Some interviews were conducted in confidence, and the names of the interviewees are withheld by mutual agreement.
p. xi ‘These charges against him in Sweden are absurd and were judged absurd by a senior Swedish prosecutor’ John Pilger, in author’s notes, December 2010.
p. xii ‘He’d just come out of nowhere and flop for a few days … then he’d be gone’ Interview with anonymous author source, August 2010.
p. xiii He was ‘not safe physically wherever he is’ ABC TV, Foreign Correspondent, May 2010.
p. xiii one of his friends confided, ‘He enjoys taking risks’ Interview with anonymous author source, August 2010.
p. xiii ‘The citizenry have a right to scrutinise the state’ Julian Assange, televised speech, Federation Square, Melbourne, 4 February 2011.
p. xv Assange … had been asked whether he thought his life would ever return to normal. ‘I hope not,’ he replied Julian Assange, in author’s notes, December 2010.
p. 2 She’d had a tempestuous relationship with her father, and has been described as ‘very strong-willed’ Northern Star, July 2010.
p. 2 He is remembered by one person who worked with him as a ‘staunch traditionalist’ Northern Star, ‘WikiLeaks Founder’s Lismore Roots’, 29 July 2010.
p. 3 She wrote that she lived ‘in a bikini’ and was ‘going native with my baby and other mums on the island’ Magnetic Island Visitors Centre guestbook.
p. 3 Together they travelled around Australia with Christine’s puppetry company, spending much of their time ‘in Lismore and the Adelaide Hills’ Christine Assange, author interview, February 2011.
p. 3 they had to ‘slash [their] way to the front door with a machete’ Magnetic Island Visitors Centre guestbook.
p. 4 ‘He was a geeky, smart kid’ Northern Star, op. cit.
p. 4 ‘He always stood up for the underdog’ Brett Assange interview, Channel Seven news, December 2010.
p. 4 ‘We were travelling and touring around many different places, so this was quite a rich environment’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 4 ‘We try to develop free thinkers and people of independent thought here and Julian would be the ultimate example of that’ Northern Star, op. cit.
p. 6 It was said Dr Johnson’s goal was to ‘understand the meaning of life’ Parnaby, Owen, biography of Johnson, Raynor Carey (1901–1987) in The Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 17, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, 2007, pp 590–591.
p. 7 ‘Bleached blonde hair singing like the Von Trapp family …’ Channel Nine, Sixty Minutes, October 2009.
p. 8 ‘We watched them trying to stifle their sobs, trying to be brave’ Hamilton-Byrne, Sarah, Unseen, Unheard, Unknown, Penguin, Australia, 1995.
p. 9 Assange said neither he, nor his mother or half-brother, had ever been involved in the cult Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 9 For Christine that was more than enough evidence Christine Assange, author interview, January 2011.
p. 10 Assange said he was told Hamilton used several different identities Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 10 ‘children with IQs up to 150 get along in the ordinary course of school life quite well, achieving excellent marks without serious effort’ IQ.org, http://web.archive.org/web/20071020051936/http:/iq.org/#WilliamJamesSidis
p. 11 Assange had an IQ ‘in excess of 170’ Sydney Morning Herald, ‘The Geek Who Shook the World’, 12 December 2010.
p. 11 He said he liked learning ‘and telling people what I learnt’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 11 ‘We were bright sensitive kids who didn’t fit into the dominant subculture and fiercely castigated those who did as irredeemable boneheads’ Khatchadourian, Raffi, ‘No Secrets’, New Yorker, 7 June 2010.
p. 13 ‘Back then there was no Internet’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 15 ‘We were watching them watching us’ Ken Day, author interview, May 2010.
p. 15 like a shipwrecked man washed ashore on a Tahitian island Dreyfus, Suelette, Underground, Reed, Australia, 1997.
p. 17 ‘They were into the core systems, the heart of our comms’ Ken Day, author interview, May 2010.
p. 18 it was an ‘extremely educational experience’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 18 Assange vividly recalls the siren from the local fire brigade sounding like ‘the start of World War Three’ ibid.
p. 19 He claimed that they were bound by ‘ethical codes and ethical standards’ ibid.
p. 19 ‘We had total control’ ibid.
p. 24 an individual’s right to ‘privacy is necessary for an open society in the electronic age’ Hughes, Eric, Cypherpunk Manifesto, 9 March 1993, published at http://www.activism.net/cypherpunk/manifesto.html
p. 25 ‘What you have then is a Church based on brainwashing yuppies and other people with more money than sense’ Cryptome, http://cryptome.org/
p. 26 He wrote that ‘censorship, concealment and revelation (for a fee) is the Church’s raison d’etre’ ibid.
