private bradley manning court statement

7/29/2019 Private Bradley Manning Court Statement

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MEMORANDUtvi THRU Civi l ian Defense Counsel,-il i t a ry-OR Military Judge ,-- ..Tria l Counsel, JointSUBJECT: Statement in Support of Providence I nqui r y - - U.S. v.Priva te Firs t Cla ss (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)1. (U) The following facts are provided i n support of theprovidence i nquiry for my court-mart ia l , United States v. PFCBradley E. Manning.2. (U) Personal Facts .

a. (U) I am a twenty-f i ve (25.) year-old Pr i vate Firs t Classin the United States Army, current l y assigned to Headquartersand Headquarters Company (HHC}, U. S . Army Garrison {USAG), Join tBase Myer-Henderson Hall , Fort Myer, Virginia. Prior to th isassignment, I \


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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support of Providence I n q u i r y - - U.S. v.Pr iva te Fi r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

b. (U) Afte r research ing the In t e l l i gence Analyst pos i t ion , Iagreed t h a t t h i s would be a good fit fo r me. In p a r t i c u l a r , Ienjoyed th e f ac t t h a t an ana lys t would use in fo rmat ion derivedfrom a v a r i e ty o f sources to c rea te work products t h a t informedth e command on i t s ava i l ab le choices fo r determining th e b es tcourses o f ac t ion (COAs). Although th e MOS requ i red a workingknowledge of computers , it pr imar i ly required me to cons ider howraw in fo rmat ion can be combined with other ava i l ab lei n t e l l i g en ce sources in order to c rea t e products t h a t ass i s tedth e command in i t s s i t u a t i o n a l awareness (SA). I assessed tha tmy na tu ra l i n t e r e s t in geopo l i t i ca l a f f a i r s and my computers k i l l s would make me an exce l l en t In te l l igence Analyst .

c . (U) Afte r e n l i s t i n g , I reported to the For t Meade Mil i t a ryEntrance Process ing Sta t ion (MEPS) on 01 October 2007. I thent r ave led to , and repor ted a t Fort Leonard Wood on 02 October2007 to begin Basic Combat Training (BCT) .

d. (U) Once a t For t Leonard Wood, I quickly r ea l i zed th a t Iwas ne i the r phys ica l ly nor mental ly prepared fo r th erequi rements of BCT. My BCT exper ience l a s ted s ix (6 ) monthsi ns t ead o f th e normal ten (10) weeks. Due to medical i s sues , Iwas placed in a hold s t a t u s . A physical examination ind ica ted Isus ta ined i n ju r i e s to my r i g h t shoulde r and l e f t foo t . Due tothese i n j u r i e s I was unable to cont inue BCT.

e. (U) During medical hold, I was informed t h a t I may be outprocessed from th e Army. However, I res i s t ed being "chaptered"because I f e l t I could overcome my medical i ssues and cont inueto serve .

f . On 20 January 2008, I re turned to BCT. This t ime I wasbe t t e r prepared , and I completed t r a in in g on 2 Apri l 2008. Ithen repor ted fo r th e MOS-specific Advanced Ind iv idua l Training(AIT) on 7 Apr i l 2008.

g. (U) AIT was an enjoyable exper ience fo r me. Unlike BCT,where I f e l t d i f f e r e n t than th e other Sold ie r s , I fit in and didwel l . I pre fe r red th e mental chal lenges of reviewing a l a rgeamount of in format ion from var ious sources and t ry ing to c rea teuse fu l , o r " ac t i o n ab l e , " products . I espec ia l ly enjoyed th eprac t ice of ana lys i s through th e use of computer appl ica t ionsand methods I was fami l i a r with .

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UNCLASSIFIEDSUBJECT: . Statement in Support of Providence Inquiry - - U. S. v.Private Firs t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

h. (U) I graduated from AIT on 16 August 2D08 and r eported tomy f i r s t duty s ta t ion , Fort Drum, New York on 28 August 2008 .As an analyst , Signi f icant Activi t ies (S IGACTs) were a frequentsource of information for me to use in creat ing work products.I s tar ted working extensively with SIGACTs early af t e r myarr iva l a t Fort Drum. My compute r background allowed me to usethe tools organic to the Distr ibuted Common Ground System--Army(DCGS-A} computers and c r ea t e polished work products for the 2ndBrigade Combat Team (2BCT) chain of command.

i . (U) The non- comm i ssioned-officer - in - charge (NCOI C) 1111111111 recognized mys a potent , an tasked me to work on a tool abandonedby a previously assigned analyst , the "Incident Tracker ." TheI nc ident Tracker was viewed as a backup t o the Comb i nedInformati on Data Network Exchange (CI DNE ) and a unit hi s to r ica lreference tool .j . (U) In the months preceding my upcoming deployment , Iworked on creat ing a new version of t he inc i dent t racker, andused SIGACTs to popula te it . The SIGACTs I .used were fromAfghanistan, because a t t he time our uni t was scheduled todeploy to the Logar and Wardak provinces Afghanistan. Later ,our uni t was reassigned to deploy to eastern Baghdad, Iraq . At

tha t point , I removed th e Afghanistan SIGACTs and switched toIraq SIGACTs .k. (U) As an analyst , I view the .SIGACTs as his tor ica l data .I believe th i s view i s shared by other a l l - source ana l ysts aswell . SIGACTs g ive a f i r s t - look impression of a specif ic or

iso l ated event . Thi s event can be an Improvised ExplosiveDevise (IED) at tack , a Small Arms Fire (SAF} engagement with ahost i le force, or any other event a specif ic uni t documented andreported i n r ea l - t ime . I n my pe r spective, th e informationcontained within a single SIGACT , or group of SIGACTs i s notvery sensi t ive . The events encapsulated within most SIGACTsinvolve e i ther enemy engagements or casua l t ies . Most of th;Lsinformation is public ly reported by t he Pub li c Affai rs Office(PAO) , embedded media pools , or host-nat ion (HN) media.

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support of Providence Inquiry - - U.S. v.Priva te Fi r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

1. (U) As I s t a r t e d working with SIGACTs, I f e l t they weres imi l a r t o a da i ly j ou rna l or log t h a t a person may keep. Theycapture what happens on a p a r t i c u l a r day and t ime . . They arecrea ted immediate ly a f t e r th e event and are po ten t i a l ly updatedover a per iod o f hours u n t i l a f i n a l vers ion i s publ i shed onCIDNE.

m. (U) Each u n i t has i t s own s tandard opera t ing procedure(SOP) fo r repor t ing and recording SIGACTs. The SOP may d i f f e rbetween repor t ing in a p a r t i c u l a r deployment, and repor t ing inga r r i son . In ga r r i son , a SIGACT normally invo lves personne li s sues , such as a Driving Under- the- In f luence (DUI) inc ident , oran automobile acc i d en t invo lv ing the death or ser ious i n ju ry o fa Sold ie r . The r e p o r t s t a r t s a t the company l eve l , and goes upto the ba t t a l ion , br igade , and even up to th e div i s ion l eve l .In a deployed environment, a uni t may observe o r p a r t i c i p a t e inan event and th e pla toon l eader or pla toon sergeant may repor tth e event as a SIGACT to the Company Headquar ters through th erad io t ransmiss ion opera to r (RTO) . The commander or RTO wil lthen forward th e repor t lo th e Bat ta l ion Bat t lecapta in o r Bat t leNon-commissioned o f f i c e r (NCO) . Once th e Bat ta l ionBa t t l e cap ta in o r Bat t l e NCO receives th e repor t , they wil le i t h e r :

(1) Notify t he Ba t t a l ion Operat ions Off i ce r (S3).(2) Conduct an ac t ion , such as launching th e QuickReaction Force (QRF) .(3) Record th e event and repor t fu r the r repor t it up th echain of command to th e Brigade.

The record ing o f each event i s done by radio o r over the Secre tIn te rne t Pro toco l Router Network (SIPRNet), normally by anass igned Sold ie r , u sua l ly jun io r en l i s t ed (E-4 and below).

n. (U) Once a SIGACT i s reported , th e SIGACT i s fu r the r sen tup th e chain o f command. At each l eve l , add i t iona l informat ioncan e i t h e r be added or cor rec ted as needed. Normally, within 24to 48 hours, th e updat ing and repor t ing o f a p a r t i c u l a r SIGACTi s complete . Eventua l ly , a l l repor t s and SIGACTs go through thechain of command from Brigade to Divis ion, and Divis ion toCorps. At Corps - leve l , the SIGACT i s f i n a l i z ed and publ ished.

