"The hearing stopped for a short recess. During the recess, one of America's most well regarded whistleblowers, Daniel Ellsberg, who released the Pentagon Papers, approached Manning and put his hand on his shoulder. He said, "Hello Bradley Manning," and just as the generation gap between two major whistleblowers in U.S. history was about to be momentarily bridged, military police officers swarmed him and he was removed."
So goes it with our right as citizens to know what our government does in our name. The book also makes note of Ellsberg's distinction between what was revealed in the Pentagon Papers, and the "field level war crimes" documented in the WikiLeaks war logs.
Bradley Manning the Man
I have left this for last purposely. If there is one weakness in "Truth And Consequences: The U.S. vs. Bradley Manning," it is that the book (in the first section) describes Manning's history without making clear why that is relevant. It describes his family problems and sexual identity issues. I still do not know whether those things are important and suspect only Manning can explain that. It provides a context for blaming the army for the release, but doesn't tell us anything about Manning. How could it? No one is able to see Manning, much less interview him and get to know him. I think the book would have been stronger had it de-focused on this, and left Manning as he is to most of us: a figure in the distance who may possibly have done a very important thing.
The very beginning pages cite the Karen Silkwood case, whose death in the town that Manning was born in, thirteen years previous to Manning's birth, is used to frame the book's central question: "Crescent residents still argue about Silkwood today: hero or political malcontent?" By the end of the book, that Manning is a hero for our times is made clear. "Truth And Consequences: The U.S. vs. Bradley Manning" is an excellent and thoughtful account well worth reading.
This article originally appeared at scribillare.com
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