p. 27 The Church had already won several court cases by what Assange called ‘its manipulation of the legal system’ ibid.
p. 29 the FBI, the NSA and the Department of Justice were demanding tough laws Zimmerman, Philip, ‘PGP for Personal Privacy’, published at http://www.philzimmermann.com/
p. 30 he ‘wanted cryptography to be made available to the American public before it became illegal to use it’ US Senate testimony, http://www.philzimmermann.com/EN/testimony/index.html
p. 30 ‘The government has a track record that does not inspire confidence that they will never abuse our civil liberties’ ibid.
p. 31 ‘I want to read you a quote from some email I got in October 1993’ ibid.
p. 32 ‘put it in a frame and put it on your wall to remind you to be a good boy for the next three years’ Melbourne County Court judgement.
p. 32 ‘It’s an unusual experience when the judge says “the prisoner will rise” and no one else stands up’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 35 ‘We like to put up original documents so people can make up their own minds’ Wired magazine, October 1999.
p. 36 ‘It’s the greatest thing since love’ Wired magazine, January 1999.
p. 36 Readers Digest described the website as ‘an invitation to terrorists’ Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 38 Assange signed off his Cypherpunks message quoting the French aviator and author, Antoine de Saint-Exupery ibid.
p. 38 [Assange] insists that though he worked for large corporations he only did consultancy work Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 39 ‘Normally NGOs beg, but I’m no good at that sort of thing’ Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 40 He formed a particularly close relationship with one woman student, Lisa. Lisa is not her real name.
p. 40 ‘He was special to know’ ‘Lisa’, author interview, September 2010.
p. 42 In other words, Julian Assange was asking the founder of Cryptome … to be the silent partner in his venture Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 43 ‘As soon as you have opened your mind to a malcontent you have given him the material with which to content himself’ ibid.
p. 45 Riseup … promises to provide ‘secure communication’ for people involved in ‘struggles for liberation’ Riseup, https://riseup.net/
p. 45 Part of its recruitment drive assured supporters in emails that Riseup had an established lawyer and ‘plenty of backbone’ Internal WikiLeaks emails published by Cryptome, http://cryptome.org/
p. 45 WikiLeaks would also cater for those in the West ‘who wish to reveal illegal or immoral behaviour in their own governments and corporations’ ibid.
p. 45 WikiLeaks aimed for ‘maximum political impact’ ibid.
p. 46 It was also, they declared ‘within our means to achieve’ ibid.
p. 46 WikiLeaks wanted Riseup to be one of the ‘stable and trustworthy’ ibid.
p. 46 a ‘deniable drop off’ ibid.
p. 46 A ‘regular drop’ ibid.
p. 47 CJ Hinke … confirmed he had regularly been consulted by WikiLeaks ‘on such issues as credibility and importance of leaked materials’ Wired magazine, September 2009.
p. 47 But that he has since developed ‘great regard and trust for their mission’ ibid.
p. 49 Ellsberg’s recent statements on leaking had been followed with ‘interest and delight’ Internal WikiLeaks email published by Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 49 Assange informed Ellsberg that WikiLeaks had crossed over from ‘prospective’ to ‘projective’ ibid.
p. 50 Ellsberg had said to himself: ‘Who’s this coming out of the blue?’ Daniel Ellsberg, author interview, January 2011.
p. 50 ‘I didn’t get anything back and then I just put it out of my mind; I just didn’t think it would come to much’ ibid.
p. 50 Ellsberg would have provided a much-needed guiding hand as the WikiLeaks activists struggled to define the organisation and its ‘new kind of journalism’ Internal WikiLeaks emails published by Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 51 There was no easy way for the reader to check ‘whether they are being lied to by the journalists’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 51 Assange said that many organisations involved in the reconstruction only had ‘three or four days’ ibid.
p. 53 ‘There he is, flame on his chin, holy book in his hand and anti-aircraft cannon between his legs’ Internal WikiLeaks emails published by Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 54 [Assange] was concerned about the readership, which, though large, ‘tends to pal up on one pew and sometimes even sings and claps’ ibid.
p. 55 ‘until all is dancing confetti and the truth’ ibid. p. 56 ‘Only revealed injustice can be answered; for man to do anything intelligent he has to know what’s actually going on’ IQ.org, 31 December 2006.
