Assange has guts! Something few people nowadays have. He stirred the pot. It is about time the truth's are told. The useful citizens are the ones that are paying the useless politicians for them to tell us lies? This is a wake up call for true democracy which has become more and more distant in so called first world countries. What are governments so concerned about? If they knew the game was clean they wouldn't worry, would they?
All politicians abuse power and citizens shouldn't and cannot tolerate this!!!
Assange is not only inconvenient he is also the inconvenient truth. That is the reason why they created the story to throw him into prison. We are in the hands of Demons so dare not know more or reveal more than what they decide is acceptable.

The relevance is that the INQ and all other internet publishers fear that external corporate (and state) censorship and internet laws could manifest from this.
The relevance is that WikiLeaks is not shaping, nor concocting a propaganda piece, rather dumping this information, raw.
The relevance is that WikiLeaks is being dismantled and vilified in the "mainstream" media, from Wired to FOX.
The relevance is that the truth stands out above these lies and deceptions.
The relevance is that the powers-that-be know this, but relish that you are too lazy, too conditioned and too indifferent of "those others" to care.

Doesn't INQ have an editor anymore?

I thought this was an I.T. news board, and this article isn't about I.T. (it's politics) and it isn't news (war is bad - everyone knows that).

The link to your website is four clicks away from the recycle bin. Keep this up and that is where you will be.

Isn't in your interest when information alights that is important to everyone?

I'm still not sure what each of these corresponding US-based wars are about...

Is Iraq about * retaliation for al-quaida on 9/11 * harbouring terrorists * removing an 'evil dictator' (put in by the US) * oil

Is Afghanistan about * removing the Taliban (supported by the US) * boosting the opium trade * getting that gas pipe that the afghani's have been opposed to up until the point of 'salvation' by the US?

I dunno. I've yet to get a straight answer...

In reality, most not only will not tell the truth but most actually do not want the truth. They mostly want Fame, Fortune & Immortality – except when there is trouble, most then demand the truth and the kicker is, they will take any patsy – so long it is “evil”, the more evil, the better. Behavioural inconsistency, that’s what the problem is and no wonder. When you lack the ability to know how you became human other than some knowledge like “evolution”, oka others’ experience, should it be that and not 2nd/3rd hand knowledge, you won’t have much interest in anything other than Fame, Fortune & Immortality. Yes, Gandma is a faffing, parotting, mindless, nag.

Now, should there be Perfection, oka the Omnipotent, Omnipresent & Omniscient, and we not only know it but are able to prove it without a single doubt, will we still desire the truth? You sure? Cocksure? Or perhaps fear-cum-greed will then be running amok within most. That is how distant most people are from The Truth which is why Truth comes as Love, not Control-cum-Abandonment, the religious favourite pastime. Truth is not the reality when Love is lacking. Then, Stupidity-cum-Dumbness is the reality. All the mickey-mousing we see all around is the norm. What is sub-cum-abnormal is the desire for purity, as in the purity of others, cars, carpets, houses, bathrooms, yachts, food, health, bodies, ad infinitum, oka Fame, Fortune & Immortality.

Every Lunatic-cum-Idiotic wants to have a say and be responsible for others except themselves. What is normal/real, is the Desire of Purity, and not for Purity. Then you have become part of Reality and not the desire for Reality which will never be attained because you cannot own Reality/Infinity – not when you have not even mastered your immediate reality. And which human have you heard that one from before. Sure? Cocksure? Not even one, perhaps, and yet they all have the democratic right to vote for perfection in everything they desire? Flow/detachment is the reality, not accumulations/attachments. Most know nothing in reality/Realtiy. Even less have the experience of the knowledge they so desired to possess. Why? Because knowledge is just another word for wanting to possess/master that which you have been denied. Repeatedly, which then sets up addiction. The addiction for perfection, which is not merely illusional, it is delusional. And that goes for CEOs, CFOs, Presidents, PMs, Popes and more, infintely more. The joke then is, prison/the-zoo, is when you’d stepped outside of your abode.

Churchill's grandchildren would probably die from old age before the war ends.

Nice try at diversion with the old "not conservative news sources" ploy. -- WHO CARES? They're ESTABLISHMENT, "Main Stream Media". When they tell The Truth, The Whole Truth, and Nothing But The Truth, that's the *only* time CBS and Time or the site that you plug have *any* credibility. Truth doesn't depend on its source, it stands alone.

