Most people believe that Pvt. Daniel Manning, who is currently being held in prison for sending classified documents and videos to wikileaks, is guilty. However there is a very vocal minority who believes he is innocent. The most prominent figure of the group is a man who found himself in the same situation exactly 40 years ago. Daniel Ellsberg, leaked the infamous "Pentagon Papers" to the New York Times which showed that many top government officials knew that the Vietnam War was unwinable. Daniel Ellsberg said "I was Daniel Manning." They have both been charged with similar crimes and Ellsberg has personally reached out to Manning's family. However contrary to Ellsberg's belief there are some distinctions between the two, most notably the fact that Manning was in the army at the time he released the documents meaning he was bound by the Army's standard operating procedures and chain of command, which he did not follow to release classified data. Ellsberg had already been out of the Marine Corps for years by the time he released the Pentagon Papers and was not bound by the same restricitions that Mannning was. Also the media fought to get the pentagin papers released. With Manning, that does not appear to be the case.
http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/03/19/wikileaks.ellsberg.manning/index.html?hpt=T2
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