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Jul262010

Leaked military files elevate mystery about Wikileaks founder Assange

Monday, July 26, 2010 at 5:08PM

Photo of Julian Assange from Wikipedia. At first glance, I was reminded for some reason of David McCallum who played Russian-born spy Illya Kuryakin on the TV series The Man From UNCLE.Wikileaks has published 75,000 US military documents about the war in Afghanistan and thousands more about other US military matters. No one knows the extent of the damage yet. But behind this new media coup is the Wikileaks founder who goes by the name of Julian Assange. And his public biography sounds more like fiction than fact.

The early years information in Assange’s bio is attributed to a single source—a New Yorker article by Raffi Khatchadourian. We have to assume there was a viable means of checking facts about Assange, but with media nowadays, it’s really hard to know what you can trust.

Start with Assange’s early life documented in the publicly-composed Wikipedia. Assange is said to be the child of a couple who ran a touring theatre company and that “he was enrolled in 37 schools and six universities in Australia over his early life.” He “lived on the run with his mom and half-brother.”

But the Assange family didn’t live on the run because of Julian’s theatre-linked dad who sort of just disappears from the bio. No, they were fleeing the half-brother’s father “who was believed to belong to a cult led by Anne Hamilton-Byrne.”

Hamilton-Byrne’s Wikipedia bio is full of equally bizarre details—she was into yoga, managed to get her hands on a bunch of children she treated horribly and—who knows why?—dyed every one of those kids’ hair blonde. She also dressed them all alike.

Apparently Assange would’ve been a great addition to Hamilton-Byrne’s Nordic collection because of the way he looks—no racism or gender bias is intended.

Wikipedia goes on to describe Assange as a software developer and author, and some leftwing media seem to think his life is in danger. I wouldn’t worry about that too much—he appears to be fine after leaking reams of information that could perhaps embarrass the U.S. Some media have openly fretted about the safety of US troops and other personnel because of the leaks. Whatever the case, Assange isn’t dead yet and if someone really wanted him dead, he probably would be by now.

If you read documents at Wikileaks, you’ll more than likely come to agree the U.S. is the biggest target. I saw nothing on inhumane treatment of women in repressive societies. I saw nothing on treatment of minorities in Cuba or undocumented travelers in Mexico. Nothing much about Egypt or Syria or North Korea.

Sadly, there are no leaked documents linked to al Qaeda or other terrorists. There are some documents that reflect negatively on China and others, but by and large, the US is the Wikileaks reason for existing.

There is also no disclosure on the website about who funds Wikileaks, and this alone is enough that the world media should seriously be questioning the authenticity of these documents and others leaked.

To put it all in context, we have alleged documents leaked by a man with an alleged bio (Can anyone really fact check it, especially his early years?) who founded an organization that appears to run on air although there must certainly be expenses associated with Assange’s self-professed travel and website operation. He’s a media darling abroad, so perhaps the media companies pay him to travel. Who knows?

*The Wall Street Journal said the Pentagon 'eyes' the accused military US Army analyst Bradley Manning to see if he's the leaker. Manning already leaked classified information, a video of a battle that served as propaganda because the video had been truncated. There's additional puzzling information related to Manning.

WSJ also said, "He [Assange] said WikiLeaks has nonetheless 'committed funds' to Pfc. Manning's legal defense, offering his military-appointed legal team money in case it wants to hire civilian counsel."

Wikileaks has a donor with deep pockets, obviously.*

And all this comes to a head as the Obama administration comes under scrutiny over US military rules of engagement. Parents and families of soldiers and some conservative media have criticized the current ROEs that appear to place the safety of civilians above the value of our troops. Big media rarely mention the fact that many civilians support the so-called insurgents and those same insurgents also use civilians for cover.

As a matter of fact, Wikileaks, according to statements by Assange, didn’t get cranked up until around 2006 although he claims to have registered a domain in 1999. The birth of Wikileaks came at a time when news from Iraq was very bad. The birth also came on the eve of the cranking of another big machine—the US presidential election. It’s an established fact world opinion influenced our election, or at least some major US media filtered world reaction to influence it.

And now, just in time for the 2010 elections, here comes Wikileaks with another expose.

In coming weeks, media will sift through all the Wikileaks docs and get one version of a war.

The leaks of what are reportedly significant documents should raise questions about the mystery of the Wikileaks founder and where his money is coming from. But I’m not holding my breath for international media to look into that. What’s perplexing is the credibility they assign to this man based on highly suspicious circumstances.

What the US government needs to figure out is how somebody like Assange got his hands on this material.

We live in an age where disinformation has been spun to a level of high art. We already know we can’t trust most media, so why should we trust a guy named Julian Assange whose bio reads like a script for a Lifetime movie? (Commentary by Kay B. Day/July 26, 2010)

*This section was added after TUSR's story was filed.*

Update on Monday, July 26, 2010 at 8:55PM by