As The First Anniversary Of The Start Of The Trial Of Heroic Whistle-Blower Chelsea (Then Bradley) Manning Approaches- We Will Not Leave Our Sister Behind-President Obama Pardon Chelsea Manning Now!- An Update

 

Note that this image is PVT Manning’s preferred photo.

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

 

In a speech made on behalf of Chelsea Manning at the annual Smedley Butler Brigade Veterans for Peace- sponsored peace event on Armistice/Veterans Day last year in Boston the speaker, as he updated the audience on what was happening in her case after the  trial, mentioned that he was speaking on her behalf under the slogan -We Will Not Leave Our Sister Behind-President Obama Pardon Chelsea Manning Now! As we approach the first anniversary of the beginning of her trial on June 3, 2013 which resulted in a late August conviction on many counts, including ominously several espionage counts, and a thirty-five year prison sentence to be served at the military barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas this is another appropriate time to take stock of what has happened in her case over the past year. We in any case still operate under that Veterans Day speaker’s slogan.

 

The headlines that seemed to be a daily media occurrence last summer in the Manning case from the first of June when a couple of thousand supporters marched in front of the main gates at Fort Meade in Maryland just before the trial’s opening day through to the verdict and sentence in August are still now barely making a ripple. The verdict, the legal verdict if not the verdict of history, in the case of the United States vs. Private First Class Bradley (Chelsea) Manning was proclaimed in late August, guilty on 20 of 22 counts. The draconian 35 year hard time sentence imposed by the cruel blatantly pro-government military judge, Colonel Lind, is now being served as the appeals process slowly unwinds. The media pundits and commentators then had their say, mainly that stern justice had been served by the conviction, a conviction in keeping with their own desire to keep things secret from us and not let some lowly enlisted soldier expose their house of cards. Some, like the ostrich-like New York Times, balked a little at the excessive sentence and then moved on. Others had a momentary titter when Bradley turned into Chelsea to express her real gender identity and then they too moved on. All is now quiet, the case is yesterday’s news now long outside the 24/7 news cycle interest. In their eyes Chelsea Manning has had her fifteen minutes of fame and now she is reduced to just another military prisoner confined to the maximum security barracks out in the prairies of Kansas at Fort Leavenworth to face an uncertain future.

 

Chelsea Manning also faces the hard fate that occurs in almost all political prisoner cases; doing the hard time while waiting for the slow cumbersome appeals process to work its way through the military and civilian courts of appeal. Private Manning has already suffered a couple of set-backs in that process recently with the denial of a reduction of sentence by General Buchanan of the Washington Military District, the convening officer of her court-martial. And subsequently on the heels of that announcement hopes of a presidential pardon have faded as the White House has cowardly announced that no such request will be reviewed until all the appeals processes have run their course. Appeals which, according to Chelsea’s newly procured appeals legal team of Attorneys Nancy Hollander and Vincent Ward, will take several years, more years than President Obama, who wrongfully interjected himself into the case with his comments early on, has left in office. That pardon campaign while still on-going had in any case in late September of last year taken a serious turn for the worst when the post-conviction Amnesty International/ Private Manning Support Network White House on-line petition failed, falling seriously short of getting the required 100,000 signatures that would have forced the Obama Administration to address the question posed by the petition. On the personal level the Army has fudged the issue of giving Chelsea appropriate medical treatments to reflect her gender identity, although recently a civilian judge has given her an important personal victory and boost to her morale by granting her request to legally change her name to Chelsea.

 

Chelsea has also faced the very real falloff in the fervent public support and activity around her case now that the verdict and sentence are in and the media interest has shut down around the case. There have been fewer periodic public rallies around the world from Afghanistan to the States on her behalf, reflecting a diffusion of focus now that supporters are not riveted to the public presence at trial. Despite that publicity slowdown she has received several whistle-blower awards, including the prestigious Sam Adams award, and is slated to be the honorary grand marshal of the huge San Francisco Gay Pride Parade in June (after being snubbed last year).

 

And that point above about falloff of interest is really the crux of the matter. Despite everything the struggle continues, our struggle continues until Chelsea is free. That is where we of Veterans for Peace come in, people who have served in the military, who have gotten “religion” on the right side of the angels on the questions of war and peace and who have stood in solidarity with, and defense of, Chelsea Manning since the beginning of her incarceration four years ago. All VFPers, whether we served in wars or in “peace-time,” went through the rigors and madness of basic training where hoary old drill sergeants beat us over the head with the notion that we had to take care of our buddy, that our survival, and by this they meant in the heat of battle, depended on us buying into that concept.

 

Any veteran can tell you many stories about how in the end their involvement with the military came down to just that embedded idea when the deal went done and the dust settled. Not letting our buddies down. Not leaving our buddies behind. Whether most of those drilled-in military concepts we learned are worth anything is hard to judge, fear and recklessness may in fact play a larger role. Nevertheless we can take that "not leaving our buddy behind" concept and apply it to this case. However we may end up providing support to Chelsea Manning, financial for her legal appeals and further education, political via the on-going pardon campaign, or socially with messages of solidarity sent out to her in Fort Leavenworth, or wherever civilian facility she might be transferred as a recent posting of hers from the Support Network has speculated, it is with the understanding that she is our buddy. We will not leave our sister behind. Remember that. Remember this as well- We will not let President Obama hide behind his cowardly legal screen in this case and will continue to call on him to pardon Chelsea Manning now!