To Leak or Not To Leak, That's The Question !

I suppose George Orwell must be having a blast in his grave. What has dominated the news over the last week, was Little Brother finally standing up to Big Brother and saying: "Now let's see, what have we got here, huh ?"

Julian Assange must have been on the cover of practically any magazine and newspaper from here to the moon and beyond and his "WikiLeaks"-website did what was before deemed impossible: beat Steve Jobs this time around when it came to creating buzz. Consider this figure: the site that is under heavy attack from hackers of all sorts and is now basically roaming the Web from host to host, is mirrored on over 1200 other sites, neatly indexed here. Little Brother is not likely to make it's retreat any time soon, it would seem.

Illustration by Rob Beschizza via boingboing

The leaked cables from the American diplomatic corps induced a few good laughs, a few raised eyebrows and so far a minority of real "wow"s (and even those: are we really - I mean: REALLY - surprised American diplomats are instructed to spy on senior U.N. Staff, Ban Ki Moon included, and if possible gather any biometric data they can get their hands on ?). At least, that's what the mainstream media is feeding us and I haven't gone into much further detail on the exact content of the cables themselves. Maybe there is much more incriminating stuff, maybe there is more that still has to surface from the WikiLeaks document vaults, but so far, I think the late French President François Mitterrand would have taken recourse to his famous little phrase again (when asked by the press to confirm whether he had an extra-marital daughter by the name of Mazarine): "Et quoi alors ... ?" End of the story. (Eat your heart out, Bill Clinton !)

Yet, "Cablegate" is already whipping up a growing storm (I wouldn't want to classify it as a hurricane yet, for we still do not know the complete fall-out or what is to follow still). The US State Department is already reshuffling it's diplomatic personnel, starting with those that are named in the cables. I suspect we'll see more actions coming up as a result, however I don't see a new world order emerging in the wake of the publications as some seem to think or hope. The question we should ask ourselves, is whether "Cablegate" is serving the purpose of making this world a better place, of increasing transparency and of holding stakeholders responsible. For many people, the answer is an unconditional "yes, of course". For Big Brother Government ... well, I think the current witch-hunt for Assange says it all: Big Brother is NOT amused ... at all. Good thing ! But do the pro's outweigh the contra's ? Here's my take.

I personally already get a bit nervous from the starting point. We are indeed talking about leaks, meaning per definition something that isn't meant to exist, to be there. These documents were not meant to be seen by the wide public, at least not in any near future, so someone had to go through a lot of hassle (and personal risk) to get them out of wherever they were stored. Now why is that someone taking such an action against such formidable odds, and now I am not strictly speaking about Cablegate (next release promised by Assange is on a major American Bank, so we'll be in a whole different ballpark then. That is: if the poor guy survives Interpol that suddenly shows interest in sexual assault, Swedish Justice, UK police and the wrath of the Holy American Inquisition) ? I am always inclined to think that human behavior is basically driven by selfish motives. I know the exceptions are numerous and easy to pinpoint, but for a fairly big part of what is called the human race, I think my premise stands. So if someone is coming to me with a set of documents which may contain incriminating evidence against any organisation, my first reaction would be to think: "What is in it for this person, making him do this ?". His reasons may have resulted in him selecting a very particular part of a wider set of documents that serves his particular purposes. Or it may be that he wants to  cast a shadow on one party in order to benefit another one ... that pays more ? I mean: leaks may serve a purpose for the better, but they are never innocent, for often it will be one or few individuals, by means of the leak, silently trying to impose their will or vision on a crowd who's typically not in the know. So if we are seeing the start of a movement that will flatly condone and hail any leak on any big organisation, I'm sceptic whether this is a sound foundation to work from. I'm not overly concerned (yet) with Assange's brainchild, for WikiLeaks in general seems to be doing it's due diligence on the documents before spreading them, but the next kid on the block may be tempted to be less scrupulous already, drooling at the thought of the media coverage and visibility it will get, and I don't even want to think what the next baby on the block might look like.

