The End Of Secrecy_ The Rise And Fall Of WikiLeaks Part 8

In the week before publication, the state department warned many of its allies about the cables' embarra.s.sing contents. But they appeared not to know that the leaked cables ceased at the end of February, believing some to be more recent. Rumours circulated that Washington had been unimpressed with David Cameron and Britain's new coalition government, which took power in May. The US amba.s.sador in London, Louis B Susman, allegedly said as much in a post-election cable. The Americans, it was gathered, had now sheepishly briefed Downing Street about its contents. They were under the impression the leaked cables went up to June 2010, the month of Manning's arrest.

The Guardian Guardian didn't have that Cameron cable. As a result Cameron survived the WikiLeaks drama relatively unscathed. "We were amazed about how little the US knew about what we were doing," Katz says. 'They clearly had no idea which data set we had. They ma.s.sively over-briefed about what was in the cables." didn't have that Cameron cable. As a result Cameron survived the WikiLeaks drama relatively unscathed. "We were amazed about how little the US knew about what we were doing," Katz says. 'They clearly had no idea which data set we had. They ma.s.sively over-briefed about what was in the cables."

The New York Times New York Times had decided to forewarn the state department which cables it was intending to use. The had decided to forewarn the state department which cables it was intending to use. The Guardian Guardian which worked in Britain under a peculiarly oppressive legal regime was not going to follow the Americans quite that far. The paper was willing to listen, but was already doing all it could, without official prompting, to protect sensitive human contacts from reprisal, and not to publish irresponsibly. which worked in Britain under a peculiarly oppressive legal regime was not going to follow the Americans quite that far. The paper was willing to listen, but was already doing all it could, without official prompting, to protect sensitive human contacts from reprisal, and not to publish irresponsibly.

A few days before the cables' release, two senior figures from the US emba.s.sy in Grosvenor Square called in to the Guardian Guardian's London offices for a chat. This discussion led to a surreal transatlantic telephone call on Friday 26 November two days before D-Day. Rusbridger had agreed to ring Washington. He made the conference call from the circular table in his office. On the line in Washington was PJ Crowley, the US a.s.sistant secretary of state for public affairs. The conversation began: "OK, here's PJ Crowley. I just want you to know in this phone call we've got secretary of state Clinton's private secretary, we have representatives of the DoD, the intelligence communities, and the National Security Council."

All Rusbridger could offer in reply was, "We have our managing editor here ..."

Crowley then set out how the cable scandal looked from the lofty heights of US power: "Obviously, from our perspective these are stolen doc.u.ments. They reveal sensitive military secrets and addresses that expose people to security risks."

Crowley made his pitch. He said the US government was "willing to help" the Guardian Guardian if the newspaper was prepared to "share the doc.u.ments" it had in other words, tip off the state department which cables it intended to publish. Rusbridger was non-committal. He said: "I don't think we are going to agree on that now, so why don't we return later to that." if the newspaper was prepared to "share the doc.u.ments" it had in other words, tip off the state department which cables it intended to publish. Rusbridger was non-committal. He said: "I don't think we are going to agree on that now, so why don't we return later to that."

Crowley said some special forces operations and dealings with some countries were sensitive. He then asked for a pause. He came back a couple of minutes later: "Mr Rusbridger, we don't feel this conversation is working for us because at the moment we are just giving a lot of stories, and we are not getting a lot in return."

Clinton's private secretary chipped in. She said: "I've got a very direct question for you, Mr Rusbridger. You journalists like asking direct questions and I know you expect direct answers. So I'm going to ask you a direct question. Are you going to give us the numbers of the cables or not?"

"No, we're not."

"Thank you very much."

Rusbridger did decide to tell the Americans the Guardian Guardian's broad publication schedule. Day one, he said was to feature Iran, with North Korea on day two and Pakistan on day three. Then the conversation was over.

In Germany, the editor-in-chief of Der Spiegel Der Spiegel had taken a call from the US amba.s.sador. He told Georg Mascolo that there was huge concern at the "highest, highest levels" about the security of sources: "Lives could be in jeopardy." Mascolo replied that had taken a call from the US amba.s.sador. He told Georg Mascolo that there was huge concern at the "highest, highest levels" about the security of sources: "Lives could be in jeopardy." Mascolo replied that Der Spiegel Der Spiegel had done everything it could to protect sources who might be in danger. He invited the state department to share with him their areas of concern. had done everything it could to protect sources who might be in danger. He invited the state department to share with him their areas of concern.

The New York Times New York Times had been holding its own sometimes tense negotiations with US government officials. The paper's lawyers were confident that it could report on the secret doc.u.ments without violating American law. But Bill Keller felt a large moral and ethical responsibility to use the material responsibly: "While we a.s.sumed we had little or no ability to influence what WikiLeaks did, let alone what would happen once this material was loosed in the echo chamber of the blogosphere, that did not free us from the obligation to exercise care in our own journalism. From the beginning we determined that in our articles and in any doc.u.ments we published from the secret archive we would excise material that could put lives at risk," he wrote later. had been holding its own sometimes tense negotiations with US government officials. The paper's lawyers were confident that it could report on the secret doc.u.ments without violating American law. But Bill Keller felt a large moral and ethical responsibility to use the material responsibly: "While we a.s.sumed we had little or no ability to influence what WikiLeaks did, let alone what would happen once this material was loosed in the echo chamber of the blogosphere, that did not free us from the obligation to exercise care in our own journalism. From the beginning we determined that in our articles and in any doc.u.ments we published from the secret archive we would excise material that could put lives at risk," he wrote later.

The New York Times New York Times's policy was to err on the side of caution. With the Afghan and Iraq war logs, the paper redacted names of all sources who had spoken to US soldiers and diplomats, and edited out details that might have revealed continuing intelligence-gathering operations or military tactics. But because of the range of the material and the hypersensitivities of diplomacy, the emba.s.sy cables were bound to be more explosive than the war logs, Keller considered.

