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Hands off Assange!
US imperialism's attempts to shut down Wikileaks must be defeated, argues Eddie Ford
Julian Assange, the founder and leading figurehead of Wikileaks, was on December 7 locked up in HMP Wandsworth - one of Britain’s most notoriously overcrowded and brutal prisons. Believed to be held in a vulnerable prisoners unit, primarily reserved for those convicted of crimes like rape or child sexual abuse, Assange was remanded in custody after being denied bail by Westminster magistrates court in connection with alleged “sex crimes” in Sweden.
His lack of a permanent address, having initially identified a post office box in Australia as his home, and “nomadic” lifestyle were cited by the judge as factors in denying him bail. Assange will come back to court for a full hearing on December 14. The suspicion, or fear, is that the British legal authorities will extradite him to Sweden - which issued a European arrest warrant for Assange on December 6 - and from there he will eventually be extradited to America, where he will face a gamut of espionage-related charges totally unconnected to the original allegations that led to his detention. Stitched-up like a kipper, you could say.
Of course, following the Wikileaks publication of 251,287 secret - and hugely embarrassing - US embassy cables, there has been a concerted effort to smear and vilify its central spokesperson. Self-evidently, this is part of a campaign by imperialism and its stooges in the corporate mass media to smother, mute and eventually close down Wikileaks - and, indeed, all other such independent outlets. This is not to resort to fanciful conspiracy theories, but rather just to state an obvious political reality, regardless of the swirling minutiae that surrounds these events or the exact nature of Assange’s character or conduct. Without doubt, the nature and timing of his arrest could not be more beneficial for imperialism and the political establishment as a whole - revenge at last?
So when Wikileaks released this enormous batch of diplomatic cables on November 28, it was immediately denounced by Hillary Clinton for launching a Pearl Harbour-like “attack on the international community” - that is, exposing the whole dirty business of clandestine diplomacy and state secrets that underpins imperialist-dominated international relations. Angry US officials declared that “criminal investigations” were ongoing against Wikileaks - there was even the suggestion that it be branded a “foreign terrorist organisation” and dealt with according. A viewpoint aggressively espoused by the crackpot, Sarah Palin, the former Republican vice-presidential candidate and Young Earth creationist, who demanded that Assange be “pursued with the same urgency we pursue al-Qa’eda and Taliban leaders”. Clearly, Julian Assange was becoming public enemy number one.
The fury directed against Wikileaks intensified when it published yet more revelations. Thus on December 6 it disclosed a US state department cable from February 2009 asking its officials around the world to update a list of key sites - the loss of which “could critically impact” upon its ability to act as the world’s policeman. This imperialist global supply chain or infrastructure includes undersea cables, key communication centres, ports, mineral resources, firms and businesses of “strategic importance” in countries all over the world, and so on. This list, it has to be noted, is not of military facilities - whether previously known or unknown. Therefore, for example, you will not find any mention of somewhere like Diego Garcia, the US military base built on land leased from the UK in the middle of the Indian Ocean, which has proved so critical for the recent conflict in Afghanistan. Rather you get to know about the network of cables that lie on the ocean bed - linking up the American continent across the Pacific Ocean to New Zealand, Australia and US allies in Asia. Similarly, with regards to the European coastline, it is the cables that reach from the UK and Ireland northwards and stretch across to the US and Canada that are supposedly a source of grave concern to the US government.
Interestingly, as Wikileaks makes clear, this concern extends to a long list of pharmaceutical and medical organisations in Europe that are deemed to be of “vital importance” - such as those who manufacture Tamiflu and typhoid vaccines in Switzerland, anti-snake bite venom in Italy, foot and mouth vaccines in the UK, and numerous drugs-making sites in Germany: indicating a considerable interest or concern about biological warfare.