Then there is the issue of spin. Depending on who gets to read it, a message will often be open to interpretation in different ways. There is no need to put a spin on a message that remains hidden in the back-offices of Big Government in Washington. There is always a need to do so, for any party involved, for any message that finds it's way out of those back-offices. And from the "Cablegate" documents, I am particularly concerned with those on the Middle-East. WikiLeaks has now unmasked some of the heads of state in that region as having secretly insisted with the U.S. Government to retaliate against the nuclear "insubordination" of Iran. Forget Israël, Iran is the threat. So we are lead to think: "Hah, those hypocrites, they fear their own muslim brothers more than the Jews". However, if we had been in the Bush-era still, I suppose the champagne supply to Washington would have noticed a remarkable hausse for finally, here is the perfect excuse to go and bomb those ayatollahs into oblivion: even Iran's neighbours, even if they can't say it out loud, are begging us to do it ! Now suppose those cables had not been leaked, nobody would have been "officially" aware of the stance of those kings and presidents and then of course the U.S. couldn't have attributed any such statements to them since they are considered allies to a certain level. Those cables are a rallying cry for war against Iran and those who want to oppose the idea will now have an even tougher time to counter the arguments, since the support of the hard-line just got so much stronger.

A further related point, to which my attention was drawn in an interview with Noam Chomsky, is that by releasing all this information on the top levels of government, it is, alongside with Big Government, deviating attention away from the reality in the street:

NOAM CHOMSKY: That essentially reinforces what I said before, that the main significance of the cables that are being released so far is what they tell us about Western leadership. So Hillary Clinton and Benjamin Netanyahu surely know of the careful polls of Arab public opinion. The Brookings Institute just a few months ago released extensive polls of what Arabs think about Iran. The results are rather striking. They show the Arab opinion holds that the major threat in the region is Israel -- that's 80. The second major threat is the United States -- that's 77. Iran is listed as a threat by 10%.
With regard to nuclear weapons, rather remarkably, a majority -- in fact, 57% say that the region would have a positive effect in the region if Iran had nuclear weapons. Now, these are not small numbers. 80, 77, say the U.S. and Israel are the major threat. 10 say Iran is the major threat. This may not be reported in the newspapers here -- it is in England -- but it's certainly familiar to the Israeli and U.S. governments, and to the ambassadors. But there is not a word about it anywhere. What that reveals is the profound hatred for democracy on the part of our political leadership and the Israeli political leadership. These things aren't even to be mentioned. This seeps its way all through the diplomatic service. The cables do not have any indication of that. 

Oops.
Okay, I concur with Chomsky that the cables thus uncover the cover-up of this reality by the western leadership, as he calls it, ... but only if you are aware of that reality from other sources. Meaning, the cables do not in themselves give you the right or total view. The cables themselves are putting already a spin on a reality that many at the top would prefer to be kept hidden and it is for us to strip it down again. Not an easy task indeed, if you ask me.

And then there is "Transparency". I bet God Almighty himself is jealous he didn't create that during the seven days he had at his disposal for Creation. What would we be without transparency ? WikiLeaks says it is offering up 250.000 documents for perusal. Hallelujah, Transparency brought to us on four wheels, drawn by a 2 and a 5. However, I think that in itself is an insane number. No-one, however interested he or she may be, is going to read all that, yet, a lot of that stuff will have obvious (or less obvious, but maybe not less important) links to each other in the frenzied folly of world politics. So what will happen ? Big Media will filter it for us so that it's easier to digest, in the process putting THEIR spin on it ... and we're back from where we came. I have my doubts that the release of all those classified documents is really going to represent a major breakthrough in transparency and holding governments accountable for their actions. Governments start wars, so they're good at it. First rule when you come under attack from the enemy: either run for your lives ... or dig yourself in. I suppose we'll be seeing a lot of digging going on in the foreseeable future, thus bringing in effect the exact opposite of what we were after.

