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WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

nytimes.com

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Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#231

Post by _djo_ »

kolektiv wrote: post #227
berntb wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider this: How many (sober) politicians will now have an open heart discussion with an US diplomatic official, which really couldn't reach his own voters/subjects? Without being that knowledgeable about diplomacy internals, that should be worse than most any scandal.

If politicians no longer feel comfortable stating opinions or plans which would be unacceptable to the electorate and/or their own voters, I for one don't feel that's entirely bad. I'm pretty much in favour of politicians being open about their plans and principles.

It's not only about their own populations, it will also have a detrimental effect on world leaders' willingness to discuss other countries, especially their neighbours, with US diplomats.

The end result of the Wikileaks cable dump is that it's going to make it much more difficult for American diplomats to engage in calm, rational diplomacy behind closed doors with most of the world's countries. That may bring immeasurable harm to America's foreign policy and make it harder to maintain a peaceful and stable international system.

I don't believe this leak was necessary or in the best interest of most of the world's people.

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#232

Post by skore »

zemaj wrote: post #195

It seems to me that Wikileaks is disruptive to Governments in the way that Napster was disruptive to the Music Industry. While Wikileaks may not survive in the mid term, I believe what it represents may have far reaching, long term consequences. The internet has democratised information to the point that an unhappy individual with mid level trust in an organisation can expose the organisation's "sensitive" informatio…

> but I do think we're in for an interesting decade

Very much agree with this. Every time I see what Assange and Wikileaks are doing, I cannot help but think: "Hey, looks like this decade just got a whole hell lot more interesting".

The biggest challenge right now is how the sheer amount of information and the responsibility of having access to it will change our society. Many of those in the "there is a reason for all this secrecy" camp border on blissful ignorance and while I disagree with them, there is something to be said for the human desire for just that.

So, to me, the most interesting thing is not that all this information sharing is happening, but whether or not the people will be up to the challenge.

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#233

Post by wslh »

zemaj wrote: post #195

It seems to me that Wikileaks is disruptive to Governments in the way that Napster was disruptive to the Music Industry. While Wikileaks may not survive in the mid term, I believe what it represents may have far reaching, long term consequences. The internet has democratised information to the point that an unhappy individual with mid level trust in an organisation can expose the organisation's "sensitive" informatio…

I don't think so. WikiLeaks is mainly targetting US because their infrastructure and their culture enables the society to uncover this kind of activities.

I am waiting WikiLeaks for the other hundreds of countries around the globe.

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#234

Post by shrikant »

nostrademons wrote: post #19

Is there a torrent anywhere with the actual text of the cables? Wikileaks itself is being DDOSed, and none of the news sites are reprinting anything but summaries.

Is this what you were looking for? - http://cablegate.wikileaks.org/static/cablegate-201011290900...

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#235

Post by [deleted] »

zemaj wrote: post #195

It seems to me that Wikileaks is disruptive to Governments in the way that Napster was disruptive to the Music Industry. While Wikileaks may not survive in the mid term, I believe what it represents may have far reaching, long term consequences. The internet has democratised information to the point that an unhappy individual with mid level trust in an organisation can expose the organisation's "sensitive" informatio…

[deleted]

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#236

Post by spot »

aneth wrote: post #194
bcroesch wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was struck by a pretty similar sentiment (and was somewhat surprised by it). Maybe more negative pieces will subsequently come out, but I was surprised to find myself thinking that some of the leaks may actually be helpful in producing a unified, multi-state agreement on how to approach the situation in Iran. I couldn't believe that it was actually other countries asking the US to bomb Iran.

And the fact that some of our most secret communications support that we are not out to destroy Ahmadinejad could be the most powerful weapon we have to actually undermine him. I expect in the future, there will be calculated "secret leaks" to Wikileaks - who knows - these may be just that.

FYI, none of the most secret communications were leaked.

This was just one layer of an onion.

