I am very disturbed with recent media leaks regarding highly classified information that has been released to the general public by the website WikiLeaks. On November 28, 2010, Julian Assange, founder of WikiLeaks released U.S Diplomatic Cables and U.S. State Department Documents, which disclose highly, classified information about our government infrastructure including confidential interactions and discussions about and with foreign leaders. I don’t understand what benefits the founder of WikiLinks expects to accomplish by releasing this information. It certainly will be detrimental to the relationships with foreign governments in that they may not be willing to share information and conduct candid conversations about foreign policy.
The question that I cannot seem to answer is… If a person releases this type of information while knowing the potential harm it can cause to many people, why does he still release it? Can this premeditation be considered a threat to national security? I believe it is. I also believe that it should be considered an attack on the United States and he should be considered in the same category as a terrorist.
Another very concerning subject is that WikiLeaks would not have this information had the United States maintained the proper security measures required of such highly classified information. Army Private Bradley Manning is the one who easily transferred this information without raising suspicion. I think that he should be charged with the highest penalties allowed for taking the information in the first place. I certainly feel that Julian Assange is ultimately to blame because when he was approached with this information he made the decision to disclose this information to the public without regard to the harm it could bring others.
It’s frightening to imagine that after 911, we are still a very vulnerable country.