p. 59 ‘Every person is the ultimate arbiter of justice in their own conscience’ Internal WikiLeaks emails published by Cryptome, op. cit.
p. 62 he was ‘haunted by demons’ which revealed themselves by the fact he had ‘massive trouble sleeping’ Lisa, author interview, September 2010.
p. 65 Freedom of Information requests they carried out later unearthed a trail of decisions made by ‘radical feminists’ Christine Assange, author interview, January 2011.
p. 66 [Assange’s] ‘technical advice’ and support assisted in the ‘prosecution of persons suspected of publishing and distributing child pornography on the Internet’ Age, ‘Assange Helped Our Police Catch Child Pornographers’, 12 February 2011.
p. 66 according to Christine, her son also put his technical expertise to use helping Victorian police ‘remove a book on the Internet about how to build a bomb’ Christine Assange, author interview, February 2011.
p. 66 he thought the idea of leaking government documents ‘to the entire world’ was a ‘ridiculous concept’ Crikey, ‘Daniel Assange: I Never Thought WikiLeaks Would Succeed’, 17 September 2010.
p. 67 ‘I support similarly minded people, not because they are moral agents, but because they have common cause with my own feelings and dreams’ Cryptome, http://cryptome.org/
p. 67 ‘He gets easily frustrated with people who aren’t capable of working up to his level’ Crikey, op. cit.
p. 73 [Elmer] said he had witnessed ‘practices used by the Julius Bäer bank to evade or reduce its own tax payments’ Der Spiegel, 3 March 2008.
p. 78 ‘The identification, exposure, or termination of employment of or legal actions against current or former insiders, leakers or whistleblowers’ WikiLeaks, ‘US Intelligence Planned to Destroy WikiLeaks’, 15 March 2010.
p. 79 According to a ‘Manual of Justice’, purportedly written by Scientology founder L Ron Hubbard The Register, http://www.theregister.co.uk/
p. 80 It was unlawful to ‘reproduce or distribute someone else’s copyrighted work without that person’s authorisation’ ibid.
p. 85 ‘These acts were ordered, directed or coordinated by the top leadership of the Kenya police acting jointly with a common purpose’ The Kenyan National Commission on Human Rights, ‘Cry of Blood’, September 2008.
p. 90 The message was simply relayed to Hrafnsson: ‘We were supposedly breaching bank secrecy laws’ Kristinn Hrafnsson, author interview, May 2010.
p. 90 ‘Those very few that dare to question this insanity, they will be just basically character assassinated’ Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 92 ‘Legal obstacles, which cannot be identified … proceedings, which cannot be mentioned …’ Guardian, ‘Guardian Gagged from Reporting Parliament’, 12 October 2009.
p. 92 It can also encourage what Geoffrey Robertson called ‘libel tourism’ University Observer, February 2010.
p. 93 The Guardian revealed to its readers it had been forbidden from telling them Guardian, op. cit.
p. 93 Assange argued that the secret gag order against the Trafigura report, ‘remains in effect’ WikiLeaks, ‘Guardian Still Under Secret Toxic Waste Gag’, 14 October 2009.
p. 94 ‘A number of news organisations have got the facts wrong’ Transforming Freedom, www.transformingfreedom.org
p. 96 As we chat in a Reykjavik café she remembers how well Assange and Domscheit-Berg performed Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 97 Domscheit-Berg told me he’d been approached by a friend who ‘had genuine interest in changing the world for something better’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 97 ‘… we have to do the same thing in order to protect our sources [from] malicious, vexatious lawsuits affecting our ability to continue’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 99 ‘They were saying, “Yes, let’s do this”’ Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 99 ‘Why don’t one of you come there with me’ ibid.
p. 100 Watson noted that the Icelandic delegation believed that if the Icesave issue wasn’t resolved soon and Iceland defaulted on its loans it would ‘set Iceland back thirty years’ Wikileaks, ‘Classified cable from US Embassy Reykjavik on Icesave’, 13 January 2010.
p. 105 Jonsdottir asked: “Can you help us do some video editing?” Gudmundur Ragnar Gudmundsson, author interview, November 2010.
p. 106 ‘I am in the helicopter, I am the member of the crew’ ibid. p. 106 ‘We originally thought this was a video about Afghanistan’ interview transcript, Julian Assange, interview with Rhonda Pence, Press TV, A World Beyond Borders, 4 November 2010.