So should we get rid of this new sort of "leak-journalism" altogether ? Not by any means.

We in the West pride ourselves on the fact that we have democratic institutions, that we live in democratic countries and yes, it's not me who is complaining about that. But let's look at the facts. After the nice show that is being made of elections, it's still a select group of people at the top who set out the lines. Where I live, with our six governments, it has been very much "en vogue" over the last rounds of elections -and I can assure you, we've had more than of our fair share of them- to put candidates on the lists who were telling us beforehand that, if they were elected, they wouldn't take up that mandate (for instance, because they were already elected in one of the other five governments) but who are simply there because they have the highest visibility within a certain Party and thus are useful for electoral marketing purposes. Have no doubt: some of those, notwithstanding the upfront warning, do get elected so you won't find me among the chorus chanting that the voter is always right. But that means that our electoral process shows the A-side, while the important things are going on on the B-side. That's an oversimplification of sorts, but I guess you know what I am hinting at. Therefore, it is good that some pressure is exerted on those in Big Government, or as Sean Connery put it to Wesley Snipes in "Rising Sun" (Philip Kaufman, 1993): "We're beating the grass to startle the snakes". WikiLeaks may have started to do just that. If "Cablegate", as well as the previous or the still to follow releases, is contributing to creating a mindset with those in command where, before taking action, they start asking themselves :"What if this gets known ?", then we're on the right track.

The Internet, by means of this sort of actions, may be growing into the sort of instrument that becomes the nightmare of corrupt governments worldwide. By virtue of it's easy and ubiquitous access, it is predestined to become just that and WikiLeaks is exploring it's possibilities at full throttle, leaving some of the implicated in uncomfortable positions gasping for breath. And for sure, there is much more work left to be done by this whistleblower, as basically, what we've seen so far is that the one blowing the whistle becomes the hunted while the target walks free. Bradley Manning, the intelligence analyst of the U.S Army in Iraq who leaked this video of a U.S. helicopter attack on a group of Iraqi civilians, killing several among whom two Reuters' journalists and injuring two children, is now being held in a Kuwait prison for leaking this information while the attackers still have to be charged and the Rules of Engagement for U.S soldiers have not been changed in any significant way. So yes, let's keep pushing the buttons, but let's do it in a responsible way.

Because, after all, it's a very thin line we are walking. I'm not with those wolves howling in the woods that every diplomat is a corrupt and treacherous creature. Diplomacy, in my view, is one of the very few instruments we have that can keep this world from sinking down in outright chaos and diplomacy is often what is still saving lives when the big industrial complexes and various lobby groups have decided that it wouldn't be bad for business to start a war. Halliburton, anyone ? The very essence of diplomacy is that it works in the background (for it's the only place where it can work, with too many over-sized ego's monopolizing the foreground) and I wouldn't want to see that entire machinery being destroyed. Also, the job was never meant for sissies, so let's get over it when they call each other a "nutcase" and move on. We've seen far worse things than that. Finally, one last thing to keep in mind: when Mao Zedong kicked off the "Four Pests Campaign" in 1958, he ordained all sparrows to be killed because they eat grain seeds and were considered bad for agricultural production. So the masses were mobilized to turn China's countryside into the noisiest place on earth, such that the sparrows had to constantly remain airborne, leading to them falling dead from the sky by the millions from sheer exhaustion. What followed, however, was an enormous increase in locusts and insects that destroyed the crops, leading to a nationwide famine, as there were no more sparrows to keep them from doing it. So let's be careful what we ask for, let's make sure we are not killing all the sparrows.

The famous "Chinese" curse "May you live in interesting times" is definitely working it's charm again these days. I prefer to keep a cautious attitude on what's going on now, though I do feel a certain sense of excitement that this is happening and that Little Brother is voicing some opposition to Big Brother. I tend to like equal playing fields, so as long as we don't forget to "check the checker", I'll be pleased to side with the underdog.

George, weren't you working on a sequel ?