Then the next day - maybe better to be hanged for a sheep than for a goat - Wikileaks released documents showing that in January of this year the US and Nato drew up plans (code-name ‘Eagle Guardian’) to extend its existing strategy of ‘defending’ Poland from any resurgent Russian threat by further incorporating the Baltic states into its military chain of command. In other words, revive the old cold war foreign policy of containment. The nine Nato divisions involved would be American, British, German and Polish, and the “expansion was formally submitted to allies for decision under a silence procedure” - which is to say that the military plans should not be discussed publicly, as that might lead to an “unnecessary increase” in tensions between Nato and Russia. Another cable quotes a senior Polish official hoping that his country would eventually receive fully operational missiles from the US, as opposed to what he called the “potted plants” they normally get.
‘Lives at risk’
Giving voice to imperialist dismay, the former UK foreign secretary, Sir Malcolm Rifkind, described Wikileaks’ decision to publish this new round of material as “verging on the criminal” - indeed, virtual treachery, responsible for putting “people’s lives at risk”. In its own defence, Wikileaks pointed out that specific details from the secret list, such as the actual names and locations of the key sites, had been carefully removed.
But, of course, that in no way diminished the seething resentment felt towards Wikileaks by the pro-imperialist establishment and its media. Even the ‘leftwing’ Guardian expressed its disapproval, obviously feeling that Wikileaks had just gone too far and violated the rules of the game. So we read that “without secret communication there could be no meaningful diplomacy and textured communication between countries”, which is why the paper sympathises with those who had argued “persuasively” that the US government “should openly use the law against Wikileaks and others rather than muscle” - brain, not brawn, is preferred, it seems - as “we work through the process democracies always go through” when confronted by new technology (December 8).
Hating the fact that its underhand diplomacy and political double-dealings were coming under a bright searchlight, elements within the imperialist elite clearly want to ‘take out’ Wikileaks. Hence on December 3, Wikileaks came under a massive and obviously well planned ‘distributed denial-of-service’ (DDOS) attacks - equivalent to jamming the switchboard by making near countless requests for information, effectively making the site inaccessible. However, identifying the actual source of such DDOS sabotage is notoriously difficult, because the attack itself is mounted by tens or hundreds of thousands of computers - or “bots” - that have been commandeered without their owners’ consent, through the use of a computer virus programmed for such a purpose. Hacking as the continuation of politics by other means.
But there are also thoroughly legal ways to pursue the same objective of silencing Wikileaks. So its website temporarily went down after being booted off by Amazon, which was hosting Wikileaks on its EC2 cloud computer network. Naturally, Amazon denied caving in to political pressure, declaring that its “terms of service” state you must “represent and warrant that you own or otherwise control all the rights to the content” - and that it was “clear that Wikileaks doesn’t own or otherwise control all the rights to classified content”. Then after quickly finding refuge with the EveryDNS web provider, it too pulled the plug - saying it had terminated services because the DDOS web attacks aimed against Wikileaks “threatened the stability of the EveryDNS.net infrastructure, which enabled access to almost 500,000 other websites”. In response, Julian Assange denounced the creeping “privatisation of state censorship” in the US.
However, undaunted, Wikileaks quickly relocated to the French server, OVH - even if that country’s industry minister, Éric Besson, belligerently called for it to be banned from all French servers. Purely coincidentally, of course, Wikileaks’ account with Swiss bank PostFinance was unilaterally terminated because Assange had “provided false information regarding his place of residence during the account opening process”.[1] You can’t just allow anybody to open an account, can you?
Persecution
Inevitably, there will be other legal and extra-legal efforts to bring Wikileaks tumbling down - but that is easier said than done, even with bureaucratic state power behind you. Exemplified by how Wikileaks Twitter page responded immediately to the crisis by publishing the site’s IP address and alerting people to the mirror sites that popped up quickly after ‘WikiLeaks.org’ went down - and to date there are over 500 Wikileaks mirrors.
To further defend itself, Wikileaks has created additional IP addresses - the raw information internet routers use to find content - and now has some 14 or more DNS servers. Even more significantly - power to the people - Wikileaks has released encrypted files containing all of the embassy cables, and copies of these encrypted files shared over peer-to-peer networks, especially those using BitTorrent. Meaning that there are potentially millions of ordinary people who have copies of the cables sitting on their hard drives. Try confiscating all of those, or throwing everyone into jail. Like the early Christian church, the more Wikileaks is persecuted, the bigger it seems to become - literally by the day, as more and more mirrors are created.