p. 107 ‘I could easily identify with those children because they are a similar age as my own’ ABC TV, Foreign Correspondent, May 2010.
p. 107 ‘I didn’t give up my job under the premise that I would never earn any money’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 107 Assange started to move against Domscheit-Berg ‘because his presence was causing problems’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 108 Assange admits that he ‘engineered’ a way that Domscheit-Berg ‘would be kept away from more delicate things that we were doing’ ibid.
p. 108 ‘It was just too tense, and it just became more aggressive and aggressive every day’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 108 ‘It was very difficult; I walked out three times’ Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 109 Julian can deal with incredibly little sleep and a hell of a lot of chaos, but even he has his limits and I could see that he was stretching himself’ Khatchadourian, Raffi, ‘No Secrets’, New Yorker, 7 June 2010.
p. 110 ‘Julian, there is something not right here’ Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 110 ‘I know for sure that there are no tapped phone conversations’ ibid.
p. 111 ‘How can that be cool, you know that a 17-year-old kid has accumulated through shady dealings, with shady companies, three cars?’ ibid.
p. 111 sending tweets worldwide and a letter ‘to the Icelandic press about the Icelandic authorities collaborating with the CIA’ ibid.
p. 111 Jonsdottir was blunt: the allegation was ‘a load of bollocks’ ibid.
p. 112 ‘Icelandic journalists have been unable to substantiate his claims’ Columbia Journalism Review, ‘Thin Ice’, 1 April 2010.
p. 112 ‘Julian was getting ready to go on stage in the United States in front of the firing squad’ Gudmundur Ragnar Gudmundsson, author interview, November 2010.
p. 112 ‘At the same time, we are displaying them as monsters,’ one of the editors said Khatchadourian, Raffi, op. cit.
p. 113 ‘Are you crying? ibid.
p. 113 ‘Julian didn’t want at that time to be practical, his mind was already in the States, he was already there preparing’ ibid.
p. 113 ‘I actually didn’t want him to take any computers along with him’ Gudmundur Ragnar Gudmundsson, author interview, November 2010.
p. 114 ‘When you’re dealing with a big bureaucratic state they just cannot respond that quickly’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 114 ‘The promise that we make to our sources’ Colbert Report, 13 April 2010.
p. 115 He admitted to being ‘a little bit worried’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 115 Assange took the floor, telling the assembled media that what they were about to see was ‘a very rich story’ Michael Collins, Democratic Underground.com, 5 April, 2010.
p. 117 ‘They are still traumatised and still suffer from the pain of their wounds’ Interview (not broadcast) for Foreign Correspondent, ABC TV, April 2010.
p. 118 war as seen ‘through a soda straw’ Los Angeles Times, ‘Gates Says Video of US Helicopter Attack in Iraq Out of Context’, 14 April 2010.
p. 118 ‘When you have unarmed people including a wounded prostrate man on the ground …’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 119 ‘We think the safest way to cover these operations is to be embedded with US forces’ Washington Post, ‘Military’s Killing of Two Journalists in Iraq Detailed in New Book’, 15 September 2009.
p. 119 Asked if he could say when he saw the video Finkel said, ‘I can’t’ ABC TV, Foreign Correspondent, May 2010.
p. 119 ‘I assume they had the video, you know, close back to 2007 when these events happened’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 120 ‘They didn’t show the actual shooting of the people’ ABC TV, Foreign Correspondent, May 2010.
p. 120 the correspondent said they were doing that ‘out of respect for the relatives’ ibid.
p. 122 ‘I don’t feel that the attack on the van was warranted’ ABC TV, Lateline, April 2010.
p. 127 ‘Should there be a centralised, automated, national censorship system between every newspaper and its reader …?’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 128 ‘Ah journalists,’ he smiled. ‘Can’t do an interview without a drink!’ author’s note, May 2010.
p. 130 He was also sent to a chaplain after officers noticed what was called ‘odd behaviors’ ABC News America, 29 November 2010.
p. 131 ‘Take me for who I am, or face the consequences!’ Bradley Manning’s Facebook page.
p. 131 Lamo said it was a sure way of discovering whether someone was a fake Adrian Lamo, author interview, June 2010.
p. 134 ‘I want people to see the truth, regardless of who they are …’ Wired magazine, Lamo chatlogs.
p. 134 ‘The American military said in a statement late Thursday that eleven people had been killed’ New York Times, ‘Two Iraqi Journalists Killed as US Forces Clash with Militia’, 13 July 2007.
