Manning Verdict

All Governments know that they have to crack down on anyone who attempts to chip away at their authority as an example to others who could be emboldened to strike blows at them also.
So is the case with Bradley Manning who has been found not guilty of aiding the enemy but guilty on  20 remaining charges meaning that he still faces the possibility of up to 136 years behind bars.
His crime was exposing the secretive and barbaric actions of his government who initiated two horrific wars in Afghanistan and Iraq which resulted in a horrific loss of life which continues today over a decade later with car bombings and sectarian killings.
The perpetrators of the wars were always interested in keeping the consequences of their actions as quiet as possible and when people like Julian Assange, Bradley Manning or Edward Snowden shine a spotlight on their sordid actions, the result is prosecution for the whistleblowers.
America want their wars to be seen as clean and sanitised with them as the good guys and the other side as the bad guys but as the three whistleblowers have shown, war is innocent people being killed, lives being destroyed and cavalier soldiers humiliating, torturing and killing the people they are supposedly there to bring freedom to.
Like the US Government, the armchair warriors of the internet don't want the reality to be seen, the Apache helicopter pilots bombing Iraqi civilians and journalist or the charred remains of a wedding party mistaken for an Al Queada meeting. 
The US government will now be hoping that this will set an example to any future whistleblowers who may be tempted to reveal injustices while America go about their wars.
Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden have courageously sacrificed everything to expose their Government who do not come out of this with any moral integrity whatsoever and after Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan, they never had much to start with.