War Resistors:
- Bradley Manning
Bradley Manning
Inmate: Bradley Manning
c/o Courage To Resist
484 Lake Park Ave # 41
Oakland CA 94610
This young man’s story, exposes some of the most shameful conduct ever undertaken by the government of this nation. In April of 2010, whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks published a classified video of a United States Apache helicopter firing on civilians in New Baghdad in 2007. The video, available at www.collateralmurder.com, shows Americans shooting and killing 11 individuals who do not return fire. Two of those murdered were Reuters’ media employees, including 22 year old Reuters’ photojournalist, Namir Noor-Eldeen and his driver. The video includes an audio recording of the internal commentary by the American soldiers before, during and after the shooting. The soldiers repeatedly request and are granted permission to open fire, encouraging one another while making sick jokes about the dead and dying civilians. Full transcript available here: www.collateralmurder.com/en/transcript.html) A total of 11 adults were killed. Two children, passengers in a van that arrived on the scene after the first bout of gunfire had ceased, were seriously injured when the Apache helicopter opened fire on their van. In 2007, Reuters called for an investigation into the attack. In response, a spokesman for the multinational forces in Baghdad lied: “There is no question that coalition forces were clearly engaged in combat operations against a hostile force.” No charges have been filed against the American soldiers in the Apache helicopter who shot and killed the civilians in the video. Instead, the U.S. went after Bradley Manning with a vengeance for having the courage to do what was undeniably right – expose the intentional slaughter of civilians. Private First Class Bradley Manning, an intelligence analyst with the US Army in Baghdad, was arrested in late May of 2010. He is accused of aiding the enemy and has been charged with 2 counts of violating the Uniform Code of Military Justice, including eight criminal offenses and four noncriminal violations of Army regulations. The full charge sheet is available at: www.bradleymanning.org/3163/charge-sheet-html. As this is being written, Manning’s case in pretrial hearings before a judge that will determine how many of the 22 charges Manning faces, are valid. Bradley is imprisoned in the brig at US Marine Corps Base Quantico in Quantico, Virginia, awaiting trial. If convicted, Bradley Manning could spend the rest of his life in military prison with no chance of parole. Since his arrest, Bradley Manning has issued no formal public statements. Many people, including Daniel Ellsberg, the famed whistleblower behind the Pentagon Papers, has heralded Pfc. Bradley Manning as a hero. In late July 2010, the U.S. Military alleged that Manning was the chief suspect in the “Afghan Diaries” leak of U.S. Military combat and incident reports from the occupation of Afghanistan. The Afghan Diaries is the largest collection of leaked intelligence records in U.S. history, and details what Wikileaks and others have described as “countless war crimes” by U.S. and NATO forces.
Support site: BradleyManning.org