p. 137 He has also asserted that Assange ‘groomed’ Manning, Adrian Lamo, author interview, June 2010.
p. 137 ‘I have encouraged people to donate and I still do’ ibid.
p. 136 he was grabbing what he could and ‘firing bullets into the air without thought to the consequences of where they might land or who they might hit’ Adrian Lamo, author interview, June 2010.
p. 136 the first contact from Manning came ‘out of the blue’ ibid.
p. 136 Manning contacted him via Twitter Salon.com, http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/06/18/wikileaks
p. 137 given access to a ‘special servers’ reserved for those who submitted the most sensitive documents Adrian Lamo, author interview, June 2010.
p. 139 ‘None of us knew that Bradley Manning was under arrest’ Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 140 ‘Leaking is inherently an anti-authoritarian act, it is inherently an anarchist act’ ABC TV, Foreign Correspondent, June 2010.
p. 140 something Ellsberg jokingly put down to ‘the Australian accent’ Daniel Ellsberg, author interview, January 2011.
p. 141 ‘The Pentagon was of the belief that I was carrying two-hundred–and-sixty thousand classified US cables in my pocket and a whole bunch of other things’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 141 ‘We started hearing the reports that they were hunting for me’ ibid.
p. 142 ‘He was genuinely concerned about being killed by the Americans’ author note, August 2010.
p. 142 It would cause an ‘uproar’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 143 ‘While I was on the train going under the Channel, I had tried to work out what I would say to him’ Columbia Journalism Review, 28 July 2010.
p. 144 ‘He taught us we couldn’t trust him’ Nick Davies, author interview, February 2011.
p. 146 Schmitt had covered the military for many years and Keller saw him as a journalist with ‘excellent judgment and an unflappable demeanor’ New York Times, ‘Dealing with Assange and the WikiLeaks Secrets’, 26 January 2011.
p. 148 ‘He smelled as if he hadn’t bathed in days’ ibid.
p. 149 ‘Open a second spreadsheet’ ibid.
p. 149 he was ‘running around like he had like a shop … selling cigarettes’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 149 Domscheit-Berg said that Assange had shown the New York Times some of the other cables he had Domscheit-Berg, Daniel, Inside WikiLeaks, Scribe, Melbourne, 2011.
p. 151 For Davies it was an experience to see a group of journalists working so closely together Columbia Journalism Review, ‘The Story Behind the Publication of WikiLeaks’ Afghanistan Logs’, 28 July 2010.
p. 151 Assange was still ‘spooked’ by reports from the US the previous month that the Pentagon had launched a manhunt for him Interview with anonymous author source, August 2010.
p. 151 some of the reporters had the impression that Assange was ready to publish the documents on the WikiLeaks site immediately Columbia Journalism Review, op. cit.
p. 152 ‘We were starting from: “Here’s a document. How much of it shall we print?” Ellison, Sarah, Vanity Fair, ‘The Man Who Spilled the Secrets’, February 2011.
p. 152 ‘Five days before publication the Spiegel guys asked me how far we are with the redaction’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 152 ‘I asked the people that were processing the material making it ready for publication, and they said “we don’t know anything about this”’ ibid.
p. 153 ‘Man we’re talking about ninety thousand documents here’ ibid.
p. 153 recommendations made … ‘on the identification of innocents for this material if it is willing to provide reviewers’ News.com, ‘Accused WikiLeaks Source Had Help, Says Hacker’, 2 August 2010
p. 153 ‘I certainly didn’t consider this a serious and realistic offer to the White House to vet any of the documents before they were to be posted’ ibid.
p. 154 ‘If you think you have a hot phone, you charge the battery up fully, and then you post it overseas’ SBS, Dateline, August 2010.
p. 154 He was ‘pretty much doing something that his family did when they were involved in theatre and movie business’ ibid.
p. 156 ‘I’m untouchable now in this country’ ibid.
p. 157 WikiLeaks had ‘tried hard to make sure that this material does not put innocents at harm’ Frontline Club press conference, July 2010.
p. 157 Assange dismissed the group as ‘people who prefer to do nothing but cover their asses’ Wall Street Journal, ‘Rights Groups Join Criticism of WikiLeaks, 9 August 2010.
p. 158 Assange said WikiLeaks had taken his advice and done a ‘much bigger job of redaction’ on the next tranche of documents they were about to release Daniel Ellsberg, author interview, January 2011.
p. 158 He had also gained a reputation, as Bill Keller pointed out, as someone who was ‘smart and well educated, extremely adept technologically but arrogant, thin-skinned, conspiratorial and oddly credulous’ New York Times, op. cit.