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support of Providence Inquiry - - U.S. v.Priva te F i r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

o. (U) The CIDNE system con ta ins a database t h a t i s used bythousands of Department of Defense (DoD) personnel , includingSold ie r s , c iv i l i a ns , and con t rac to r suppor t . I t was th e U.S.Cent ra l Command (CENTCOM) repor t ing t oo l fo r opera t iona lrepor t ing in I raq and Afghanis tan . Two separa te but s imi l a rdatabases were maintained fo r each t h ea t e r , "CIDNE-I" fo r Iraqand "CIDNE-A" fo r Afghanis tan .

p. (U) Each database encompasses over a hundred types o frepor t s and othe r h i s t o r i c a l informat ion fo r access . Theycontain mil l ions o f ve t ted and f ina l i zed records includingopera t iona l and i n t e l l i g en ce repor t ing . CIDNE was crea ted toc o l l e c t and analyze ba t t l e space data to provide da i ly operat ionand i n t e l l igence community (IC) repor t ing re levant to acommander 's da i ly dec i s ion mak.].ng process .

q. (U) The CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A databases con ta in repor t ingand ana lys is f i e l d s from mul t ip le d i s c ip l i n e s including:

(1) Human In te l l igence (HUMINT) r epor t s .(2) Psycholog ica l Opera t ions (PSYOP) r epor t s .(3) Engagement r epor t s .(4) Counter- Improvised Explos ive Device (CIED) repor t s .(5) SIGACT r epor t s .(6) Target ing r epor t s .(7) Soc ia l -Cul tu ra l r epor t s .(8) Civ i l Af fa i r s r epor t s .

( 9) Human Terra in repor t ing .r . (U) As an i n t e l l igence ana lys t , I had unl imi ted access to

th e CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A databases and th e in fo rmat ion containedwithin them. Although each t ab l e with in the da tabases i simportant , I pr imar i ly d ea l t with HUMINT repor t s , SIGACTrepor t s , and CIED repor t s because these repor t s were used toc rea t e the work produc t I was required to publ i sh as an ana lys t .

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s . (U) When working on an assignment, I looked anywhere andeverywhere fo r in fo rmat ion . As an a l l - source ana lys t , t h i s wassomething t h a t was expected. The DCGS-A systems had databasesb u i l t in , and I u t i l i z e d them on a da i ly bas i s . This includesth e search too l s ava i l ab le on DCGS-A systems on SIPRNet such asQuery-Tree, and th e DoD and In te l ink search eng ines .

t. (U) Pr imar i ly , I u t i l i z e d th e CIDNE database , using th eh i s t o r i c a l and HUMINT repor t ing to conduct my ana lys is andprovide backup fo r my work product . I did s t a t i s t i c a l ana lys i son h i s to r i c a l da ta , including SIGACTs, to back up analyses t h a twere based on HUMINT repor t ing and produce char t s , graphs, andt ab les . I a lso c rea ted maps and cha r t s t o conduct pred ic t iveana lys is based on s t a t i s t i c a l t rends . The SIGACT repor t ingprovided a re fe rence po in t fo r what occurred, and providedmyself and othe r ana lys t s with the in fo rmat ion to conclude aposs ib le outcome.

u. (U) Although SIGACT repor t ing i s sens i t ive a t th e t ime oft h e i r c rea t ion , t h e i r s e ns i t i v i t y normally d i s s ip a t e s wilhin 48to 72 hours as the in format ion i s e i t he r publ i c ly re l ea sed , o rth e uni t involved i s no longer in th e area and not in danger .I t i s my unders tand ing t h a t th e SIGACT repor t s remain c l a s s i f i e donly because they a re mainta ined with in CIDNE, because it i sonly access ib le on SIPRNet. Everyth ing on CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A,to inc lude SIGACT repor t ing was t r ea ted as c l a s s i f i e din fo rmat ion .

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Suppor t of Providence Inqu i ry - - U.S. v.Pr iva te F i r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

4. (U) Facts Regarding Storage of SIGACT Reports .a. (U) As p a r t of my t r a in in g a t Fort Drum, I was i ns t ruc t ed

to ensure t h a t I crea te back-ups of my work product . The needt o c rea t e back-ups was p a r t i c u l a r l y acu te given th e re l a t ivei n s t ab i l i t y o f and unre l i a b i l i t y of the computer systems we usedin th e f i e ld and dur ing deployment . These computer systemsinc luded both organ ic and thea te r -p rov ided equipment (TPE) DCGSA machines. The organ ic DCGS-A machines we brought with us in toth e f i e l d and on deployment were Del l M-90 l ap tops , and th e TPEDCGS-A machines were Alienware brand l ap tops .

b. (U) The M-90 DCGS-A l ap tops were th e pre fe r red machine touse , as they were s l i gh t ly f a s t e r , and had fewer problems withdus t and t empera tu re than the TPE Alienware l ap tops .

c . (U) I used s ev e ra l DCGS-A machines during th e deploymentdue to var ious t e c h n i c a l problems with th e l ap tops . With thesei s sues , s ev e ra l ana lys t s l o s t informat ion, bu t I never l o s tinformat ion due to the mul t ip le back-ups I c rea t ed .

d. (U)I at tempted to back-up as much re l evan t informat ion asposs ib l e . I would save the i n format ion so t h a t I , o r ano theran a l y s t could quick ly access it when a machine crashed, SIPRNetco n n ec t i v i t y was down, o r I fo rgo t where data was s t o red . Whenbacking-up in fo rmat ion I would do one o r a l l of the fol lowingt h i n g s , based on my t r a in in g :

(1 ) (U) Phys ica l Back-up. I t r i e d to keep phys ica l backupcopies of in format ion on paper , so in fo rmat ion could be grabbedquickly . Also , it was eas i e r to b r i e f from hard-cop ies researchand HUMINT r ep o r t s .

(2 ) (U) Local Drive Back-up. I t r i e d t o s o r t outi n format ion I deemed r e l ev an t and keep complete cop ies o f theinformat ion on each of the computers I used in th e TemporarySen s i t i v e Compartmented Informat ion Fac i l i ty (T-SCIF), inc lud ingmy pr imary and secondary DCGS-A machines. This was s to red undermy u s e r - p r o f i l e on th e "desktop.u

(3 ) (U) Shared Drive Backup. Each ana lys t had access to a"T-Drive" sha red across th e SIPRNet. I t al lowed o t h e r s to accessinformat ion t h a t was s to red on it. S6 opera ted th e "T-Drive .u

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support o f Providence Inquiry - - U.S. v.Priva te F i r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

(4) (U) Compact Disc Re-Writable (CD-RW) Back-up. Forl a r g e r d a t a s e t s , I saved th e information onto a re -wr i t ab led i sc , l abe led the di sc s and s to red them in th e conference roomof the T-SCIF.

e . (U) This redundancy permi t ted us th e ab i l i t y to not worryabout in fo rmat ion lo s s . I f a system crashed, I could eas i lyp u l l the in format ion from my secondary computer, th e "T-Drive ,"o r one o f th e CD-RWs. I f anothe r ana lys t wanted access to mydata , but I was unavai l ab le , she could f ind my publ ishedproducts d i r ec to r y on th e "T-Drive" o r on th e CD-RWs. I sor teda l l o f my products and research by date , t ime, and group, andupdated th e in fo rmat ion on each of th e s torage methods to ensuret h a t the l a t e s t in fo rmat ion was ava i lable to them.

f . (U) During th e deployment, I had severa l o f the DCGS-Amachines crash on me. Whenever th e computer crashed, I usual lyl o s t in fo rmat ion , b u t the redundancy method ensured my ab i l i t yto quick ly r e s to r e old backup data , and add my cur ren tin fo rmat ion to th e machine when it was repa i red or rep laced .

g. (U) I s to red th e backup CD-RWs of l a rger da tase t s in theconference room o f th e T-SCIF o r next to my workstat ion . Imarked th e CD-RWs based on th e c l a s s i f i c a t i on l ev e l and i t scon ten t . Unclass i f ied CD-RWs were only l abe led with th e contenttype, and not marked with c l a s s i f i c a t i on markings.

h. (U) Ear ly on in th e deployment, I only saved and s to redth e SIGACTs t h a t were with in o r near our Opera t iona l Environment(OE). Later , I thought it would be eas i e r j u s t to save a l l theSIGACTs onto a CD-RW. The process would not take very long tocomplete, and so I downloaded the SIGACTs from CIDNE-I onto aCD-RW. Afte r f in i sh ing with CIDNE-I, I did th e same with ClONEA. By downloading th e CIDNE-I and ClONE-A SIGACTs, I was ableto re t r i eve th e in fo rmat ion whenever I needed it, and not re lyupon th e unre l i ab le and slow SIPRNet connec t iv i ty needed to"pu l l " them. Ins tead , I could j u s t f ind the CD-RW, and open thepreloaded spreadshee t .

i . This process began in la te-December 2009, and cont inuedthrough ear ly -January 2010. I could quick ly expor t one month ofth e SIGACT data a t a t ime, and download in th e background as Id id other t a sks .

