Jeff Byrne

    “AN ambassador is an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.”

    — Sir Henry Wotton, 1568-1939.

    Quite a sweeping statement from Sir Henry which is more likely to have been true in his day than the present. Which makes all the hoo-ha about the publication of diplomatic cables on WikiLeaks seem even more ridiculous.

    WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, has been publicly lynched by rabid American conservatives who lean so far to the right they merely go round in circles as they try to discredit anyone who has an opposite opinion.

    Assange has been condemned as a spy, traitor, terrorist and a raft of other accusations by politicians and the dependable ultra conservative pundits. It has reached the point of hysteria with calls for Assange to be “executed.” No trial. He’s guilty.

    But, if we rise above the hysteria what do we find? Assange is not the whistleblower here. Bradley Manning is safely locked up at a military base in Virginia, the United States, accused of passing more than 250,000 diplomatic cables to WikiLeaks which then passed them on to some of the world’s most influential newspapers. The United States would do well to remember that no one forced these newspapers to publish the cables. They could have been ignored if they were found to be “un-newsworthy.”

    And just what has been learned? Not much more than was already known — or suspected — apart from gossip and thinking aloud by many who have probably learned now to keep private thoughts private. The outrage expressed over these leaks has more to do with national embarrassment than national security. Indeed, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has denied the cables were having any effect on U.S. foreign policy. They were simply “embarrassing” and “awkward.”

    But, having said that, diplomats will probably be a little more careful about where they leave evidence of their DNA from now on.

    What we do have here is freedom of speech in the raw. If these documents were so secret, why was Private Manning able to access them so easily? One would have thought that if this exposed information was such a threat to national security, they would have been inaccessible. Public corporations, too, have their secrets but I doubt their systems would be as easy to penetrate as the U.S. State Department’s which most people would have thought were impenetrable. Or was it just that these cables were just not considered that confidential. With at least 3 million people having access (including Private Manning).

    What we have learned from all this is a little more about how some governments work. Or don’t work. The rights and wrongs of Assange’s decision to place all out there for the world to see will be a continuing subject for debate well into the future.

    But, we must all remember that the leaks came from a 23-year-old U.S. Army intelligence officer which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said “tore at the fabric of government.” Rubbish! The only thing torn was a few inflated egos and the reputations of a few who should have known better.

    No law has been broken — national or international. Assange is facing accusations of sexual assault in Sweden which were earlier thrown out of court. That Interpol has now issued an alert for Assange could indicate that there is some tweaking going on behind the scenes by shadowy people who have not been above bringing down governments in the past.

    Sanity needs to prevail. As George Orwell prophetically said: “In a time of universal deceit, [uttering] the truth is a revolutionary act.”

    It seems that time has arrived.

    (The author is a Shenzhen Daily senior copy editor and writer.)