p. 158 ‘That’s why I do what I do and the way that I do it’ Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 158 Yet despite his criticisms, he spoke of working on the Afghan War Logs ‘in a collaborative basement’ and identified the three outlets … ‘media partners’ NPR.org, ‘Leaked Reports Paint “An Unvarnished and Grim Look at the Afghan War”’, 26 July 2010.
p. 159 ‘I’ve seen Julian Assange in the last couple of days kind of flouncing around talking about this collaboration like the four of us were working all this together’ Columbia Journalism Review, op. cit.
p. 159 ‘He’s making it sound like this was some sort of journalistic enterprise between WikiLeaks, the New York Times, the Guardian, and Der Spiegel’ ibid.
p. 159 ‘Did it come from Bradley Manning?’ ibid.
p. 160 ‘The battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potentially severe and dangerous for our troops …’ Military Veterans and Foreign Affairs Journal, 29 July 2010.
p. 160 ‘… the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family’ ibid.
p. 160 The New York Times reported … lawyers ‘are exploring whether Mr Assange and WikiLeaks could be charged with inducing or conspiring in violations of the Espionage Act’ New York Times, ‘US Military Scrutinizes Leaks for Risks to Afghans,’ 28 July 2010.
p. 161 Keller reported that Assange was ‘openly contemptuous of the American government’ New York Times, op. cit.
p. 161 When he was asked specifically if he had ever directly contacted Bradley Manning, Assange replied ‘No’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 162 ‘So if they’re trying to say I conspired with Bradley Manning …’ ibid.
p. 162 He understood that the New York Times may ‘need to be not truthful because of threats’ ibid.
p. 162 ‘We reject collaboration or revelation … protected by us, he wrote’ WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy, Guardian Books, 2011
p. 166 ‘We aren’t involved in that,’ one of the FBI agents said CNET.com, ‘Researcher Detained at US Border, Questioned about WikiLeaks’, 31 July 2010.
p. 163 ‘There’s no doubt about that’ Walkley Foundation magazine, January 2011
p. 166 Assange says he only posted the file so he could have confidence in WikiLeaks’ ability to withstand what he called ‘even a massive multi-continental roundup’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 167 ‘limiting his travels across international borders’ Daily Beast, ‘US Urges Allies to Crack Down on WikiLeaks’, 10 August 2010.
p. 167 WikiLeaks could have ‘committed serious criminal offence’ Age, ‘WikiLeaks Head Attacked by ADA’, 28 July 2010.
p. 168 she’d been connected with ‘US-financed anti-Castro and anti-communist groups in Cuba’ Counterpunch, September 2010.
p. 176 Assange said that as WikiLeaks, grew Domscheit-Berg’s ‘stature’ and power grew more and more ‘unstable’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 176 ‘because they were comfortable about women’ Christine Assange, author interview, February 2011.
p. 176 Assange had come up against what she called the ‘Scandinavian female’ Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 176 ‘If a guy acts in a certain way to a Scandinavian female, he is going to encounter big trouble, particularly when it comes to sexuality, and the boundaries’ ibid.
p. 177 Birgitta described Assange as a ‘wild child’ ibid.
p. 177 ‘I don’t want to get into that, it’s too personal’ ibid.
p. 177 He added that it hadn’t ‘backfired too many times’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 178 Assange had also given him some advice when he met his wife that he should ‘get as much dirt’ on her as he could Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 178 Jonsdottir says she has ‘seen guys that were critical of him’ meet Assange and be turned around in a few minutes Birgitta Jonsdottir, author interview, November 2010.
p. 178 ‘If your actions result in the terminating, incarceration or execution of my sources I will kill you’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 178 Assange said he had ‘warned him on numerous occasions previously [about not] taking care of some security procedures or sources’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, December 2010.
p. 179 ‘At the time I meant it, yes. At the time that was the feeling’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 179 ‘It might be a good precedent to set for all our staff’ ibid.
p. 179 He said that Assange thought of him as ‘like a dog’ that he needed to be ‘contained’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 179 Domscheit-Berg wrote that anyone who offered too much criticism was punished by having his rights suspended Domscheit-Berg, Daniel, Inside Wikileaks, Scribe, Melbourne, 2011.
p. 180 ‘We have certain responsibilities for this money, and we are taking this seriously’ Wired magazine, December 2010.