Dean Baquet, the New York Times New York Times's Washington bureau chief, gave the White House an early warning on 19 November. Five days later, the day before Thanksgiving, Baquet and three colleagues were invited to a windowless room in the state department, where they encountered an unsmiling crowd: representatives of the White House, the state department, the director of national intelligence, the CIA, the Defence Intelligence Agency, the FBI and the Pentagon, gathered around a conference table. Others, who never identified themselves, lined the walls. A solitary note-taker tapped away on a computer.

The meeting was off the record, but it is fair to say the mood was tense. Scott Shane, one of the reporters who partic.i.p.ated in the meeting, described "an undertone of suppressed outrage and frustration". Subsequent meetings and daily conference calls were less p.r.i.c.kly and more businesslike, Keller says. The US administration had three areas generally of concern. It wanted to protect individuals who had spoken candidly to US diplomats in oppressive countries something the New York Times New York Times was happy to do. It also wanted to remove references to secret American programmes relating to intelligence. Lastly, it did not want the paper to reveal candid remarks by heads of state and other top foreign officials, and feared publication would strain relations with those countries. "We were mostly unpersuaded," Keller recalls. was happy to do. It also wanted to remove references to secret American programmes relating to intelligence. Lastly, it did not want the paper to reveal candid remarks by heads of state and other top foreign officials, and feared publication would strain relations with those countries. "We were mostly unpersuaded," Keller recalls.

This was, of course, hardly the first time the New York Times New York Times had published secrets that discomfited the US government. Before the year of WikiLeaks, nothing the paper had done on Keller's watch had caused quite the agitation of two articles the paper published about tactics employed by the Bush administration after the attacks of 11 September 2001. One article, which was published in 2005 and won a Pulitzer prize, revealed that the National Security Agency was eavesdropping on domestic phone and email conversations without the legal courtesy of a warrant. The other, published in 2006, described a vast treasury department programme to screen international banking records. had published secrets that discomfited the US government. Before the year of WikiLeaks, nothing the paper had done on Keller's watch had caused quite the agitation of two articles the paper published about tactics employed by the Bush administration after the attacks of 11 September 2001. One article, which was published in 2005 and won a Pulitzer prize, revealed that the National Security Agency was eavesdropping on domestic phone and email conversations without the legal courtesy of a warrant. The other, published in 2006, described a vast treasury department programme to screen international banking records.

The editor had vivid memories of sitting in the Oval Office as President George W Bush tried to persuade him and the New York Times New York Times's publisher to withhold the eavesdropping article. Bush told him that if the paper published, it should share the blame for the next terrorist attack. Unconvinced, the paper published anyway, and the reaction from the government and conservative commentators in particular was vociferous.

This time around, the US administration reaction was different. It was, for the most part, sober and professional. The Obama White House, while strongly condemning WikiLeaks for making the doc.u.ments public, did not seek an injunction to halt publication. There was no Oval Office lecture, no plea to Keller or the publisher not to write about the doc.u.ments. "On the contrary, in our discussions before the publication of our articles, White House officials, while challenging some of the conclusions we drew from the material, thanked us for handling the doc.u.ments with care. The secretaries of state and defence and the attorney general resisted the opportunity for a crowd-pleasing orgy of press-bashing," Keller says, adding: "Though the release of these doc.u.ments was certainly painfully embarra.s.sing, the relevant government agencies actually engaged with us in an attempt to prevent the release of material genuinely damaging to innocent individuals or the national interest."

From his secret hideout back in Ellingham Hall, a.s.sange sought to open his own channel of negotiations, sending a letter on 26 November to the US emba.s.sy in London. Headed "Julian a.s.sange, editor-in-chief, WikiLeaks", it began: "Dear Amba.s.sador Susman, I refer to recent public statements by United States government officials expressing concern about the possible publication by WikiLeaks and other media organisations of information allegedly derived from United States government records."

a.s.sange invited the US government to "privately nominate" examples where publication of a cable could put an individual "at significant risk of harm". He promised WikiLeaks would quickly consider any US government submissions ahead of publication. The state department's legal adviser Harold Koh sent an uncompromising letter back. It stated that the cables "were provided in violation of US law and without regard for the grave consequences of this action".

Releasing them "would place at risk the lives of countless individuals", jeopardise ongoing military operations, and threaten co-operation between the US and its allies and partners, the letter said. It would hinder co-operation on "common challenges such as terrorism, pandemic diseases and nuclear proliferation".

The letter ordered WikiLeaks to halt plans to publish the cables, hand back the stolen files, and "destroy all records of this material from WikiLeaks' databases."

a.s.sange wrote to Susman again on 28 November. He made clear that WikiLeaks had no intention of putting anybody at risk, "nor do we wish to harm the national security of the United States". He continued: "I understand that the United States government would prefer not to have the information that will be published in the public domain and is not in favour of openness. That said, either there is a risk or there is not. You have chosen to respond in a manner which leads me to conclude that the risks are entirely fanciful and that you are instead concerned only to suppress evidence of human rights abuses and other criminal behaviour."

The negotiations with the state department such as they were thus terminated. All that was left was to prepare for simultaneous publication of the biggest leak in the history. What could possibly go wrong?

CHAPTER 15.

Publication day

Basel railway station, Switzerland 28 November 2010

"Launch! Launch! Launch!"

GUARDIAN NEWSROOM NEWSROOM.

It was Sunday morning at the sleepy Badischer Bahnhof. Few were around. The station sits precisely on the border between Germany and Switzerland. It is a textbook example of European co-operation with the Germans providing the trains, and the Swiss running the cafes and newspaper kiosks. This morning, however, the station would become briefly notorious for something else: a gigantic foul-up.

