The Impact of WikiLeaks

Regardless of the impact of the contents revealed by WikiLeaks, a new picture of the media has emerged. A citizens’ organization is capable of shaking up the United States and subordinating the world´s major news media. It is remarkable that at present the international agenda can be dictated by an insignificant group of individuals armed only with information. Until recently, a damning report might be relegated to alternative media without wide public exposure or credibility. As any journalist knows, information is accepted more because of the trustworthiness of the source than because of the message itself. In other words, what is said tends to weigh less than who says it.

An example is the coverage of the My Lai Massacre in Vietnam in May of 1968.* The day after the massacre, The New York Times gave the official version: the death of 128 Vietcong soldiers in a “mopping-up operation.” In fact, it was estimated that 500 people were killed. My Lai is one of the most intensively studied massacres in military history. The United States Army thoroughly investigated the massacre, and many of the officers involved wrote memoirs or gave interviews. But this was much later. At the time, the journalist Seymour Hersh had the background and submitted an article to Life magazine, who, like many other important publications, refused to print it. The arduous path that the information had to take before becoming known to the public illustrates the fact that a crime has many accomplices. [It was not] until the middle of 1969 — a year and a half after the massacre, after long negotiations — [that] Hersh had his article published.

Now WikiLeaks has at their disposal The New York Times; the British [newspaper] The Guardian; the German weekly, Der Spiegel; the respectable French newspaper, Le Monde; and the Spanish newspaper, El País. It is a historic event in the life of the press that a small organization should have such an ability to handle information. This is the third round of revelations within a year: In July, 77,000 secret U.S. documents about the war in Afghanistan were released. In October, 400,000 more documents about Iraq followed, and now a quarter million U.S. diplomatic communications. So far, no one has questioned the veracity of these leaks.

The U.S. government says that the revelations are awkward — as if derogatory statements about allies would not have been. But in spite of everything, Washington is confident that nothing will change, since both friends and enemies must take into account their power. That is the case. But the world no longer lives in a Cold War in which the abuses were attributed to struggles for hegemony, to clashes between opposing sides. The leaks about the espionage carried out by the U.S. State Department against representatives of countries of the United Nations reveal a violation of international law. The unjustified unilateral invasion of Iraq caused the government of President George W. Bush to lose credibility. Now the mass access to documents that are issued by embassies and consulates undermines confidence in the judgment of those conducting U.S. foreign policy. This is a process that has just begun, as there are thousands of documents still to be delivered in trickles. In any case, it would be a mistake to blame the messenger. The obligation lies with the leaders responsible for the information that was divulged.

*Editor’s Note: The My Lai Massacre occurred on March 16, 1968.