U.S. spies at the UN, threats to attack Iran, and 'inappropriate behaviour' by a member of the British royal family: WikiLeaks blows the lid on global secrets

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 9:21 PM on 28th November 2010

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• Hillary Clinton phoning world leaders in diplomatic damage control
• Arab leaders 'privately urging an air strike on Iran'
• Claims of inappropriate behaviour by a member of the British royal family
• Chinese operatives waging cyber war on U.S.
• U.S. tells WikiLeaks that publication of documents is 'illegal'
• Embarrassing' assessment of Cameron's Coalition
• Gordon Brown's rocky relationship with Obama

Spy claims: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has found herself at the centre of the latest WikiLeaks revelations

The U.S. has been plunged into a diplomatic crisis with the publication of millions of documents the U.S. claims will endanger 'countless lives'.

The revelations, leaked by whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks to media around the world, have been published online today to the embarrassment of the Obama administration.
Among the revelations to highly damage the U.S. was the claims that Hillary Clinton told U.S. diplomats to spy on other countries at the U.N.
The leak was reported in German newspaper Der Spiegel ahead of more secrets due to be made public through the controversial WikiLeaks site.
Almost immediately, WikiLeaks announced that its site was under cyber attack.
And more leaks followed, including the claim that Arab leaders were privately urging an air strike on Iran, and claims of inappropriate behaviour by a member of the British royal family.
It follows an 'embarrassing' assessment of David Cameron by the the U.S. administration which was set to be made public on the WikiLeaks whistleblowers website.
The harsh analysis of the Prime Minister is among thousands of leaked State Department files set to be revealed imminently on the site.
And Gordon Brown's rocky relationship with President Barack Obama is almost certain to mentioned as is Britain's troop withdrawal from Iraq.
The likely revelations emerged as the White House took the extraordinary step of writing to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, warning 'countless' lives would be put at risk by publication of the diplomatic cables
It said revealing the secret documents could threaten global counter terrorism operations and jeopardise U.S. relations with its allies.
And the UK government has warned British citizens in Pakistan, Iraq, Iran and other parts of the Muslim world they could suffer a violent  backlash over 'anti-Islamic' views in documents.

Withering assessments:  Gordon Brown and David Cameron are the subject of secret cables by U.S. diplomats

The revelation that repeated private calls from King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia for the United States to attack Iran to destroy its nuclear programme and 'cut off the head of the snake' risked destablising the Middle East, experts warned.
President Barack Obama is revealed in one damaging cable as having 'no feelings for Europe' and preferring to 'look East rather than West'.
Others reveal withering assessments of the U.S. of a long list of world leaders.
The U.S. branded France's President Nicolas Sarkozy an 'emperor with no clothes' with a 'thin-skinned and authoritarian personal style', Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin as an 'alpha dog' and Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as 'Hitler'.
The documents released tonight show Saudi donors remain chief financiers of militant groups like al Qaeda and that Chinese government operatives have waged a coordinated campaign of computer sabotage targeting the United States and its allies, according to a review of the WikiLeaks documents published in the Times.

OPENING OF A PANDORA'S BOX

The personal foibles of the world leaders come under close scrutiny in the documents.

German Chancellor Angela 'Teflon' Merkel allegedly 'avoids risk, and is rarely creative', while Afghan President Hamid Karzai is 'driven by paranoia'.

Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin is an 'alpha-dog', while President Dmitry Medvedev is 'afraid' and 'hesitant'.

U.S. President Barack Obama 'has no feelings for Europe', while Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is compared to Adolf Hitler.

The released documents also detail a global computer hacking effort by the Chinese which saw China’s Politburo directing the intrusion into Google’s computer systems in that country, according to a Chinese contact speaking to the American Embassy in Beijing in January.
The Google hacking was part of a coordinated campaign of computer sabotage carried out by government operatives, private security experts and Internet outlaws recruited by the Chinese government.
They have broken into American government computers and those of Western allies, the Dalai Lama and American businesses since 2002, cables said.
WikiLeaks said on Twitter that Spain's El Pais, France's Le Monde, Germany's Der Spiegel, Britain's Guardian newspaper and The New York times 'will publish many US embassy cables tonight, even if WikiLeaks goes down.' Shortly before, WikiLeaks said its website was 'currently under a mass distributed denial of service attack.'
Simon Hoggart, a journalist on The Guardian - one of the newspapers that has been working with WikiLeaks on the release of the material - said the the paper would be releasing extensive details of the files tomorrow.