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support of Providence Inquiry - - U.S. v.Pr iva te Fi r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

j . (U) The process took approximate ly a week fo r each t ab l e .A f t e r downloading th e SIGACT t ab les , I per iod ica l ly updated themby pul l ing only th e most recen t SIGACTs, and simply copying themand "pas t ing" them in to th e database saved on CD-RW.

k. (U) I never h id th e f ac t I had downloaded copies o f bothth e SIGACT t ab les from CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A. They were s to red onappropr ia te ly labe led and marked CD-RWs s tored in th e open. Iviews the saved cop ies of the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A SIGACT t ab lesas being fo r both my use , and the use of anyone with in the S2sec t ion during SIPRNet connec t iv i ty i s sues .

l. (U) In addi t ion to th e SIGACT t ab l e , I had a l a rgerepos i tory o f HUMINT repor t s and CIED repor t s downloaded fromCIDNE-I. These con ta ined repor t s t h a t were re levant to the areain and around our OE, in eas t e rn Baghdad and the Diyala provinceo f I raq .

m. (U) In order to compress the data to fit onto a CD-RW, Iused a compression a lgor i thm ca l l ed "BZip2." The program usedto compress the da ta i s ca l l ed "WinRAR." WinRAR i s anapp l i ca t ion t h a t i s f ree and can eas i ly be downloaded from theIn te rne t v ia th e Non-secure In t e rne t Relay Pro toco l Network(NIPRNet). I downloaded WinRAR on NIPRNet and t r ans fe r red it toth e DCGS-A machine user p ro f i l e "desktop" using a CD-RW.

n. (U) I d id not t r y to hide the fac t t h a t I was downloadingWinRAR onto my SIPRNet DCGS-A computer . With th e ass i s t ance ofth e BZip2 compression a lgor i thm using th e WinRAR program, I wasab le to fit a l l th e SIGACTs onto a s ing le CD-RW, and th ere l evan t HUMINT and CIED repor t s onto a separa te CD-RW.

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UNCLASSIFIEDSUBJECT: Statement in Support of Providence Inquiry - u.s. v.Private Firs t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manni ng (U)5. (U) Facts regarding my knowledge of the WikiLeaksOrganization (WLO}

a. (U) I f i r s t became vaguely aware of WLO during my AI T a tFort Huachuca, AZ. Though, I did not f ul ly pay at tent ion unt i lWLO released purported Short Messaging System {SMS) messagesfrom 11 September 2001 on 25 November 2009 . At that time ,references to the re lease and the WLO website showed up in mydaily Google News open source search for information re la ted toU.S. foreign policy.

b . (U) The s tor ies were about how WLO published approximately500,000 messages . I then reviewed the messages myself , andrealized tha t t he posted messages were very likely real giventhe sheer volume and deta i l of the content.c. (U) After th i s , I began conducting research on WLO. Iconduct ed searches on both NIPRNet and SIPRNet on WLO beginningi n la te November 2009 and ear ly December 2009 . At th is time Ialso began to rout inely monitor the WLO website.d. (U) In response to one of my searches in December 2009 , Ifound the u.s. Army Counter-Inte l l igence Center (USACIC) report

on WLO . After review i ng the repor t , I believed tha t t his reportwas the one tha t my AIT ins t ructor referenced i n ear ly 2008 . Imay or may not have saved the repor t on my DCGS - A workstation .I know I reviewed the document on other occasions throughou tear ly 2010, and saved it on both my primary and seconda r yl aptops.e. (U) Af te r reviewing the report , I cont i nued doing myresearch on WLO. However, based upon my open-source collection ,I di scovered i n formation tha t contradicted the 2008 USACICreport , including in format ion i ndica t i ng tha t , s imilar to otherpress agenc ies , WLO seemed to be dedicated to exposing i l l ega l

ac t iv i t ies and corruption . WLO received numerous awards andrecognition fo r i t s repor t ing act i vi t i e s . Also , in review i ngthe WLO website, I found i nfo rmation regarding U. S. mili tarySOPs for Camp De l ta a t Guantanamo Bay , Cuba , and i nformation onthen- outdated Ru l es of Engageme nt (ROE) in Iraq fo r cross-borderpursuit s of former members of a l -T ikr i t i ' sgovernment .

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support of Providence Inqu i ry - U.S. v.Priva te F i r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

f . (U) Afte r see ing th e informat ion ava i l ab le on th e WLOwebsi te , I cont inued fol lowing it and co l lec t ing open-sourceinformat ion from it. During t h i s t ime per iod , I followedsevera l organiza t ions and groups, inc lud ing wire press agenciessuch as th e Associa ted Press and Reuters and pr iva tein t e l l i g en ce agencies including St ra teg ic Forecas t ing(STRATFOR). This p r ac t i c e was something I was t r a ined to doduring AIT, and was something t h a t good ana lys ts are expected todo.

g. (U) During th e searches of WLO I found s ev e ra l pieces ofinformat ion t h a t I found usefu l in my work as an ana lys t .Spec i f i ca l ly , I r e c a l l WLO publ ishing documents re l a t ing toweapons t r a f f i c k i n g between tw o nat ions t h a t a f fec t ed my OE. Ii n t eg ra t ed t h i s in fo rmat ion in to one o r more o f my workproducts .

h. (U) In add i t ion to v i s i t i ng th e WLO webs i te , I beganfol lowing WLO using an I n s t an t Relay Chat (IRC) c l i e n t ca l led"X-Chatu sometime in ear ly January 2010. IRC i s a pro toco l fo rrea l - t ime i n t e rn e t communicat ions by messaging o r conferencing,co l loqu ia l ly r e fe r red to as "chat roomsu o r "cha t s .u The IRCcha t rooms are designed fo r group communication in discuss ionforums. Each IRC cha t room i s ca l l ed a "channel .u Simi la r to at e l ev i s io n , you can " tune- inu to or "fol lowu a channel , so longas it i s open and does not requ i re an i nv i t e . Once jo in ing aspec i f i c IRC conversat ion , o ther users in th e conversat ion cansee you have " jo inedu the room. On th e In te rne t , the re aremil l ions o f d i f f e r e n t IRC channels across seve ra l se rv ice s .Channel t op ic s span a range o f t op ic s , cover ing a l l kinds ofi n t e r e s t s and hobbies .

i . (U) The primary reason fo r fol lowing WLO on IRC wascu r io s i t y , pa r t i c u l a r ly in regards to how and why they obta inedth e SMS messages re fe renced above. I bel i eved co l l e c t i n ginformat ion on th e WLO would a s s i s t me in t h i s goal .

j . (U) I n i t i a l l y , I simply observed th e IRC conversat ions . Iwanted to know how th e organ iza t ion was s t ruc tu red , and how theyobta ined t h e i r data . The conversa t ions I viewed were usua l lyt echnica l in natu re , b u t sometimes switched to a l i v e l y debateon i ssues a pa r t i c u l a r ind iv idua l f e l t s t rongly about .

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Support of Providence Inquiry - U.S. v.Priva te F i r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

k. (U) Over a per iod of t ime, I became more involved in thesediscuss ions , espec ia l ly when the conversa t ion tu rned tog eo p o l i t i c a l even ts and information t op ic s , such as networkingand encryp t ion methods. Based on these observat ions I woulddescr ibe th e WLO conversat ion as almost academic in natu re .

1. (U) In add i t ion to th e WLO conversat ions , I par t i c ipa tedin numerous othe r IRC channels across a t l e a s t three d i f fe ren tnetworks. The othe r IRC channels I p a r t i c ip a t ed in normallyd ea l t with t e chn ica l t op ic s inc lud ing the Linux and BerkeleySecur i ty Dis t r ibu t ion (BSD) Operat ing Systems (OS), networking,encryp t ion a lgor i thms and t echn iques , and othe r more p o l i t i c a ltopics such as po l i t i c s and queer r igh t s .

m. (U) I normal ly engaged in mult ip le IRC conversa t ionss imul taneous ly , most ly publ i c ly but of ten p r iv a t e ly . The X-Chatc l i e n t enabled me to manage these mul t ip le conversat ions acrossd i f f e r e n t channels and se rve rs . The screen fo r X-Chat was oftenbusy, but exper ience enabled me to see when something wasi n t e r e s t i n g . I would then se lec t th e conversat ion and e i the robserve o r pa r t i c ipa t e .

n. (U) I rea l ly enjoyed th e IRC conversat ions pe r t a in ing toand invo lv ing the WLO. However, a t some p o i n t in l a t e Februaryo r ear ly March, th e WLO IRC channel was no longer access ib l e .Ins tead, the regu la r p a r t i c ip an t s o f t h i s channel swi tched tousing a "Jabber" se rve r . Jabber i s ano ther In te rne tcommunication too l , s imi la r , bu t more soph is t i ca ted than IRC.The IRC and Jabber conversat ions al lowed me to f ee l connected too thers even when alone. They helped me pass the t ime and keepmotivated throughout th e deployment.