Sincerely Yours.

The Case of World vs. Betancourt

It tends to get lonely at the top. Ask Ingrid Betancourt.

Just a mere two years ago, then probably the highest-profile hostage worldwide roughly at par with house-arrested Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar, Betancourt was embraced and lauded as a hero by the world when, as a result of "Operation Jaque" , she and fourteen others were rescued from the hands of her kidnappers of the FARC; now, two years later, that same world is coming down full force on her for having the audacity to require the Colombian State to pay roughly six million euro in damages to her and her family for the time she was held in captivity and for failing to protect her as a presidential candidate in 2002.

Let's get it over with: we all make some miscalculations in life and this is one truly seems epic in it's dimension, unless the implicit aim of Mrs. Betancourts' action was to commit political suicide in her homecountry, where in fact there was some speculation that after her release she might have another go at the presidency. I also find it hard to blame the Colombians that are now spitting her out because of her perceived ingratitude and hostility towards the government and army that saved her. Colombians have seen a lot of bad things happening in their scarred country and pity on a person of her standing, asking for money, is in rare supply. It's hard to judge her otherwise ... or is it ?

From a personal perspective, I wouldn't want to be in a position where I would have to judge someone who has been robbed of her liberty and dignity for a full six years, who has been tied to trees, humiliated and beaten. I invite anyone who has not gone through such an ordeal to step forward and explain how it feels and what it does to a person. Good luck to you and may the sound of my scorn be with you forever after. Therefore, more than by her claim, I am shocked by the mass of comments on newsreports that have been posted on the internet (such as here) and that are screaming murder, calling her a villain, suggesting she be returned into the hands of her FARC captors or worse ... by people who probably show signs of nervous breakdown when their computer is not responding within ten milliseconds after pushing a button.

Very revealing in many of the reports is also what is not being said, often more than what is being said and in which most of  the reports just echo each other.

I see two fundamental questions in this whole debate. First is whether Ingrid Betancourt, yes or no, as a Colombian citizen has the right to seek damage repair for what she suffered. Second is whether her claim that she was not sufficiently protected by the government when she was kidnapped makes sense or not. It needs to be said that I have never been any closer to Colombia than at a five-thousand miles distance, that I neither speak nor read Spanish, that I haven't studied the history and developed only very recently an interest in this amazingly disturbing country. Yet I still would like to voice my opinion based on the reports I have read and the reactions I have seen.

Let's start with the second issue. What happened on that 23rd of February 2002 ? Ingrid was running for president (admittedly as one of the lesser candidates for the "Oxygen Green"-Party) and had decided she wanted to visit San Vicente del Caguan  . This village was in the middle of what had been, till a few days before her arrival in the area, a so-called Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) where the Colombian government, then headed by president Andres Pastrana, was meeting with the leaders of the marxist FARC rebels to try to negotiate a peace agreement. Officially, in the DMZ there was a truce (reality seems to have sometimes been quite different). These negotiations, which had been going on at intervals over a period of almost three years, in the end didn't go anywhere and made president Pastrana decide to re-militarize the DMZ. This was what was happening when Ingrid Betancourt's campaign trail crossed the area, and as a result of the president's initiative, fighting in the area was flaring up again.

Several people in the military have laid down witness to the fact that several attempts were made to warn Ingrid to not enter the area because it was too dangerous. Strangely, what is missing in most of the articles that I have seen on the Web, is that the Mayor of San Vicente del Caguan, where most of the peace talks between the government and the FARC had taken place, was a member of the "Oxygen Green"-Party and, according to Wikipedia (the only source I found sofar that is mentioning this), at the time the only elected official of that Party in the entire country. So let me try to picture this: there is this town where for a prolonged period of time people from the highest government levels have been trying, through talks with the rebel factions, to make Colombia as a whole a safer place; this town, which has been the centerpoint of these discussions (to which Ingrid Betancourt at occasions had been part), is presided over by a fellow partymember of Ingrid ... and people would question why, on a campaign where she's aiming for the presidency of Colombia, she would want to go there ??? Either my information is not correct, or someone must be kidding me ...

