Prosecutors claim Bradley Manning wanted to remove 'the fog of war'
Investigators say they found emails to Julian Assange under the alias 'Press Association' about release of secret documents
US army prosecutors claim to have found email correspondence between alleged WikiLeaks source Bradley Manning and Julian Assange, the founder of the whistleblowing website.
Prosecutors made the allegation on the fourth day of a hearing on whether the suspect will face a court-martial for alleging leaking thousands of classified documents while working as an intelligence analyst in Iraq.
Manning is said to have expressed hope in an email to Assange that publishing a file of hundreds of thousands of classified reports on Iraq and Afghanistan would prove "one of the more significant documents of our time, removing the fog of war and revealing the true nature of 21st century asymmetrical warfare".
The email was discovered on a memory card found amongst the soldier's belongings after they were shipped back to his aunt's house. It contained 400,000 records of "significant activities" from Iraq and 91,000 from Afghanistan.
The author also suggested that the recipient might want to "sit on this information to figure out how best to release such a large amount of data".
Other files found on either the memory stick or Manning's personal laptop contained contact information for Assange and instructions on how to upload data to WikiLeaks, the court was told.
Mark Johnson, a computer forensics expert, told the hearing his investigations found that computers used by Manning had been used to send information to WikiLeaks. The hard drive on Manning's computer was securely erased in January 2010. "Everything from early January is gone," he said.
Johnson said he had also found reference on a chat room "buddy list" to a contact using the alias "Press Association" the name of a UK news agency. This, it was claimed, was an alias for Assange.
Manning's defence team questioned Johnson and his boss David Shaver, an agent with the US army! 's compu ter crime investigative unit, about who could have used the computers. Johnson said Manning's computer was not password protected and that he "could not put anybody at the keyboard".
He also confirmed that he did not know who else had come into contact with the file before it came into his possession.
On Sunday, Shaver testified that he found tens of thousands of diplomatic cables and other sensitive information on one computer used by Manning. Another of Manning's computers had been used to search for information on WikiLeaks, where the classified material eventually surfaced.
But on Monday the hearing was told that no evidence had been found
that linked Manning to sending any of the information.
It also emerged that the US government was only saved from the release of another 10,000 secret cables because of a corrupted file.
Shaver said 10,000 cables were stored in one file found on Manning's computer called "files.zip." The file was corrupted and would have needed special tools for anyone to open, said Shaver. "When it was created something went wrong. There was a partial problem. If someone tried to open it, it would not open. It was a corrupted file," he said.
The defence has pointed to a lack of security at the Forward Operating Base Hammer in Iraq where Manning was stationed. No passwords were required to access the cables and there was no prohibition on downloading cables, Shaver confirmed.
The USB ports on Manning's computers were blocked as part of army policy so he could not transfer material using a memory stick. But Manning had downloaded Roxio, a program for burning CDs, on to both of his computers and on Sunday Shaver told the hearing that he found a program on Manning's computer designed to allow the speedy downloading of files.
According to the prosecution Manning was able to download huge quantity of documents using the program, called Wget. Manning started using the program in early March 2010 and used it hundreds of times to illegall! y downlo ad classified files, according to the government.
The hearing also heard from Manning's former roommate in Iraq, Eric Baker, a military police officer. Baker portrayed manning as a loner computer geek. "I would wake up in the middle of the night and he would be using his computer," he told the court.
The pair began sharing a room on deployment to Baghdad in October 2009, but once he suspected Manning was gay, Baker broke off their conversations. "The gist of what you said to him was it is best we did not talk?" David Coombs, Manning's lawyer, asked. "Yes," the soldier replied.
Baker added that Manning once confided in him a desire to leave the army. "I remember him saying this wasn't for him," the witness told court.
There are still about a dozen witnesses to go in the hearing which is scheduled to end Friday. Manning is charged with aiding the enemy and violating the Espionage Act. Aiding the enemy is a capital offence, but army prosecutors have said they will not seek the death penalty. If convicted, Manning could be sentenced to life in prison.
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