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UNCLASSIFIEDSUBJECT: Statement in Support of Provi dence Inquiry - U.S . v.Private Firs t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U}

6. (U} Fact s regardi ng the unauthorized storage and disclosureof the SIGACTs.

a . (U) As indicated above, I created copies of the CIDNE-1and CIDNE - A SIGACTs tables as par t of the process of backing upinformation . At the time I did so , I did not i ntend to use th isinformation for any purpose other than for back-up. However , Il a te r decided to re lease th i s information publicly. At thattime I believed, and s t i l l be l ieve, tha t these tables are two ofthe most s ign i f ican t documents of our t ime.b . (U) On 8 January 2010 , I collected the CD-RW I stored inthe conference room of the T-SCI F and pl aced it into t he cargopocket of my Army Combat Uniform (ACU). At the end of my shi f t ,I took the CD-RW out of the T-SCIF and brought i t to myContaineri zed Housing Unit (CHU) . I copied the data onto mypersonal l aptop. Later, a t the beginning of my sh i f t , Ireturned the CD-RW back to the conference room of the T- SCIF.c. (U) At t he time I saved t he SIGACTs to my lapt op, Iplanned to take them with me on mid- tour leave, and decide what

to do with them. At some point prior t o mid-tour leave, It ransferred the information from my computer to a SecuredDigi ta l memory card for my dig i ta l camera. The SD card for thecamera also worked. on my computer, and allowed me to s tore theSI GACT tables in a secure manner for t ranspor t .

d . (U) I began mid-tour leave on 23 January 2010, f l ying f romAtlanta, GA to Reagan National Ai r t i n Vi rg i nia . I arriveda t the home of my aunt, 11111111 , in Potomac, MD andqu i ckly got into contact with my then-boyfriend 1111111111111111 11111, then a student a t Brandeis University inWa l tham, MA , and I made plans for me to v i s i t in the Boston , MAarea. I was exci ted to see 11111 , and planned on talking toI I I I I about wher e our relat ionship was going, and about my timein Iraq .

e. (U) H o w e v e ~ , when I arrived in the Boston area , IIIII andI seemed to have become dis tan t . He did not seem very exci tedabout my return from Iraq. I t r ied ta l king to him about ourre la t io nship, but he refused to make any plans . I also t r iedra i s i ng t he topic of releasing the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A SIGACTtables to the public .

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f . (U) I asked - hypothet ical questions about what hewould do i f he had documents that he thought the public neededaccess to . - didn ' t rea l ly have a specif ic answer for me.He t r ied to answer the question and be supportive, but seemedconfused by the ques t ion and i t s context. I then t r ied to bemore specif ic , but he asked too many questions . Rather than t ryto explain my dilemma , I decided to jus t d rop the conversat ion.

g. (U) After a few days in Waltham, I began feel ing tha t Iwas overstaying my welcome, and I returned to Maryland. I spentthe remainder of my t ime on leave in the Washington, DC area.h . (U) During th i s time, a blizzard bombarded the midAtlant ic, and I spent a s ignif icant pe r i od of time essent ia l lystuck a t my aunt ' s house in Maryland. I began to t hi nk aboutwhat I knew , and the informat io n I s t i l l had in my possession.

For me, the SIGACTs represen t ed the on-the-g round rea l i ty ofboth the conf l ic t s in I raq and Afghanistan . I fe l t we werer isking so much for people tha t seemed unwill ing to cooperatewith us, leading to f rus t ra t ion and hatred on both sides .i . (U) I began to become depressed a t the s i tuat ion that wefound ourselves increasingly mired i n, y e a ~ - a f t e r - e a TheSIGACTs documented th i s in great de ta i l , and provided context to

what we were seeing on-the-ground. In attempt in g to conductcounter- terrorism (CT) and counter-insurgency (COIN) operations,we became obsessed with capturing and ki l l ing human targets onlis t s , on being suspicious of and avoiding cooperation with ourhost-nation partners , and ignoring the second and th i rd orderef fec t s of accomplishing short-term goals and missions.

j . (U) I believed tha t i f the general public, especial ly theAmerican public , had access t o the information conta ined withinthe CI DNE-I and CIDNE-A tab l es, th is could spark a domesticdebate on the role of the mil i tary and our foreign pol icy ingeneral, as well as it re la ted to Iraq and Afghanistan. I alsobelieved a detai led analysis of the data over a long period oftime, by di f fe ren t sectors of socie t y, might cause society tore-evaluate the need, or even the desire to engage in CT andCOIN operat ions t ha t ignored the complex dynamics of the peoplel iv ing in t he affected envi r onment each day.

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k. (U) At my a u n t ' s house, I debated about what I should dowith th e SIGACTs. In p a r t i c u l a r , whether I should hold on tothem, or di sc lose them through a press agency. At t h i s poin t , Idecided it made sense to t r y and di sc lose th e SIGACT t ab les toan American newspaper.

1. (U) I f i r s t ca l led my l oca l newspaper , th e Washington Postand spoke with a woman saying she was a r epor te r . I asked herif th e Washington Post would be i n t e r e s t ed in rece iv inginformat ion t h a t would have enormous value to th e Americanpubl i c . Although we spoke fo r about f ive minutes concern ing thegenera l na tu re o f what I possessed, I do not be l ieve she took mese r ious ly . She informed me t h a t th e Washington Post wouldposs ib ly be i n t e res t ed , but t h a t such dec i s ions a re made onlya f t e r seeing th e in fo rmat ion I was r e fe r r ing to , and a f t e rcons idera t ion by th e senior ed i to r s .

m. (U) I then decided to contact the l a rg e s t and most popularnewspaper, th e New York Times. I ca l led th e publ ic ed i to rnumber on th e New York Times websi te . The phone rang and wasanswered by a machine. I went through th e menu to the sec t ionfo r news t i p s and was rou ted to an answering machine. I l e f t amessage s t a t i n g I had access to informat ion about I raq andAfghanistan t h a t I bel i eved was very important . However,despi te leaving my Skype phone number and persona l emailaddress , I never received a reply from th e New York Times.

n. (U) I a lso br i e f ly considered dropping in to th e of f ice fo rth e p o l i t i c a l commentary blog Pol i t i co . However, the weathercondi t ions during my l eave hampered my e f fo r t s to t r a v e l .

o. (U) After these fa i l ed e f fo r t s , I ul t ima te ly decided tosubmit th e mate r i a l s t o the WLO. I was not sure if WLO wouldac tu a l l y publ i sh the SIGACT t ab les , o r, even if they didpubl i sh , I was concerned they might not be not iced by theAmerican media. However, based on what I read about WLO throughmy research descr ibed above, t h i s seemed to be th e bes t mediumfo r publ ishing t h i s in fo rmat ion to the world within my reach.

p. (U) At my a u n t ' s house, I jo ined in on an IRC conversat ionand s ta ted I had in fo rmat ion t h a t needed to be shared with theworld. I wrote t h a t the information would help document th et rue cos ts o f th e wars in I raq and Afghani s tan .

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q. (U) One o f the indiv idua ls in th e IRC asked me to descr ibethe in format ion . However, before I could descr ibe thein format ion , ano ther indiv idua l pointed me to th e l ink fo r theWLO webs i t e ' s onl ine submission system.

r . (U) Afte r ending my IRC connect ion, I considered myopt ions one more t ime. Ult imate ly , I f e l t t h a t th e r i g h t th ingto do was t o re l ea se the SIGACTs. On 3 February 2010, I v i s i t edth e WLO websi te on my computer, and c l icked on th e "SubmitDocuments" l i n k . Next, I found the "submit your informat iononl ine l i n k , " and e lec t ed to submit th e SIGACTs v ia th e TOROnion Router (TOR) anonymizing network by a spec ia l l i n k .

s . (U) TOR i s a system in tended to provide anonymity onl ine .The sof tware routes I n t e r n e t t r a f f i c through network o f serversand other TOR c l i e n t s in order to concea l a us e r ' s l oca t ion andi den t i ty . I was fami l i a r with TOR and had it prev ious lyi n s t a l l e d on my computer to anonymously monitor th e s o c i a l mediawebsi tes of mi l i t i a groups operat ing with in cen t r a l I raq .

t . (U) I fo l lowed th e prompts and a t t ached the compresseddata f i l e s o f the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A SIGACTs. I a t t ached at e x t f i l e I dra f ted while prepar ing to provide th e documents toth e Washington Pos t . I t provided rough guide l ines s t a t i n g "it'sa l ready been s an i t i z ed o f any source i den t i fy ing in fo rmat ion .You might need to sit on t h i s in fo rmat ion , perhaps 90-180 days,to f igure ou t how b e s t to re l ea se such a l a rge amount of data ,and to pro tec t source . This i s poss ib ly one of th e mores i g n i f i c a n t documents of our t ime, removing the fog of war, andrevea l ing the t rue natu re o f 21s t cen tury asymmetric warfare .Have a good day ." Af te r sending t h i s , I l e f t the SD card in acamera case a t my aun t ' s house, in th e event I needed it againin th e fu tu re .

u. (U) I re turned from mid-tour leave on 11 February 2010.Although th e in fo rmat ion had not y et been publ i shed by the WLO,I f e l t a sense o f r e l i e f by them having it. I f e l t hadaccomplished something t h a t allowed me to have a c l e a rconscience based upon what I had seen, read about and knew werehappening in both I raq and Afghanistan every day.

