won't qualify a statement with "I am pretty much convinced". Disagree with me all you like but credit me that much, all right?
You only have to look at the instances of either misinformation or manipulation to see that.
And the US government is not known for misinformation or manipulation? If you think that then, respectfully, you have not been paying attention or else you have an unusually strong cognitive dissonance filter on.
The so called "collateral murder" video was nonsense.
I agree the material would have been stronger unedited and without commentary. That said, the fact remains that these assholes, from a safe distance in their Apache, shot a bunch of kids to shreds and attacked people who came to the scene to help. That much is not controversial. And the remarks they made to one another afterward are nothing short of disgusting.
As far as diplomacy goes, it is in essence politics, which tends to be messy and usually takes place behind closed doors. Perhaps you are familiar with the old saying about making laws and sausages?
I am familiar with the saying about sausages and making laws. Maybe I'm the odd one out in that regard, but I prefer to know what goes inside a sausage -- and if I don't like what I find I'll stop eating them. Easy fix. Same goes for lawmaking. Besides, the analogy doesn't apply here, the leaks were about international diplomacy, not lawmaking. It included some pretty lowbrow gossip, and I remain unconvinced that such banter is somehow an essential part of the game.
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That said, the fact remains that these assholes, from a safe distance in their Apache, shot a bunch of kids to shreds and attacked people who came to the scene to help. That much is not controversial. And the remarks they made to one another afterward are nothing short of disgusting.
Perhaps you didn't watch much of the video. The helicopter crews weren't assholes. The "safe distance" as a tactic is desirable, and irrelevant to the discussion. It's war, not a boxing match. The kids were in a van where they weren't visible, and why was that van there? Wasn't it violating a curfew? And why would you take your kids into a firefight? The van was trying to help insurgents escape. It was entirely proper to engage it. From what I recall the remarks were hardly disgusting, but if you la
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I watched the video. I read the transcripts.
The initial attack on the armed enemy combatants was justifiable considering the circumstances. The Apache crew didn't know about the embedded journalists, and in any case those journalists were accompanying enemy soldiers in a hot zone. Wrong place, wrong time, war sucks.
But the subsequent post-firefight attack on unknown samaritans?
That was simply obscene. That was "man's inhumanity to man" - in other words, a war crime (both by the Apache crew and their base co
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The kids were in a van where they weren't visible, and why was that van there? Wasn't it violating a curfew? And why would you take your kids into a firefight? The van was trying to help insurgents escape. It was entirely proper to engage it.
That would be true if it that behaviour was in concordance with the US own rules of engagement at the time. I.e. attacking a van based on the premises you list. However, as that would be a violation of the Geneva convention (that the US follows even though they are not a signatory) it wasn't and isn't. Hence the helicopter crew found it necessary to lie to their chain of command to receive permission to fire:
Re:Assange said he likes crushing bastards (Score:5, Insightful)
"The so called "collateral murder" video was nonsense."
Out of interest, what was nonsense about it? I saw the unedited version first, not even being aware that there was an edited version and it was objectively the case that the Apache pilots broke various norms of war.
They claimed they needed to fire because the targets had RPGs that could be used against them but their gun cam clearly showed that not only were they out of RPG range, but they were even further out of objective RPG range.
The van they shot with the kid in they completely and utterly failed to determine if it was even actually a threat and fired anyway.
These are not the actions of competent military personnel. The norm in such situations is do not fire until fired upon, but this took it to another level and fired before they could even be sure there was a real actual threat.
This isn't just my opinion, this is objective fact. The rules of engagement are well publicised and there's simply no argument against the fact that the Apache gunner broke them. There's absolutely no avoiding that.
It's directly equivalent to a cop just sitting alongside the road and then shooting a guy passing with a hunting rifle visible in his car before even talking to them, and then shooting another passer by that stops to try and help just in case they were both a threat. We don't allow our police to do that at home, and we shouldn't be allowing military forces to do it in a post-war occupation role. It's counter productive and the whole reason America got fucked in Iraq - because the Iraqis quickly realised they didn't want to be occupied by forces that shot them for shits and giggles - "just in case" and turned on American forces as a result.
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Out of interest, what was nonsense about it? I saw the unedited version first, not even being aware that there was an edited version and it was objectively the case that the Apache pilots broke various norms of war.