Early in the morning, a van rolled in, bearing 40 copies of the German news magazine Der Spiegel Der Spiegel. The weekly normally starts distributing copies to newsagents over the weekend, with revellers in Berlin able to buy it late on Sat.u.r.day night on their way home. But on this occasion as with the publication of the Afghan war logs Der Spiegel Der Spiegel was supposed to have held all copies of its edition back. The international release of the US emba.s.sy cables had been painstakingly co-ordinated for 21.30 GMT that Sunday evening. The was supposed to have held all copies of its edition back. The international release of the US emba.s.sy cables had been painstakingly co-ordinated for 21.30 GMT that Sunday evening. The Guardian Guardian, New York Times New York Times, El Pais El Pais and and Le Monde Le Monde were all waiting anxiously to push the b.u.t.ton on the world's biggest leak. were all waiting anxiously to push the b.u.t.ton on the world's biggest leak. Der Spiegel Der Spiegel had agreed to roll its stories out at the same time on its website, with the magazine only published on the following Monday morning. Everyone knew the script. had agreed to roll its stories out at the same time on its website, with the magazine only published on the following Monday morning. Everyone knew the script.

But the G.o.ds of news had decided to do things differently. At around 11.30am Christian Heeb, the editor-in-chief of the local Radio Basel, discovered a copy of Der Spiegel Der Spiegel at the station. It was dated 29/11/10. It cost 3.80. The front cover was nothing less than sensational: "Revealed: How America Sees the world". The strap-line confirmed: "The secret dispatches of the US foreign ministry". Against a red background was a photo-gallery of world leaders, each accompanied by a demeaning quotation culled from the US cables. Angela Merkel, Germany's increasingly un popular chancellor, was "risk averse and rarely creative". Guido Westerwelle, Merkel's disastrous foreign minister, was "aggressive". Then there were the others. Vladimir Putin? "Alpha dog". Dmitry Medvedev? "Pale and hesitant". Silvio Berlusconi? "Wild parties". Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? "Hitler". Next to Libya's Muammar Gaddafi were the tantalising words "Luxuriant blonde nurse". More extraordinary revelations were promised inside. at the station. It was dated 29/11/10. It cost 3.80. The front cover was nothing less than sensational: "Revealed: How America Sees the world". The strap-line confirmed: "The secret dispatches of the US foreign ministry". Against a red background was a photo-gallery of world leaders, each accompanied by a demeaning quotation culled from the US cables. Angela Merkel, Germany's increasingly un popular chancellor, was "risk averse and rarely creative". Guido Westerwelle, Merkel's disastrous foreign minister, was "aggressive". Then there were the others. Vladimir Putin? "Alpha dog". Dmitry Medvedev? "Pale and hesitant". Silvio Berlusconi? "Wild parties". Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? "Hitler". Next to Libya's Muammar Gaddafi were the tantalising words "Luxuriant blonde nurse". More extraordinary revelations were promised inside.

Heeb's station started to broadcast the news, saying a few early copies of Der Spiegel Der Spiegel had become available at Basel station. It was at this point that an anonymous Twitter user called Freelancer_09 decided to check out the prospect for himself. He tweeted: " had become available at Basel station. It was at this point that an anonymous Twitter user called Freelancer_09 decided to check out the prospect for himself. He tweeted: "Der Spiegel zu fruh am Badischen Bahnhof Basel! Mal schaun was da steht." ( zu fruh am Badischen Bahnhof Basel! Mal schaun was da steht." (Der Spiegel too early at Basel station! Let's see what's there.) Freelancer_09 managed to obtain one of the last two or three copies of the rogue too early at Basel station! Let's see what's there.) Freelancer_09 managed to obtain one of the last two or three copies of the rogue Spiegel Spiegel batch, just as panicked executives at the magazine's Berlin headquarters were realising something had gone horribly wrong: one of the distribution vans sent to crisscross Germany had set off for Switzerland 24 hours too early. batch, just as panicked executives at the magazine's Berlin headquarters were realising something had gone horribly wrong: one of the distribution vans sent to crisscross Germany had set off for Switzerland 24 hours too early.

Radio Basel in Switzerland received a hasty phone call from Germany. Would they come off the air in return for subsequent help with the story? But it was too late. Freelancer_09 was already at work: within minutes he had begun tweeting the magazine's contents. Merkel had a better relationship with US president George W Bush than with his successor Barack Obama! US diplomats have a low opinion of Germany's regional politicians! The Americans think Westerwelle is a jerk! At the start of the morning Freelancer_09 had a meagre tally of 40 Twitter followers. His own political views seemed pretty clear alternative, counter-cultural, even anarchist judging from the leftist Twitter users he followed, and from his own profile photo: a child shouting through a loud-hailer above the words: "Police state". Who he was exactly was uncertain. (His ident.i.ty remained mysterious; some weeks later his Twitter account went dormant.) Soon, word spread through the blogosphere that an anonymous local journalist in Basel had stumbled on the Holy Grail. Other German journalists started "retweeting" his posts. Der Spiegel Der Spiegel frantically messaged him to make contact. He ignored them. "His Twitter follows rapidly s...o...b..lled. We could see it was becoming a serious problem," admits frantically messaged him to make contact. He ignored them. "His Twitter follows rapidly s...o...b..lled. We could see it was becoming a serious problem," admits Der Spiegel Der Spiegel's Holger Stark. "While we were closing the hole, he had managed to get a copy of the magazine."