The story could be even more interesting, though also this fact is only hinted at in very few of the articles I have read. It seems that at the time Pastrana himself was flying into San Vicente del Caguan, that Ingrid had asked him to hitch a ride on his plane and that the president refused because he had refused two other requests of other candidates before her. From a Pastrana perspective, I am not saying I can not understand that decision. For him, it might have been a matter of fair-play: either everybody or no-one. I have absolutely no view so far on the personal relation between these two politicians, and whether that might have played a role in denying Betancourt's request. What I do know is that for me Ingrid Betancourt had a legitimate reason to want to go to that place. One of the commenters, under the name Juancho Colmenares, on the excellent blog "Colombia Reports" (to which I am much indebted for writing this article) voices what I was thinking when digging into this story in a pretty accurate and colourful way:

If a man would do the same thing Ingrid did, it would be said that he is “macho” that he has “cojones” that he has his pants “well belted” that he is strong that he is an example of firm will

I think he is right. Let's compare for a moment to the previous US presidential election . What was McCain doing in Iraq during the campaign ? Had the GPS system on his bus gone bust ? Had he any voters over there to convince ? Could he have any impact on the situation there ? Don't think so. I bet the official explanation was that, as a candidate running for president, it was necessary to get in touch with the issues he would be facing as a president if he ever were to be elected and that it had to be done on the ground, instead of having a video-conference from Washington with the generals leading the operations in Iraq at that time. Truth is: seeing a guy walk a (suggested) mine-field without a bullet-proof vest (never mind the one hundred soldiers, the three Blackhawks and 2 Apache gunships that, unfortunately, didn't fit in the frame of the camera) is a great photo-op and is very, very macho. Cojones, yes. I didn't hear too much clamor about McCain's visit and never mind the money that must have been spent to get the guy there in conditions safe enough to make that bulletproof vest obsolete.

I wouldn't want to underestimate Ingrid Betancourt's ego. From what I've been reading in some comments, it seems it would almost require Saint-Peter's cathedral to fit in. I don't know, I haven't met the lady. Yet I believe she had a point in wanting to go and be at San Vicente at that time. She had only one "beacon" of her Party in the entire country to refer to and with the re-militarization of the area, life over there was bound to become much more unpleasant again. She had the right -I'll stop short from saying "the duty"- in my eyes to go and support the Mayor (and the citizens) of San Vicente del Cagaun  and tell them that with her as a president they wouldn't be forgotten and they would be taken care of. Yet the right to do that under as safe conditions as possible (meaning, by plane or helicopter) is her denied. She insists, notwithstanding the multiple warnings, and attempts to drive there by car, accompanied by her campaign manager Clara Rojas and some other people. About thirty miles into the danger zone, she gets stopped at a roadblock set up by the FARC, they recognize her and she and Clara get driven off into the jungle ... from where she won't emerge for another six years, thanks to  a risky operation set up by the government and the army: let me by all means not fail to stress that point again.

Based on this course of events, I think any government could at least take the trouble to do some introspection and consider whether it had done enough to protect the safety of anyone who was in the race to become the next president of Colombia. Sure, Ingrid Betancourt must have been aware of the danger in entering that area, but what I'm wondering is whether the situation there was really so much worse than in the rest of pre-Uribe Colombia (Alvaro Uribe Velez won the elections in 2002 and in the next eight years managed to make the country a much safer place). What is the image you are projecting when you fail to stand by your people who are in the crossfire ? Politics is a hard-ball game and it is played dirty. Ingrid, I have no doubt, had in the first place her own presidential cause in mind when she forged forward with her plan but I am sure any politician, worthy of that name, would have tried the same had he been in her shoes.

