Wikileaks release of embassy cables

[SAS]

What's your view on this? BBC News - Wikileaks release of embassy cables reveals US concerns

 

[chipper]

i think

a) its totally irresponsible of the government to lose such documents their screening process for people with access to secret documents has obviously let them down.

b)i think sites such as wikileaks should excercise more restraint in what it releases. all this will do is heighten tensions between governments which is not what we need in this economical climate and especially with tensions between north and south korea and iran.

there isnt a government in the world that doesnt hold material like what has been leaked they are held for viewing between that nations top officials to assess a countrys current state and threat level and whether people think its right or not you need to hold information on enemy and friendly nations.

you cant tell your neighbours exactly what you think of them you have to play nice or nothing gets accomplished the US might hate iran but its got to be objective and think of the bigger picture.

i seriously condemn what wikileaks has done here now is just not the right time to release information like this.

 

[Tom]

You don't actually believe that the countries involved will be surprised at anything these documents contain, do you?

 

[TdC]

tbh the only thing the US has against it is their internal security being compromised. any country that gets up on their hind legs to accuse them of anything is guilty of extreme hipprocracy.

ofc that will not hinder certain countries from doing it anyway, and I bet there are some juicy things in there. perhaps the release will cause people in the world to open their eyes to the fact that red is not so red and blue not so blue. shades of grey everywhere, plans within plans.

anyway, back to my vino and database programming...

 

[rynnor]

Good old wikileaks - to those who raise security concerns I say phaugh

Thats the instant condemnation of anything the state doesnt like - I cant see this will do any harm other than a lot of embarassment.

Anyone found out what the UK royal was doing and which one it was?

 

[Mabs]

its fucking pathetic

its the fact they dont want the people who vote for them to know how they run things, basically, i refuse to believe ANY country isnt full aware of what its neighbours etc actually -think- of it rather than what they put in the christmas card. there will be no suprises at all in actual fact, just people upset about being forced to admit it

and im glad someone did it, bout time these people were made to live with the consequences

 

[Zenith.UK]

Good old wikileaks - to those who raise security concerns I say phaugh

Thats the instant condemnation of anything the state doesnt like - I cant see this will do any harm other than a lot of embarassment.

Anyone found out what the UK royal was doing and which one it was?

 

[rynnor]

Apparently the UK has issued a DA-notice to the mainstream media in an attempt to censor it - hilariously out of date

 

[chipper]

what they think of us and what they say about us are two different things. theres plenty of people at work i think are absolute *****, but i dont say it cos it wouldnt solve any problems just create them. seriously its a very naieve to think this couldnt go beyond mere embarassment

take the saudi king urging to bomb iran you think iran is gonna laugh it off?

im sure a large portion of it will cause nothing but embarassment but you have to admit there could be some really dangerous documents that have been released

as said by TDC everything is not black or white theres a hell of a lot of grey inbetween. but its alot easier to deal with just black or white and not all the guff in between

i honestly hope it doesnt go beyond mere embarassment america could do with taking down a peg or two especially since obama took power. i just think you have to take in a bigger picture

 

[ECA]

Some of the early juicy stuff, courtesy of the beeb

Iran attempting to adapt North Korean rockets for use as long-range missiles
Corruption within the Afghan government, with concerns heightened when a senior official was found to be carrying more than $50m in cash on a foreign trip

Bargaining to empty the Guantanamo Bay prison camp - including Slovenian diplomats being told to take in a freed prisoner if they wanted to secure a meeting with President Barack Obama

Germany being warned in 2007 not to enforce arrest warrants for US Central Intelligence Agency officers involved in an operation in which an innocent German citizen with the same name as a suspected militant was abducted and held in Afghanistan
US officials being instructed to spy on the UN's leadership by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

The very close relationship between Russian PM Vladimir Putin and his Italian counterpart Silvio Berlusconi

Alleged links between the Russian government and organised crime

Yemen's president talking to then US Mid-East commander General David Petraeus about attacks on Yemeni al-Qaeda bases and saying: "We'll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours"

Faltering US attempts to prevent Syria from supplying arms to Hezbollah in Lebanon

http://cablegate.wikileaks.org/ for direct access to the data.

 

[rynnor]

seriously its a very naieve to think this couldnt go beyond mere embarassment

All the major powers have their own intelligence gathering activities and tbh what I have seen so far seems pretty trivial if a bit embarassing to have aired.

You think Iran didnt know that Saudi didnt like it? Was there anyone on the planet who didnt realise the money for international terrorism mostly came from Saudi?

