Julian Assange and the dark secrets of war | DW Documentary

Julian Assange and the dark secrets of war | DW Documentary

[Music] I cannot believe someone spent 5 years in such a tiny cell this is torture absolute torture it’s medieval and this in a western [Music] democracy such cells are usually reserved for terrorists I can imagine how Julian Assange felt when he was able to gaze at the Open Sky for the first time in years so is this a happy ending after all [Music] like his arrest Julian ass’s release in June 2024 made headlines around the [Music] globe Assange has been a controversial figure since he founded Wikileaks a platform that specializes in publishing leak [Music] documents the US called him a Hightech terrorist and spent years seeking his extradition the real trouble began when Wikileaks published an explosive video from 2007 showing US soldiers killing civilians in Iraq they called it collateral [Music] murder I am John dundar a journalist from Turkey and I have been targeted for a similar act by my government I published a video showing the Turkish intelligence service illegally smuggling weapons to jihadists fighting in the Syrian War I was tried and imprisoned in solitary confinement and was a target of an assassination [Music] plot since my release I’ve been living in Exile in Germany it feels like a San and I are caught in the same battle State secrecy versus the Public’s right to [Music] know I began following his story closely 6 months before his release I was not permitted to visit Assange in jail myself but I accompanied his wife Stella and their children on one of their final visits to Belmar prison I know one thing from personal experience if you publish the wrongdoings of intelligence Services they can ruin your life as well as your families the truth we always make the most of the time we have together and it’s not much time it’s only an hour and a half a week and these people why contaminate it with the fears that take place the rest of the time when we’re together it’s comforting it’s loving it’s affectionate and um it’s kind of a sacred time the truth that these wars must end he’s in a single cell for over 20 hours a day usually 22 he spends a maximum of 1 hour outside in in a yard which is all C with a mesh overhead so he doesn’t see the sky directly above of his head he’s been paying with his life with years of his life I know how precious these meetings are from my own family visits during my imprisonment everyone pretends to be doing well but in fact everyone is worn out so how are they um different than he first came and physically physically aged and mentally um I mean he’s still brilliant but um maybe yeah after the visit Stella didn’t seem hopeful of achieving a legal solution she listened in amazement as I explained how my own release was resolved politically one of the visits my wife came and there was a window between us and she was so cheerful and happy and I said what happened you know what Biden wants to talk to me because Biden was visting turkey as a vice president oh yeah and Biden said how important the Press freedom is ETC he gave it speech and in 3 weeks I was out really yeah because just after my my wife they met with ER and most probably he said something to wow so Biden saved your life kind of great great ass ass us UK the next day Stella addressed a crowd of [Applause] demonstrators he should never be extradited to the United States he would never be safe the United States plotted to murder my husband he’s being accused of Journalism it’s an attack on all journalists all over the world it’s an attack on the truth and it’s an attack on the Public’s right to know Assange has a lot of supporters but to many he’s a highly controversial and polarizing figure some media outlets and the US government have accused him of careless handling of sources and alleged links to the Kremlin opinions about his person have often overshadowed the content of the Publications I decided to go back to the beginning and focus on the message not the messenger the story that led WikiLeaks founder Juliana Assange to a prison cell in London began in Iceland back in 2010 that year he met Kristen hubson who is now the editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks but it’s it’s said that when the US president Assange had sensitive material for him to look at which they watched in a quiet Cafe were you expecting the video no he said well I I want to show you something so he flips the computer over the laptop and uh I I noticed that he was watching me in my reaction and it was it was so shocking and I I still remember this feeling it know just U this is going to make history light up come on fire keep shoot keep shoot keep shoot in some breaking news this afternoon a shocking graphic video from Iraq apparently showing US troops gunning down innocent civilians and now a classified video of the attack is being watched by millions around the world alongside the video Assange released thousands of classified military documents from the IRA Iraq and Afghanistan Wars they expose 15,000 previously unreported civilian deaths the real story of this material is that it’s War it’s one damn thing after another it is