The Wikileaks Revolution, Part 2: Notes from the Insurrection

14Dec
by Maximilian C. Forte

On this site “The Wikileaks Revolution” (the first article in an ongoing series of three) provided a survey of opinions on what kind of turning point Wikileaks represents. At the same time I worked on a related article, with a nearly identical title, for CounterPunch, which was published today: “The Wikileaks Revolution: Notes from the Insurrection.” That is instead my own take on the Wikileaks movement as ushering in a revolutionary conjuncture.

“The State. Secrecy. Security. Censorship. Big Brother. Courts. Police. Corporations. Banks. Espionage. Treason. Assassination. Infowar. Field of battle. Troops. Terrorists. Criminals. Hackers. Activists. Danger. Arrest. Imprisonment. Avenge. Retaliation. Defiance. Subversion. Justice. Freedom. Rights. The People.

These are the keywords of a conflict with revolutionary potential. Most of them could be the keywords of any conflict. They happen to be some of the most frequently recurring words one encounters when following the battle between the Wikileaks movement and the state.” …continue

13 thoughts on “The Wikileaks Revolution, Part 2: Notes from the Insurrection”

  1. Tom O'Farrell

    Read you on Counterpunch. Good article. Keep it coming. I audited about 800 of the Iraqi warlogs for WikiLeaks. About half or possibly a bit more were reports of IED’s. An interesting issue is the surprising number of home made IED’s, made from tin cans and semi-effective home made detonators. Amateur and perhaps more dangerous to the builders than to the patrols they were aimed at.High level of failure to work. To me this indicates the level of opposition to the U.S. from Iraqi locals. Theymust be fairly desperate to resort to making these kind of explosives.

    1. Maximilian Forte

      Many thanks Tom, good to hear from you. Yes, good point about the IEDs, and that’s an interesting finding, especially as they also managed to turn the fortunes against the U.S.–which as shown in countless videos found even its heaviest armour blown to pieces by what were possibly more advanced IEDs. Eventually, the makers graduate from the “improvisation” stage, something the IED label does not admit.

    1. Chris

      John,
      How did you find that piece of intrepid 19th century reportage? Cannibals! It’s like I’ve been instantly transported back to the age of sail, reading murky mudstained reports from ‘undiscovered’ lands afar. Well, that settles it – Afghans are all cannibals. Cut back on the butter, make way for more big guns!

      Hard to believe this is intended to pass for ‘social science’ and sway any educated person. I feel very sorry for whatever segment of the public this does work on.

      Thanks to Mitchel Wilkinson and Sergio Villareal for exposing themselves as social science hacks, and for a nice belly laugh. Thanks, John, for posting this. HTS, please bring on more April-fools day pseudoscience. Your States ability to produce even marginal propaganda diminishes with each passing day!

      It will be fun to explain this to your grandchildren: “Well sonny, it’s true… at one point in time I stereotyped an entire civilization and its history and painted with the broad brush of ‘cannibalism.’ I did it in a public piece and as a disinformation op on my own fellow citizens. It was a move designed for centuries earlier, when not many people were able to read or travel. All I can say in my defense is that I had PTSD at the time from some hairy field missions where the locals weren’t too happy to see me and my stuffed animals, and I went in really believing I needed some Washington paper money, though while I was in the military I watched the value of that currency drop through the floor.”

  5. Pingback: Wikileaks and the Moral Dualism of the U.S. State Department « ZERO ANTHROPOLOGY

  6. Pingback: Here come New Whistleblowing Sites | Erkan's Field Diary

  7. Anon

    Well today I read anyone that wants to download porn in the UK will need to opt out of ISP’s blocking these sites and next we will need to opt out just so we can read a site like this one where people are able to express themselves and are able to say a word against the powers that be.

    Also read today about a 12 year old school boy in the UK was arrested at school because he posted on facebook to ask people to join him in a demonstration against his youth club being closed down but this should come as no surprise since the UK police want to stop all student protests when university fees rise by 300% and god know how many more will be murdered like Ian Tomlinson before the year is out.

    12 people where arrested today on charges of being terrorists but as usual none will be charged because our policemen are making it up as they go along to keep themselves in overtime.

    Google ‘Holly Greig’ if you want to see how members of the justice system are able to rape a little girl and despite a million people knowing about the case are still able to block the investigation and silence the defence lawyer.

    http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/official-greig-green-petition/

    If you come to the UK then don’t take pictures at the airports else the police will smash your face in and take your camera because we are all terrorists now.

    Go wikileaks the people are behind you and it’s so bad in the UK that even Iran has reported to UK to the UN for the violations committed against the British public.

    Wake up people and stop acting like cowards for today they come for me but tomorrow it will be you!

    1. Maximilian Forte

      Many thanks Anon, for the bad news, no comedy intended. And what your government does, ours will do next. More than once the UK has been the trend setter for Western surveillance and securitization.

  8. Pingback: Anthropology, Secrecy, and Wikileaks « ZERO ANTHROPOLOGY

  9. Pingback: The Wikileaks Revolution, Part 2: Notes from the Insurrection (via ZERO ANTHROPOLOGY) | First Praxis

  10. John Allison

    I went to the “cannibal” article that John Stanton linked, and read as much as i needed. Clearly this Team is working at moving the Center of Gravity among ourselves and others, well, maybe only Others, since we are probably outside that group that might be charmed enough to follow their flute. Quite smoothly and persuasively written, IF you are NOT an anthropologist of the sort writing on this fringe; which, like WikiLeaks, is growing more central to “mainstream” anthro.
    Many things he says are “true”, that is, they describe things that, if described in the terms and the languages used among Pashtun people in Afghanistan, or a region of “Pashtoonistan”, and the hearer is competent both in the language and the culture, then the hearer would understand.
    But this is strictly an English/USan language, and its terms and phrases define … construct how the reader is to “see” the situation; which will then justify the policy action that the Team is promoting to their General.
    That said, from my reading of it, it is simple-minded yellow-journalist ads to those whose boots they desire to lick. Big words, complicated references to other people’s opinions, but clearly not a document that developed from talking to Afghans, though they do say they actually have talked to Afghans. What they write is a foggy mix of “social science” and 19th century psycho analysis; sort of a “National Character Studies Return” starring Margaret Mead as the General. Published by RedTeam, or Redbook? sort of like something that got cut from Avatar.

    “Chaotic Cannibalistic State. We are defining it as a political state, as well as a state of being that exists in constant flux and chaos, resembling an egoistic anarchy; a state of violence, oppression and power-mongering that feeds on itself and its citizenry until a foreign body is introduced, at which point the internal actors, once feeding on each other, coalesce and feed on the foreigner.”

    Authors:

    COL Kevin Meredith, Team Leader, HTAT AF-18

    Sergio Villarreal, Social Scientist, HTAT AF-18

    Mitchel Wilkinson, PhD, Social Scientist, HTAT AF-18

Comments are closed