Sitting helplessly in London, Alan Rusbridger realised that the 9.30pm GMT embargo for the release of the cables looked wobbly. "You have five of the most powerful news organisations, and everything was paralysed by a little freelancer. We started having conferences on the hour wondering what to do," Rusbridger says. There was more bad news. Rival German news organisations contacted Freelancer_09 and asked him to start scanning entire pages of Der Spiegel's edition. By about 3pm, he had 150 followers, with more joining every minute. By 4pm he had found a scanner, and was pumping the embargoed articles out onto the internet. His followers jumped to around 600. A French mirror site began translating Freelancer_09's posts. "We realised the story wasn't going to hold. We had sprung a leak ourselves," Rusbridger recalls wryly. It was a great irony. Rusbridger had been an early Twitter proselytiser; he had relentlessly encouraged Guardian Guardian journalists to sign up to the San Francis...o...b..sed micro-blogging site. Now Twitter had turned round and figuratively speaking skewered him in the bottom. journalists to sign up to the San Francis...o...b..sed micro-blogging site. Now Twitter had turned round and figuratively speaking skewered him in the bottom.

The previous day, Sat.u.r.day, at around 5pm a German technician from Der Spiegel Der Spiegel's own online service in Hamburg had made an earlier gaffe: he managed to go live on the website with an extract from the edition of the magazine. It gave a few intriguing early details: that there were 251,287 cables; that one cable dated back to 1966, but most were newer than 2004; that 9,005 doc.u.ments dated from the first two months of 2010. Stark apologised for the accident and said the German link was erased as soon as it was discovered. The screen shots circulated through the net for some time. Then on Sunday afternoon more material appeared on Spiegel Spiegel's popular English-language site. The rumours were now sweeping feverishly across Twitter. The antic.i.p.ation was reaching bursting point.

The New York Times New York Times soon spotted the soon spotted the Spiegel Spiegel online story. The paper's executives said the embargo was dead now effectively meaningless. "What was so brilliant was the irony that of all the people to mess up it was the Germans," said Katz not always the online story. The paper's executives said the embargo was dead now effectively meaningless. "What was so brilliant was the irony that of all the people to mess up it was the Germans," said Katz not always the Guardian Guardian's most politically correct representative. Until now, it was the Germans impeccably ethical at all times who had managed to avoid the recriminations hurled freely by a.s.sange at both the Americans and the British. Janine Gibson, editor of guardian.co.uk, the Guardian Guardian's website, compared the pratfall-strewn cables launch to Britain's 1993 Grand National. That shambolic instalment of the historic horse race was infamously cancelled after two false starts.

"It all got terribly untidy," Rusbridger says. "But it was the most complicated thing we have ever done, co-ordinating a Spanish morning paper with a French afternoon paper with a German weekly with an American [paper] in a different time zone and a bunch of anarchists in a bunker who would only communicate via Jabber [online instant messaging]."

By 6pm the Guardian Guardian and everyone else agreed just to publish, go with it. As though at Nasa's Mission Control Center in Houston, the and everyone else agreed just to publish, go with it. As though at Nasa's Mission Control Center in Houston, the Guardian Guardian's production staff stood poised at the newspaper's King's Cross office in front of a flickering bank of screens. Production boss Jon Ca.s.son asked: "Will we launch?" Katz replied: "LAUNCH!" The word was taken up and spread instantly across the back bench, the newsroom echoing with the words: "Launch! Launch! Launch!" The world's biggest leak had gone live.

The Guardian Guardian's front-page splash made the historic dimensions of the story clear. With David Leigh's byline, it appeared on guardian.co.uk at 6.13pm. The headline proclaimed: "US emba.s.sy cables leak sparks global diplomatic crisis." It began: at 6.13pm. The headline proclaimed: "US emba.s.sy cables leak sparks global diplomatic crisis." It began: "The United States was catapulted into a worldwide diplomatic crisis today, with the leaking to the Guardian Guardian and other international media of more than 250,000 cla.s.sified cables from its emba.s.sies, many sent as recently as February this year. At the start of a series of daily extracts from the US emba.s.sy cables many designated 'secret' the and other international media of more than 250,000 cla.s.sified cables from its emba.s.sies, many sent as recently as February this year. At the start of a series of daily extracts from the US emba.s.sy cables many designated 'secret' the Guardian Guardian can disclose that Arab leaders are privately urging an air strike on Iran and that US officials have been instructed to spy on the UN leadership." can disclose that Arab leaders are privately urging an air strike on Iran and that US officials have been instructed to spy on the UN leadership."

The story went on: "These two revelations alone would be likely to reverberate around the world. But the secret dispatches, which were obtained by WikiLeaks, the whistleblowers' website, also reveal Washington's evaluation of many other highly sensitive international issues."

At 6.15pm the Guardian Guardian launched a WikiLeaks live blog, to chart reaction as it came in. More live blogs would follow; they would become an innovative part of the cables coverage. The disclosures in Leigh's story were the first of many over the next four weeks. Despite its sc.r.a.ppy launch, the publication of the US state department cables amounted to the biggest leak since 1971 when Daniel Ellsberg gave the Pentagon papers to the launched a WikiLeaks live blog, to chart reaction as it came in. More live blogs would follow; they would become an innovative part of the cables coverage. The disclosures in Leigh's story were the first of many over the next four weeks. Despite its sc.r.a.ppy launch, the publication of the US state department cables amounted to the biggest leak since 1971 when Daniel Ellsberg gave the Pentagon papers to the New York Times New York Times, provoking a historic court case and revealing the White House's dirty secrets in Vietnam. This data spillage was far bigger an unprecedented release of secret information from the heart of the world's only superpower.

n.o.body could think of a bigger story certainly not one auth.o.r.ed by the media themselves. "You could say the World Trade Center was a bigger story, or the Iraq war. But in terms of a newspaper, where by the act of publication you unleash one story that is then talked about in every single corner of the globe, and you are the only people who have got it, and you release it each day, this was unique," Rusbridger says.