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#237

Post by blaines »

wslh wrote: post #233
zemaj wrote: post #195

It seems to me that Wikileaks is disruptive to Governments in the way that Napster was disruptive to the Music Industry. While Wikileaks may not survive in the mid term, I believe what it represents may have far reaching, long term consequences. The internet has democratised information to the point that an unhappy individual with mid level trust in an organisation can expose the organisation's "sensitive" informatio…

I don't think so. WikiLeaks is mainly targetting US because their infrastructure and their culture enables the society to uncover this kind of activities. I am waiting WikiLeaks for the other hundreds of countries around the globe.

The front page has articles in various languages from many countries... http://mirror.wikileaks.info/

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#238

Post by zephyrfalcon »

sdcfvbnjkllkj wrote: post #187
zephyrfalcon wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Why is it surprising? America can't go against every one who doesn't agree with them. It needs to weigh its options carefully and intelligently. The mere reason that Hugo Chavez is still in power testifies to this fact." In this post-cold war world, he might be less important, so I would expect there would be less of an effort to oust him. The US does have, shall we say, a bit of a track record of unseating governme…

Actually it has a track record of failing embarrassingly to oust governments it doesn't like, cuba, angola, france ...

Agreed, they haven't always been successful. I wasn't aware that they tried to replace France's government though...

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#239

Post by motters »

zemaj wrote: post #195

It seems to me that Wikileaks is disruptive to Governments in the way that Napster was disruptive to the Music Industry. While Wikileaks may not survive in the mid term, I believe what it represents may have far reaching, long term consequences. The internet has democratised information to the point that an unhappy individual with mid level trust in an organisation can expose the organisation's "sensitive" informatio…

It's also a function of the transition from paper based storage to primarily electronic storage of documents - something which has only occurred in most organisations within the last 10-15 years.

Probably governments will try to tighten up their security in response to the Wikileaks, and I'm anticipating more internet authoritarianism such as government sanctioned permits for bloggers or people running web servers.

Re: WikiLeaks Archive — Cables Uncloak U.S. Diplomacy

#240

Post by jwhite »

aneth wrote: post #225
glenstein wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being kidnapped, flown to a prison for five months and possibly tortured, possibly sodomized is more than a "mistake." And merely admitting to having committed a human rights violation is not a substitute for following due process of law. Threatening a country with "implications" for wanting to bring the people to justice who wrongfully detained one of their citizens does not make the United States look good. Plus th…

As helium said, my point is not that there is a perfect record. What is not there - a sinister plot to monopolize the world's oil, destroy Muslim society, or assassinate world leaders - is more important. That said, a broader point is in order - I don't think anyone expects perfect adherence to "international law" by the USA. Despite the weight of the phrase "international law," the actual concept is deeply ambiguous…

> I don't think anyone expects perfect adherence to "international law" by the USA.

> The phrase "violation of international law" tastes meaty, but it's just tofu.

Good and valid points, but mildly tongue-in-cheek my response to your first assertion is "I do!"

I'm not an American, but I deeply appreciate what America has done to move the whole world towards a system that values innate human rights, the rule of law, and representative democracy [1], so when America behaves in a way that contravenes its own publicly stated values I am genuinely disappointed -- even though America owes me nothing. I agree that "international law" can't be easily defined (and therefore can't be adhered to), and it is not always easy to judge the moral value of an act, particularly without the benefit of hindsight (one of the best known examples being the decision to use nuclear weapons on Japan), but there are other cases where it is clear. If America clearly acts against its values, it weakens its credibility when it tries to promote them to the rest of the world.

We can of course distinguish between America and Americans -- admitting mistakes and punishing those who commit them is the way that America can deal with them and keep its credibility with respect to its values in tact.

The case of the abduction of the German citizen seems on the surface to be a fairly clear case where America should allow due process in a friendly democracy to take its course. But perhaps there are other considerations that I don't know about... either way I'm grateful to wikileaks.

[1] However imperfect our democracies are, the current alternatives are a lot worse, and I'd prefer to be optimistic that we'll discover even better methods to govern people in future.

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