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UNCLASSIFIEDSUBJECT : Statement in Support of Providence Inquiry - - u.s . v .Pr i vate Fi r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U}7 . (U) Facts regarding the unauthorized s t orage and di sclosureof "10REYKJAVIK13" .

a . (U) I f i r s t became aware of diplomat i c cables during myt ra in i ng period in AIT . I l a te r learned about the Department ofState (DOS) Net- Cent r i c Di omacy (NCD) porta l from the 2-lOBCTS2, 1111111 1111 1111111 sent a sect i on -wide emailto the other arialysts and off icers in l a te December 2009containing the SIPRNet l ink to the porta l , along withinst ruct ions to look a t the cables contained within andincorporate them into our work product. Shortly af t e r th is , Ialso noticed that diplomatic cab l es were be ing referred to inproducts from the Corps- level , U.S. Forces-Iraq (USF-I) .

b. {U ) Based on direct ion to become fami l i a r withi t s contents, I read r tua l ly every published cable concerningIraq. I also began scanning the database and reading other ,random, cables tha t piqued my cur ios i ty . I t was around th ist ime , in early- to- mid-Januar y 20 10 that I began searching thedatabase for i nformation on Iceland . I became i nteresLed .i.nIceland due to IRC conversations I viewed i n the WLO channeldiscussed an is sue cal led "Icesave." At th i s time, I was notvery familiar with the topic , but it seemed to be a big issuefor those par t ic ipa t ing in t he conversation . This i s when Idec i ded to invest igate , and conduct a few searches on Iceland tof i nd out more .

c . (U) At the time , I did not f i nd anything rl iscussing the" I cesave" i s sue , e i ther direct ly or i ndirect ly . I thenconducted an open source search f or " I cesave . u I then le arnedtha t Iceland was involved in a dispute with t he United Kingdom(UK) and Ne ther lands concerning the f inancial collapse of one ormore of Ice la nd ' s banks. According to open source reports , muchof the public controversy involved the UK's use of "antiterrorism l eg is la t ion" against Iceland in order to freezeIcelandic assets for payment of the guarantees for UK depositorsthat los t money.

d . (U) Shor t ly a f te r r e turning from mi d-tou r leave, Ireturned to the NCD to search for information on Iceland and"Icesave" as the topic had not abated on the WLO IRC channel.To my surpr ise , on 14 February 2010, I found the cable10REYKJAVIK13 which re f erenced the '\.Icesav.eu issue di rec t ly .17

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SUBJECT: Sta tement in Suppor t of Providence Inquiry - - U.S. v.Priva te F i r s t Class (PFC) Bradley E. Manning (U)

e . (U) The cab le , publ i shed on 13 January 2010, was j u s t overtw o pages in l eng th . I read th e cab le , and quick ly concludedt h a t Iceland was e s se n t i a l l y being bu l l i ed , dip lomat ica l ly , bytw o l a rger European powers. I t appeared to me t h a t Ice land wasout o f viable so lu t ions , and was now coming to th e U.S. fo rass i s tance . Despi te t h e i r quie t reques t fo r ass i s tance , it d idnot appear we were going to do anything. From my perspec t ive ,it appeared we were no t ge t t ing involved due to the lack o f longterm g eo p o l i t i c a l b en e f i t to do so.

f . (U) A f t e r diges t ing th e con ten ts o f 10REYKJAVIK13, Idebated on whether t h i s was something I should send to the WLO.At t h i s poin t , th e WLO had not publ ished nor acknowledgedr ece ip t o f th e CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A SIGACT t ab les . Despi te notknowing if th e SIGACTs were a pr io r i t y fo r th e WLO, I decidedth e cable was something t h a t would be important , and I f e l t Imight be ab le to r i g h t a wrong by having them publ i sh t h i sdocument. I burned th e informat ion onto a CD-RW on 15 February2010, took it to my CHU and saved it onto my personal l ap top .

g. (U) I navigated to the WLO websi te v ia a TOR connect ionl i ke before , and uploaded th e document via the secure form.Amazingly, th e WLO publ i shed 10REYKJAVIK13 with in hours, provingt h a t th e form worked and t h a t they must have rece ived the SIGACTt ab les .

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UNCLASSIFIEDSUBJECT: Statement in Support of Providence Inquiry - - U. S. v.Private Firs t Cl ass (PFC) Br adley E. Manning (U)

8. (U) Fact s regarding the unauthorized storage and disclosureof the 12 July 2007 Air Weapons Team {AWT) video .

a. (U) During the mid-Februar 2010 timeframe, the 2-lOBCTTarget ing analyst , then - - andothers discussed video found on the "T-Drive . u Thevideo dep i c ted a several individuals being engaged by an AirWeapons Team (AWT) . At f i r s t , I d i d not cons i der the vi deo veryspecial , as I had viewed countless other "war-porn" type videosdepict ing combat . However, the recorded audio comment s by theAWT crew and the second engagement i n the video, of an una r medbongo truck, t roub l ed me.

b . (U) - and a few other analysts and off icers inthe T-SCIF conunented on the video, and debated whether the crewviolated the Rules of Engagement (ROE) in t he second engagement .I i e d away from th i s debate , and instead conducted someresearch on the event . I wanted to lea r n what happened, andwhether there was any background to the events of the day theevent occurred , 12 July 2007 .c . (U) Us i ng Google , I searched for the event by i ts date andgeneral locat ion. I found several news accoun t s involving twoReuters employees who were ki l led during the AWT's engagement .

Another story explained tha t Reuters requested for a copy of thevideo under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) . Reuterswanted t o view the video in order to be ab l e to understand whathappened, and improve the i r safety pract ices in combat zones . Aspokesperson for Reuters was quoted saying tha t the video migh thelp avoid a reoccurrence of the tragedy , and believed there wasa compel l ing need for the immediate release of the video .d. (0 ) Despi te the submission of a FOIA request , t he newsaccount explained that CENTCOM repl ied to Reuters , s ta t ing thatt hey cou l d not give a t.imeframe for consideri ng the FOIA

request, and the video might no l onger exist . Another story Ifound, writ ten a year l a ter , said tha t even though Reuters wass t i ll pursuing the i r request , they s t i l l did not receive aformal response or writ ten de t ermination in accordance with theFOIA .

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e . (U) The f a c t n e i th e r CENTCOM nor Mul t i -Na t iona l ForcesI raq (MCF-I) would not volun ta r i ly r e l ea s e the video t roub led mefu r t h e r . It was c l e a r to me t h a t the even t happened because theAWT mistaken ly i d e n t i f i e d th e Reuters employees with a p o t e n t i a lt h r e a t , and t h a t th e people in the bongo t r u ck were mere lya t tempt ing to a s s i s t th e wounded. The people in th e van werenot a t h r e a t , b u t "good Samar i t ans . "

f . (U) The most a la rming aspec t o f th e video to me, however,was th e seemingly d e l ig h t f u l blood lus t they appeared to have.They dehumanized th e i n d i v i d u a l s they were engaging, and seemedto not value human l i f e by r e f e r r i n g to them as "dead b as t a rd s "and co n g ra t u l a t i n g each o t h e r on the a b i l i t y to k i l l in l a rg enumbers.

g . (U) At one poin t in th e video , t h e re i s an ind iv idua l onth e ground a t tempt ing to c rawl to s a fe t y . The i n d i v i d u a l i sse r ious ly wounded. Ins tead o f ca l l ing fo r medica l a t t e n t i o n toth e l o ca t i o n , one of th e AWT crew members v e rb a l l y asked fo r thewounded person to p ick up a weapon so he would have a reason toengage . For me, t h i s seems s i mi l a r t o a ch i ld t o r t u r i n g an t swith a magnify ing g l a s s .

h. (U) While saddened by th e AWT crew ' s l ack o f concern abouthuman l i f e , I was d i s t u rb ed by t h e i r response to th e discoveryof i n j u red ch i l d ren a t th e scene . In th e video, you can see thebongo t ruck dr iv ing up to a s s i s t th e wounded i nd iv idua l . Inresponse , th e AWT crew assumes th e i n d i v i d u a l s a re a t h r e a t .They r ep ea t ed ly r eq u es t fo r au t h o r i za t i o n t o f i r e on th e bongot ruck , and once gran ted , t hey engage th e veh ic le a t l e a s t s ixt imes .

i . (U) Shor t ly a f t e r th e second engagement, a mechanizedi n f a n t ry u n i t a r r i v e s a t th e scene . Within minutes , th e AWTcrew l e a rn s t h a t ch i l d ren were in the van and, d es p i t e th ei n j u r i e s , th e crew e x h i b i t s no remorse . In s t ead , t heydownplayed th e s ign i f i cance o f t h e i r ac t i o n s say ing "we l l , it'st h e i r f a u l t fo r b r in g in g t h e i r kids in to a b a t t l e . " Th e AWTcrew members sound l i k e t hey l ack sympathy fo r the ch i ld ren ort h e i r p a ren t s . L ate r , in a p a r t i c u l a r l y di s tu rb ing manner, th eAWT crew v e rb a l i ze s enjoyment a t th e s i g h t of one o f th e groundveh ic les d r iv ing over th e bodies .