The US state department had already a.s.sembled a team of 120 people, to burn the midnight oil and sift through those cables likely to be disclosed. The department also issued a condemnatory statement. It said: "We antic.i.p.ate the release of what are claimed to be several hundred thousand cla.s.sified state department cables on Sunday night that detail private diplomatic discussions with foreign governments. By its very nature, field reporting to Washington is candid and often incomplete information. It is not an expression of policy, nor does it always shape final policy decisions. Nevertheless, these cables could compromise private discussions with foreign governments and opposition leaders, and when the substance of private conversations is printed on the front pages of newspapers around the world, it can deeply impact not only on US foreign policy interests, but those of our allies and friends around the world." The release of the cables was a "reckless and dangerous action". It had put lives at risk, the White House declared.

The statement was a damage limitation exercise. Even opponents of WikiLeaks had to acknowledge that some of the disclosures for example, that the US had spied on UN officials and sought to gather their credit card account numbers were overwhelmingly in the public interest. The White House, moreover, frequently expressed concern when other authoritarian regimes clamped down on freedom of speech. This testy response when the leak came from inside its own large governmental machinery would provoke the Russians, Chinese, and just about everyone else, to accuse Washington of double standards.

The Guardian Guardian posted its own riposte. It pointed out that the paper had carefully redacted many cables. This was done "in order to protect a number of named sources and so as not to disclose certain details of special operations". posted its own riposte. It pointed out that the paper had carefully redacted many cables. This was done "in order to protect a number of named sources and so as not to disclose certain details of special operations".

The New York Times New York Times also vigorously defended its decision to publish: "The cables tell the unvarnished story of how the government makes its biggest decisions, the decisions that cost the country most heavily in lives and money. They shed light on the motivations and, in some cases, the duplicity of allies on the receiving end of American courtship and foreign aid. They illuminate the diplomacy surrounding two current wars and several countries, like Pakistan and Yemen, where American military involvement is growing. As daunting as it is to publish such material over official objections, it would be presumptuous to conclude that Americans have no right to know what is being done in their name." also vigorously defended its decision to publish: "The cables tell the unvarnished story of how the government makes its biggest decisions, the decisions that cost the country most heavily in lives and money. They shed light on the motivations and, in some cases, the duplicity of allies on the receiving end of American courtship and foreign aid. They illuminate the diplomacy surrounding two current wars and several countries, like Pakistan and Yemen, where American military involvement is growing. As daunting as it is to publish such material over official objections, it would be presumptuous to conclude that Americans have no right to know what is being done in their name."

Franco Frattini, Italy's foreign minister, was one of the earliest politicians to grasp that the leak could not be undone, and was game-changing. "It will be the 9/11 of world diplomacy," he exclaimed. For once the comparison didn't look like hyperbole. "It was being discussed in the White House, the Kremlin, the elysee, by Berlusconi and the UN, by Chavez, in Canberra, in every capital city of the world," Rusbridger said. "The ones where it wasn't being discussed, you knew they were bracing themselves. You just had this sense of mayhem being let loose. All these incredibly powerful people, the most powerful people in the world, were scrambling into emergency board meetings."

At Kings Place, the following day's editorial conference was more crowded than usual. Morning conferences are a Guardian Guardian ritual: the heads of department home, foreign, city, sport, as well as features, comment and arts give a quick run-down of the day's offerings. All staff can attend and anybody can speak. The seating arrangement mirrors the ritual: the heads of department home, foreign, city, sport, as well as features, comment and arts give a quick run-down of the day's offerings. All staff can attend and anybody can speak. The seating arrangement mirrors the Guardian Guardian's unspoken hierarchy: Rusbridger sits in the middle of an elongated yellow sofa; junior staff perch uncomfortably on stools around the gla.s.s walls. After the news roundup the editor typically says: "What else?" The words are often hard to hear. It is a brave, or foolish, person who opens the debate; sometimes the silence extends awkwardly for 10 seconds. This morning, however, there was no hesitation. The room was packed; the atmosphere one of excitement, and astonishment that the Guardian Guardian had managed, with a few glitches, to pull the story off. had managed, with a few glitches, to pull the story off.

One of the unfamiliar faces there was Luke Harding, the Guardian Guardian's Moscow correspondent, who had mined the cables for a series of hard-hitting stories about Russia and who, having just returned again from Moscow, stood unshaven and jet-lagged next to the door. Ian Katz recalled Sunday's dramatic events and explained the decision to bring forward publication when it became clear that Cablegate itself had sprung a leak. Katz described the Guardian Guardian's sitcom-style wranglings with its many Euro-partners: "It was a cross between running a Brussels committee and an episode of 'Allo 'Allo!" He came up with a characteristically rococo a.n.a.logy "like being a kind of air traffic controller, with several small aircraft crashing at Stansted but managing to land a couple of big jets at Heathrow".

The Guardian Guardian's website had gone "absolutely tonto", Janine Gibson reported. The story produced remarkable traffic the 4.1 million unique users clicking on it that day was the highest ever. Record numbers would continue, with 9.4 million browsers viewing WikiLeaks stories between 28 November and 14 December. Some 43% of them came from the US. The Guardian Guardian team had designed an interactive graphic allowing readers to carry out their own searches of the cable database. This feature became the most popular aspect of the team had designed an interactive graphic allowing readers to carry out their own searches of the cable database. This feature became the most popular aspect of the Guardian Guardian's coverage. People from around the world looked to see what US officials had privately written about their rulers. "This was really pleasing," says Gibson. "People were looking for themselves and engaging with the cables and not just the a.s.sange-ness."

