Steve Aftergood, the proprietor of the blog Secrecy News, knows more about secrecy in government than just about anyone else in the United States. He has also thought deeply about the issue. He and I disagree about a great many things, including his contention that the Bush administration has been excessively secretive about what he calls its “shameful” activities in the realm of national security.
But unlike some of his colleagues in the open-government lobby, Aftergood believes that “genuine national security secrets such as confidential sources and legally authorized intelligence methods should be protected from disclosure.”
In this, he evidently disagrees with the premise of Wikileaks.org, whose purpose is to develop “an uncensorable version of Wikipedia for untraceable mass document leaking and analysis” that will combine “the protection and anonymity of cutting-edge cryptographic technologies. . . . Anybody can post comments to it. No technical knowledge is required.”
Aftergood has pointed out that there is a cardinal distinction between unauthorized disclosure of classified information in a democracy and in an authoritarian state, a distinction that Wikileaks.org (the site has been temporarily shut down by order of a federal judge) aims to blur:
In a democratic system, people have the opportunity to define their own disclosure standards. If you violate those standards or encourage others to do so then you are in effect undermining the democratic process.
Jay Lim of Wikileaks.org is unhappy with this kind of criticism, and has written a message to Aftergood, which has been posted on Secrecy News.
Who’s side are you on here Stephen [sic]? It is time this constant harping stopped.
You know full well if you make n comments about us and m negative ones about us it’ll only be the negative comment that is reported — since everyone else has only positive things to say and by your position at FAS [Federation of American Scientists} there is an expectation of positive comment. You are not a child. As a result of your previous criticism it seem you are becoming the “go to” man for negative comments on Wikileaks. Over the last year, our most quoted critic has not been a right wing radio host, it has not been the Chinese ambassador, it has not been Pentagon bureaucrats, it has been you Stephen [sic]. You are the number one public enemy of this project. On top of everything else, your quote is the only critical entry on our Wikipedia page. Some friend of openness!
We are very disappointed in your lack of support and suggest you cool it. If you don’t, we will, with great reluctance, be forced to respond.
Jay Lim
“Cool it” Aftergood. In other words: the message from Wikileaks.org to Aftergood is that he should shut up or they will “be forced to respond.” This sounds awfully like a threat. Is it not ominous that this is how some advocates of openness in government want to conduct the discussion? What does this tell us about Wikileaks.org project and the people behind it?