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j . (U} As I continued my research I found an ar t i c l ediscussing a book "The Good Soldiers ," wri t ten by WashingtonPost wri ter In Ill 11111111 book , he writes aboutthe AWT at tack . As I read an online excerpt on "Google Books,"I followed Ill 11111111 account of the event , along with thevideo. I quickly real ized Ill 111111 was quoting, I feel inverbatim, the audio communications of the AWT crew. I t ' s c learto me tha t Ill 111111 obtained access and a copy of the v.ideoduring h is tenure as an embedded jo urna l i s t .

k. (U) I was agha s t a t Ill 11111111 portrayal of theincident . Reading h is account, one would bel ieve the engagementwas somehow jus t i f ied as "payback" for an ear l ie r at tack tha tlead to the death of a Soldier . Ill 111111 ends h is account ofthe engagement by discussing how a Sol dier finds an indivi duals ti ll a live from t he at tack . He writes tha t the Soldier findshim, and sees him gesture with his two forefingers toget he r , acommon method in the Middle -East to communicate tha t they arefr iendly . However, ins tead of assis t ing him , the Soldier makesan obscene gesture, extending his middle finger . The individualapparently dies short ly t hereaf ter . Reading th i s , I can onlyt hink of how t h i s person was simply t rying to help others , andt hen qui ckly f inds he needs help as we l l . To make mattersworse, in t he l a s t moments of his l i f e , he continues to expressh is f r i endl y in ten t , only to f i nd himself receiving th i s we l lknown gesture of "unfr iendl iness ." For me, it's all a big mess ,and I'm l e f t wondering what these things mean, and how it a l lf i t s together . I t burdens me emotional ly.

1 . (U) I saved a copy of the video on my workstat ion. Isearched for , and found the ROE, ROW Annexes and a flowc ha r tfrom the 2007 time period, as we l l as an unclass i f i ed ROE smartcard from 2006 . On 15 February 2010, I burned these documentsonto a CD- RW, th e same time I burned 10REYKJAVIK13 onto a CD-RW.m. (U) At the time, I placed the video and ROE in formationonto my personal laptop in my CHU. I planned to keep th isin formation there un t i l I redep l oyed in Summer 2010. I plannedon providing th i s to the Reuters off i ce i n London 1 UK to ass is tthem in preventing events such as th is in the future .

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n. (U) However, a f te r th e WLO publ ished 10REYKJAVI K13, Ia l t e red my plans. I decided to provide the video and ROEs tothem, so tha t Reut e r s would have th i s information before Iredeployed from I raq . On about 21 February 2010, as describedabove, I used the WLO submi ssion form and uploaded thedocuments .

o. (U) The WLO released the v ideo on 5 April 2010. After there lease , I was concerned about the impact of the video , and howit would be perceived by the general public. I hoped the publ icwould be as alarmed as me about the conduct of t he AWT crewmembers. I wanted th e American publ ic to know tha t not everyonein I raq and Afghani s tan were targets th a t needed to beneutra l ized , bu t ra ther people who were struggling to l ive inthe "pressure-cooker" environment of what we ca l l asymme t r i cwarfare.

p. (U) After the re lease , I was encouraged by the response inthe media and general publ ic who observed the AWT video . As Ihoped, others were jus t as t roub led, if not more t roub led, t hanme by what they saw . At th i s t ime, I began seeing repor tsc la iming tha t Do D and CENTCOM could not con f i rm the aut hent ic i tyof the video . Addit iona l ly , one of my supervisors111111 s ta ted her bel ie f tha t the video was notauthent ic . In response, I decided to ensure tha t t heauthent ic i ty of t he video would not be quest i oned in the f uture .On 25 April 2010 I e-mai l ed a l ink to the video tha twas on our "T-Drive" and to a copy of the video publ i s hed by WLOfrom t he Open Source Center (OSC) so she could compare themhe rse l f .

q . {U) Around th i s t imeframe, I burned a second CD-RWconta ining the AWT video . In order to make it appear authentic ,I p laced a class i f icat ion .st icker and wrote "Reuters FOIA Req"on i t s face. I p l aced the CD-RW in one of my personal CD casescontaining a se t of " Sta r t ing out in Arabic ." I planned onmailing t he CD-RW to Reut e rs a f te r I redeployed so they couldhave a copy tha t was unquestionably authent ic .

r . (U) Almos t immediately af te r submitting the AWT video andROE documents , I not i f ied the i ndividuals in the WLO IRC toexpect an important submission . I received a response from anindividual going by the hand l e of "of f ice . "22UNCLASSIFIED


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s . (U} At f i r s t our conversat ions were general in nature , butover t ime , as our conversat ions progressed , I assessed th i sindividual to be an important par t of the WLO. Due to thes t r i c t adherence of anonymi t y by the WLO, we never exchangedidentifying informat ion; however I bel ieved the individual wasl ike ly , or a proxy-representative of

t . (U) As the communications t ransferred from IRC to theJ abber c l i en t , I gave ~ o f f i c e , " and l a te r "pressassociat ionu thename of "Nathaniel Frank" in my address book, a f te r t he authorof a book I read i n 2009 .u. (U) After a period of t ime , I developed what I fe l t was af r iend l y r e la t ionship with Nathaniel . Our mu tua l in t eres t ininformation technology and po lit i c s made our conversat ionsenjoyable. We engaged in conversation of ten , sometimes as longas an hour o r more . I often looked forward to my discussionswith Nathaniel a f t e r work .v . (U ) The anonymity t hat provided by TOR , the Jabber c l ien t ,and WLO's policy al lowed me to fee l I could j u s t be myself, freeof the concerns of soc ia l label ing and percept ions tha t areoften place upon me in rea l l i f e (I RL) . IRL, I lacked close

f r iendship with t he people I worked with in my sect ion , the S2sect io ns in subordinate ba t ta l i ons, and 2BCT as a whole. Forinstance , I lacked c l ose t i e s with my roommate due to hisdiscomfort regarding my perceived sexual orientat ion.w. (U) Over the next few months, I stayed in f requent contactwith Nathan ie l . We conversed on near l y a dai ly bas is , and I

fe l t we were developing a fr iendship . The conversat ions coveredmany topics , and I enjoyed t he abili ty to ta l k about pre t ty muchanything, and not ju s t the publicat ions t h a t the WLO was work i ngon.x. (U) In re t rospec t , I rea l i ze these dynamics were

a r t i f i c i a l , and were valued more by myself than Na thanie l . Forme, thes e conver sa t ions represented an opportunit y to escapefrom the i mmense pressures and anxiety tha t I experienced andbu i l t up throughout the deployment . I t seemed t ha t as I t r iedharder t o " f i t in" a t work, the mo re I seemed to al ienate mypeers , and lose respect , t ru s t and the support I needed .

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9. (U) Facts regarding the unauthorized s torage and disclosureof documents re la t ing to detainments by the I raq i Federal Police(FP), the Detainee Assessment Briefs (DABs), and the USACICreport .

a. (U) On 27 February 2010, a repor t was received from asubordinate bat t a l ion . The repor t descr ibed an event in whichthe FP detained f i f t een (15) individuals for pr in t ing "ant i I raq i l i t e r a tu r e . " By 2 March 2010, I received ins t ruc t ionsfrom an S3 sec t ion of f i ce r in the 2-lOBCT Tact ica l OperationsCenter (TOC) to inves t iga te the matter , and f igure out who these"bad guys" were, and how s igni f icant th i s event was for the FP.

b. (U) Over the course of my research, I found t ha t none ofthe indiv iduals had previous t i e s with an t i - I r aq i act ions orsuspected t e r r o r i s t or mil i t i a groups. A few hours l a t e r , Ireceived severa l photos from the scene from the subordinateba t ta l ion . They were accident ly sent to an of f i ce r on adi f fe ren t team in the S2 sect ion , and she forwarded them to me.These photos included p ic tu res of the indiv iduals , pa le t te s ofunprinted paper, seized copies of the f ina l pr in ted document,and a high-resolut ion photo of the prin ted mater ia l .

c. (U) I prin ted a blown up copy of the high-resolut ionphoto, and laminated it for ease of storage and t r ans fe r . Ithen walked to the TOC and delivered the laminated copy to ourcategory 2 i n t e rp re t e r . She reviewed the informat ion and abouta half -hour l a t e r del ivered a rough writ ten t r ansc r i p t inEnglish to the S2 sec t ion .

d. (U) I read the t ranscr ip t , and followed up with her ,asking for her t ake on i t s contents . She said it was easy fo rher to t ranscr ibe verbatim s ince I blew up the photograph andlaminated it. She sa id the general nature of the document wasbenign. The documentation, as I assessed as well , was merely ascholar ly cr i t ique of the then-current I raq i Prime Minis te r ,Nouri al-Mal ik i . I t deta i led corrupt ion within the cabinet ofa l -Mal ik i ' s government, and the f inancia l impact of th i scorrupt ion on the I raq i people.

e. (U) After discover ing th i s discrepancy between the FP'sreport , and the i n t e rp re t e r ' s t ranscr ip t , I forwarded th i sdiscovery, in person to the TOC OIC and Bat t le NCOIC.