And then there is the other side to look at this: if the zone around San Vicente was really dangerous to the extent that no guarantee could be given that one would get out unharmed, wasn't it then the responsibility of those in charge to simply prohibit anyone from entering there? Under such circumstances, anyone, be it commoner or presidential candidate, is just a liability to those who have to manage the conflict on the ground.

No matter where Betancourt's claim might have gone had she not chosen to retract it of her own, it might be good for the government to at least spend a few moments on the question whether there is not some rationale in the claim and what should be done to avoid it from happening again. For this is not just Ingrid Betancourt's problem: it is one person turning into a colossal PR problem for the entire country for years on a row, as the world is watching and scratching it's head about how the hell in country C a presidential candidate can go missing for such a long time. And honey, shall we take the kids and spend our next holiday over there ? Naaah, don't think so, darling ... maybe in twenty years or so.

Now coming back to the first issue, whether Betancourt has the right, in a legal sense, to claim damages for her suffering. Interesting point again is that most of the articles seem to indicate that she had sued the State. Technically she didn't do that: she tried, through conciliation, to settle outside the Court. If her conciliation request would have resulted in a rejection, the next step could have been bringing a lawsuit against the State to Court, but as we know now, matters will never get to that point, as she retracted her claim. Being anything but an expert on Colombia and it's institutions myself, it is hard to judge whether, hypothetically speaking, her claim would have stood any chance. From what I read, the country has in place a victims law, which allows victims of illegal armed groups to claim reparation by the State. The government indeed seems to have paid repairs already in the past to kidnap victims who were considered to have not been adequately protected by the authorities.

The broader question is of course whether the government can be held liable for misdeeds it didn't commit. I would be inclined to answer no, but I certainly would not go as far as to turn down the responsibility towards the victims entirely. On an even broader level, I believe the society as a whole has a responsibility towards these victims, for an army of some ten thousand rebels can not continue to wreak havoc on an entire country of over forty million people -for decades now already- if that society is united in it's will to rid itself of them. I see it as the government's job to guide and steer society in such a direction that it will unconditionally cooperate to smoke out those festering elements, failing of which to reach such a result in the short term, as a stopgap solution it should try to repair as much as possible the harm done to whichever victim seeks it's help. The funds to do that could be organized as are the welfare and pension funds in most developed countries, meaning based on the solidarity-principle: the healthy contribute for the sick, the young for the old and when you get old yourself, you know someone of the new generation is paying to take care of you. That might rid us of this hypocritical cry that echoes from everywhere in those comments I've been reading: "Why should we pay for her with the tax-payers' money ?" Well, for one reason, because in a country like Colombia where the shadow of FARC, paramilitaries and narco-gangs still looms large, you could be next.

So was Betancourt's claim justified ? I think it was. Was it outrageous ? Probably. She admitted readily to that herself. But it would have been in the interest of everyone to have the proper institutions deal with her claim and either bring it down to reasonable proportions (but in this context, what is reasonable ? How much money is six lost years of your life worth ? Just for comparison reasons: I would be very interested to learn how much Brangelina are suing that magazine for that wrote they are discussing divorce. I think saying that we're possibly in the same order of magnitude might not be very far off the mark) or dismiss the request altogether based on such and such reasons strongly funded in the Law and constitutional rights.

By unilaterally retracting her claim when the voices of protest started shouting at her, Ingrid Betancourt may have done her fellow citizens that are still in captivity or will fall into rebel hands in the future, a great disservice, for the message has just gone out now that it is bad, outrageous even, to even dare to ask for compensation. Where the democractic instutions seem to have done a perfect job in preventing outgoing president Uribe to run for a third term (which would have been in violation of the Constitution) and thus allowed a (generally speaking) fair election process to take place, they seem to have failed in this case, silenced by the vox populi.

The morals of Ingrid Betancourt's action towards her saviors in the face of the massive effort and risk undertaken to restore her to freedom, may be questionable, but so is any effort that was taken to prevent this case from taking it's natural legal course through the appropriate institutions.

Pity. Really pity.

Sincerely Yours,