the continuous small events The Continuous deaths of children Assange published the documents in partnership with some of the world’s leading media organizations and so began the US government’s man hunt for Assange it’s time to call out Wikileaks for what it really is a non-state hostile intelligence service Julian Assange was indicted for violating the Espionage Act it was the first time that this law was used against the publisher we’re familiar with groups whose abuse we exposed is attempting to criticize the messenger to distract from the power of the [Music] message I did not believe him in 2010 when he told us you know they’re going to hunt me to the end of the Earth I thought it was being overly dramatic they will not dare you’re working with the biggest powerhouses in the media in the world they are part of the project they cannot do it but surely no they could they have [Music] I’m on my way to the US to dig deeper into the story behind the infamous collateral murder video there’s there’s [Music] about this location and there’s more that keep walking by and one of them has a weapon receive [Music] I have arranged to meet two key Witnesses of the attack against the Iraqis one lives in Kansas the other one in Baghdad their lives collided on an Iraqi Square on that faithful day in 2007 I will first meet Ethan mord he was a soldier in the US Army and was deployed to Iraq hello s my court very nice to meet you nice to meet you thank you for accepting us that’s an honor pleasure to meet you thank you calm down I grew up on GI Joe John Wayne movies and cartoons of of soldiers I wanted to be a soldier from the time I can remember immediately after 911 it was within an hour being said that it was um Afghanistan and Iraq and and the Muslims so at that point I I just I hated Muslims Iraq think you know but you have no idea at the time I was still very much brainwashed into thinking you know America we’re the greatest we’re we’re here to provide freedom and democracy through the barrel of a gun I didn’t understand just how diluted it was was um it took a long time for me to find to figure it out and then when I when I did figure it out there in Iraq it it changed everything about me military force is here [ __ ] only two children survived the attack shown in the collateral murder video we set out to find them location there were rumors that the little boy now a grown man died some years ago we looked for him nonetheless and found someone with his name but we couldn’t be sure it was the boy in the video it turned out to be him I fore [Music] it was extremely hot and I think it was like already 120 at 9 in the morning [Music] for the most part of the morning there wasn’t much going on we we’d Court off an area and and we’d search the homes and look for weapons and stuff and uh the Apaches are are [Music] circling I’m maybe six blocks to the northeast of that area got to see all those people walking around they were not threatening in any way uh they’re not doing anything to anybody they weren’t firing at us the two guys who did have weapons uh RPG and and an AK-47 they were MOS guards from right down the street they couldn’t realize that they they were cameras and they were journalists well you could could tell like um but again these are guys who are looking at a screen that’s this big and going off of that informationp we got with an RPG to fire when the guy comes around the corner he was taking a picture of one of her humies with a long lens camera that’s not an RPG since when do you shoot an RPG like this they’re 1:00 haven’t seen anything since then one thing I noticed about Apache Gunners is they’re trigger happy because they don’t see what’s on the ground they don’t see the aftermath of what they’ve done it’s a video game and then we heard the apache’s Open Fire um with 30 mm rounds come on fire shoot shoot so it just all of a sudden to stand there and then the next minute they’re just so they had no [Music] idea for we also have one individual [Music] Roger I’m just trying to make sure Pi up a weapon this is where the war crime comes in okay he’s unarmed they are wishing and hoping on everything that he picks up a weapon all you got to do is pick up a weapon they want to finish what they did loation this is 2 rer Hotel 26 is my unit crazy hor is the the pilots if we see a weapon we’re going to engage and I was Bravo Company which is Bushmaster who is giving the order okay so the person giving the order is my platoon Sergeant who is not even anywhere near here he’s listening to the Apaches say this is what’s going on and he’s the one who authorizes the firing but he’s G they’re giving him bad information now Bush Master we have a van that’s approaching and picking up the [Music] bodies right down there by picking up bodies and weapons one thing I’ve noticed in Iraq was you can’t pass by someone who’s wounded on the ground and just like in America just not care so they pull over and do what a good Samaran would do and pick a man up hey we need to stop that so we get down see the two children right there they don’t see it they’re not they’re not paying attention or they do see it I don’t know I’m not in the but you can tell that there’s two