WASHINGTON - January 25 - NBC is reporting: “U.S. military officials tell NBC News that investigators have been unable to make any direct connection between a jailed army private [Bradley Manning] suspected with leaking secret documents and Julian Assange, founder of the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks….

“The officials told NBC News that a U.S. Marine commander did violate procedure when he placed Manning on ‘suicide watch’ last week.”

DAVID MacMICHAEL
MacMichael, who commanded the facility where Manning is being held, last week wrote a letter to General James F. Amos, Commandant of the Marine Corps. The letter reads in part: “I wonder, in the first place, why an Army enlisted man is being held in a Marine Corps installation. Second, I question the length of confinement prior to conduct of court-martial. The sixth amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing to the accused in all criminal prosecutions the right to a speedy and public trial, extends to those being prosecuted in the military justice system. Third, I seriously doubt that the conditions of his confinement — solitary confinement, sleep interruption, denial of all but minimal physical exercise, etc. — are necessary, customary, or in accordance with law, U.S. or international.

“Indeed, I have to wonder why the Marine Corps has put itself, or allowed itself to be put, in this invidious and ambiguous situation. I can appreciate that the decision to place Manning in a Marine Corps facility may not have been one over which you had control. However, the conditions of his confinement in the Quantico brig are very clearly under your purview, and, if I may say so, these bring little credit either to you or your subordinates at the Marine Corps Base who impose these conditions.

“It would be inappropriate, I think, to use this letter, in which I urge you to use your authority to make the conditions of Pfc. Manning’s confinement less extreme, to review my Marine Corps career except to note that my last duty prior to resigning my captain’s commission in 1959 was commanding the headquarters company at Quantico. …”

MacMichael is a former CIA analyst. He is now a member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.

See full letter

Note to producers: David Rovics recently released recorded “Song for Bradley Manning”

Also, the widely circulated internet video “Rap News 5” makes reference to Manning