This weekend saw the publication of possibly the most significant leak of U.S. military documents in history. Wikileaks shared hundreds of thousands of pages of documents about the Iraq War – first with major media outlets like the New York Times and then with the rest of us. If reports are to be believed, the documents confirm a lot more deaths than originally reported, raise questions about our use of contractors to fight wars, and show that we were losing the war more badly than reported in 2006.
The latest set of WikiLeaks harken back to a similar event in 1971 when Daniel Ellsburg leaked a report commissioned by former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara to the New York Times and other publications. Unlike the Obama Administration, the Nixon Administration raced to court to stop continued publication of the papers by the New York Times, Washington Post, and ultimately others. Although the Nixon Administration raised concerns about the threat to military operations, the U.S. Supreme Court did not find them sufficiently grave to restrain the publication of the Pentagon Papers.
The landmark case stands for the proposition that there will be no prior restraints of the press in the absence of the most grave of threats to national security – and possibly not even then. (Importantly, the case does not stand for the proposition that a person may not be subsequently punished for violating the law in the publication process, assuming that law is constitutional.)
Does this leak put people – including U.S. soldiers – in harm’s way? Possibly, but that’s not yet certain, even though current Defense Secretary Robert Gates has suggested that an earlier leak of Afghan War documents put Afghanis at risk even if it did not reveal any important secrets.
Wikileaks’ release of U.S. military documents raises difficult questions. Without people like Daniel Ellsburg and Julian Assange, about whom the New York Times ran a very interesting profile over the weekend, we likely would not know important truths about wars that went/have gone on for years – about whether we truly were winning or losing and about abuses that otherwise would have been covered up. But their leaks do risk collateral damage to our soldiers, our allies, and our image abroad.
I am struck by the relevance of a quotation by Israeli Supreme Court Chief Justice Aharon Barak that I stumbled upon this weekend. It technically is about the war on terror, but its words, as taken from a speech by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, resonate here.
[It] is the fate of a democracy [that] not all means are acceptable to it, . . . not all methods employed by its enemies are open to it. Sometimes, a democracy must fight with one hand tied behind its back. Nonetheless, it has the upper hand. Preserving the rule of law and recognition of individual liberties constitute an important component of [a democracy's] understanding of security. At the end of the day, [those values buoy up] its spirit and strength [and its capacity to] overcome [the] difficulties.
The West Virginia Division of Culture and History has accepted $250,000 from Mylan Pharmaceuticals primarily for an addition to the State Museum featuring the company. 
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