After reading chapter 9, The information I find most applicable to present day discourse has to do with the limitations regarding the concept of prior restraint - specifically when it has to do with matters of national security. Recent whistleblowing incidents involving people like Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden have led to questions regarding the ethics of their actions as well as the content they revealed, but the notion of prior restraint explored in the reading reminded me of a different event.
About a year after President Obama authorized the killing of Osama Bin Laden, Matt Bissonnette, one of the SEAL Team 6 members involved in the raid, published a book in which he recounted his experience as both a navy seal and the assault on Bin Laden's compound. The book was titled "No Easy Day," and it quickly came under scrutiny by the Pentagon. This was due to the fact that Bissonnette didn't present his work to the federal government before publishing it, which meant there was potential it could have contained classified information. Finding classified information would have been enough to warrant prosecution by the Justice Department on its own, but the possibility of legal action was still present in another way: Bissonnette violated a non-disclosure agreement by refusing to submit his book to the Pentagon prior to its publishing. After over two years of legal battles, Bissonnette and the federal government agreed to a $6.8 million settlement - the combined total of all royalties he earned on the book. The Pentagon found that no classified information was revealed in the book.
I think it's a reasonable expectation to require someone with the knowledge of classified info to have their work screened before making it public. As with all other rights conveyed by the first amendment, there are a select few reasonable limitations imposed upon these rights that prevent the freedom of speech from being totally absolute. The content that this book had the potential to contain, whether it was the names of individuals who wished to remain secret or classified information regarding military technology, should not be information that is readily made public. Although Bissonnette didn't publish content like this, I believe people in his position should be required to have their work screened beforehand.
Sources:
Drew, Christopher. “Ex-SEAL Member Who Wrote Book on Bin Laden Raid Forfeits $6.8 Million.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 19 Aug. 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/08/20/us/bin-laden-book-seal-team-6.html.
About a year after President Obama authorized the killing of Osama Bin Laden, Matt Bissonnette, one of the SEAL Team 6 members involved in the raid, published a book in which he recounted his experience as both a navy seal and the assault on Bin Laden's compound. The book was titled "No Easy Day," and it quickly came under scrutiny by the Pentagon. This was due to the fact that Bissonnette didn't present his work to the federal government before publishing it, which meant there was potential it could have contained classified information. Finding classified information would have been enough to warrant prosecution by the Justice Department on its own, but the possibility of legal action was still present in another way: Bissonnette violated a non-disclosure agreement by refusing to submit his book to the Pentagon prior to its publishing. After over two years of legal battles, Bissonnette and the federal government agreed to a $6.8 million settlement - the combined total of all royalties he earned on the book. The Pentagon found that no classified information was revealed in the book.
I think it's a reasonable expectation to require someone with the knowledge of classified info to have their work screened before making it public. As with all other rights conveyed by the first amendment, there are a select few reasonable limitations imposed upon these rights that prevent the freedom of speech from being totally absolute. The content that this book had the potential to contain, whether it was the names of individuals who wished to remain secret or classified information regarding military technology, should not be information that is readily made public. Although Bissonnette didn't publish content like this, I believe people in his position should be required to have their work screened beforehand.
Sources:
Drew, Christopher. “Ex-SEAL Member Who Wrote Book on Bin Laden Raid Forfeits $6.8 Million.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 19 Aug. 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/08/20/us/bin-laden-book-seal-team-6.html.
Tedford, Thomas L., and Dale A. Herbeck. Freedom of Speech in the United States. 8th ed., Strata Publishing, Inc., 2017.
Thompson, Mark. “Bin Laden Raid SEAL Author Faces ‘Double Jeopardy.’” Time, Time, 27 Aug. 2012, nation.time.com/2012/08/27/bin-laden-raid-seal-author-faces-double-jeopardy/.
I thought your discussion was interesting. I have actually never heard of the book "No Easy Day" so I looked it up and read a little about it. I guess I missed the memo there because it was very popular when it first came out. I agree with you that the author should have had his book screened before releasing it. Personally, I don't like the idea of prior restraint by the government but I do see that there is a place for it. I agree with you that it is a reasonable expectation for someone with classified information to have their work screened. If the government is willing to trust a citizen with classified information the citizen is then taking the responsibility of keep that information secret. In this case, publishing a book has a huge potential to release information that is supposed to be secret. Like I said, I don't like the idea of the government using prior restraint but this is an instance where I think it would have been okay and the author probably should have complied. I am curious why he decided not to comply if his book didn't have any classified information. It seems like it would have saved him a lot of time and money to simply have the book screened.
ReplyDeleteYour statement that those who are privy to classified information should have their work screened first is one that I agree with completely. As you explain in your post, the content being published might divulge names and military technology that are better left a secret. Under more ordinary circumstances, post facto punishment is usually an adequate deterrent to keep individuals from publishing material they shouldn’t. However, when the content in question involves military secrets, the potential harm caused by publication is immense and irreparable, especially if the information was to fall into the wrong hands. For this reason, I too concur that prior restraint is an appropriate measure to be taken when the content being published involves military secrets.
ReplyDeleteWhat really piqued my interest though was your reference to the book “No Easy Day.” Although I have never read it, my grandfather owns a copy. When it first came out 5 years ago, my grandfather and I talked about it—which is to say he recounted the main events mentioned in the book and I posed various questions and comments. Since this conversation occurred five years ago, the specifics of the discussion, as well as those of the book, elude me. However, the general impression I remember being left with was surprise and confusion. Simply, I was shocked that someone was allowed to write about the mission that killed Osama bin Laden only a year after it was conducted. This was my initial reaction as a freshman in high school. As the years have passed, I have spotted “No Easy Day” on my grandfather’s book shelf from time to time while visiting my grandparents. Even to this day, I still metaphorically shake my head in confusion when I spot it and ask the same question I did five years ago: How did this get authorized?
Now I know the answer to this question—it wasn’t. However, this brings up a new series of questions for me. First of all, why was Matt Bissonnette insistent on publicizing the Osama bin Laden raid so soon after the mission was executed? Was he worried that the mission would be shrouded in eternal secrecy? Furthermore, why didn’t he seek permission from the Pentagon if the agency found that no classified information had been leaked in the book? Would the Pentagon have allowed him to publish the book even if it’s content was given the all clear? Doing a bit of research, I found answers to some of my questions. According to the official website of the Department of Justice, the government has a policy of automatic declassification. In short, the system of automatic declassification states that classified information is to be released for public use once it is twenty-five years old unless it is clearly falls under one or more of the nine exemption categories (“Declassification FAQ”). Based on this information, we can conclude that Bissonnette could have theoretically published all the details in his memoir once the mission was twenty-five years old.
Now, I understand that he probably didn’t want to wait twenty-five years to relay this information to the public, so it makes sense that he would want it published before the deadline of automatic declassification. However, this brings me back to the question: would the Pentagon have allowed him to publish the book a year after the mission was completed, even if it was given the all clear? If not, then what amount of time must pass before it is informally permissible to release the book? Five years? Ten years? More than a decade?
Sources:
“Declassification Frequently Asked Questions” The United States Department of Justice, 13 Sept. 2016, https://www.justice.gov/open/declassification/declassification-faq Accessed 25 Oct. 2017.