Do you have some sort of source for that? Because I was working directly WITH Apache pilots and maintainers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan and they all agree that the pilots did follow proper procedure for the discharge of weapons.
They claimed they needed to fire because the targets had RPGs that could be used against them but their gun cam clearly showed that not only were they out of RPG range, but they were even further out of objective RPG range.
They were providing close air support for troops on the ground that were under active engagement. It does not matter if the Apache itself is under direct threat from any potential RPG. The ground troops were under direct threat. The Apache pilots were tasks with prosec
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Except they were not. The differences between this fuckup and the fuckup where undisciplined US pilots shot up British tanks and killed their allies are that there was far less threat and it got caught on film. It's a fuckup and then a coverup instead of disciplining the people who deliberately fired on a target they were aware that they should have confirmed first.
Re:Assange said he likes crushing bastards (Score:5, Insightful)
"Do you have some sort of source for that?"
Well, I'd imagine the fact they broke the US' own rules of engagement is about as authoritative as it gets? -
http://wikileaks.org/wiki/US_Rules_of_Engagement_for_Iraq [wikileaks.org]
"Because I was working directly WITH Apache pilots and maintainers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan and they all agree that the pilots did follow proper procedure for the discharge of weapons."
Of course they would. US military doctrine is to close rank and protect your fellow soldier. This has about zero relevance though - I'd rather trust those who don't have a vested interest in arguing that they should be free to shoot what they want, when they want.
"They were providing close air support for troops on the ground that were under active engagement. It does not matter if the Apache itself is under direct threat from any potential RPG. The ground troops were under direct threat."
There's so many things wrong with your statement here:
- The troops could not be under active engagement because the cameraman had a camera, not an RPG
- The troops were not under direct threat when the Apache fired because they were not near enough the scene at that point
What the Apache pilot did was attempt pro-active killing under the suspicion they might be a threat when they were in range. That's not the same as protecting allies under "active engagement". See my cop example - should cops shoot anyone with a gun in their vehicle, just in case they might be a threat? It's absurd, it's nonsense.
"Obviously you do not know what the rules of engagement were at that time in Iraq."
Obviously you don't. But obviously I do. See above link. What you went on to describe doesn't even fit into rules of engagement. Rules of engagement don't describe what civilians can and can't do, only what makes a valid target and civilians are explicitly never a target otherwise the US' rules of engagement would be in direct breach of the geneva convention and that would make any US soldiers following it war criminals.
"Did you have the audio muted on the video? You could hear the ground personnel in contact with the close air support. You could also see these groups actively engaging the troops on the ground."
I think you watched completely the wrong video because what you're describing is not what was on the unedited feed.
Seriously, check your facts before you post in future. Between pretending things are in the video which aren't, and pretending that the rules of engagement aren't now widely publicised you've merely exposed yourself as spouting as much nonsense as Cold Fjord.
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"They were providing close air support for troops on the ground that were under active engagement. It does not matter if the Apache itself is under direct threat from any potential RPG. The ground troops were under direct threat."
There's so many things wrong with your statement here:
- The troops could not be under active engagement because the cameraman had a camera, not an RPG
- The troops were not under direct threat when the Apache fired because they were not near enough the scene at that point
First of all the camera was not identifiable as a camera when the attack started. Secondly, unless you think that Wikipedia is pro US Military, the Wikipedia article on the attack clearly states:
And indeed you can see the armed people
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"First of all the camera was not identifiable as a camera when the attack started. Secondly, unless you think that Wikipedia is pro US Military, the Wikipedia article on the attack clearly states"
I think Wikipedia is whatever the biases of the last editor who edited that section are.
But you're still missing the point, even if armed it doesn't matter. There was nothing illegal about being armed, Iraq was full of local militia who were legitimately armed. Merely being armed wasn't a green light to fire at wil
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I think Wikipedia is whatever the biases of the last editor who edited that section are.
I doubt that such a strong pro US military bias could stand in that Wikipedia page unless there was source material to back it up. However, I'm not going to claim that I looked through the revision history of this article.
But you're still missing the point, even if armed it doesn't matter. There was nothing illegal about being armed, Iraq was full of local militia who were legitimately armed. Merely being armed wasn't a green light to fire at will.
