The aim of Wikileaks is to give the public access to a library of documents which would otherwise be shrouded in official secrecy. From war crimes to rigged elections to CIA cyberweapons, Wikileaks has amassed the largest repository of classified information now available to the public record. This feat has all been done under constant pressure and interference from intelligence agencies, media conglomerates and political factions. Crowdfunding restrictions, media smears and even the imprisoning of journalists have been used against the publishing organization. However Wikileaks has continued it’s work of vetting document caches in it’s attempt to expose corruption. The battle for public access to vital information has always been raging, and currently Wikileaks is leading the charge.
Since humanity began forming societal power structures a central problem emerged; how does the public keep the state’s power in check. Over this issue wars have been fought, populations have suffered and bloody revolutions have ensued. Corrupt hierarchies are able to stay in power with the public’s consent by controlling the societal narrative. This control comes in many forms and is by no means limited to:
-state run media organizations that parrot the message of the powerful
-seemingly independent media organizations that are actually bought and paid for
-secret classification of crimes under the guise of “National Security”
-manufactured events intended to sway public opinion.
Behind corruption of any large organization is evidence in the form of classified documents, digital communications or picture/videos. Any group or individual behind crimes or corruption will do whatever they can to keep evidence hidden, but when corruption grows so large and is systemic across an organization the numbers of individual people who are exposed to damning evidence grows. This is the where the fragility of corrupt systems lies. Most people privy to evidence of corruption are unwilling or unable to expose it to the public out of fear for their personal safety and consequences. Wikileaks lessens these dangers by providing a secure and anonymous avenue to leak the documents, then have them vetted for accuracy and released for the public record. This process has provided a formula for public accountability that has been unmatched in history.
Wikileaks boasts a pristine, 100% redaction free record of publishing. A badge of trust much needed in the current media environment. The documents are set up in searchable database, made to be a valuable tool for journalists seeking first hand documents. In order for a functioning society to live cohesively, the public must be informed. Wikileaks allows the world to see the most important information, that which the powerful don’t want the public to know. Below is just a few examples of Wikileaks’ releases.
Iraq and Afghanistan War Logs
Wikileaks first made a name for itself when in April 2010 a video showing an unprovoked attack by an Apache helicopter killing over a dozen Iraqi people and two Reuters journalists and wounding two young children who’s father was murdered after stopping to help the victims.
Below content is graphic.
The Iraq and Afghan War logs provide an incident by incident assessment of the two wars that dominated the first decade of the millienium. When examined closely the official civilian kill count has been underreported by the military. The logs also reveal human rights abuses by allied Iraqi personnel, from extrajudicial executions to rape to unwarranted torture, all of which was known up the US military chain of command but ignored under military order Frago 242. This order ended all investigations into human rights abuses by the allied Iraqi army before they could even be started.
Vault 7 Release
In Wikileaks largest release to date, they revealed the cyberweapons used by the CIA with accompanying source code. The disclosures showed how the CIA used known vulnerabilities in software such as Android OS, iOS, Google, Mozilla, and Opera to continuously exploit for surveillance uses. In addition to phones and computers, the CIA developed a program called “Weeping Angel” which infected and monitored smart TV’s microphone even while being off and able to remotely send back the data when connected to the internet again. One of the most striking documents from the release showed the CIA researching different ways to infect the operating systems of cars. No accompanying information for use of these programs were found but this opens up the possibility for undetectable assassinations. One can’t help but to connect this with the mysterious death of reporter Michael Hastings. Who according to communications with coworkers 12 hours before the crash wrote ”I’m onto a big story and need to go off the radar for a bit.”
Below is the crash footage.
OPCW Douma Reports
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has been the latest group to have compromising information revealed by Wikileaks. The OPCW in their mission statement says their aim is “..to achieve a world permanently free of chemical weapons and to contribute to international security and stability..” However in the recent chemical attack in Douma, Wikileaks reveals the OPCW engaging in destruction of evidence and legitimizing a staged attack in order to implicate the Syrian government. The following excerpt is from Wikileaks’ analysis of the event.
(Note: Wikileaks analysis in italics, OPCW communications in bold)
One of the documents is an e-mail exchange dated 27 and 28 February between members of the fact finding mission (FFM) deployed to Douma and the senior officials of the OPCW. It includes an e-mail from Sebastien Braha, Chief of Cabinet at the OPCW, where he instructs that an engineering report from Ian Henderson should be removed from the secure registry of the organisation:
“Please get this document out of DRA [Documents Registry Archive]… And please remove all traces, if any, of its delivery/storage/whatever in DRA”.
The main finding of Henderson, who inspected the sites in Douma and two cylinders that were found on the site of the alleged attack, was that they were more likely manually placed there than dropped from a plane or helicopter from considerable heights. His findings were omitted from the official final OPCW report on the Douma incident.
Another leaked document contains meetings minutes of an internal investigation.
“With respect to the consistency of the observed and reported symptoms of the alleged victims with possible exposure to chlorine gas or similar, the experts were conclusive in their statements that there was no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure”.
The OPCW team members wrote that the key “take-away message” from the meeting was
“that the symptoms observed were inconsistent with exposure to chlorine and no other obvious candidate chemical causing the symptoms could be identified”.
The OPCW’s official released report omitted the evidence that dismissed use of chlorine but actually endorsed the narrative of chlorine as the weapon used. Below is an excerpt from their public findings, which is inconsistent with the actual on the ground investigation.
“Regarding the alleged use of toxic chemicals as a weapon in Douma, the evaluation and analysis of all the above-referenced information gathered by the FFM provide reasonable grounds that the use of a toxic chemical as a weapon has taken place on 7 April 2018. This toxic chemical contained reactive chlorine. The toxic chemical was likely molecular chlorine.” OPCW 1 March 2019
The clear cover up of a crime scene and subsuquent false manufacturing of evidence, by what is supposed to be an independent truth seeking organization is precisely why the need for Wikileaks and the transparancey they bring is vital in today’s world. It is difficult to put into context the effect this faked chemical attack had during a time when the Western involvment in Syria was being called to be scaled back.
Julian Assange, through Wikileaks has created the most effective formula for public citizens to keep a check on those in power. He dedicated his life and talents to the public. He is currently in maximum security Belmarsh Prison in the UK, awaiting an extradition hearing that would bring him to America where he will be tried on 18 charges, 17 of them stemming from the Espionage Act of 1917 for the publishing of classified documents. If convicted he faces up to 170 years in prison. Not only is the freedom of an innocent man at stake, the fate of a truly free press is.
