[THS] Eric Walberg: Julian Quixote

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Wikileaks vs. the Empire

Julian Quixote

By Eric Walberg

http://www.counterpunch.org/walberg12082010.html

It was United States president Woodrow Wilson who called for "open diplomacy" —
number one of his fourteen points in 1918 — so that "diplomacy shall proceed always
frankly and in the public view." He would surely approve of Wikileaks' efforts at open
diplomacy, though current US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called them "an
attack on America's foreign-policy interests" and indeed on "the international
community", though she failed to specify which particular community members were
the victims, or what they were the victims of.

On 7 December, the bane of US empire voluntarily gave himself up to Scotland Yard
and will face trial and extradition to Sweden possibly by the end of the year, accused
of "rape, unlawful coercion and two counts of sexual molestation", alleged to have
been committed in August 2010. The trumped-up cases involve consensual relations,
one an obvious "honey trap" by a CIA plant and the other a spurned Lewinsky-like
groupie.

Assange is nothing short of a legend after a year of leaks, especially an April video
taken from a US helicopter in Iraq in 2007 showing GIs shooting at least 12 innocent
Iraqis like rabbits. Starting in July, he issued 500,000 US military documents on the
US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The straw for the imperial camel was a batch of
250,000 US diplomatic notes (1966-2009) in November, revealing a US diplomatic
world increasingly acting as a branch of the CIA, and the cynicism of both Western
and Arab regimes anxious to destroy Iran.

The leaks have been hailed as a blow to US criminal activity by people around the
world, including staunchly American US Congressman Ron Paul, and condemned by
lovers of US empire such as former US vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who
called for Assange to be "pursued with the same urgency we pursue Al-Qaeda and
Taliban leaders". Former UK Foreign Secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind said WikiLeaks'
actions were "active assistance to terrorist organisations", neglecting to reflect on the
UK's own long history of worldwide terrorist activities.

The 39-year-old Assange is an Australian citizen, though his Prime Minister Julia
Gillard has threatened to cancel his passport. He is described by colleagues as
charismatic, driven and highly intelligent, with an exceptional ability to crack
computer codes. To his critics, he is just a publicity-seeker and womaniser.

In 1995 he was accused with a friend of dozens of hacking activities and fined,
promising to be a good boy. He quietly co-authored Underground with Suelette
Dreyfus, dealing with the subversive side of the Internet. Dreyfus described Assange
as "quite interested in the concept of ethics, concepts of justice, what governments
should and shouldn't do".

He began Wikileaks in 2006 as a "dead-letterbox" for would-be leakers — the real
heroes of this saga, the unknown soldiers disgusted with their role as hired killers. His
collective developed a Robin Hood guerrilla lifestyle, moving communications and
people from country to country to make use of laws protecting freedom of speech.
Co-founder Daniel Schmitt describes Assange as "one of the few people who really
care about positive reform in this world to a level where you're willing to do
something radical".

Wikileaks was forced this year to switch to a Swiss host server after several US
Internet service providers shut him down, claiming he was endangering lives, though
he made clear he was careful to vet the military cables from Afghanistan and Iraq
precisely to avoid this. His site also came under cyber attack and PayPal cut off his
ability to raise funds.

There is no doubt that Gillard, the Swedish prosecutor, PayPal, etc are all being
pressured by the US government to help snuff out this ray of light exposing its many
crimes. Only French Internet service provider OVH said it had no plans to end the
service it provides to Wikileaks, and a judge threw out Industry Minister Eric Besson's
case to force it to.

Hackivist admirers of Mr Quixote have set up mirror sites faster than traditional
servers can shut Wikileaks down and are launching denial-of-service attacks
targetting its Internet enemies. Coldblood, a member of the computer group
Anonymous, told BBC, "Websites that are bowing down to government pressure have
become targets. We feel that Wikileaks has become more than just about leaking of
documents, it has become a war ground, the people vs the government."

The Man of La Mancha fought off more than "100 legal attacks" before his arrest,
including one by Swiss banks whose illicit offshore activities were exposed. That case
too was dismissed and left the bankers to scramble to protect their ill-gotten gains.

The show goes on. Wikileaks spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson said Assange's arrest was
an attack on media freedom but assured, "Wikileaks is operational. We are continuing
on the same track as laid out before." Assange — or his colleagues still at large —
hopes to set up a number of "independent chapters around the world" as well as to
act as a middle-man between sources and newspapers.

Strangely, he has been attacked on the left as a stooge of the CIA or Israel, though
the former makes no sense at all. True, the latter comes off relatively clean amidst
the diplomatic cesspool. But what the few tight-lipped US diplo leaks relating to Israel
really show is the fear that US diplomats have of saying anything negative about
Israel. Perhaps they fear they will be passed over for their "anti-Semitism" or perhaps
they fear that all their missives are read by Mossad as a matter of course.

A terse cable from the US embassy in Baku, Azerbaijan compares Israeli-Azeri
relations ominously to an "iceberg with nine-tenths unseen". Another polite one from
Tel Aviv reveals that several "OT" (organised crime) figures applied for visas to attend
a "security conference" in Los Vegas but thankfully didn't come back when asked for
their prison records in Russia.

An interesting comparison is between Assange and another exposer of US military
secrets, Jonathan Pollard, the (only) US-Israel spy serving a life sentence he received
in 1987 for revealing US military secrets. The big difference, of course, is Pollard did
not apply the "open diplomacy" principle. If he had blacked out the sensitive names,
and exposed the secrets to broad daylight, like Assange, he could have had a
beneficial influence on world politics. Instead he sold the secrets to Israel, and
uncounted CIA agents lost their lives in the Soviet Union as a result.

Another worthy comparison is with the legendary Daniel Ellsberg, leaker of the
Pentagon Papers in 1971, who like Assange, gave himself up and faced the music,
which turned out to be sweet. The judge dismissed all charges against him in 1973
and the New York Times pompously applauded him in 1996, saying that the papers
demonstrated "that the Johnson Administration had systematically lied" about "a
subject of transcendent national interest and significance."

Ellsberg and Assange, following the advice of Woodrow Wilson, are heroes. Pollard,
truly a villain, is worshipped today in Israel, where his 9000th day in prison last year
was commemorated with a light show on the walls of the old city of Jerusalem. Last
month 39 Congressmen petitioned US President Barack Obama to pardon him. Last
summer, Netanyahu had the gall to offer to hold off a few more months on
settlements if Obama freed him.

Will Assange suffer the fate of Pollard or Ellsberg? The US military machine was in
disarray in 1971 and Ellsberg gave it a brave shove and helped bring the troops
home. But this is 2010. The open calls to free Pollard are treated as a matter of
course. While the Hillaries and Sarahs are calling to assassinate Assange for doing
something noble, their like are calling to free a traitor who was responsible for
betraying his country and causing untold deaths of US officials.

The sides are lining up, much like Bush predicted in 2001 with his "You are with us or
against us." A brave Aussie, a principled French judge, an American libertarian
congressman, a youthful computer nerd — the enemies of empire come in all shapes
and sizes.

Eric Walberg writes for Al-Ahram Weekly. You can reach him at
www.geocities.com/walberg2002/