As the cables rolled out day by day, an ugly, and in many ways deranged, backlash took place in the US. A vengeful chorus came mostly from Republicans. New York congressman Peter King, incoming chair of the homeland security committee, talked of "treason" and proposed WikiLeaks should be designated as "a foreign terrorist organisation". Eschewing any risk of understatement, he said: "WikiLeaks presents a clear and present danger to the national security of the US."

Congressman Pete Hoekstra of Michigan was reported calling for executions. "Clearly the person that leaked the information or hacked into our systems we can go after and we can probably go after them for espionage and maybe treason. If we go after them, and are able to convict them on treason, then the death penalty comes into play."

His Michigan colleague, Mike Rogers, was not to be outdone. He told a local radio station: "I argue the death penalty clearly should be considered here. He clearly aided the enemy to what may result in the death of US soldiers, or those co-operating. If that is not a capital offence, I don't know what is."

Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, darling of the unhinged right, denounced a.s.sange's "sick, un-American espionage" and came close to inciting his a.s.sa.s.sination: "Why was he not pursued with the same urgency we pursue al-Qaida and Taliban leaders? ... He is an anti-American operative with blood on his hands."

But it was Senator Joe Lieberman, Senate homeland security committee chairman, a foreign policy hawk and maverick Democrat, who was the most practical attack dog. Lieberman described the leak in apocalyptic terms as "an outrageous, reckless and despicable action that will undermine the ability of our government and our partners to keep our people safe and to work together to defend our vital interests". He stopped short of denouncing a.s.sange as a "terrorist" but said: "It's a terrible thing that WikiLeaks did. I hope we are doing everything we can to shut down their website."

On the first day of publication of the cables, Sunday, WikiLeaks came under ma.s.sive hacker attack. The net traffic heading to WikiLeaks leapt from 13 gigabits (thousand million bits) per second to around 17Gbps. It peaked at 18Gbps. WikiLeaks was no stranger to DDOS or "distributed denial of service" attacks. Someone controlling a "botnet" of tens of thousands of compromised Windows PCs was apparently orchestrating them in an attempt to bring wikileaks.org crashing down.

In a usual DDOS attack, the PCs try to communicate with the targeted site. A typical method is to send a "ping" request with a few packets of data. It's a bit like ringing the site's front doorbell. The site generally responds by acknowledging that the data reached it. On its own, a ping request is easy for a site to deal with. But when a blizzard of them arrives from all over the world and continues and continues, it becomes impossible for the site to do anything useful: it's too busy answering the ping requests to deliver any useful data.

The DDOS attack that hit WikiLeaks that afternoon was eight times as large as any previous ones. The hacker behind it appeared to be a curious right-wing patriot called "The Jester" or, in the argot he used, "th3j35t3r". The Jester described himself as a "hacktivist for good". His goal, as stated on his Twitter account, was to obstruct "the lines of communication for terrorists, sympathisers, fixers, facilitators, oppressive regimes and general bad guys". As the attacks continued to pummel WikiLeaks, he tweeted excitedly: "www.wikileaks.org TANGO DOWN for attempting to endanger the lives of our troops, 'other a.s.sets' & foreign relations." Normally, The Jester preferred to disrupt sites he viewed as being used by jihadist groups and other Islamist revolutionaries; every time he succeeded he sent the same delighted message: "TANGO DOWN". Believed to be a former US military recruit, The Jester appeared to have decided on this occasion to target a.s.sange. TANGO DOWN for attempting to endanger the lives of our troops, 'other a.s.sets' & foreign relations." Normally, The Jester preferred to disrupt sites he viewed as being used by jihadist groups and other Islamist revolutionaries; every time he succeeded he sent the same delighted message: "TANGO DOWN". Believed to be a former US military recruit, The Jester appeared to have decided on this occasion to target a.s.sange.

The Jester's attack was the first intriguing skirmish in what turned into a serious cyber-fight. Big US corporations tried to push a.s.sange off the internet. But he was defended by a committed online group of underage libertarians and cyber-freaks. In this warfare, some would discern the beginnings of a decentralised global protest movement. Others would dismiss it as the antics of a handful of s.e.xually frustrated young men. But there was no doubt WikiLeaks was under siege.

To dodge the DDOS attacks, a.s.sange diverted the site's main WikiLeaks page though not the one with the diplomatic cables on it to run on Amazon's EC2 or "Elastic Cloud Computing" service. The cablegate.wikileaks.org directory and its contents remained outside Amazon, on a server located in France. Amazon's commercial service was big enough to absorb DDOS attacks. On Tuesday 30 November there were more attacks against Amazon's main site and WikiLeaks' France-hosted cables site. Using machines in Russia, eastern Europe and Thailand, the a.s.saults were larger and more sophisticated. Nonetheless, WikiLeaks managed to weather the storm, aided by Amazon's powerful EC2 servers. a.s.sange publicised that he was hiring them.

Senator Lieberman upped his campaign. He called Amazon and urged them to stop hosting WikiLeaks. Lieberman's browbeating worked. Amazon removed WikiLeaks from its servers. Instead of admitting it had come under political pressure, the firm claimed in weasel tones that WikiLeaks had breached its "terms of service". "It's clear that WikiLeaks doesn't own or otherwise control all the rights to this cla.s.sified content," Amazon said. "Further, it is not credible that the extraordinary volume of 250,000 cla.s.sified doc.u.ments that WikiLeaks is publishing could have been carefully redacted in such a way to ensure they weren't putting innocent people in jeopardy."

This was a statement Amazon had no factual basis to make. Only a tiny proportion of the 250,000 cables had been published, and each one was, in fact, being carefully redacted. It seemed plain that Amazon executives were regurgitating lines fed to them by politicians.

The senator hailed Amazon's "right decision" and urged "any other company or organisation that is hosting WikiLeaks to immediately terminate its relationship with them". He went on: "WikiLeaks' illegal, outrageous, and reckless acts have compromised our national security and put lives at risk around the world. No responsible company whether American or foreign should a.s.sist WikiLeaks in its efforts to disseminate these stolen materials."

