Julian Assange is not the hero many want him to be

Michael de Percy & Sascha Dov Bachmann I 27 June 2024 I The Spectator Australia

Some are celebrating the release of Julian Assange while others beg to differ. Were his actions those of a whistleblower interested in calling out war crimes and human rights violations? Or were his actions those of a traitor? Was it freedom of the press or a childish action by a self-centred activist with financial interest that threatened the lives of our military personnel and the lives of our allies?

Leading the celebrations, controversial Greens leader, Adam Bandt, tweeted that ‘Journalism is not a crime’. Teal MP Zali Steggall later tweeted that we should ‘champion’ the principles of press freedom and whistleblower protections that play an important role in a strong democracy.

But Alan Howe, veteran editor and journalist with The Australian, wrote that Assange ‘is neither a journalist nor an editor’. Indeed, Howe wrote that:

‘Julian Assange is a criminal, a fabulist and an undisciplined, arrogant work-shy fraud who lacks an education while remaining a mannerless vulgarian.’

We couldn’t have put it better ourselves.

That’s because freedom of speech and freedom of the press are meant to protect democracy. It should not put at risk those who dedicate their lives in defence of our liberties.

John Howard referred to freedom of the press as one of the three great pillars of our democracy:

‘A vigorous parliamentary system, robustly Australian, responsible for the making of laws; a strong independent and incorruptible judiciary; and a free and sceptical media, free and sceptical often to the discomfort of us but nonetheless an important and integral part of our society.’

The system is not perfect. But unlike other political systems where there is no press freedom and everyone knows who is corrupt (and that nothing can be done about it), the free press is important to oust corruption and to get us closer to the truth.

And as Titus Livy wrote:

‘Truth, they say, is all too frequently eclipsed but never extinguished.’

A ‘free and sceptical media’ is an essential element of our way of life.

But there are limits. As Howe wrote:

‘Recklessly dumping classified correspondence on a website is regarded as journalism by nobody.’

We see the Assange saga as an intensification of the tension between civil liberties and national security that characterises liberal democracies. But this tension is an issue during peace time. In times of war, liberal democracies censor the media. And credible media outlets play their part in the national interest.

During our lifetimes, we were at war from the time we were born up until the collapse of the Soviet Union. The brief decade of peace and the hope that global capitalism and trade liberalisation meant the end of the ideological battles between east and west.

The 9/11 terrorist attacks changed all that, and we have been in a state of war, albeit in constantly changing morphing theatres, ever since.

The difference today is that the technology that enabled Assange to ‘dump’ classified information on a website has advanced and allows almost anybody to have a global audience, even terrorists.

So-called journalists who subvert the law for personal gain through media awards or book contracts are one thing, but releasing information that puts our military personnel in danger is another. Freedom of the press must be exercised with caution to avoid assisting our enemies and their cognitive warfare aims.

It is important to remember that actions have consequences. Assange and his WikiLeaks online ‘media’ organisation and publisher of leaked sensitive and classified documents became notorious for ‘leaking’ information on the US and its allies’ military operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Two troves of documents were released by Wikileaks in 2010, the Afghan War Diary and the Iraq War Logs. Totalling nearly 500,000 classified US military documents, these leaks saw the publication of these documents on the internet. Assange had no interest (nor the actual capabilities in place) to anonymise or redact vital information such as geolocations, military standard operational procedures, nor the actual identities of collaborators and informers working with coalition forces.

Consequently, Assange was charged with contraventions against the US Espionage Act, namely the conspiracy to obtain and disclose National Defense Information. The rationale behind was the high possibility that by releasing operational security (OPSEC) information, the lives of the US military and its allies.

The seriousness of this charge is highlighted by the fact that Manning, the US soldier who provided Assange with the documents, was charged under the same Act and found guilty for her role in disclosing highly sensitive and classified documents to Assange.

In addition to these espionage charges, Assange has been heavily criticised for having endangered the lives of the individuals working alongside coalition forces. While we can only speculate if his leaks have led to the actual killing of informants, it was the Taliban themselves who publicly acknowledged the usefulness of these WikiLeaks files for identifying informants. In addition there were reports that Belarus used once secret US cables to go after dissidents.

The need to treat such potentially life threatening information in an ethical manner while not killing the story has been well documented by the Guardian UK itself and how they made sure that the information they used would not endanger lives by means of redactions and anonymising content.

Assange was not a journalist but a self-promoting information ‘publisher intermediary’ who has neither advanced the freedom of the press nor shown the necessary ethical and professional acumen the public can and should expect from the press and media.

For these reasons alone, any celebration of Assange’s freedom plea deal and avoidance of the death penalty should not be conflated with a win for whistleblowers or press freedom as many Australian politicians seem to be doing. A Nelson Mandela of press freedom Assange is not and must never be made to be.

Authors: Michael de Percy & Sascha Dov Bachmann

Dr Michael de Percy is a political scientist and political commentator at the University of Canberra. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CILTA), and a Member of the Royal Society of NSW. He is National Vice President of the Telecommunications Association, Chairman of the ACT and Southern NSW Chapter of CILTA, and a member of the Australian Nuclear Association. Michael is a graduate of the Royal Military College, Duntroon and was appointed to the College of Experts at the Australian Research Council in 2022.

Professor Sascha-Dominik (Dov) Bachmann is Professor in Law and Co-Convener National Security Hub, University of Canberra, and a Research Fellow with the Security Institute for Governance and Leadership in Africa, Faculty of Military Science, Stellenbosch University. He is also a Fellow with NATO SHAPE – ACO Office of Legal Affairs where he works on Hybrid Threats and Lawfare.