 WASHINGTON — Investigators have concluded that Army commanders ignored advice not to send to Iraq an Army private who's now accused of downloading hundreds of thousands of sensitive reports and diplomatic cables that ended up on the WikiLeaks website in the largest single security breach in American history, McClatchy has learned.
Pfc. Bradley Manning's direct supervisor warned that Manning had thrown chairs at colleagues and shouted at higher ranking soldiers in the year he was stationed at Fort Drum, N.Y., and advised that Manning shouldn't be sent to Iraq, where his job would entail accessing classified documents through the Defense Department's computer system.
| So it was clear he had a problem, and unfortunately the Army screwed up. |
But superior officers decided to ignore the advice because the unit was short of intelligence analysts and needed Manning's skills. The commanders hoped they could address Manning's discipline problems in Iraq, the officials told McClatchy, but then never properly monitored him. The result was a "comedy of errors" as one commander after another assumed someone else was addressing Manning's problems, one official said.
Investigators are now considering whether they should recommend disciplinary action against at least three officers in Manning's chain of command. Investigators must submit their findings to Army Secretary John McHugh by Tuesday.
| Just like in the Fort Hood shooting case, people up the chain of command had concerns and didn't do anything -- or at least enough -- about it. |
Investigators looking at Manning's case found that while the military had followed procedures in giving Manning a security clearance, more questions should have been asked about whether he should retain it once he displayed disciplinary problems.
At one point, Manning, who joined the Army in 2007, saw a mental health specialist, officials said, but it's unclear what came of that meeting. He was deployed to Iraq in 2009 and served there until he was arrested in May, shortly after the first WikiLeaks posting in April.
| Wonder if the security clearance service knew about the mental health visit? |
Manning, 23, isn't cooperating with investigators, and prosecutors still don't know how the hundreds of thousands of documents and files he allegedly downloaded reached WikiLeaks.
| We may never know, but we can still hang him. |
|