Cablegate

[saxitoxin]

This evening wikileaks will release 20,000 U.S. diplomatic cables that contain frank American discussions about the heads of their various subsidiary states.

Now the leaks have leaked ... the cover of tomorrow's Der Spiegel, which shows a variety of leaders captioned with brief U.S. intelligence services assessments of each. Frankly, I'm non-plussed. There doesn't seem to be anything particularly salacious so far.

French President Sarkozy: "The Emperor Without Clothes"
Italian PM Berlusconi: "Wild Parties"
FRG Chancellor Merkel: "rarely creative"
FRG Foreign Minister Westerwelle: "aggressive"
Afghani President Karzai: "paranoid"

[saxitoxin]

The Guardian has released some ...

Hilary Clinton ordered U.S. diplomats to gather credit card numbers, frequent flier numbers, fingerprints, optical scans, encryption codes and technical details of communications systems used by the British and French Security Council delegations so U.S. intelligence could begin hacking their computers and intercepting their communications.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/no ... -spying-un

[saxitoxin]

The State Department is warning Obama that Paraguay is supporting Al-Qaeda.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-emba ... nts/147040

[Timminz]

Is this just going to be another one of those things that seems like it should be a big deal, but gets shuffled away quietly, within a couple days?

[saxitoxin]

Obama orders U.S. intelligence to collect DNA samples and optical scans of African heads of state and transmit to Washington:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-emba ... nts/202678

[saxitoxin]

OK, I'm done. This is a bunch of tripe. The only interesting things are items like "French secretly support attack on Iran but can't say so due to domestic political considerations", "EU secretly supports attack on Iran but can't ...", "Saudi Arabia secretly supports attack on Iran", "Canada secretly supports attack on Iran", "Slovenia secretly supports attack on Iran", "[Insert Country] Secretly Supports Attack on Iran" etc.

This is clearly a planned leak of fictional material, with a few juicy "embarrassing" tidbits thrown-in for realism, to win-over naysayers who are against various aspects of foreign policy.

Wikileaks are either total NATO dupes or - as John Young has alleged - a massive CIA front operation.

[Commander9]

Haven't fully read the whole thing (nor that it's possible to read everything), but I have to say that from what I've read so far, I've at least been entertained.

[BigBallinStalin]

OK, I'm done. This is a bunch of tripe. The only interesting things are items like "French secretly support attack on Iran but can't say so due to domestic political considerations", "EU secretly supports attack on Iran but can't ...", "Saudi Arabia secretly supports attack on Iran", "Canada secretly supports attack on Iran", "Slovenia secretly supports attack on Iran", "[Insert Country] Secretly Supports Attack on Iran" etc.

This is clearly a planned leak of fictional material, with a few juicy "embarrassing" tidbits thrown-in for realism, to win-over naysayers who are against various aspects of foreign policy.

Wikileaks are either total NATO dupes or - as John Young has alleged - a massive CIA front operation.

I thought the US has been doing such things for awhile. Is this news?

BUT IT'S EVIDENCE.

Why would you call them a CIA front operation or NATO dupes? What does the CIA or the US itself really gain from releasing information that doesn't need to be released?

[BigBallinStalin]

By the way, does anyone have a good decryptor? =P

[saxitoxin]

The tone of the information seems to be 20% (minor) embarrassment, 80% inside perspective of a dangerous global reality that justifies an aggressive foreign policy. When released within the context of revealed or leaked information it takes on a credibility that would be lost via conventional methods of public disclosure when critics would be wont to presume it was PR spin or hype.

A more conspiratorial-minded person might even suggest Wikileaks is an elaborate U.S. honeypot operation. I won't go that far but it doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility ...

[Commander9]

The tone of the information seems to be 20% (minor) embarrassment, 80% inside perspective of a dangerous global reality that justifies an aggressive foreign policy. When released within the context of revealed or leaked information it takes on a credibility that would be lost via conventional methods of public disclosure when critics would be wont to presume it was PR spin or hype.

A more conspiratorial-minded person might even suggest Wikileaks is an elaborate U.S. honeypot operation. I won't go that far but it doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility ...

You must also remember that USA agencies have a lot of power, so if they would have really wanted to, they could have stopped the site and the leader...

Anyways, another fun one:

Clashes with Europe over human rights: American officials sharply warned Germany in 2007 not to enforce arrest warrants for Central Intelligence Agency officers involved in a bungled operation in which an innocent German citizen with the same name as a suspected militant was mistakenly kidnapped and held for months in Afghanistan. A senior American diplomat told a German official “that our intention was not to threaten Germany, but rather to urge that the German government weigh carefully at every step of the way the implications for relations with the U.S.”

[GabonX]

I disagree with your analysis Saxi, because from what I'm reading this leak may lead to allies in countries like Yemen facing serious consequences.

Even when they recount events that are already known, the cables offer remarkable details.

For instance, it has been previously reported that the Yemeni government has sought to cover up the American role in missile strikes against the local branch of Al Qaeda. But a cable’s fly-on-the-wall account of a January meeting between the Yemeni president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, and Gen. David H. Petraeus, then the American commander in the Middle East, is nonetheless breathtaking.

“We’ll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours,” Mr. Saleh said, according to the cable sent by the American ambassador, prompting Yemen’s deputy prime minister to “joke that he had just ‘lied’ by telling Parliament” that Yemeni forces had carried out the strikes.

Mr. Saleh, who at other times resisted American counterterrorism requests, was in a lighthearted mood. The authoritarian ruler of a conservative Muslim country, Mr. Saleh complains of smuggling from nearby Djibouti, but tells General Petraeus that his concerns are drugs and weapons, not whiskey, “provided it’s good whiskey.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/29/world ... anted=2&hp

[saxitoxin]

You must also remember that USA agencies have a lot of power, so if they would have really wanted to, they could have stopped the site and the leader...

That's a good point, C9. In looking at the wikileaks site right now I was struck that not a single item was classified above 'Secret.' I'm wondering how many people are legitimately submitting classified info to wikileaks, thinking they're leaking it, only to be whisked away several days later by the CIA operators who are on the receiving end of wikileaks.

I disagree with your analysis Saxi, because from what I'm reading this leak may lead to allies in countries like Yemen facing serious consequences.

That's a good observation, Gabby, and you may be right. Though, if I were going to leak information that - in the long run would help my foreign policy 5-year plan - I suppose I'd throw-in a few sacrificial lambs to make it as believable as possible. But ol' Sax is just spit-balling. It's just, if not more, likely that you're correct.