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f . (U) The TOC OIC and, th e overhear ing Bat t l ecap ta in ,informed me they d idn ' t need o r want to know t h i s informat ionany more. They to ld me to "drop i t " and to j u s t a s s i s t them andth e FP in f ind ing out where more of these p r i n t shops crea t ing" a n t i - I r a q i l i t e r a t u r e " might be. I cou ldn ' t be l i eve what Iheard, and I re tu rned to th e T-SCIF and complained to th e otherana lys ts and my sec t ion NCOIC about what happened. Some weresympathet ic , b ut no-one wanted to do anything about it.

g. (U) I am th e type o f person who l i k e s to know how th ingswork, and as an ana lys t , t h i s means I always want to f igure outth e t r u t h . Unlike other ana lys ts in my sec t ion , o r othe rsec t ions wi th in 2-lOBCT, I was not s a t i s f i e d with j u s tscra tch ing the surface , and producing "canned" o r "cookiecu t t e r" assessments . I wanted to know why something was th e wayit was, and what we could do t o co r rec t or mit iga te a s i t u a t i o n .I knew t h a t if I cont inued to a s s i s t th e Baghdad FP iniden t i fy ing th e p o l i t i c a l opponents o f Prime Minis te r a l -Mal ik i ,those people would be a r r e s t ed , and in th e custody o f t h i sspec ia l u n i t o f th e Baghdad FP, very l i ke ly t o r t u r ed and notseen again fo r a very long t ime, if ever .

h. (U) Ins tead o f a s s i s t i n g the spec ia l u n i t of the BaghdadFP, I decided to t ake th e information and di sc lose it to th e WLOin th e hope t h a t , before th e upcoming 7 March 2010 e lec t ion ,they could generate immediate press on the i s sue , and preventt h i s u n i t of the FP from cont inuing to crack down on p o l i t i c a lopponents. On 4 March 2010, I burned the repor t , th e photos,th e high r eso lu t ion copy o f th e pamphlet , and th e i n t e r p r e t e r ' shandwri t ten t r a n s c r i p t onto a CD-RW. I took th e CD-RW to my CHUand copied the da ta onto my personal computer.

i . (U) Unlike th e t imes before , ins tead o f uploading theinformat ion through th e WLO webs i t es ' submiss ion form, I made aSecure Fi le Trans fer Pro toco l (SFTP) connect ion to a "c loud"dropbox opera ted by th e WLO. The dropbox con ta ined a fo ldert h a t allowed me to upload d i r e c t l y in to it. Saving f i l e s in tot h i s d i rec to ry allowed anyone with log in access to the se rver toview and download them.

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j . (U) After upl oading these f i les t o the WLO on 5 March2010 , I no t i f ied Nathaniel over Jabber . Although sympathetic,he sa i d tha t the WLO needed more information t o confirm theevent in order for i t to be published or to gain in te res t in thein ternat ional media. I attempted to provide specif i cs, but tomy disappoin tment , the WLO website chose not to publish th isi nformation.

k. (U) At the same time, I began s i f t ing through informationfrom t he U.S . Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) and Joint Task Force(JTF) Guantanamo, Cuba (GTMO) . The thought occurred to me,a l though un l ikely, tha t I wouldn't be surprised i f theindividuals detained by the FP might be turned over back intoU.S . custody and ending up in the custody of JTF-GTMO.1 . (U) As I digested through the information on JTF- GTMO, Iquickly found the detainee assessment br ie fs (DABs) . Ipreviously came across these documents before , in 2009 , but didnot think much of them. However, th i s time I was more curiousand dur i ng t h is search I found them gain . The DABs we r:ewrit ten in standard DoD memorandum format, and addressed the

C o ~ n a n d e r , U. S . SOUTHCOM . Each memo randum gave basic backgroundinformation about a specif ic detainee held a t some point by JTFGTMO .m. (U) I have always been in terested on the issue of themoral efficacy of our act ions surrounding JTF-GTMO. On t he onehand, I always understood the need to detain and i nterrogateindividuals who might wish to harm th e U.S. and ou r a l l i e s . Ife l t tha t was what we were t ry ing to do a t JTF-GTMO . However,the more I became educated on the topic , it seemed tha t we foundourselves holding an increasing number of individua l s

indef ini te ly tha t we bel ieved or knew were innocent , low-level"foot soldiers" tha t didn' t have useful in te l l igence and wou l dbe released i f they were s t i l l held in thea t er .n. (U) I also recal led t ha t i n early 2009, the then-newl y-elected s ta ted he would close JTF - GTMOa nd tha t the fac i l i ty compromised our standing in the world anddiminished our "moral author i ty . " After famil iarizing myselfwith the DABs , I ag reed .

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o. (U) Reading through th e DABs, I noted t h a t they were notan a ly t i c a l product s . Ins tead , they con ta ined summaries o f t e a r l i ned vers ions of In ter im In t e l l i gence Repor ts (IIRs) t h a t wereold o r u n c l a s s i f i ed . None of the DABs con ta ined names o fsources o r quotes from Tac t i ca l In t e r roga t ion Repor ts (TIRs) .Since the DABs were being sen t to th e U.S. SOUTHCOM commander, Iassessed t h a t they were in tended to provide very genera lbackground in fo rmat ion on each deta inee , and not a d e t a i l edassessment .

p. (U) In add i t ion to th e manner th e DABs were wri t t en , Irecognized t h a t they were a t l e a s t seve ra l years old , anddiscussed deta inees t h a t were al ready re leased from JTF-GTMO.Based on t h i s , I determined t h a t th e DABs were not veryimportant from e i t h e r an in te l l igence or na t iona l secur i tys tandpo in t .

q. (U) On 7 March 2010, during my Jabber conversa t ions withNathan ie l , I asked him if he thought th e DABs were o f any use toanyone. Nathan ie l i nd ica t ed t h a t al though he d i d n ' t bel i evethey were of p o l i t i c a l s igni f icance he did be l i eve t h a t theycould be used to merge in to the genera l h i s t o r i c a l account o fwhat occurred a t JTF-GTMO. He also thought t h a t th e DABs mightbe h e l p fu l to th e l eg a l counsel of those cur ren t ly andprev ious ly he ld a t JTF-GTMO.

r . (U) Afte r t h i s discuss ion , I decided to download th e DABs.I used an app l ica t ion ca l led "WGet" to download th e DABs. Idownloaded WGet o f f th e NIPRNet l ap top in th e T-SCIF l i ke otherprograms. I saved t h a t onto a CD-RW and placed the executablein "My Documents" d i rec to ry o f my user p ro f i l e on th e DCGS-ASIPRNet works ta t ion .

s . (U) On 7 March 2010, I took th e list o f l inks fo r th e DABsand WGet downloaded them sequen t i a l ly . I burned th e DABs onto aCD-RW and took it to my CHU and copied them to my personalcomputer. On 8 March 2010, I combined th e DABs with th e USACICrepor t on th e WLO in to a compressed "z i p " f i l e . Zip f i l e scon ta in mult ip le f i l e s which are compressed to reduce t h e i rs i ze . After crea t ing th e z ip f i l e , I uploaded the f i l e ontot h e i r "c loud" dropbox v ia SFTP. Once these were uploaded, Ino t i f i ed Nathan ie l t h a t th e informat ion was in the "x"di rec to ry , which had been ass igned fo r my use .

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t . (U) Ear l ie r tha t day, I downloaded the USACIC repor t onWLO. As discussed above, I previously reviewed the repor t onnumerous occasions and, al though I had saved the document ontoworkstat ion before , I could not locate i t . After I found thedocument again , I downloaded it to my workstat ion and saved itonto the same CD-RW as the DABs, described above.

u. (U) Although I my access inc luded a grea t deal ofinformat ion, I decided I had nothing else to send to the WLOa f t e r sending them the DABs and the USACIC report . Up to th i spoin t I sent them the following:

(1) The CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A SIGACT t ab les .(2) The "10REYKJAVIK13" DOS cable .(3) The 12 July 2007 AWT video and the 2006 and 2007 ROE

documents.(4) The SIGACT report and supporting documents concerningthe 15 ind iv idua l s detained by the Baghdad FP.(5) The U . S. SOUTHCOM and JTF-GTMO DABs.(6) The USACIC r epor t on the WLO and website.

v. (U) Over the next few weeks, I did not send any addi t ionalinformat ion to the WLO. I continued to converse with Nathanie lover the Jabber c l i en t , and in the WLO IRC channel. Although Istopped sending documents to WLO, no one associa ted with the WLOpressured me in to giving more informat ion. The dec is ions tha t Imade to send documents and information to the WLO and websitewere my own decis ions , and I take fu l l re spons ib i l i ty fo r myact ions .