Legitimate militia were uniformed. In fact anyone who is not uniformed is considered, by the Geneva convention, to be an unlawful combatant [wikipedia.org]. In fact, once a person has been determined to be an unlawful combatant, they are not accorded the same rights as a uniformed member of an armed fo
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I may be wrong. but you appear to have deleted your initial comment which started this thread.
Can you say why? I was entertained by the argument but now I can't re-assess your initial position based on your arguments.
I have no solid opinion on the matter so please don't construe this as sarcasm.
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"Legitimate militia were uniformed."
What the fuck? You're still outright making stuff up. But let's just say for a second you weren't. Why did the Apache pilot fire? are you actually telling me he could tell they were uniformed but couldn't tell that a camera wasn't an RPG? Seriously, you're making that stupid an argument?
"In fact anyone who is not uniformed is considered, by the Geneva convention, to be an unlawful combatant."
That's not even what the link you provided says. Again, you're making stuff up.
"N
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The van was not engaged until it interacted with the dead/wounded people on the ground. As I mentioned, such activity marked you as an enemy combatant according to the rules of engagement. It was not an ambulance, and was not carrying any markings that would protect it through the Geneva convention. Who the hell brings their van with children out to a battle with the enemy still orbiting overhead in a helicopter? Where is the sense in that?
Nope. That's wrong. While a clearly marked vehicle is off limits, that doesn't mean that only clearly marked vehicles are off limits. In actual fact the very first Geneva convention explicitly provides protection for civilians providing aid to the wounded with no other requirements. Look it up.
Now as the helicopter crew lied to their chain of command to obtain permission to fire, it is not unreasonable to assume they knew about this provision also
As to why someone would "bring their van full of children out
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I may be wrong. but you appear to have deleted your initial comment which started this thread.
Can you say why? I was entertained by the argument but now I can't re-assess your initial position based on your arguments.
I have no solid opinion on the matter so please don't construe this as sarcasm.
I didn't really start the collateral murder thread. I was just stating my thoughts on the matter. My original comment is here [slashdot.org]
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"Legitimate militia were uniformed."
What the fuck? You're still outright making stuff up. But let's just say for a second you weren't. Why did the Apache pilot fire? are you actually telling me he could tell they were uniformed but couldn't tell that a camera wasn't an RPG? Seriously, you're making that stupid an argument?
I would suggest you work on your reading comprehension skills. I was making the statement that these people were INSURGENTS. Not militia. That militia members, authorized to carry weapons openly in the streets (perhaps including RPGs, machine guns, and other weapons forbidden by the occupying army) wore uniforms. The people in the video were not wearing uniforms. They were deemed to have hostile intent, in compliance with the Rules of Engagement. This means that they are, per the link I provided an unl
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"The people in the video were not wearing uniforms."
So you ARE saying the Apache pilots could determine whether these guy's clothing had any insignias on their clothing but couldn't possibly differentiate between a camera and an RPG?
I mean, let's just be clear here, you're saying you can determine that people in these pictures both have weapons, and aren't in some kind of uniform? -
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=collateral+murder&source=lnms [google.co.uk]
Some of them clearly don't have weapons, some are clearly un
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Thank you for providing your perspective. I've never had to suffer war but my grandmother was a blitz survivor during World War II. If I told her that someone had said civilians don't go outside, or help each other in war she'd have been sickened at such an attitude - our whole country's existence depended precisely on people "Keeping calm, and Carrying on" even if what was at risk was your very own life. We simply would've never held out against the Nazis if everyone was like him, with the attitude that th
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<quote>I like to stick random stuff up my ass when I ah, masturbate. Random, like err, pens, action figures, whatever.</quote>
OK, we shouldn't pick on a person for their fetishes. But what about this one!:
<quote>I think we should round up all those liberal scum and send'em to camps. Teach them the values that obviously their parents and schools failed to instill. Values like hard work, the suprem
Re: (Score:1)
Sounds like a basement-dwelling libertarian. Maybe his parents should kick his ass out into to 'free market'.
Uh, problem... (Score:4, Insightful)
"Given that the parliament is not violating laws it is clear that Assange or his associates would have to have installed recording devices or wiretaps in the parliament".
This last sentence makes no sense. You are leaving out a huge possibility. Someone else could have done this, and leaked it to WikiLeaks.
Re: (Score:2)
Why would he? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why would Assange wiretap the Icelandic parliament and how could he? I doubt he has that powerful connections up there.
