Chelsea Manning’s release is a mistake
For all his empathy and putting himself in another man’s shoes, former president Barack Obama has never walked an Iraq foot patrol after sundown, listening for the crack of a twig, straining to distinguish innocuous night sounds from the menacing — a warning caw by a human voice, the click of a trigger being cocked.
He’s never been tossed around inside a personnel carrier while a driver scans the roadside in Afghanistan for telltale signs of disturbed earth hiding a trip wire on an IED. He’s never been under fire. Neither of course has President Donald Trump or any other of the commanders-in-chief since George H.W. Bush, with no experience of combat.
But Trump, otherwise busy turning American policy on its head over recent days, wasn’t the one who commuted a prison sentence for an admitted traitor who put at risk the lives of coalition troops and informants, diplomats and interpreters and contract workers in some of the worst killing zones on the planet.
That was Obama, ignoring the advice of his own secretary of defence, the warnings from both Democrats and Republicans, springing free — as of May 17 — Chelsea Manning.
One stroke of the pen and Manning swaps a 35-year sentence for seven years in Fort Leavenworth.
No wonder she gratefully tweeted: “Thank you @BarackObama for giving me a chance.”
Except on Thursday, writing in the Guardian, Manning questioned Obama’s legacy. “Unfortunately, despite his faith in our system and his positive track record on many issues over the last eight years, there have been very few permanent accomplishments.” Adding, in an obvious swipe at Trump ( join the queue): “This vulnerable legacy should remind us that what we really need is a strong and unapologetic progressive to lead us.”
Years earlier, Manning was a hapless, deeply troubled young man — née Bradley — who was exploited by Julian Assange. The WikiLeaks founder is still hiding in the Ecuadorean embassy in London, on the lam from sexual-assault warrants issued by Sweden, and possibly extradition from Sweden to the U.S. and prosecution for obtaining and publishing secret documents.
Assange had previously indicated he would turn himself over to American authorities if Manning was released. Easy to say when nobody expected Obama would commute Manning’s sentence. Now he’s singing a different tune. Asked by an Australian TV interviewer this week why he’d reversed himself, Assange responded: “Because I’m not an idiot! I’m not a complete idiot!”
Assange is the Iago here; Manning was his naive stooge.
Manning: portrayed as a wellintentioned whistleblower-martyr by her numerous advocates; excoriated as a quisling for the untold damage she caused to tactical operations, national security and global alliances.
Via WikiLeaks, Manning copied and leaked nearly 750,000 classified documents, including thousands of secret State Department cables and troves of military information about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, material she (then he) accessed while serving in the latter as a lowlevel intelligence analyst.
Some of that content — notably a chilling video of the 2007 Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad in which civilians, including two Reuters journalists, were killed — the American public had a right to see. A nation was entitled to know how these wars were being conducted.
It was WikiLeaks that massaged the video under the title “Collateral Murder,” palpably inciting revenge for innocent Muslims killed.
Leaking all the rest, however, served no purpose except to cause embarrassment at the highest levels, alarm allies and provide ammunition for dictators to further tyrannize their opponents. (After the disclosure, for example, tireless Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was yet again hauled in for investigation by the Robert Mugabe regime for “treasonous collusion between local Zimbabweans and the aggressive international world.”
A navy SEAL who participated in the 2011 raid on Osama bin Laden’s Pakistan compound testified that Manning’s leaks were found on the terrorist’s computer.
Sen. John McCain, for six years a prisoner of war in Hanoi and chairman of the armed services committee, was appalled by Obama’s stunning compassion toward Manning, calling the commutation “a grave mistake that I fear will encourage further acts of espionage and undermine military discipline.” McCain said Manning’s “dishonour will last forever.”
Defence Secretary Ash Carter told CNN: “All I’ll say about the Manning case is I did not support the direction the president went. That was not my recommendation.”
Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez: “I’m not sure what sort of message we are sending here. We ought not treat a traitor like a martyr.”
Manning originally pleaded guilty to 10 charges. The army brought further charges and Manning was ultimately convicted on 17 of 22. In earlier war times, these crimes were punishable by firing squad on the battlefield or hanging for treason upon trial conviction.
Keep in mind that Obama had, over eight years, taken a tough stance on government leakers. In the waning hours of his administration, he pulled a dramatic U-turn as a gesture of mercy.
Thirty-five years — the longest sentence ever for a leak conviction — was always an absurd, draconian and disproportionate overreach. Military experts said that the minimum of 10 years would likely be the term Manning ended up serving. If Obama wished to show mercy, commuting the sentence to a decade time served would have been far more appropriate, given the severity of Manning’s crime.
Army prosecutors never presented evidence that the leaks had actually resulted in the death of U.S. troops. Still, that seems hardly the point and, in the absence of supporting evidence either way, the opposite isn’t necessarily true. As Republican Sen. Tom Cotton, a veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan, said: “When I was leading soldiers in Afghanistan, Private Manning was undermining us by leaking hundreds of thousands of classified documents to WikiLeaks. I don’t understand why the president would feel special compassion for someone who endangered the lives of our troops, diplomats, intelligence officers and allies.”
Unknown, or at least not divulged, was the retribution wrought against Afghans and Iraqis who had cooperated with the U.S. and whose identities were revealed in the documents.
Understandably, military and intelligence communities were incensed by Obama’s decision. So much sympathy for Manning had accrued not as a purported whistleblower of military secrets but from the fact that, within 24 hours of the 2013 sentencing, Manning announced her intention to live as a woman and request hormone therapy to begin gender transition. Two very distinct issues — her guilt, her gender dysphoria — were conflated, as she began serving her sentence in an all-male military prison as a transgender woman.
The complexities were overwhelming for the army. Yet, following two suicide attempts, the army has been providing transitioning treatment, including hormone therapy. If, as expected, Manning is dishonourably discharged, she will lose benefits entitlement and won’t be able to continue transitioning at any military medical treatment facility.
Obama’s commutation does not change the verdict. It isn’t a pardon.
Shakespeare wrote: “The quality of mercy is not strain’d.”
But seven years for the biggest secrets leak in history, by a soldier who’d sworn a military oath to protect American security, strains compassion and clemency. Rosie DiManno usually appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.