Despite everything then, Wikileaks lives on - even if Julian Assange himself currently finds himself incarcerated in a Wandsworth hell-hole. Needless to say, the details surrounding his “sex crimes” are highly murky, to put it mildly. James D Catlin, one of Assange’s many lawyer - and if anyone needs an army of lawyers permanently by his side, it is him - stated that the sex assault investigation into the Wikileaks founder is based upon claims that he did not use condoms during sex with two Swedish women - though it appears that in one case a condom broke during intercourse. Furthermore, Swedish prosecutors told AOL News last week that Assange was not actually wanted for rape - as has been widely reported - but for something under Swedish law that is called “sex by surprise” or “unexpected sex” (depending on your translation). So Assange, as things stand now, stands charged of having “molested” Miss A “in a way designed to violate her sexual integrity” and also of having “unprotected sex” with Miss W while she was asleep.
Curiously, the original prosecution against Assange was dropped by the Swedish authorities for lack of evidence and, even more curiously, one of his alleged victims has strong links to a CIA-financed, anti-Castro, feminist group - Las Damas de Blanco (the Ladies in White).[2] Catlin also observes that both women sent out numerous text messages and tweets “bragging” about having sex with Assange, never once mentioning any rape or sexual assault.
But, whatever occurred between Assange and these two Swedish woman, fully consensual sex or otherwise, communists steadfastly defend the principles of freedom of information and freedom of speech - so we say, hands off Wikileaks and no charges against Assange for espionage. We also demand that he be released from Wandsworth prison and freed from the threat of extradition to either Sweden or the US.
It is essential that the organisations of the working class take up these demands. Assange is targeted because of the particularly powerful and embarrassing nature, and sheer quantity, of the information released. But it is in the interests of the world’s peoples - and especially the international working class - that the dirty dealings of imperialism and of all states be thoroughly exposed. Once the workers’ movement regains its former strength - as it surely will - it is our parties, unions and organisations that will be at the receiving end. Defending the right to free information and its unfettered dissemination is in our interests.
Notes
I hope the sex assault charges are dealt with in a timely manner. It's pretty clear that the laying of the charges is political. The behaviour alleged is awful, but also very very common -- this is the only time I've heard any public figure getting into trouble for taking off a condom mid sex. It's wrong to do and I disapprove --- I be a child of the Safe Sex AIDS Generation ---
He may be safer in Swedish jail than elsewhere, so who the %$##*@! knows.
Please do sign the Avaaz petition: http://www.avaaz.org/en/wikileaks_pe...ddb856cca8e54c
Why are so many people hero worshipping this guy, hes a rich suit wearing flash asshole, and isnt exactly intent on peoples war is he.
I personally don't worship the guy, but come the fuck off it man. There are shades of grey in the world, not everybody (in fact, only a tiny minority today) advocate "people's war", etc, etc. If you take some naive puritanical stance then almost everyone is fucking evil and of zero use. Thankfully, this view is really only held by dip shit high-schoolers and the like.
Assange may not hold politics that we agree with, but he's doing a good thing. A hell of a lot more than you or I.
He may not be the brains behind the wikileaks operation, but he stepped up and is taking the brunt of Imperialism's pressure. He put his life on the line and he may well wind up facing death or a very long stay in a prison somewhere, before all is said and done.
If you can't see the value in what Assange and the entire wikileaks team is doing, or the grave sacrifices he and likely the rest (eventually) are making, you really do have your head so far up Mao or Hoxha's ass that you can't appreciate material reality anymore or recognize that apolitical people (or even people who hold views opposing our own) can still sway history in a progressive direction and accomplish great things.
The fact is, the monster that is US imperialism needs to be slayed, and while this may not fully accomplish that, it's doing a lot more to further that end than us bickering on a forum. Taking the entirety of the global situation in mind, now is an insanely important time in history and every little thing that can tip the scales is necessary.
