Are The Wikileaks Logs Just Another Version Of Breitbart?

9:24 am EST July 28th, 2010 | Media | 3 Comments

Wired:

Echo company got into a gunfight last August 25th in Afghanistan’s Helmand province. You’ll learn that by reading the report found in WikiLeaks’ database. You’ll learn that, after a chase, the marines killed one insurgent. You’ll learn that the insurgents supposedly fled and that the troops – part of the 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines — decided to stay the night in the area in case the militants returned.

What you won’t learn is that a marine sniper team sparked the shoot-out with a surprise assault on the insurgents; that every member of that team was nearly killed in the battle; that the incident would kick off a three-day siege in which the Taliban nearly had the Echo company squad surrounded; that this spot eventually became an Echo company base; or that, while this extended gun fight was going on, British and Afghan troops were nearby, waging a more gentle form of counterinsurgency as they sat cross-legged under shady patches of farmland and talked with village elders.

I happen to know this because I was there with Echo company, reporting for WIRED magazine. And the wide difference between what actually happened at the Moba Khan compound and what the report says happened there should give caution to those who think they can discover the capital-T truth about the Afghanistan conflict solely through the WikiLeaks war logs.

Context matters.

Topic: ,

Related Posts

«
»

3 Responses to “Are The Wikileaks Logs Just Another Version Of Breitbart?”

  1. Deepak says:
    July 28, 2010 at 9:51 am

    Hi Oliver,

    I can’t figure out if you’re carrying water for the administration over the war-logs or saying that their release does in fact expose Pentagon propaganda, as the excerpt you quote would seem to suggest. Which is it?

    ps: 90,000 pages of memos analyzed by three international newspapers (nytimes, guardian and der speigel) … not quite in the same league as a five minute edited video clip.

  2. Ben says:
    July 28, 2010 at 10:41 am

    Maybe because this is data from the ground, which officer wants his failures on a document of any kind? If he survives good for him, he gets to write the story. It’s the big picture that these documents shed light on.

  3. Steven D says:
    July 28, 2010 at 12:55 pm

    I agree with Ben. Oliver, I understand that you don’t have a lot of respect for Assange, but transparency, while a thorn in the foot to anyone waging war, is necessary if we are to see humanism flourish. I don’t think he should have published the video of the helicopter “friendly fire” deaths of the two Reuters journalists under such an inflammatory title, nor should he have baited press by calling this leak equal to the Pentagon Papers. But, under no circumstance can he be compared with the dishonest half-wit, Breitbart!