WIKILEAKS: THE CLAIMS

• Strong criticism of the UK's military operations in Afghanistan
• Attacks on both David Cameron and Gordon Brown, who is said to be branded 'unstable'
• U.S. requests for specific intelligence on individual MPs
• Alleged links between the Russian government and organised crime
• Deep concern in Washington and London over the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme
• Strong pressure from the West's Arab allies for a military strike on Iran   
• A dangerous stand-off between the U.S. and Pakistan over nuclear fuel since 2007
• The gaming out of the eventual collapse of North Korea
• The extraordinarily close relationship between Vladimir V. Putin, the Russian prime minister, and Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister and business magnate, including 'lavish gifts,' lucrative energy contracts and a 'shadowy' Russian-speaking Italian go-between
• Suspicions of corruption in the Afghan government

'It is going to give the candid American views of world leaders and indeed the reverse too,' he told BBC1's The Andrew Marr Show.
'There is going to be some embarrassment certainly for Gordon Brown but even more so for David Cameron who was not very highly regarded by the Obama administration or by the US ambassador here.' 
The series of revelations which are expected to begin tonight and 'drip fed' over the week will put a fresh strain on the 'special relationship' between Britain and the U.S.
U.S. diplomats reported on Gordon Brown's final months and the likelihood of the Coalition lasting after the May election, according to the Sunday Telegraph.
Mr Brown's controversial visit to New York in September 2009 during which the White was accused of 'snubbing' him is also likely to be leaked.
The cables are also believed to contain a withering assessment of Mr Brown’s personality and prospects of staying in power.
A Coalition source admiited the leaks would be 'embarrassing rather than damaging to the Government.'
He added: 'The last Labour government has a lot more reason to be nervous.'
Previous leaks from the WikiLeaks website have included hundreds of thousands of secret Iraq war logs, including detailing a Apache helicopter crew in Iraq discussing the carnage below them as if it were a video game.

Expose: WikiLeaks' posts on its Twitter page showing how the U.S. government, in anticipation of an imminent expose, is briefing its allies on what to expect

'HA HA I HIT THEM':THE EXPOSES THAT SHOCKED THE WORLD

Until now WikiLeaks had published two batches of classified files.

The first was about the war in Afghanistan and gave a grim picture of the day-to-day struggle against the Taliban and the frustrations of trying to train the Afghan police.

The second covered the period in the occupation of Iraq between 2004 and 2009 and contained revelations that America failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, rape, torture and murder by Iraqi police and soldiers.

The information also revealed that more than 15,000 civilians died in previously unknown incidents - U.S. and UK officials have insisted that no official record of civilian casualties exists but the logs record 66,081 non-combatant deaths out of a total of 109,000 fatalities.

In addition, the logs claim that in one incident a British rifleman shot dead an eight-year-old Iraqi girl as she played in the streets.

Before the June exposes, the whistleblowing service shocked the world with the publication of a video in April showing American soldiers laughing as a helicopter strike kills around a dozen civilians in Baghdad. 

In the 17-minute black-and-white footage, pictured above, from an Apache helicopter gunsight, the crew can be heard discussing the carnage as if they were playing a video war game.

One soldier can even be heard shouting: Ha, ha, I hit 'em.' Another says, 'Look at those dead b******s

WHO'S JUILIAN ASSANGE AND WHAT IS HIS WIKILEAKS WEBSITE ABOUT?

 WikiLeaks was set up in 2007 by journalist and computer programmer Julian Assange.

The Australian, whose parents met at a protest against the Vietnam War, says he wanted to allow whistleblowers to publish sensitive materials without fear of being identified.

Mr Assange, pictured below at a press conference in July following his first major expose, says his website's complex set-up is designed to ensure that information sent to it becomes anonymous before it is passed on to the web servers.

Its servers are spread all over the world and do not keep logs, so governments cannot trace where the information is being sent and received from

Even so, WikiLeaks encourages donors to post the material to them on CDs to its base in Iceland, over encrypted internet connections or from net cafes.

The service, which also runs a network of lawyers to defend its publications and sources, claims that none of its informants have been traced so far.

Adding to this intrigue, Mr Assange's legal team have recently been busy arguing over an international arrest warrant which has been issued for the WikiLeaks boss by Swedish prosecutors over allegations of rape, sexual molestation and unlawful coercion.

The allegations, which the 39-year-old has repeatedly denied, relate to two women he met while on a visit to Sweden in August.

Mr Assange’s London lawyer Mark Stephens, has said the claims were 'false and without basis’.

The State Department's senior lawyer Harold Koh has written to Assange, stating America would not co-operate with WikiLeaks to axe documents that might put U.S. operations at risk.
The letter was released as U.S. diplomats around the world are scrambling to warn foreign governments about what might be in the secret documents.

 

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  Yes - the public has a right to know

  No - they are secret for a reason

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They are believed to contain highly sensitive assessments about world leaders, their policies and America's attempts to lobby them.
Nelson Mandela, the 92-year-old ex-South African President, is among those believed to have been criticised. He condemned George Bush over the Iraq war.
He also called Tony Blair the ‘foreign minister of the United States’ for supporting Mr Bush over Iraq.
Afghanistan’s leader Hamid Karzai is believed to be among those set to come off badly in the no-holds-barred private cables to the White House from scores of US embassies.
Responding to Assange's letter asking for information of individuals at risk, Mr Koh said:'Despite your stated desire to protect those lives, you have done the opposite and endangered the lives of countless individuals.
'You have undermined your stated objective by disseminating this material widely, without redaction, and without regard to the security and sanctity of the lives your actions endanger.
'We will not engage in a negotiation regarding the further release or dissemination of illegally obtained U.S. government classified materials.'