The WikiLeaks team had used free software to generate a graphic display showing an overview of the cables' cla.s.sification, number and other general data. The small company that licensed it, Tableau Software, removed the graphic from its public site also feeling the pressure (though there was no direct contact) from Lieberman's office. The dominoes then started to fall. The company EveryDNS, which provides free routing services (translating human-readable addresses such as wikileaks.org into machine readable internet addresses such as 64.64.12.170) terminated the wikileaks.org domain name. It also deleted all email addresses a.s.sociated with it. Justifying the move, EveryDNS said the constant hacker attacks on WikiLeaks were inconveniencing other customers.

In effect, WikiLeaks had now vanished from the web for anyone who couldn't work out how to discover a numeric address for the site. WikiLeaks shifted to an alternative address, www.wikileaks.ch, registered in Switzerland but hosted in a Swedish bunker built to withstand a nuclear war.

Fresh problems surfaced: PostFinance, the Swiss postal system, closed a.s.sange's bank account, on the basis that he was not living in Geneva, as required by the rules. PayPal, owned by the US auction site eBay, said it would suspend WikiLeaks' account there, due to "violation of the PayPal acceptable use policy". A spokesman said the account "cannot be used for any activities that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity". It later emerged that the US state department had written to the company on 27 November the eve of the cables' launch declaring that WikiLeaks was deemed illegal in the US. On Monday 6 December, the credit card giant MasterCard followed suit, saying that WikiLeaks "contravened rules". On Tuesday, Visa Europe did the same. These were popular and easy methods of donating online; seeing both closed down shut off much of WikiLeaks' funding. (Critics pointed out that, while WikiLeaks was judged off-limits, the Ku Klux Klan's website still directed would-be donors to a site that takes both MasterCard and Visa.) It was a wounding blow and left a.s.sange struggling to pay his and WikiLeaks' growing legal bills.

These salvoes against WikiLeaks did not go unanswered: they triggered a backlash against the backlash. Fury raged online at such a demonstration of political pressure and US corporate self-interest. While polls suggested many Americans backed a shutdown of WikiLeaks, others were angered by the suppression of free speech; and far more outside the US thought the company cave-ins were a bad portent for free expression on the internet.

Into the arena stepped "Anonymous", a grouping of around 3,000 people. Some were expert hackers in control of small-scale botnets: others were net newbies seeking a cause to rally around. It was a loose collective, mainly of teenagers with time on their hands, and older people (almost all men) with more nous and technical skills. The Anonymous crowd was only a group in the loosest sense, the Guardian Guardian's technology editor Charles Arthur wrote: "It's more like a stampeding herd, not sure quite what it wants but certain that it's not going to put up with any obstacles, until it reaches an obstacle which it can't hurdle, in which case it moves on to something else."

Anonymous which grew out of the equally chaotic "/b/" messageboard on the discussion site 4chan.org had in the past tormented the Scientologists, reposting videos and leaking secret doc.u.ments that the cult hoped to suppress. Anonymous's broad manifesto is to fight against the suppression of information but its members were not above childish actions simply to annoy and frustrate web users for their own amus.e.m.e.nt (known as "doing it for the lulz"). Anonymous supporters turned up at demonstrations from time to time some of them wearing the same spooky Guy Fawkes mask that adorned the group's Anony_Ops Twitter page. "It's complex, puerile, bizarre and chaotic," one of them told Arthur.

Operation Payback had previously been directed against the websites of law firms that pursued online music pirates, as well as against the Recording Industry a.s.sociation of America (RIAA). Now it was the online payment firms' turn for "payback". Despite having no hierarchy or recognisable leader, on Wednesday 8 December Anonymous hackers forced the main website of MasterCard offline for several hours. They temporarily disrupted Sarah Palin's credit card account. Anonymous also claimed to have knocked out PostFinance's site and that of the Swedish prosecutor's office. Some Anonymous supporters posted a "manifesto". "We support the free flow of information. Anonymous is actively campaigning for this goal everywhere in all forms. This necessitates the freedom of expression for the internet, for journalism and journalists, and citizens of the world. Though we recognise you may disagree, we believe that Anonymous is campaigning for you so that your voice may never be silenced."

What effect the attack had on MasterCard's actual financial operations is unclear: the company did not say whether transactions (which would be carried out over secure lines to its main computers) were affected. It largely ignored the attack, hoping not to inflame the attackers. The tactic worked; Anonymous next considered turning its ire on Amazon and PayPal, but the disorganised nature of the group meant they could not muster enough firepower to knock either site offline; Amazon was too big, while PayPal withstood some attacks. The suggestion made privately was that the powerful hackers who had acted against MasterCard did not want to inconvenience themselves by taking out PayPal, which they used themselves all the time.

This event was something new the internet equivalent of a noisy political demonstration. What had begun with a couple of teenage nerds had morphed into a cyber-uprising against attempts to restrict information. As they put it in one portentous YouTube video, upon a soundtrack of thrashing guitars: "We are everywhere." They were certainly in the Netherlands, at least, where, in December, police arrested a 16-year-old and a 19-year-old. Some Anonymous supporters without sufficient computer skills had overlooked the fact that the software called LOIC being offered to them to run attacks would give away their internet location. Police could, given time, tie that to a physical user.

