So claimed Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., in a statement to a New York CBS affiliate. The hundreds of thousands of documents released yesterday by WikiLeaks and a few of the world's largest newspapers put "American lives at risk all over the world," King stated. He also wants WikiLeaks officially labeled a terrorist organization by the State Department.
Does the leak undercut claims that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's isn't anti-American, but simply anti-war?
Until today, one could argue (unpersuasively) that Wikileaks isn’t so much anti-American as it is anti-war; releasing secret docs about Iraq and Afghanistan supposedly would speed an end to the conflicts, forcing a U.S. withdrawal and leaving Iraqis and Afghans to enjoy a thousand years of kite-flying, occupation-free peace, etc. That’s moronic, but it’s more or less in line with traditional leftist policy priorities. What’s the “anti-war” motive, though, in releasing a few hundred thousand diplomatic cables? Progressives are forever telling us that we need to rely less on Defense and more on State, and yet it sounds like today’s leak will do much greater damage to the latter than the previous leaks did to the former. Not only will it strain U.S. diplomatic relationships, but the paranoia it’ll engender among U.S. diplomats about future communiques being exposed will cripple their ability to be candid. In fact, depending upon how sensitive the revelations are and which countries they involve, Wikileaks is potentially increasing the risk of war in the Middle East, on the Korean peninsula, or who knows where else. As Glenn Reynolds likes to say: They’re not anti-war, they’re just on the other side.
Be sure to check out the scores of other posts on the topic, but come back and give us your thoughts.