children right there if you’re looking at it [Music] so they’re picking up this man who’s clearly wounded you could almost say that this is now a Red Cross or an ambulance yeah um which is illegal under Geneva conventions to attack yeah but by him saying that they’re picking up weapons that’s that loophole they’re taking them there’s no weapons there’s not multiple bodies like they say go ahead Roger we have a black SUV or Bongo truck picking up the body request permission to engage you can tell that they say numerous things that are wrong they say they have a black Bongo truck which that’s clearly not a bongo truck that’s a minivan the reason they said that is because we were attacked earlier that day by a black Bongo truck that had a mort tube in the back so they’re just using that to get authorization this is bsh Master 7 Roger engage 18age clear come on clear [Music] clear coming around clear I lost him in the Lost for some reason I think the van’s disabled the van’s disabled it I got as Li for some reason no reason to shoot it left left we were just told to head to that location oh yeah look at that right through the [Music] windshield movement from the van that was engaged look like a kid over you going to pull in here do you want me to push up so you can get clear so we’re running towards that and the first thing I saw when I got up to the scene was um four men on a corner um who they weren’t men anymore they were destroy chunks of meat um it’s like something You’ see out of a really bad horror movie guy’s head’s completely blown off another person’s shoulders spun all the way around his body now 30 mm rounds are about as big as my forearm here and that’s usually used for uh armor piercing you don’t usually tend to see 30 mm rounds being used on humans necessarily because it’s Overkill you know and the first thing I noticed when I ran up to the scene was the smell um people’s inside smell a certain way um and uh it smelled like smoke and and blood and urine and feces um almost to the point it was almost to the point where it choked you um and it stays in your in your nose for the day you I couldn’t get it out on top of a room as my guys are Fanning out I I saw the van and um I Heard a a child crying if you have children and you’ve heard your child crying in the middle of the night from a nightmare um like help me help me I’m scared um there was that type of cry which I immediately as a parent was drawn to it like I had have to see what’s happening and I saw a little girl on the um passenger seat she had a wound to her stomach and uh she had um glass in her eyes and then this is me come in and and pick her up next to her laying on he was sitting on on the floorboard with his head resting on the bench seat um was a little boy probably eight or nine um he didn’t look like he was breathing he had a wound to the right side of his head that was kind of kicked up um you could see bone fragments of his skull so you plus he had small cuts and shrapnel wounds at other places um so I thought he was dead and then in the driver’s seat was who you could only conclude was the father cuz he was kind of hunched over them to like block what was happening which was feudal one child wounded over D the the BR the drop r I got a wounded girl we need to take the rough of I don’t know why I went back to the van honestly um just something pushed me back towards the van I looking at the little boy’s face and at that moment he took like an exasperated breath like a like a forced breath um which he wasn’t doing before so I started screaming out the boys alive the boys’s alive and I ran around to the passenger side and I I grabbed him and I I kept telling to him hey I’ve got you don’t die you’re going to be okay and in the video you can see me running and then I stop running at that moment he he looks up at me and I remember feeling H so happy cuz his eyes were open but then at the same second they roll back in the back of his head and his whole body goes limp and I thought he died at that that that time and so I stopped running and I just placed him in the in the Bradley as gently as I could damn I hate this part and I I sat with the boy for a minute and just quietly to myself I was telling them I was sorry cuz when I look at him I saw my own son and I think I’m just tired at this point I’m tired of seen everything that we were doing and uh my platoon leader tells me mord what are you [ __ ] doing [ __ ] with these [ __ ] kids and a soldier took a picture of me and said mord you’re bloody as hell and I looked down and I had chunks of the boy on me and uh I just wanted to rip everything off of me I couldn’t wash the blood off me off my hands at the time and I just remember feeling like wanting to rip my skin off to get this blood off me their fall for bringing their kids to battle that’s right let [Music] here the chilling elements in the video is the way they are uh slaughtered with this Hightech equipment um 30 mm bullets from an Apache helicopter gunship is a is like a small hand grenade and to spray that in a, rounds per minute on a group of individual it’s just it’s just you know grotesque bear in mind that the extreme sum and balancing of the cameras that