But here's a site for those who wish more:
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/

@ well it's me isn't it?: Don't mean to be rude -- taking you at face value as more than a "oh, let's not *think* about bad things" method for stifling discussion -- but I bet that you're not required to read or participate, and the author of the piece set the topic, we're not hijacking the thread.

How does this article pertain to tech or IT in any way, shape, or form? Leave the politics to CNN or Huffington Post please. I don't come to The Inquirer for your uninformed political opinions.

Here's an interesting article. Note the quotations from CBS and Time, which are certainly not conservative news sources.

http://www.captainsjournal.com/category/rules-of-engagement/

Dear Nice Folks, like the inquirer site a lot, used it for years. TRY TO KEEP POLITICS OUT OF IT!!!!!
for God's sake, sigh.

If it's true that US troops "are hardly allowed to shoot the enemy", then you've proven that it's by intent a meat grinder for profits: victory is *not* an option.

Why don't *you* learn the parallel lessons of Vietnam? -- Phony "Gulf of Tonkin" incident for pretext, years of troop deployments even before that effectively kept secret, an intractable "quagmire" with no clear friends or foes, atrocities as a matter of policy (My Lai only the best known), endless bombing from airplanes with indiscriminate slaughter of the populace, more bombs dropped on Vietnam than in all of WW2, chemical warfare in Agent Orange, the CIA running drugs -- and after 56,000 US soldiers dead, the US simply left, millions of Vietnamese dead and maimed for no visible result, no "domino effect" occurred.

And to forget the horrors veterans still having a conscience turn to drink, drugs, and frequently suicide.

But the war machine made profits.

Am I alone in when I watch the news reports showing the Afghan army in training (nearly 10 years and counting..how long does it take exactly??) that once the UK and USA pull out and hand control over that 99% of the Afghan army will straight away defect to the Taliban?

It wouldnt surprise me at all that we are training the Taliban to have a new army.

You can't spell, and are sadly misinformed. US troops are not focused on killing women and children. Do you know anything about their ridiculously restrictive rules on engagement? They are hardly allowed to shoot the enemy. Why don't you read a little before you run your drooling mouth.

First I have some quibbles with the piece:

"In one incident Wikileaks shows ISI agents and five al-Qaida operatives are working together on a mission" -- No, *Wikileaks* doesn't; it's presumed to be US field reports. But since the US "at the highest levels" knowingly lied about WMD in Iraq, it's no big leap to assume that in this report ground is being laid for the *next* illegal invasion, of Pakistan, and / or Iran.

"It does lead to the question of whether the Pakistan intelligence community uses its al-Qaida contacts to do its dirty work." -- Maybe, but don't stop there. The US / UK intelligence communities at the very least use "al-Qaida" as the pretext for a police / surveillance state. Tyranny is built by staging "false flag" terrorism, then its mere "shadowy" presence is used to justify suppressing all liberties.

Ghastly as the incidents are, ask *why* they occur. Atrocities aren't merely incidental to unjustified, illegal WARS OF EMPIRE such as the US in Afghanistan and Iraq, they're a primary goal. Soldiers become desensitized to violence, even to committing atrocities, and are then more useful tools for enforcing tyranny in the "homeland". Make no mistake: US soldiers are *not* promoting or protecting anyone's liberty, and especially not those of US citizens. US soldiers are already being merged into domestic police, by those returning from war zones becoming police, and more blatantly by soldiers running check points, and "helping" security at sports stadiums. This is all patient incremental installation of a total police state.

Another major goal of the war machine is of course *profits*. It costs about a million dollars to kill just *one* person in the war zone. Doesn't matter whether the dead person is civilian or "insurgent" or "combatant" or "heroic defender of democracy": the war machine *profits* from each. Costs of Afghan and Iraq wars are over a trillion dollars -- and no end in sight, have already gone on far longer than WW2, *because* they're not *intended* to be won, only for more people to be put through the meat grinder for profits.

Profits fuel the increasing domestic police state in which those who rule us will become more than merely rich, but able to dispose of lives at a whim, just like kings and queens and other savages. This isn't the first time in history when EVIL people are trying to literally take over the world.

I support the war on terror , but focusing on killing kids and women does not really feel that good does it?

No wonder we are loosing the war in afghanistan if we put all efforts in to killing as much kids and women as possible :(

I know most of you sickos are fine with that, but I feel a bit sad about it.

this guy thinks the afghan war is about terrorism!!

hahahaha

emptyhead

... Give in to the terrorists.

If Churchill had been a wimp like you, you'd all be speaking German now. No matter, you'll be speaking Arabic or Pashto soon.