Criticised: Former South African president Nelson Mandela with president George Bush

MYSTERY OF ASSANGE'S 'LIFE INSURANCE' TWEET

WikiLeaks is urging the public to download a mysterious ‘insurance’ file said to contain information to be released if Julian Assange is killed.
In a Twitter post today (pictured below) the whistleblowing service published a link to the Pirate Bay file sharing site with the comment: 'Now is a good time to download some ‘history insurance’.
The giant file, nearly 2GB in size, is said to contain thousands of secret U.S. documents aimed at embarrassing the nation’s government, and potentially causing harm to the United States’ relations with allies.
The file has been around since this summer and is heavily encrypted.
In the event of Mr Assange’s death (or some other unspecified reason), the secret key would be released — exposing the documents to all who have downloaded and obtained the key.
It is uncertain why WikiLeaks is now urging users to download the file, but it just may be that they’re planning to release the key soon.

The secret cables are believed to be from January 2006 to December 2009 – taking in the latter part of Tony Blair’s Premiership and most of Gordon Brown’s.
Defence insiders say Britain’s national security could be ‘put at risk’ by the revelations, which are understood to include details of the Iraq and Afghan wars plus inform¬ation about secret service practices and intelligence sources.
The British Government has issued a DA-Notice (defence advisory), warning newspapers that publishing the secrets could compromise national security.
In yesterday's Sunday Times, Air Vice Marshal Andrew Vallance, secretary of the Government's D Notice committee, signalled No. 10's fears about the impact the leaks could have on Britons abroad.
He warned of the 'potential consequential effects of disclosing information which would put at risk the safety and security of Britons living or working in volatile regions.'
And a Whitehall source told the paper:'The concern is that some of the diplomatic conversations may contain certain phrases which might be portrayed as being hand in glove with the Great Satan to attack Islam.
'There is a nervousness that might inflame the hothead.'
WikiLeaks gained notoriety earlier this year when it released secret details of allied military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The revelations of American brutality in Iraq and Afghanistan led to its founder Assange – an Australian-born computer hacker – being attacked by governments around the world.

Trail of damage: Bradley Manning, left, and Julian Assange

US sources say the ‘whistleblower’ for the latest leaks was most likely US Army soldier Bradley Manning, the 23-year-old American intelligence analyst arrested in Iraq in June and charged over the earlier Wiki¬Leaks disclosures.
Private First Class Manning, from Oklahoma – who was assigned to a support battalion with the US 10th Mountain Division in Iraq – is being held in custody at the Quantico Marine Barracks in Virginia, US.
He has been charged with ‘transferring classified data on to his personal computer and adding unauthorised software to a classified computer system’ and ‘communicating, transmitting and delivering national defence inform¬ation to an unauthorised source’.
Manning is believed to have gained the data by hacking into top-secret US intelligence computer systems
Last night Mr Assange refused to comment on the latest revelations.

 

TODAY'S POLL  

Is Wikileaks is right to publish documents that could threaten national security?

  Yes - the public has a right to know

  No - they are secret for a reason

POLL RESULTS  

 

 Close

All polls Click to view yesterday's poll results

US intelligence is said to have known for months that WikiLeaks held the damaging secrets contained in the cables. Huge teams of diplomats have been sifting through all cable traffic for the period affected and studying the most damaging revelations.
On Friday, senior US diplomats briefed governments including the UK, Israel, Turkey, Denmark and Norway about the damaging secrets which had been contained in cables, including classified messages sent to Washington from the American embassy in London.
The U.S. ambassador to London, Louis Susman, took the unprecedented step of going to Downing Street to brief officials on what was termed as ‘contingency planning’.
Yesterday, Italy and Canada were also briefed.
The U.S. State Department said last night: ‘They contain sensitive information and reveal sources of information that impact our national interests and those of other countries.
‘Typical cables describe summaries of meetings, analysis of events in other countries and records of confidential conversations with officials of other governments and with members of civil society.’
Last night a source close to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told The Mail on Sunday: ‘This is enormously embarrassing to the U.S. The CIA have Assange under total surveillance.
‘The idea was that nothing would be news to us. But these latest documents were moved as hard copies, not electronically, so we still don’t know the extent of the leak.’
The Foreign Office said last night: ‘We would condemn any unauthorised release of this classified information just as we condemn leaks of classified material in the UK. They can damage national security, are not in the national interest and, as the US has said, may put lives at risk.’
The US Embassy in London refused to comment.


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