the uh the pilots have up in the sky uh give them such enormous power you know the people on the ground are are basically watching a little dot in the sky but meanwhile the the uh the uh these soldiers in the sky in Total Security they are flying higher above any any possibility of being harmed and they’re just playing a game totally uh so distant from the uh the subjects on the ground and they the tone of the discussion is also reflecting this these are subhumans these are ants these are not human beings only one decision many years later and thousands of miles away it was not the soldiers who opened fire on civilians who were on trial in London it was the men who made it public watching the trial that day I felt like I was reliving my own Journey in some ways your cases are similar they’re they’re on the basis of of National Security charges but the difference is that you found Safe Haven and that Germany has acted to protect you to protect journalism to protect press Freedom we’re not seeing that here I mean this is a political decision of the UK for us journalists the effects of assang persecution are already being felt I think it already is having an impact because I think that having Assange like even if you look at this what happened to the Guardians it’s got much less Brave much more scared doesn’t really do any stories which expose the National Security State I think it’s not too much of a stretch to say that might be something to do with the fact that they know a couple of miles down the road there’s a journalist in prison that might spend the rest of his life in a in a dungeon in the US for revealing State secrets every single journalist all over the world will think twice about any story that might be embarrassing to any government [Applause] anywhere this is exactly what happened in Turkey my imprisonment was enough to convince other journalists to stay away from these dangerous topics since then media organizations including my newspaper have been avoiding issues concerning intelligence operations shame on those who put journalists in prison shame on those who murder journalists shame on those who are afraid of the truth that’s not a society I want to live in the UK courts are also under scrutiny they have heard about the murder plots against my husband they are on notice that the country that is trying to extradite him has planned to murder him they don’t deny it they just changed the subject the whole time we were in court the other side somehow avoided to talk about what the what the documents Julian published revealed they didn’t talk about the war crimes they didn’t talk about the 15,000 civilian killings in Iraq that were revealed they didn’t talk about their torture and rendition Pro program they didn’t talk about uh wantan bay they simply changed the subject free [Applause] [Music] Assange while in London for the trial I attended a panel discussion on the Assange case just a few days earlier Russian opposition leader Alex naani had died in prison that it’s diminishing the moral authority of Western liberal governments to raise Free Speech concerns but it’s also putting people at risk elsewhere and I want to recognize Jan dundar who’s here uh a Turkish journalist who was imprisoned in Turkey when he was imprisoned Julian’s case was raised um and used as an example by the Turkish authorities about why they can do this thank you Jennifer for mentioning my case well I want to ask something about Joe Biden um I was jailed because of a news story I made in my paper and uh and I was called as Turkish Assange by the Turkish Media One Day Joe Biden was in turkey and he said to my son your father is a hero and uh you must be proud of him and he did after this meeting and the same Joe Biden now is trying to uh get the extradition this decision uh from the ukuk so what has happened it’s what Chomsky calls this process of worthy and unworthy victims so there were four stories in the New York Times about naal yesterday there were none about Julian he’s a worthy victim and Julian is not so these governments need that moral veneer and so they will use quote unquote worthy victims uh to give themselves that imprint tour while persecuting unworthy victims there’s no moral crisis within Joe Biden um you were a politically deemed a worthy victim and Julian Assange is an unworthy victim it’s a very cynical game [Music] we approached several American officials for an interview on the topic before Assange was released all of them declined except John Bolton the former US National Security adviser believes that Assange committed a crime worthy of the harshest punishment I’m not bothered by the death penalty in this country and I think crimes like Espionage that harm the security and the safety of innocent American civilians deserves the strictest punishment what Assange did was decide on his own what was going to be released and that is a violation of uh the the right of the United States to decide what it’s going to make public and what it’s not going to make public it’s a sovereign right every country has and the danger is when you have self-appointed Messiahs who think they know better than the rest of the world that uh that they release