p. 181 The demands for financial scrutiny came not only from those who opposed WikiLeaks activities in principle Cryptome, http://cryptome.org/
p. 182 The Wau Holland foundation would reveal it had paid more than ‘€100,000 in salaries for 2010, including about €66,000 to Mr Assange’ Wall Street Journal, ‘WikiLeaks Spending Ballooned, Data Show’, 24 December 2010.
p. 184 He said WikiLeaks needed a ‘charter’, a ‘strategy’ and an end game Ken Day, author interview, May 2010.
p. 185 ‘disclosing classified information concerning “national defense” with reason to believe that the information could cause ‘injury to the United States’ US Military charge sheet.
p. 187 ‘I got a flurry of urgent phone calls and texts saying “you’ve got to meet him, he wants to meet you”’ Iain Overton, author interview, December 2010.
p. 187 ‘I kind of kept on disappearing out’ ibid.
p. 189 Overton said he was sure Leigh was ‘pissed off’ about it ibid.
p. 189 ‘The Guardian doesn’t care that the government know’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 192 ‘erratic and imperious behavior and a nearly delusional grandeur’ New York Times, ‘WikiLeaks Founder on the Run, Chased by Turmoil’, 23 October 2010.
p. 193 ‘I am the heart and soul of this organisation’ Wired magazine, September 2010.
p. 193 ‘I said I thought he was absolutely right in being mad at John Burns’ Daniel Ellsberg, author interview, January 2011.
p. 194 At Der Spiegel, there was a growing sense of discomfort Interview with anonymous author source, February 2011.
p. 195 ‘Does the New York Times have a copy?’ Der Spiegel, ‘An Inside Look at Difficult Negotiations with Julian Assange’, 28 January 2011.
p. 195 ‘What’s the point in making an agreement if people will dishonour it?’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 196 Understandably nervous that it might be shut out of Cablegate again, it asked the Guardian for a copy Interview with anonymous author source, February 2011.
p. 197 ‘We’re good at working together, we like each other’ Leigh, David, and Luke Harding WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy, Guardian Books, UK, 2011.
p. 197 ‘He is genuinely interested in the journalism that he does, that is a big tick from me’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 198 with ‘too many cables coming out too quickly’ this would ‘saturate the market’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 198 ‘We would have the Guardian and the New York Times campaigning against us’ ibid.
p. 200 the ‘hard drives were empty [and] there was nothing there’ ibid.
p. 200 ‘What access codes?’ Daniel Domscheit-Berg, author interview, November 2010.
p. 202 ‘It appears that the State Department thought we had a lot more than we did’ Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 203 After they passed through security, they were shown into a ‘windowless room’ New York Times, ‘Dealing with Assange and the WikiLeaks Secrets’, 26 January 2011.
p. 203 It was ‘fair to say the mood was tense’ according to Keller ibid.
p. 204 ‘I am criticising those who stole this material’ Der Spiegel, op. cit.
p. 205 Der Spiegel’s headline followed the Guardian’s global perspective Der Spiegel, ‘The US Diplomatic Leaks: A Superpower’s View of the World’, 28 November 2010.
p. 207 It would allow the US to ‘prepare their own spin’ now that it knew the identity of the cables, and thus the material they contained Julian Assange, author interview, December 2010.
p. 208 If the US military computer logs line up with ‘every goddamn record of what we release that’s very strong evidence,’ he said. ibid.
p. 209 ‘There is nothing laudable about endangering innocent people’ Hillary Clinton, NPR news, December 2010.
p. 209 He called on ‘any other company or organisation that is hosting WikiLeaks to immediately terminate its relationship with them’ Guardian, ‘WikiLeaks Website Pulled by Amazon after US Political Pressure’, 2 December 2010.
p. 210 if Amazon was ‘so uncomfortable with the First Amendment, they should get out of the business of selling books’ WikiLeaks, Twitter, 2 December 2010.
p. 210 ‘They’ve put American lives at risk’ Politico.com, ‘Mike Huckabee: Leaker Should Be Executed’, 30 November 2010.
p. 210 ‘He is an anti-American operative with blood on his hands’ Sarah Palin, Facebook.
p. 210 ‘Well I think Assange should be assassinated actually’ Age, ‘The Noose Tightens around Assange’, 3 December 2010.
p. 212 he ‘had nowhere to go’, ‘was instantly recognisable’ Mark Stephens in author’s notes, 7 December 2010.
p. 212 ‘Many people believe Mr Assange to be innocent, myself included’ ibid.