The obviously more likely explanation is that some spy agency (like NSA or counterparts) did it, and it has been leaked to Wikileaks. Notice how he looks surprised upon finding it out, so that Manning feels like pointing out that he wasn't the one who leaked it "*had nothing to do with that one*". So neither knew how the records were obtained in the first place.
Now one wonders: who would be able and willing of doing such a thing and who would have an interest in pinning it to Assange?
Re:Why would he? (Score:5, Insightful)
Notice how the summary also tries to equate this with the hijacking of internet traffic through Iceland. Attempting to imply Assange was responsible for that too. Pretty obvious that the anonymous reader who submitted this has a bit of an agenda.
Re: (Score:2)
>Why would Assange wiretap the Icelandic parliament and how could he? I doubt he has that powerful connections up there.
Actually he had an Icelandic person known here in Iceland as Siggi "the hacker" working for him, and he was actually implicated in a hack attempt at the parliment:
"In January 2011, Thordarson was implicated in a bizarre political scandal in which a mysterious "spy computer" laptop was found running unattended in an empty office in the parliament building. "If you did [it], don't tell me
The conclusion is not clear to me (Score:5, Insightful)
it is clear that Assange or his associates would have to have installed recording devices....
Hold on. They conclude that from Assange suddenly stating "Jesus Christ. I think that we have recordings of all phone calls to and from the Icelandic parliament during the past four months" ???????? How can anyone honestly conclude that? Assange seems to express surprise when he realizes what he has, surprise that he would not have if he had been wiretapping and recording. Assange was routinely getting leaked information. My conclusion would be that someone leaked this information to him, not that he had been wiretapping Iceland. And who do we know that has been spying on their friends and enemies alike, along with their own citizens? I'll give you a clue, it is someone with a 3 letter name that a whistle blower might want to expose.
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Jesus Christ. I think that we have recordings of all phone calls to and from the Icelandic parliament during the past four months
I stop expecting much when they can't even copy a quote correctly... It gets the gist across, but isn't exactly what was said.
>jesus .is parliament.
>mm?
>looks like we have the last 4 mothers of all audio to all phones in the
>s/mothers/months
That actually sounds more interesting to me... But definitely says nothing about him placing anything anywhere.
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I think they tried to translate it from internet-dialect to something a bit more formal.
Internet-dialect makes english teachers cry.
Wait, wait, wait. (Score:4, Insightful)
Any time a head-line starts with a question (Score:1)
Is this the dumbest premise ever posted to ./? (Score:3)
An anonymous reader writes.
No one is to be spared (Score:3)
Goose, meet gander.
Pot, meet kettle.
Glass house, meet stone.
Turnabout, meet fair play.
Goes around, meet comes around.
Sowed wind, meet whirlwind.
Dances-with-devils, meet the piper.
And in US helicopters. (Score:5, Funny)
Assange had gun cam footage from US helicopters in Iraq. Clearly he's been sneaking into military bases and installing cameras in the helicopters. They never showed that in the movie!
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You have got to be on to something because, see, this also works equally well as it does for the summary!
"Given that the parliament is not violating laws it is clear that Assange or his associates would have to have installed recording devices or wiretaps on US helicopters in Iraq". Undeniable right there!
Seeding the leaks? (Score:1)
The award for "most bias news analysis" goes to... (Score:4, Insightful)
Why would anyone who was actually involved in the wiretapping sound surprised when he found the wiretapping data he allegedly made? It makes no sense.
What does make sense is if either the leaked cables also contained this data, or someone else leaked the data to wikileaks but they hadn't got round to looking at it yet.
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Why would anyone who was actually involved in the wiretapping sound surprised when he found the wiretapping data he allegedly made? It makes no sense.
What does make sense is if either the leaked cables also contained this data, or someone else leaked the data to wikileaks but they hadn't got round to looking at it yet.
Well, to be fair, if I (someone not in the security industry, working alone, and with limited resources) tried to wiretap the entire Icelandic Parliament and it actually worked, I'd be pretty fucking surprised, too. And my next stop would be to buy a lottery ticket. Just one.
That's a pretty big "given" (Score:2)
Given that the parliament is not violating laws
That's not "given" at all.
it is clear that Assange or his associates would have to have installed recording devices or wiretaps in the parliament
a) It's not remotely clear even if we do accept the premise above
b) If it was true he probably wouldn't be quite so surprised at finding all those recordings.