what they want without regard to the damage it could cause according to New York based lawyer Joshua durel the problem lies in the government’s misuse of classification I don’t know what the actual executive order says that information cannot be classified simply to avoid embarrassment or to hide illegal conduct so if that’s the line then the line hasn’t been transgressed by Assange and Wikileaks it’s been transgressed by the US government in classifying illegal conduct because they want to avoid accountability the collateral murder I mean that’s the kind of conduct that the US is just simply not going to acknowledge unless someone else reveals it to take the mask off this notion that the war in Iraq was some sort of noble Venture designed to uh bring freedom and democracy to the Iraqis as opposed to to just more violence and want [Music] killing sajad and his family saw the collateral murder video for the first time in 2010 3 years after the incident engage come on let us shoot [Music] after living for some [Music] reason should [Music] can’t kill him [Music] that wasn’t just one day [ __ ] like that was happening every day and you can only block so much of it out before it affects you and that was just that was that day that it just broke for me I couldn’t I couldn’t do it anymore I couldn’t justify why I was there you can’t put these kids in positions of playing God in war because that’s exactly what you’re doing you’re playing God every day you’re telling an 18-year-old kid that if this person annoys you you have the power to take his life you get drunk off that every anybody would you know we’re trained a specific way and while a lot of it works it doesn’t at the same time because they have no way of turning it off on us dealing with what I saw what was playing in my head like a slideshow every time I closed my eyes I was losing sleep I start I started drinking heavily um they put me on 13 medications in the Army I didn’t feel anything at a certain point I didn’t feel anything but I knew what I wanted to do I knew that I couldn’t keep my son in this world anymore and I wanted to kill him and I recognized what I was doing and that’s when I tried to kill myself I recognized the thoughts that I wanted to take him out of this world to save his life that’s how [ __ ] up I was to save his life I was going to kill him and so I had a Moment of clarity what the hell am I doing and I drank a fifth of Crown Royal and I took as many pills as I could I’ve had eight friends of mine from my unit commit suicide since we caught in home eight friends you start to wonder do they know something I don’t do they know the answer I don’t know how to live anymore you try to live for your family but you feel like a burden to them and my son keeps me here if he wasn’t here I’d kill myself but I won’t do it because he won’t have anybody but I want to die I don’t say it very very often but I do can we stop [Music] Ean makur and sajat mutasher two victims of the Iraq War whose paths never crossed again since that faithful day when we invited them to meet online for the first time after 17 years sjat was reluctant and Ethan was very [Music] I don’t know if he wants to talk to me or not and he has every right to hate me if he does um because I was a part of that system but um I think about him all the time but you saved his life yeah but we also destroyed his family you know hello hello you look the same as you did without the face faal hair when I pulled you out of the van you look exactly the same I don’t know I’m just I’m kind of overcome right now seeing you I’ve waited so long for this uh and okay so I when I came up to the van I could hear your sister crying and uh when a bunch of us went over to the van everybody else left and I couldn’t leave her um I saw that she had glass in her eyes and and I had to I had to help her I was the I was the same soldier who saved your sister and saved you um I’d taken her back to clean the glass out of her eyes and then I handed her to a medic and then I came back to the van and that’s when I saw you move I immediately picked you up and started running with you to the Bradley in hopes that saving your life it it really it’s a great day for me just to see you and talk to you I’ve thought about you for what has it been 17 years now 17 years I every day I think about you guys and uh I just want to get this up I’m sorry I’m sorry for what happened to you your sister and your father um that should have never happened um and from the bottom of my heart I apologize for the actions of the men in the the helicopters um and I’ve thought about it every day since that day um and it has changed me forever you and your sister have changed me forever um and I hope that you can find it in your heart to forgive me fore fore fore I’m so happy seeing that you’re okay now physically and everything and and I’ve wanted so long to see you um and um from now on I want you to know that you will always have a friend here um and anything I can do to help you or your family if I’m capable of it I would I would help you thank you for taking the time out to talk with me I’ve waited a long time for this it’s really lifted a weight off of me that I’ve been