p. 213 ‘We now know that Visa, MasterCard and PayPal are instruments of US foreign policy’ Telegraph, ‘WikiLeaks: Julian Assange Says Visa and MasterCard are “Instruments of US Foreign Policy”’, 14 December 2010.
p. 214 Assange left a spirited message on Ellsberg’s phone, saying he was ‘calling from a Norman Basement Slammer’ Julian Assange in author’s note, December 2010.
p. 214 ‘He’s not interested in advice’ Seymour Hersh, author interview, December 2010.
p. 215 ‘ … the administration felt compelled to say publicly that the revelations had seriously damaged American interests’ Reuters, ‘US Officials Privately Say WikiLeaks Damage Limited’, 18 January 2011.
p. 215 internal US Government reviews of Cablegate had determined that the leaks had caused only ‘limited damage to US interests abroad’ ibid.
p. 216 his identity should be guarded as a ‘protected’ source Sydney Morning Herald, ‘Arbib Revealed as Secret US Source’, 9 December 2010.
p. 216 ‘To aggressively attempt … fearless press’ Walkley Foundation magazine, December 2010.
p. 218 ‘During my time in solitary confinement in the bottom of a Victorian prison I had time to reflect’ Julian Assange in author’s note, December 2010.
p. 222 ‘I have not done anything that can be considered criminal’ ABC radio, PM, January 2011.
p. 222 ‘an outrageous attack by the Obama administration on the privacy and free speech rights of Twitter’s customers’ Sydney Morning Herald, ‘US Court to Hear Twitter-WikiLeaks case’, 15 February, 2011.
p. 222 the public’s ability to ‘participate meaningfully in this ongoing debate’ Electronic Frontiers Foundation, https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/dorders_twitter/Motiontounseal.FILEDversion.pdf
p. 223 WikiLeaks described the hearing as ‘the first round in the US Government’s legal battle against Julian Assange’ Daily Telegraph, ‘Julian Assange Blasts US Bid for WikiLeaks–Twitter Information’, 15 February 2011.
p. 224 ‘It was as if for the first time someone told the Tunisians “You are not insane. You are right to hate him”’ Florence Beaugé, author interview, February 2011.
p. 224 Even Bill Keller from the New York Times was fulsome in his praise New York Times, ‘Dealing with Assange and the WikiLeaks secrets’, 26 January 2011.
p. 225 police brutality was ‘routine and pervasive’ WikiLeaks, http://wikileaks.ch/cable/2009/01/09CAIRO79.html
p. 225 Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made special mention of Tunisia and Egypt, naming them as countries where the ‘free flow of information’ was threatened Newseum, http://www.newseum.org/news/2010/01/clinton-urges-global-internet-freedom.html
p. 226 Assange was buoyed by her comments Julian Assange, author interview, May 2010.
p. 226 ‘They’re annoyed by people publishing; they’re annoyed by a free press’ ibid.
p. 226 According to US author Jonathan Alter, Obama was ‘fearsome’ on the subject Politico.com, ‘Justice Dept. Cracks Down on Leaks’, 25 May 2010
p. 227 ‘They’re going after this at every opportunity and with unmatched vigor,’ Politico.com, ibid.
p. 228 the media in Sweden had “turned very hostile” towards Assange Age, ‘Assange appeal gets under way’, 8 February 2011.
p. 228 one of the women who accused Assange of rape had let him carry on having sex with her when she woke up even though he wasn’t wearing a condom ibid.
p. 228 The Swedes wanted Assange for questioning and possible prosecution for ‘unlawful coercion’ New Statesman, ‘Why Assange Lost’, 28 February 2011.
p. 229 ‘It is hyperbolic and irrational to suggest there was wickedness involved’ Age, op. cit.
p. 229 Judge Riddle pointed out ... “alien as far as our system is concerned” Guardian, 24 February, 2011.
p. 230 ‘He denies the allegations which is fairly ambiguous’ Daniel Ellsberg, author interview, January 2011.
p. 232 ‘He has grown up being the cleverest person in the room’ Nick Davies, author interview, February 2011.
p. 232 Julian ‘always wins because he is smarter, and he’s right’ ‘Lisa’, author interview, September 2010.
p. 232 ‘I am somewhere on the autistic side’ Nick Davies, author interview, January 2011.
p. 233 Ellsberg is not optimistic that WikiLeaks will win the battle against secrecy and force organisations to be more open Daniel Ellsberg, author interview, January 2011.