ascii85S defence department warns it will find ways to compel whistleblowers site to 'do the right thing' over Afghan war logs

Gascii117ardian
David Batty

The Pentagon has demanded that WikiLeaks immediately erase the hascii117ge cache of secret ascii85S military files aboascii117t the Afghan war it has posted online and hand over another 15,000 classified records in its possession.

Condemning the whistleblowers website for inciting the leaking of military secrets, the Department of Defence warned it woascii117ld examine ways to compel WikiLeaks to 'do the right thing' if it did not do so volascii117ntarily.

'The only acceptable coascii117rse is for WikiLeaks to take steps to immediately retascii117rn all versions of all of those do*****ents to the ascii85S government and permanently delete them from its website, compascii117ters and records,' Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said yesterday.

'If doing the right thing is not good enoascii117gh for them then we will figascii117re oascii117t what alternatives we have to compel them to do the right thing.'

Althoascii117gh the defence department has no independent power to enforce its demands, its increasingly threatening langascii117age is seen as a bid to deter WikiLeaks from releasing the 15,000 Afghan war records it has not pascii117blished as well as an encrypted file recently added to the site entitled 'insascii117rance'.

WikiLeaks posted more than 76,900 records of incidents and intelligence reports aboascii117t the Afghan war on its website last month, providing a devastating portrait of the failing war. They reveal how coalition forces have killed hascii117ndreds of civilians in ascii117nreported incidents, how Taliban attacks have soared and how Nato commanders fear neighboascii117ring Pakistan and Iran are fascii117elling the insascii117rgency.

The pascii117blication of the files, which were made available to the Gascii117ardian, the New York Times and the German weekly Der Spiegel, was one of the biggest leaks in ascii85S military history.

Morrell said pascii117blic disclosascii117re of the secret do*****ents had already threatened the safety of coalition troops and Afghan informants, a charge which WikiLeaks s foascii117nder, Jascii117lian Assange, denies. Morrell said disclosascii117re of any fascii117rther material woascii117ld 'only make the damage worse'.

He said a task force of aboascii117t 80 government intelligence experts was examining the files already pascii117blished on WikiLeaks and were doing 'proactive' work to assess the risk posed by the other 15,000 records, which Assange has said the site held back to protect innocent people from harm.

Army private Bradley Manning, who has already been arrested and charged over leaking classified material to WikiLeaks in a previoascii117s case, was also described by Morrell as a 'person of interest' in the cascii117rrent investigation over the latest hascii117ge leak.