carrying around for a long time thank you uh that’s amazing that’s amazing you guys have no idea no idea how I feel right now uh yeah it’s uh if you can I’ve got to I’ve got to go if that’s okay thank you and bye and uh I’ll contact you soon thank you very much bye I got to go I got to go foreign for alhamdulillah [Music] in Bat the memories scars and the Pains of War are still being felt we had basically the expectation that that such an important video would change the perspective towards Iraq war which was already Brewing but also towards the war as it is being uh carried out today there is a transformation over to drone warfar where it somehow became okay to kill someone from maybe a Ground Control in Arizona but killing somebody in somewhere in the Middle East now we are seeing Gaza according to the latest reports and leaks from the IDF who is picking out targets with artificial intelligence and the generals and and those in charge are saying yes it’s much easier because the machine is doing it so the machine is doing the killing not the people and uh that is the most bizarre form of alienation but I think it’s an arc collateral murder drawn Warfare Artificial Intelligence on Gaza we’re seeing this and where are we going here feel really great to thank you so much I appreciate it thank you see you’ve uh you’ve given me a gift and I I very I appreciate it pleasure to meet you thank you so much so much all the best to you [Music] byebye since leaving the Army Ethan is living with his family in Kansas in financial hardship there’s a lot of hurt there and not just for me um a lot of people were hurt because of me and my wife tells me I I need to forgive myself but I I haven’t found out how yet my kids just recently we were talking about wanting to join the military and I said I’ll break your knees it’s never going to happen you’re not going to go kill people in another country for no [Music] reason sajat is selling children’s clothing in a market he and his sister grew up with their Uncle he’s married but doesn’t have children yet [Music] [Music] ore spee spee [Music] [Music] I have a vision for how it will be when Julian’s released I imagine him leaving the prison I imagine him um coming home to us um I imagine you know domestic uh things like having a meal together or drinking a glass of wine all this stuff that we haven’t been able to do together everything’s on hold until until he’s back [Music] w [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] w [Music] [Applause] [Music] so can this be considered a happy [Music] ending ruined lives civilian deaths the escalating horrors of contemporary Warfare criminalized journalistic activity it really does seem that the first casualty of War war is the truth followed by its Messengers [Music]

On June 25, 2024, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was able to walk free following a deal with the US government. Does this surprising end to the publisher’s many years of criminal prosecution and imprisonment signal a positive outcome for press freedom?

Turkish journalist Can Dündar, who was also imprisoned on similar charges in Turkey and now lives in exile in Germany, followed the Assange case for the last six months before his release. Dündar sees it as the most important trial for press freedom in this century. In this documentary, Dündar decides not to focus on the controversial figure of Assange, but instead on his most controversial publication: “Collateral Murder”, a video which shows possible war crimes committed by US soldiers in 2007 in an attack in Baghdad during the Iraq war. The recording shows journalists and Iraqi civilians being gunned down by US soldiers in an Apache helicopter.

Dündar’s investigations take him from Iceland to the US and Iraq, as he follows the story of the infamous video. He tracks down one of the only two Iraqi survivors of the attack – a boy who was 10 years old at the time – and a US soldier who was directly involved in the incident. Dündar invited the two to meet for the first time 17 years later. The encounter makes the disturbing long-term consequences of war and the lasting pain on both sides vividly apparent.

Following the publication of the video, the US military conducted an internal investigation, after which none of the soldiers were brought to trial. For Julian Assange, however, it was a different story: It was the first time in American history that publishing information the government considered secret was successfully treated as a crime.

Dündar was able to accompany Julian Assange’s wife, Stella, and their two children on one of their last visits to Belmarsh maximum security prison and to the hearings at Britain’s High Court. Although Assange is now free, Dündar asks what the ruling means for journalism. What will happen if journalists around the world stop reporting on war crimes, corruption or government wrongdoing for fear of conviction under an espionage law? The long-term implications of the Assange case are only just beginning to emerge. The film tells a gripping and highly topical story about the fight for truth.

#documentary #dwdocumentary #Assange #pressfreedom
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