Behind all this online turbulence, however, a much more serious game was afoot. President Obama's attorney general, Eric Holder, called a press conference to announce there was now an "active, ongoing, criminal investigation" into the leaking of cla.s.sified information. He promised to hold those who broke US law "accountable", and said: "To the extent that there are gaps in our laws, we will move to close those gaps, which is not to say that anybody at this point, because of their citizenship or residence, is not a target or a subject of an investigation that is ongoing." In Alexandria, Virginia, just outside Washington, rumours began to spread that a secret grand jury had been empanelled, and many subpoenas were being prepared for issue. Bradley Manning, the young soldier who had by now spent seven months in virtual solitary confinement, would only see an end to his harsh treatment, his friends started to believe, if he was willing to implicate Julian a.s.sange and WikiLeaks in some serious crimes.

It seemed clear that prosecuting a.s.sange an Australian citizen now living in the UK for espionage or conspiracy was going to be an uphill affair, not least because of the old-fashioned nature of the US Espionage Act. But it was also clear that an exasperated White House wanted to be seen vigorously pursuing this option. Would the justice department try and winkle a.s.sange out of his hideaway in the English countryside? And was there not a still unresolved police investigation into his behaviour in Sweden? The threat of extradition and the possibility of several decades in a US supermax jail began to loom over a.s.sange, as the rest of the world sought to digest the significance of the cascade of doc.u.ments he had released.

CHAPTER 16.

The biggest leak in history

Cybers.p.a.ce 30 November 2010

"It is the historian's dream. It is the diplomat's nightmare"

TIMOTHY G GARTON A ASH, HISTORIAN.

What did we learn from WikiLeaks? The question, as with virtually everything else to do with the leaks, was polarising. There was, from the start, a metropolitan yawn from bien pensants bien pensants who felt they knew it all. Arabs don't like Iran? The Russian government is corrupt? Some African countries are kleptocracies? Go on, astonish us. You'll be telling us next that the pope is Catholic. who felt they knew it all. Arabs don't like Iran? The Russian government is corrupt? Some African countries are kleptocracies? Go on, astonish us. You'll be telling us next that the pope is Catholic.

According to this critique the disclosures stated the obvious, and amounted to no more than "humdrum diplomatic pillow talk". (This was from the London Review of Books London Review of Books. Academic Glen Newey said he was unimpressed by the revelation that French leader Nicolas Sarkozy "is a short man with a Napoleon complex".) Then there were the people who argued that the cables did not reveal enough bad behaviour by Americans. On the left this was a cause for disappointment and, sometimes, suspicion. A small cabal began poring over the cables for evidence of ideological editing or censorship. And why so little on Israel? On the right, and from government, this served as fuel for the argument that there was no public interest in publication. This was not the Pentagon papers, they reasoned. There was little malfeasance in American foreign policy revealed in the doc.u.ments, so where's the justification for revealing all? Then there was the US government's insistence that the leaks were endangering lives, wrecking Washington's ability to do business with its allies and partners, and helping terrorists.

What these arguments missed was the hunger for the cables in countries that didn't have fully functioning democracies or the sort of free expression enjoyed in London, Paris or New York. Within hours of the first cables being posted the Guardian Guardian started receiving a steady stream of pleading requests from editors and journalists around the world wanting to know what the cables revealed about their own countries and rulers. It was easier to call the revelations unstartling, dull even, if one lived in western Europe, rather than in Belarus, Tunisia, or in any other oppressive regime. started receiving a steady stream of pleading requests from editors and journalists around the world wanting to know what the cables revealed about their own countries and rulers. It was easier to call the revelations unstartling, dull even, if one lived in western Europe, rather than in Belarus, Tunisia, or in any other oppressive regime.

This was as powerful a case for the WikiLeaks disclosures as any. It was not particularly edifying to see western commentators and politicians decrying the public interest in the publication of information which was being avidly, even desperately, sought after by people in far off countries of which they doubtless knew little. Who was to say what effect these disclosures would have, even if, on one level, they were revealing things that were in some sense known? The very fact of publication often served as authentication and verification of things that were suspected.

In fact, far from being routine, the leak was unprecedented, if only in size. WikiLeaks called it, accurately, "the largest set of confidential doc.u.ments ever to be released into the public domain". There were 251,287 internal state department communiques, written by 280 emba.s.sies and consulates in 180 different countries. Among them were frank, and often unflattering, a.s.sessments of world leaders; a.n.a.lysis, much of it good quality; as well as comments, reports of meetings, summations, and gossip. There were accounts of vodka-fuelled dinners, meetings with oligarchs, encounters in Chinese restaurants and even that Saudi Arabian s.e.x party. Some cables were long essays, offering fresh thinking on historically knotty problems, such as Chechnya; others simple requests to Washington.

They highlighted the geopolitical interests and preoccupations of the US superpower: nuclear proliferation; the supposed threat from Iran; the hard-to-control military situation in Kabul and Islamabad. The American emba.s.sy cables came from established power centres (London and Paris) but also the far-off margins (Ashgabat, Yerevan and Bishkek). Boring they are not. On the contrary, they offer an incomparably detailed mosaic of life and politics in the early 21st century.

But more importantly than this, they included disclosures of things citizens are ent.i.tled to know. This is true for Americans and non-Americans. The cables discussed human rights abuses, corruption, and dubious financial ties between G8 leaders. They spoke of corporate espionage, dirty tricks and hidden bank accounts. In their private exchanges US diplomats dispense with the plat.i.tudes that characterise much of their public job; they give relatively frank, unmediated a.s.sessments, offering a window into the mental processes at the top of US power. The cables were, in a way, the truth.

The constant principle that underpinned the Guardian Guardian's selection what to print and what not was whether a cable contained material that was in the larger public interest. Nowhere was this more clear-cut than with a cla.s.sified directive from July 2009 that revealed the US government was spying on the United Nations, and its low-key South Korean secretary general, Ban Ki-moon. The cable began by requesting predictable diplomatic information about positions and views on hot topics such as Darfur, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iran and North Korea. But read more closely it clearly blurred the line between diplomacy and spying.