Some of it is just pure gossip - I have yet to see anything serious but there are many things that the public was not meant to know - like Iran posessing powerfull long range (2000 miles) missiles, UK involvment in US rendition flights etc. etc.

 

[ECA]

• Allegations that Russia and its intelligence agencies are using mafia bosses to carry out criminal operations, with one cable reporting that the relationship is so close that the country has become a "virtual mafia state".

Who didn't know that already? All the oligarch billionaires are ex -FSB mates of Putin, and so are most regional governors.

 

[rynnor]

Here's an interesting UK one - report of a UK company supplying Iran with materials for its nuclear program...

Cable Viewer

 

[Yaka]

tbh i think wiki leaks are doing the right thing, so much crap reported in the media and goverments

and the yanks have got too much arse licking to do now:lol:

 

[ECA]

The stuff about Gadaffi is fucking awesome

Cable Viewer

 

[Raven]

My only problem with it is that it also releases names of informants, which will clearly put their lives at risk.

Other than that I will be very interested to read some of the more juicy bits that no doubt come out over the next few days.

And lol at the DA-notice, have they not heard of the internet? Who the fuck gets their (real) news from mainstream media these days?

 

[cHodAX]

4 blonde Ukrainian fluffers, erm I mean nurses. Good lad.

 

[Chilly]

Gadaffi = lad

 

[mr.Blacky]

I think it is stupid.
Yes nothing surprising but most of the the people they are talking about are in power in their country. We all have to deal with their actions.

Would anyone say to a mad idiot on the street that they are a mad idiot?

 

[Roo Stercogburn]

I wonder how much disinformation is in there hidden amongst the more newsworthy items.

 

[ECA]

The next big leak should be some good shit.
WikiLeaks plans to release a U.S. bank's documents | Reuters

Julian Assange declined in an interview with Forbes to identify the bank, but he said that he expected that the disclosures, which follow his group's release of U.S. military and diplomatic documents, would lead to investigations.

"We have one related to a bank coming up, that's a megaleak. It's not as big a scale as the Iraq material, but it's either tens or hundreds of thousands of documents depending on how you define it," Assange said in the interview posted on the Forbes website.

He declined to identify the bank, describing it only as a major U.S. bank that is still in existence.

Asked what he wanted to be the result of the disclosure, he replied: "I'm not sure. It will give a true and representative insight into how banks behave at the executive level in a way that will stimulate investigations and reforms, I presume."

Imo, wikileaks is doing the job that the press gave up doing 10-20 years ago.
( Mainly because everyone now is just fulfilling copy quotas so doing actual journalism is too fucking expensive ).

 

[Ormorof]

I wonder how much disinformation is in there hidden amongst the more newsworthy items.

im glad im not the only cynical one!

like the stuff about N Korea, how convenient that they have quotes of China leadership saying they are angry and frustrated, ready to support a unified S Korea

it may be true, it may not be true, but however much they deny it will the crazies in N Korea believe them?

 

[TdC]

Imo, wikileaks is doing the job that the press gave up doing 10-20 years ago.
( Mainly because everyone now is just fulfilling copy quotas so doing actual journalism is too fucking expensive ).

this tbh.

ofc, the obvious downside is to drive the bad shit even more underground. having an awesome watchdog only makes it harder to do wrong, not easier to do right.

tbh it makes me extremely sad when I feel that the view of party concerned is not as much an immoral, unethical or illegal act being wrong but getting caught at it that is wrong. as long as you don't get caught...you're the man.

 

[ECA]

Pretty interesting interview with Assange:

YouTube - Julian Assange: Why the world needs WikiLeaks

 

[caLLous]

Is wikileaks down for anyone else?

 

[Shagrat]

I see now this new stuff is hitting the internet, Assange has been flagged up on Interpols red list, wanted for "non-consensual sex" with 2 separate women in Sweden.

The same charges that appeared earlier this year and werent really substantiated in any way.


smear campaign?

 

[Shagrat]

and yeah it seems to be down.

another DDOS attack? theyve been hit by a couple recently, originating out of eastern europe "apparently".

 

[Chilly]

nah they got booted off amazon EC2 in the US (lol finally) and their DNS might have been a fruity for a while, they should be back.

 

[ECA]

Details of the "rape" charges against Assange.

Julian Assange's rape case: is Sweden just making it up? Julian Assange's former lawyer writes for Crikey | Crikey

tldr version, both girls were bragging to their friends via text/twitter and only when they found out he was shagging them both did they go to the police to complain - while texting each other to discuss how they could get the most money from the newspapers for the story.

 

[Ctuchik]

well, apparently SOMEONE wants that page to stay down.

and paypal have scrapped their donation page to...