Manning’s Sentence is too Long

Manning’s 35 year sentence is too long since claims of damage to national security from his leaks seem speculative at best. 

Manning’s leaks can roughly be divided into three parts:  diplomatic cables, Iraq War information and Afghan War Logs.  Of the three, leaks of the War Logs received the most criticism. 

The principal claim was that these logs disclosed secret Afghan sources.  The fear was that by exposing them, they would be subject to mortal danger. 

At Manning’s trial, however, it turned out the leaks had not identified Afghan sources after all.  The War Logs identified 40 Afghans who were opposing the Taliban and could be counted on for support. 

Their identification could have come as no surprise to the Taliban.  More to the point, none of the 40 suffered any harm as a consequence of the leaks. 

At the trial, however, the government claimed that one of the 40 had been killed.  The defense objected that the supporter who had been killed was not one of the 40 identified.  And after being challenged by the defense, the government withdrew its claim.

While one cannot properly generalize from this one incident, it seems to be typical of the claims the government made that were not borne out by the evidence. 

That being so, the 20 years in effect Manning agreed to serve before this phase of the trial seems adequate.  The court added 15 years to the earlier 20 for a total of 35.  This is too much. 

As noted here before, these extra 15 years is just another example of the government piling on in the many leak cases it has brought.  Obama has brought six of these cases, twice as many as all the other Presidents in the history of the United States combined. 

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