Let's play "Blame the Whistle Blower" (Score:2)
Assange posted footage of an Apache helicopter crew murdering innocent civilians. How could he possibly have that footage if he wasn't involved in the murders? It is clear that Assange or his associates would have to have installed the video recording device in the helicopter.
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Assange posted footage of an Apache helicopter crew murdering
innocent civilians. How could he possibly have that footage
if he wasn't involved in the murders? It is clear that
Assange or his associates would have to have installed
the video recording device in the helicopter.
It's also quite clear that the unauthorized video recording device caused the trigger to be pulled, shooting all those people. Since the only possible way for this to happen is for Assange to have set up a remote control trigger pull on the camera, it's obvious that Assange killed that van full of kids!
Random facts. (Score:3)
Here goes, sorry about the references in Icelandic.
In 2010 an unmarked laptop was discovered in an empty office at Alingi connected to the local network, the parliament offices are adjunct to the main building. The computer was running but after being shut down by employees of Alingi it self destruct and forensics did not come up with anything. ( http://www.dv.is/frettir/2011/1/20/grunur-um-njosnir-althingi-dularfull-tolva-fannst-i-audu-herbergi/). Around the same time that the computer was discovered Julian Assange was working in Iceland cutting the videos that would become Collateral Murder along with member of parlament Birgitta Jonsdottir and a group of other people on of which has been known in Iceland as Siggi hakkari (Siggi the hacker) a 17 year old boy with, well truth be said, very limited morals (http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/06/wikileaks-mole/all/) Siggi was at the time giving information to the FBI as well as running for Wikileaks and running his own scams, stealing money (http://www.visir.is/-og-bdquo;siggi-hakkari-og-ldquo;-grunadur-um-milljonasvik/article/2013130609737) and is now applealing a case where he was sentenced for sexual crimes against a seventeen year old boy (http://www.dv.is/frettir/2013/11/19/siggi-braut-sautjan-ara-pilt-WRMWNX/) He's a dubious caracter this Siggi. Peronally I dont think that Wikileaks had any access to real data from Althingi and that was part of Siggi's scams to get into the Wikileaks crowd and, believe it or not, the offices of Alingi are not breaking the law about recording phonecalls.
Then there is the case of the jumping packages, which is totally unrelated and has been well documented in Icelandic (http://ruv.is/sarpurinn/spegillinn/26112013-0) basically the Icelandic telecom (síminn) had faulty equipment in Canada that advertised wrong BGP routes between the 31st of july until the 22th of august and as they did not have prefix filters in place in some other endpoints these routes got advertised to the internet. There are long personal discussion threads about this on facebook in direct communications between the technicians working at the Icelandic telecom and some of the other telco's in Iceland. These guys know their stuff and have no reason to take part's in cover-ups for hackers as the community of networking experts in Iceland is very small and these guys know each other personally.
I know what this is... (Score:2)
Its a test to see if the sheeple count has gone down and how far.
Siggi "the hacker" (Score:2)
It is possible this was the work of Siggi "the hacker".
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-06/28/wikileaks-mole [wired.co.uk]
He was fired from Wikileaks after he transferred money from Wikileaks to his personal account. He then contacted FBI and was thought he was to be used as some kind of bait for Wikileaks. He has then been connected to number of other shady deals here in Iceland. I believe he is currently in Prison for a sexual assault.
Disinformation campaign sited (Score:2)
First, this is obviously a disinformation / smear campaign.
More importantly this scenario is one of the truly terrifying scenarios involving a super-power entity with unlimited control over the web. Such an entity could, at will, create guilt on the part of anyone merely through creating false access and activity logs and creating then smuggling in electronic "evidence' that they later "discover".
This level of control and aggression against citizens
who are clearly not terrorists is part of the slippery slo
I appreciate what you have written (Score:1)
To WoofyGoofy,
Of the many comments in this thread I sincerely appreciate what you have written.
The world needs more people like you who can see through the falsehoods.
No articles (Score:2)
State Department (Score:1)
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I wish I had mod points....
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Maybe the NSA needs help understanding phone calls made in a language spoken by less than half a million people alive!
Well, it's their own fault. If they included the dead people who speak the language, they'd have a much better chance of translating it all.... :P