19 Dec 2010 UPDATE: As if on cue, the Herald has released a series of diplomatic communiques that, on the face of it at least, are controversial. Whether they're controversial enough to change my overall opinion remains to be seen, but reading them will no doubt provide plenty of op-ed and confirm the suspicions of some conspiracy theorists.
Poor Bradley Manning, I knew him well.
How many www sentences now include the word ‘WikiLeaks’ as a proper noun? The website designed to secretly disseminate state secrets has blown the roof off international diplomatic relations and embarrassed the US State Department something rotten.
But the real hero isn’t the suave Julian Assange, WikiLeaks co-founder and runner-up to Time’s Person of the Year, it’s young Bradley Manning, who was the bored US Army private actually responsible for what is now called the leak of the century.
As 24-hour news networks obsess about Assange and his chances of extradition to Sweden to face sex offence allegations, Manning, already under arrest in the States, faces a fifty-year term with absolutely no chance of parole. They will quite literally lock him up and throw away the key.
Manning’s actions have exposed international diplomacy for what it so often is: meaningless observations by bored diplomats, often reflective of the diplomat’s own personal prejudices more than the Mission’s position on a matter. After all, the art of diplomacy is not taking a position on a matter.
What I’ve found so interesting is how unexciting many of the cables actually are. These diplomats could just as easily be sharing reports from Reuters or AP; more often than not, the cables merely confirm what we all suspected or already knew.
The news media.
But what of the Kiwi connection? Is there anything spectacular that we can attribute to our little South Pacific paradise? Or are Kiwi-specific cables released thus far very much like the leak’s overall flavour of “nothing too special to see here”?
Funnily enough, it’s not just our politicians wearing all of the flak. Some very well respected journalists’ names appear in the cables, thanks to a report from then US Ambassador to NZ, Bill McCormick, sent to Washington from Wellington in May 2006.
McCormick is reporting back on the success of the aptly titled “IV” programme. In his own words, “From our experience there are few programs (sic) that make as much impact on present and future decision-makers as the first-hand understanding gained through participation in the International Visitor (IV) program.”
To qualify for admission to the programme – where a participant is sent to the US and presumably fed State Department approved messages (maybe via IV?) – several things are first taken into account. The participant’s “open-mindedness”, their “field of influence” and “the multiplier effect of potential candidates” are all considered.
Successful candidates in New Zealand’s media include TVNZ’s chief political reporter, Guyon Espiner, Radio NZ’s Kathryn Ryan, and the Herald’s chief political reporter (and sister of National MP Jonathan Young), Audrey Young.
The politicians.
In other cables, McCormick describes National’s Gerry Brownlee as having “…the edge [of] an experienced street fighter.” In the same cable – from November 2006 – John Key is sold as a genuine rags-to-riches story; “…a very successful investment banker raised by his Austrian-Jewish Widowed mother in NZ state housing.” Also said of Key: “[he] is an admirer of the United States and friendly to Mission New Zealand…”
Helen Clark is described as a “micro-manager” who has, with the passage of time, become well disposed toward the US; someone who supports closer NZ-US cooperation, particularly as it affects New Zealand's corner of the Pacific and the sharing of intelligence. Of her visit to the US in March 2007, David Keegan noted “[The] visit provides us an opportunity to encourage her to stay the course and resist negative pressures from those in her party who prefer to keep us at arm’s length.”
In the same cable of early March 2007, Keegan rocks the boat by using Clark’s appointment of so-called “friendly” officials in key positions as evidence of her warming disposition. “[She] has appointed Warren Tucker as Director of the NZ Security Intelligence Service (NZ SIS), Bruce Ferguson as Director of the Government Communications Security Bureau, Roy Ferguson as NZ Ambassador to Washington, and John McKinnon as Secretary of Defence.”
As if to provide an example of how friendly these officials are, Keegan cites the example of Tucker who, soon after his arrival as Director of the NZ SIS, ordered them to house equipment “…needed to implement a possible HSPD-6 agreement with the US,” something they had resisted until his appointment to the top job.
Anything we didn't already know?
While the cables can hardly be described as revealing. They confirm what most informed commentators already knew: NZ is keen to develop a better relationship with the US while outwardly maintaining its status as an independent and principled diplomatic force; the country’s various political leaders vary little in their approach to the US, with both main parties supporting closer ties; and Kiwi journos are as susceptible to international lobbying efforts as they are domestic ones.
What’s clear is that this is only the surface of the almost quarter-million documents leaked - whether they are the most sensational remains to be seen – and that they have done irreparable damage to the US diplomatic machine, not so much because of what they say but because of what they reveal about US data collection methods and thinking. For that sin alone, Bradley Manning will be lucky to escape with his life.
