Editor’s Note: Guest contributor Kevin Young was in attendance at a rally a few weeks ago outside Quantico, the military base where Bradley Manning is being detained and, allegedly, mistreated. His account, as well as his photographs from the rally, are below. This is usually where a news organization says the views and opinions of the contributor are his own and do not reflect the views and opinions of the publication…but not this time.
Bradley Manning is the 23-year-old Army Private accused of leaking many of the US military and diplomatic documents released through the organization Wikileaks. Starting in April 2010, Wikileaks has released hundreds of thousands of files providing irrefutable evidence of US torture, civilian killings, and contempt for democracy around the world.
Although no court has convicted Manning of a crime, the Obama administration has held him in solitary confinement for the past ten months. On March 2, the Army brought 22 additional charges against Manning, including “aiding the enemy.” He is now confined to a cold, tiny cell in a military prison in Quantico, Virginia, where in recent weeks he has been forced to strip naked every night. Psychologists for Social Responsibility have criticized Manning’s treatment as “needless brutality,” and human rights organizations like Amnesty International have condemned it repeatedly. The UN Rapporteur on Torture is currently looking into Manning’s treatment.
The brutal treatment of Manning is appalling, but is hardly surprising given the government tradition of repressing dissent. Although US citizens enjoy civil liberties not present in many other countries, the US government has never willingly tolerated serious threats to state secrecy and impunity. Interestingly, many politicians and pundits have been calling for Manning’s prosecution under the Espionage Act—the draconian 1917 law that criminalized criticism of the First World War, and which remains in effect today.
Dissent is especially dangerous when it takes the form of whistleblowing—insiders defying orders and exposing evidence of their institutions‘ crimes. And disobedience within the military is a particularly serious threat. Military regulations are designed to scare soldiers into robotic obedience of orders. But a disobedient soldier can undermine the ethic of unquestioning obedience that is central to the system.
On Sunday, March 20th, hundreds of protesters demonstrated in support of Bradley Manning outside the Quantico, VA, prison where he is being confined. Former US soldiers from Veterans for Peace, Iraq Veterans Against the War, and March Forward led the demonstration, with a group delivering flowers in honor of Manning to the prison entrance. The protesters then pushed back a long line of heavily-armed police and sat down in the middle of the highway intersection adjacent to the gate. The police eventually arrested about three dozen people for peacefully occupying the highway.
When people like Bradley Manning risk their careers, reputations, and personal safety for the sake of justice, the rest of us have a moral duty to show solidarity with them. But solidarity is not just a thankless obligation—it can have a very powerful impact, strengthening the morale of the persecuted rebel and thereby encouraging others to follow suit. David House, a friend of Bradley’s who has been among the few visitors allowed to see him, told me during the rally about the miserable conditions in which his friend is being held. “But when I tell him how so many people on the outside are supporting him, his eyes light up,” he said. “It means more to him than anything in the world.” Solidarity is a powerful thing.
For more information on how to support Manning and other disobedient soldiers, see www.couragetoresist.org and www.bradleymanning.org.
(A letter sent to Officials and the President.)
Dear Sir,
My duty as an American citizen, who cares deeply about our country and people, is to speak up for the sake of our country and its principles, which are for truth and justness and human decency.
My conscience is speaking on behalf of Private 1st Class Bradley E. Manning, a soldier being held in inhumane conditions in the United States Marine Corps Quantico Brig in Virgina. The reports of the conditions of his confinement are un-American. They resemble the conditions found in repressed countries using inhumane treatment, those same conditions that United States leaders are quick to call horrible and deplorable.
Our country needs the truth for its own betterment. Intelligence agencies which also consist of Wall Street lawyers and corporate heads, and whose influences steer towards manipulating the playing field to where their own best interests come first, have already wreaked havoc upon the state of our country.
We suffer the loss of our soldiers’ lives and health in wars where their enemies are the same fighters that our intelligence agency encouraged and funded years ago, being formed overseas to fight another country in an earlier era.
Just as Church and State do not mix well, neither does the Military and Wall Street Corporatism. And no matter how hard a higher echelon of ties, tries to hide those enmeshments, it still shows. We don’t have to look far to see the effects it has had.
Our country’s lifetime has gotten to the point where its health now needs the truth for its future well-being. Nothing else will be able to continue to replace that. See the facts for yourself. There are those of high level status who remain in denial, believing that they can ultimately manipulate situations into some sort of silver lining, while failing to realize that their own denial does our country no good.
Our country needs its people’s conscientiousness. It needs its people exposing the truth. Our country does not deserve to become known as the quick cover-up capital of the world. Nor does it deserve to be influenced into being another inhumane treatment facilitator either. For those ways and means to become a policy of our country’s officials, just shows the weakness of conscience, which falls by following the methods of repressed lesser countries, rather than leading the way through the strength of truth and fairness.
No human deserves inhumane treatment. And no one in our country who exposes the truth deserves inhumane treatment. And our military does not deserve inhumane treatment amongst one another.
Truth is not our country’s enemy. Falsehoods may consider the truth to be an enemy, but our country and its principles don’t. Our country’s principles need the truth. For without the truth, our country’s principles will cease to be.
All around the world there are humans being persecuted for exposing the truth. When there is a human in the Quantico Brig in Virginia being persecuted for exposing the truth, it just shows how well lies have taken hold. And our country and military and citizens don’t deserve that.
You Sir, are in a position to intervene and stop the unfair and inhumane treatment of Pvt. Manning, and righten that unconstitutional dire situation. You Sir, are in a position to show our country, and the rest of world, that the United States Military is not like the military of repressed lesser countries.
You Sir, are in a position to let our country and the world see, that you are on the side of truth and decency.
Please intervene to stop the unfair and inhumane treatment of Private 1st Class Bradley E. Manning.
Sincerely,
Sally Kline
(Another letter sent to the President and other Officials.)
Mr. President,
Please properly investigate the possible/probable inhumane treatment of PFC Bradley E. Manning, being detained in the United States Marine Corps Quantico Brig in Virginia.
Common sense tells the conscience that possible/probable inhumane treatment must be fully investigated.
Facts of the case, as reported by David Coombs, PFC Manning’s defense lawyer, indicate that:
Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell has stated that PFC Manning has been a model detainee.
Brig forensic psychiatrists have continually stated that there’s no mental health justifications for the extreme conditions of PFC Manning’s detainment.
Quantico Commander Colonel Daniel Choike has denied a fair request by PFC Manning to be removed from the medically unnecessary extreme current conditions of his detainment.
Chief Warrant Officer Denise Barnes used a sarcastic remark made by PFC Manning, (referring to the waistband in his shorts), as an unfair convenient excuse to unjustifiably further increase the extreme conditions of PFC Manning’s detainment, with no contact of, nor recommendations from, the mental health staff to do so.
The Brig (excluding mental health staff as they don’t recommend the extreme current conditions) is using loopholes in policies to unfairly increase the extreme conditions of PFC Manning’s detainment.
These extreme conditions, inconsistencies between policies, and possible/probable abuse of authority, must be investigated.
The communication and exercise and sleep of PFC Manning is being severely restricted to the viable concern of inhumaneness.
Hence, to now rely on the sole assurance of those allegedly behind this alleged mistreatment, does nothing to justly bring the truth to light.
Our country’s principles of conscientiousness, deserve to have a serious matter such as this be fully investigated by unbiased independent third parties.
Again, please properly investigate the possible/probable inhumane treatment of PFC Bradley Manning.
Anything less falls short of truth and justness, and hence the American way, as your words so often convey.
Sincerely,
Sally Kline