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10. (U) Facts regard ing the unauthor ized s to rage and disc losureo f o t h e r government documents .

a. (U) On 22 March 2010, I downloaded two documents . I foundthese documents over th e course of my normal dut i e s as anana lys t . Based on my t r a in in g and th e guidance o f my super io rs ,I looked a t as much in fo rmat ion as poss ib l e . Doing so providedme with th e a b i l i t y to make connect ions others might miss.

b. (U) On s ev e ra l occas ions during th e month o f March, Iaccessed in fo rmat ion from a government e n t i t y . I read severa ldocuments from a sec t ion with in t h i s government e n t i t y . Theco n ten t of two o f these documents upse t me g r ea t l y . I hadd i f f i c u l t y be l i ev ing what t h i s sec t ion was discuss ing .

c . (U) On 22 March 2010, I downloaded th e two documents tha tI found t roub l ing . I compressed them in to a z ip f i l e named"b lah .z ip" and burned them onto a CD-RW. I took th e CD-RW to myCHU and saved th e f i l e to my personal computer . I uploaded thein format ion to th e WLO websi t e using the des ignated drop-box.

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11. (U) Facts regarding the unauthorized s to rage and disc losureof the NCD DOS cab le s .

a. (U) In l a t e March I rece ived a warning over Jabber fromNathaniel t h a t th e WLO websi te would be publ ishing the AWTvideo. He i nd ica t ed t h a t th e WLO would be very busy and thefrequency and i n t e ns i t y of our Jabber conversat ions decreaseds i g n i f i c a n t l y .

b. (U) During t h i s t ime, I had nothing but work to d i s t r a c tme. I read more of th e dip lomat ic cab les publ ished on the DOSNCD se rve r . With my i n sa t i ab le cur ios i ty and i n t e r e s t ingeopo l i t i c s , I became fasc ina ted with them. I read not onlycables on I raq , but also about count r ies and even ts I foundi n t e r e s t i n g . The more I read, the more I was fasc ina ted by theway we dea l t with othe r nat ions and organiza t ions . I a lso beganto th ink t h a t they documented backdoor deals and seeminglycr imina l a c t iv i t y tha t d idn ' t seem c ha ra c t e r i s t i c of the defac to l eader of th e f ree world.

c. (U) Up to t h i s poin t during the deployment, I had i ssues Is t ruggled with and d i f f i cu l t y a t work. Of the documentsre leased , the cab les are th e only one I was not absolute lyce r t a in cou ldn ' t harm the U.S. I conducted research on thecab les publ ished on NCD, as well as how DOS cables work ingenera l . In pa r t i c u l a r , I wanted to know how each cable waspubl i shed on SIPRNet v ia the NCD.

d. (U) As p a r t o f my open-source research , I found a documentpubl i shed by DOS on i t s o f f i c i a l websi te . The document providedguidance on cap t ion markings fo r i nd iv idua l cables and handlingi n s t r u c t i o n s fo r t h e i r d i s t r ibu t ion . I quickly learned t ha tcapt ion markings c l e a r l y d e t a i l the s e ns i t i v i t y l ev e l of a DOScab le . For example, "NODIS" (No Dist r ibut ion) was used fo rmessages of th e highes t s e ns i t i v i t y , and were only d i s t r ibu tedto the au thor ized rec ip ien t s . The "SIPDIS" (SIPRNetDist r ibut ion) cap t ion was appl ied only t o repor t ing and otherin fo rmat iona l messages t h a t were deemed appropr ia te for re leaseto a wide number of ind iv idua l s .

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e . (U) According to th e DOS guidance fo r a cab le to have theSIPDIS cap t io n it could no t inc lude any o th e r cap t io n s t h a t werein tended to l i m i t d i s t ri b u t i o n . The SIPDIS cap t io n was only fo rin format ion t h a t could be sha red with anyone with access toSIPRNet. I was aware t h a t thousands o f mi l i t a r y p erso n a l , DoD,DOS, and o t h e r c i v i l i a n agencies had easy access to th e cab les .The f a c t t h a t th e SIPDIS cap t ion was only fo r wide d i s t r i b u t i o nmade sense to me given t h a t th e vas t major i ty o f th e NCO cab leswere not c l a s s i f i e d .

f . (U) The more I read th e cab les , the more I came to theconc lus ion t h a t t h i s type o f in format ion should become p u b l i c .I once read and used a quote on open diplomacy wri t t en a f t e r th eF i r s t World War, and how th e world would be a b e t t e r place ifs t a t e s would avoid making s e c r e t p ac t s and d ea l s with andag a i n s t each o t h e r . I thought t hese cab les were a pr ime exampleof the need fo r a more open diplomacy. Given a l l th e DOSi n format ion I r e a d , th e f a c t t h a t most o f th e cab les wereu n c l a s s i f i e d , and t h a t a l l of the cab les had th e SIPDIS cap t ion ,I bel ieved t h a t th e p u b l i c r e l ea s e of t h ese cab le s would no tdamage th e U.S. However, I d id b e l i ev e th e cab le s might beembar ras s ing , s in ce t hey r ep resen ted very hones t opin ions ands t a t ement s behind th e backs o f o th e r n a t io n s and o rg an iza t io n s .In many ways, t h ese cab le s a re a ca t a lo g of c l i q u es and goss ip .I bel ieved expos ing t h i s i n format ion might make some wi th in theDOS and o t h e r s unhappy.

g. (U) On 28 March 2010, I began downloading a copy of t heSIPDIS cab le s us ing the program WGet descr ibed above. I usedi n s t an ces o f th e WGet ap p l i ca t i o n t o download the NCO cab les inth e background, as I worked on my d a i l y t a sks . The NCO cab leswere downloaded from 28 March 2010 to 9 A p r i l 2010. A f t e rdownloading t h e cab le s , I saved them onto a CD-RW. These cableswent from th e e a r l i e s t d a tes in NCO to 28 February 2010. I tookth e CD-RW to my CHU on 10 A p r i l 2010. I s o r t ed th e cab les on mype r sona l computer , compressed them us ing the BZip2 compress iona lgor i thm d esc r ib ed above, and uploaded them to th e WLO v ia th edes igna ted dropbox descr ibed above.

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h. (U) On 3 May 2010, I used WGet to download an update ofth e cab les fo r th e months o f March 2010 and A p r i l 2010, andsaved th e i n format ion onto a z ip f i l e and burned it to CD-RW. It hen took th e CD-RW to my CHU and saved them to my computer .

i. (U) I l a t e r found t h a t th e f i l e was corrup ted during thet r an s f e r . Although I i n t ended to re save ano the r copy of thesecab le s , I was removed from th e T-SCIF on 8 May 2010, a f t e r ana l t e r c a t i o n .

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12. (U) Facts regarding th e unauthorized s torage and disc losureof the Gharani (Farah prov ince) , Afghanis tan 15-6 i nves t iga t ionand videos .

a . (U) In l a t e March 2010, I discovered a U.S. CENTCOMdi rec to ry on a 2009 a i r s t r i k e in Afghanis tan . I was searchingCENTCOM fo r in fo rmat ion I could use as an ana lys t . As descr ibedabove, t h i s was something t h a t myself and other ana lys ts ando f f i c e r s d id on a f requen t bas i s .

b. (U) As I reviewed th e documents, I r eca l l ed th e inc iden tand what happened. The a i r s t r i k e occurred in the Gharaniv i l l ag e in th e Farah Province o f Northwestern Afghanis tan . I trece ived worldwide pre ss coverage during the t ime as it wasreported t h a t up to 100 to 150 Afghan c iv i l i a ns , mostly womenand chi ldren , were acc ident ly ki l led during th e a i r s t r i k e .

c . (U) A f t e r going through the repor t and i t s annexes, Ibegan to view th e i nc iden t as being s imi l a r t o th e 12 July 2007AWT engagements in I raq . However, t h i s event was not iceab lyd i f f e r e n t in t h a t it involved a s ign i f i can t ly higher number ofi nd iv idua l s , l a rge r a i r c r a f t , and much heav ier munit ions . Also,th e conclus ions o f th e repor t are even more di s tu rb ing thanthose of th e 12 July 2007 i nc iden t .

d. (U) I did not see anyth ing in th e 15-6 repor t o r i t sannexes t h a t gave away s en s i t i v e in fo rmat ion . Rather , theinves t iga t ion and i t s conclus ions help exp la in how t h i s inc iden toccurred and what those involved should have done, and how toavoid an event l i ke t h i s from occurr ing aga in .

e . (U) A f t e r reviewing th e repor t and i t s annexes, Idownloaded th e 15-6 inves t iga t ion , PowerPoint pre sen ta t ions , ands ev e ra l othe r support ing documents to my DCGS-A works ta t ion . Ia l so downloaded th ree z ip f i l e s con ta in ing the videos of thei nc iden t . I burned t h i s informat ion onto a CD-RW andt r ans fe r red it to the persona l computer in my CHU. Ei ther l a t e rt h a t day o r th e nex t day, I uploaded the in format ion to the WLOwebsi te , t h i s t ime us ing a new vers ion o f the WLO websi tesubmiss ion form. Unlike othe r t imes using the submission formabove, I d id not ac t iva te the TOR anonymizer.

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13 . (U) This concludes my statement and facts for th isprovidence inquiry . The po i nt of contact (POC) for th i smemorandum is the undersigned a t HHC, USAG, Joint Base Mye r Hender son Ha l l , Fort Myer, Virginia 22211 .