Chelsea Manning's Emotional Letter of Thanks to Her Fellow Inmates

by Nomad

In January this year, President Barack Obama commuted the 35-year sentence of Chelsea Manning Under the President's order, Manning's sentence will expire on May 17, 2017.
As a soldier in the US military, Chelsea Manning, (formerly known as Bradley) was court-martialed for leaking secret military and government documents to WikiLeaks.

His release will hopefully bring to a close a sorry chapter for whistleblowers around the world. Given the current administration's attitude on hunting and eliminating leakers, the Manning saga is especially troubling.

Leaks

The material leaked by Manning included the Baghdad airstrike video "Collateral Murder", which showed two American helicopters firing on a group of 10 men in the Amin District of Baghdad. As Wikipedia notes:

Two were Reuters employees there to photograph an American Humvee under attack by the Mahdi Army. Pilots mistook their cameras for weapons. The helicopters also fired on a van, targeted earlier by one helicopter, that had stopped to help wounded members of the first group. Two children in the van were wounded, and their father was killed.

Manning was also responsible for the "Cablegate" leak of 251,287 State Department cables, written by 271 American embassies and consulates in 180 countries, dated December 1966 to February 2010. The leaks, which revealed the private thoughts of those handling international relations, were considered at the time to be damaging to America's international image. Here is a top ten list of bombshells found in the leaked documents.

In his testimony before the court, Manning apologized for his actions saying

"I am sorry that my actions hurt people. I'm sorry that they hurt the United States. I am sorry for the unintended consequences of my actions. When I made these decisions I believed I was going to help people, not hurt people. ... At the time of my decisions, I was dealing with a lot of issues."

Chelsea Manning, Dianne Feinstein and the Far Right's Magic "T" Word

by Nomad

Formerly known as Bradley, Chelsea Manning turned 27 years old earlier this month. He really doesn't have a lot to celebrate. Without a presidential pardon, the military whistle-blower who was convicted on 20 of 22 counts cannot expect to be a free person until he reaches the age of 63.

His crime is familiar to all of us now. He dared to disclose to the public that the US army, the CIA and Iraqi and Afghan forces committed human rights violations.

That was something that Manning never denied. When investigations tracked him down, he admitted to sending Wiki Leaks more than 700,000 confidential files, including U.S. embassy cables, Guantanamo detainee profiles, and footage of airstrikes that killed civilians. 

Unlike many famous spies of the past, his rationale wasn't based on ideological support of America's enemy, like the Rosenbergs or Jonathan Jay Pollard, and it wasn't based on some financial motive, like John Anthony Walker, Jr. 

In many ways, Manning is a prisoner of conscience.