I'd take a fucking Randroid that is actually doing something to destabilize the ruling system of the world to a lazy nit-picking internet denizen any day, thank you very much.
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
1) Because he's the human symbol for WikiLeaks, both to us and to the enemy.
2) Because he's willing to live or die by principles that many here respect.
3) Because of his fabulous blonde hair.
He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.
-Nietzsche
No, workers are revolutionary by their relationship to the means of production.
This guy is a freemarket, free press loved by liberals asshole, yeah its great imperialism has been embaressed, but im not arguing against that.
I am however saying this guy is not what hes made out to be on here, how many threads on this guy do we need.
I ALSO LOVE THE BLOND BANGS BABE
So somehow the only people that should ever be given any attention are workers now? Well, throw out your copy of Capital as well as your copy of Homage to Catalonia.
God fucking damn it, do I hate this workerism shit that people get into. There are plenty of reactionary workers, there are plenty of progressive intellectuals and petty-bourgeois people, and vice-versa. You can't just dismiss everyone that does not fit the ideal mold of a progressive communist vanguardist/whateverthefuck. It doesn't work that way.
1) You clearly don't read much of the "free press", do you?
2) Now, I consider the MSM to not be "free press" anyway, but since you used the term, I have to ask, what exactly do you have against the free press? I mean the actual concept.
3) Liberals pretty much oppose him as much as the right, hence the Obama administration's hatred of the guy. Hey, I hear that liberals like air though, maybe we should stop breathing it lest someone think we're not pure enough.
Also, just so you know (since you're really new here), this is the way this board is; something significant happens and many different threads are created during the period of time it's relevant, usually covering different aspects of said event. This is because real communists realize that history is an extremely complex interplay of events and intentions and deem such things worthy of review, not simple dismissal out-of-hand because x person or y organization doesn't fit some arbitrary standard.
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
Giving the forces of reaction the right to say their shit is betraying the workers, so there should be no "free press" for reactionaries.
How can someone have the right to an opinion that, if put in practice, will oppress and result in starving masses in the third world and oppression of workers worldwide?
dont they have the right to not have their would be oppressors spouting anti worker propoganda and genocidal visions of genocidal slavery for the third world peasentry and the rest of their bullshit ?
liberal, conservative, anne randers, all have no right to speak, as them doing so, is giving condonance and promoting capitalism, which kills millions and oppresses us all.
, one of his alleged victims has strong links to a CIA-financed, anti-Castro, feminist group - Las Damas de Blanco (the Ladies in White
These that noisy "peaceful" group in Cuba.If so they are a load of bullshit hypocrites siding with the CIA
I take that as you giving up on your earlier statements regarding Assange then.
Listen, in order for a new round of communist revolutions to happen, we have to win on the field of ideas as well as the battlefield. Therefor, given that in order for us to take power the right must be totally discredited, the only way their rhetoric could prove to destabilize a revolution (assuming they aren't calling for armed insurrection, or aiding in it's organization), is if we fail in implimenting policies that prove us to be correct. At that point, I fear, we would already have betrayed the revolution ourselves. Any decent revolutionary state would have to, by necessity, produce both a well-educated society of politically aware people and material gains that would be valued by said population. So, any decent government, especially if we're talking about a former Imperial power like the US that wouldn't be under the same pressures as, say, Cuba, would have nothing to fear, if they were doing their jobs.
Not to mention, lack of free press simply discredits the left in the eyes of more people, probably a lot more than the net effect of allowing varying viewpoints.
Not to mention, in the age of the internet, it is incredibly naive to think that such a thing can be done effectively anyway.
Not to mention, you make everyone on the left look like a fool and an authoritarian fetishist when you talk like this.
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
Also, I like how allowing idiots to talk without being sent to the gulags is betraying the workers, but forbidding them having access to information that you shouldn't be afraid of anyway, somehow is not. Yes, the rabble needs a paternal hand to protect them from themselves and their own inherent inability to see through bullshit!
*Edit*
Also, just who exactly gets to decide what is "reactionary"? Some hack buerocrat? Surely such power would never be used to silence actual leftists that the establishment is uncomfortable with!
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
Whilst it's wrong what is happening to Assange, Wikileaks is the bigger picture here and he can and should be sacrificed if it means Wikileaks can continue.
Anonymous are doing an excellent job, though with my personal details online I do worry about the consequences of cyber warfare.
how am i giving up on my earlier statements?
and yeah cos im not some anarkiddy who only occupies himself with liberal notion of free press and individualism, without thinking of the extremely oppressed virtual slaves in the third world.
The progressive role that Wikileaks plays lies in the fact that it publicises and confirms the claims of how corruption, oppression and imperialism are inherent to the system. Not by saying this directly, but by simply exposing the facts. The benefit of this is that it lends credence to what is normally only said by communists, anarchists and by those few left-intellectuals who have both an audience and credibility. Now, it is no longer something that is only said by the usual suspects, but supported by plain and bare facts.
Therefore it is no wonder that many US liberals (can't tell whether they're in the majority, though), far from "loving" Wikileaks and Assange, are absolutely shitting themselves and are tailing the neocons about how it's necessary to put Assange in a dark, deep hole, with or without trial. If there are any "progressive liberals" who support Assange, that's all for the better; it means they've finally gotten over the infantile Obama worship. Who knows what kind of steps they could take next?
As for Assange himself, I guess it was always kind of inevitable that he would turn into a red herring without wishing for it. He decided to be the one to go on record as a spokesman, and as a thanks for it, he has to live like a wanted man (think it's time to change my avatar again...). If he didn't do that, then who? Anyway, the downside is that now, instead of seriously discussing the leaks, people are preoccupied with the personal integrity of Assange, as if that has any bearing on the contents of the cables.
With that, the national security state has already gained more than they ever will should they decide to actually convict Assange; pretty shameful that some people on Revleft also spend more time joining in on the swiftboating of Assange.
What's the matter Lagerboy, afraid you might taste something?
Strong links? Really?
"I want to say sweet, silly things." - V.I Lenin
You're making wild extrapolations that are not only based on no information, but are wrong. This doesn't surprise me since you don't display much critical thinking ability and clearly don't believe the masses posses much at all.
I see that you can't respond to what I said so you simply decided to fling mud. I'm actually not an anarchist, I just posses a little of what I like to call "intelligence".
Also, you gave up on your original statements when you ignored everything I said about Assange but one relatively minor thing, and latched onto it in order to deflect that you couldn't, or wouldn't, rebut my other statements or back up your own argument. You're kind of doing the same thing now, by trying to fling insults, IE deflecting from the point that you have no actual argument.
Also, I don't know how or why you think I "don't think about the virtual slaves in the third world", but whatever bro, we can't all be super hardcore proletarian keyboard jockeys complaining about free press on the most open and free medium for exchanging information ever (LOL!)
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
wow you bigging your intelectual abilities up really gets you popular with working class people, you smug oh so smart ********
I never said I was the smartest person ever, but I got some wits about me. And you're just degenerating into a little mud-flinging idiot, who clearly displays no intelligence.
Also, for the record, I work 40+ hours a week and support myself, making minimum wage, so suck it, kiddo.
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
Also, you just proved my point again, by seizing on literally the least relevant thing that I said rather than actually backing up your "argument".
See, I'm not "bigging up" my intelligence, I'm just contrasting my adequate intelligence with your lack of said characteristic.
Edit:
Also, I'd like to point out that your insistence on protecting the masses from "dangerous" information won't make you too popular, either, seeing as it just makes you come off as a condescending and paternalistic asshole.
... To live – does it not mean to have indomitable faith in victory?
Homage to Catalonia, please tell me you're an anarchist trying to make us MLs and MLMs look bad.
It'll be interesting to see what comes of this charge against Assange, and what consequences it'll have on Wikileaks. Personally, I'm not sure much will come of this - it seems like a very poorly executed plan by the CIA and Interpol, so it's quite possible Assange will win his trial. Not sure what'll happen then... It's entirely possible they'll just try to get the media to stop talking about Assange or Wikileaks.
