these are not the pentagon papers. and for that, the pentagon papers were not the last word. they were not the cia or white house papers. but these documents, do, in fact, at the field level, represent the human impact of this war that's been concealed by the pentagon and by the administration, two administrations now, year after year, as they told us they didn't know or didn't count how many civilians were being represent the human impact of this war that's been concealed by the pentagon and by the administration, two administrations now, year after year, as they told us they didn't know or didn't count how many civilians were being killed. we know that was a deception. they were countsing and they did know and it was much higher than the news reporting has ever revealed. that's news now. >> larry: what will -- >> the question of torture, if i may say, i was frankly, as a former pentagon official, i was ashamed of jeff morell for saying he did not and his colleagues did not perceive any war crimes in these documents. that reveals a blindness to legal and moral implications a

troops the pentagon has all but it mended its new attitude towards the press as part of an aggressive strategy to deploy the media as part of a p.r. campaign according to the weekly standard the military wants positive stories about the grit and resolve of its troops. deep in the desert. is already. secure to use chests the difference between independent journalism and embedded journalism is for starters embedded journalism if you're going to do that you have to go sign paperwork essentially says i will follow all orders of my superior officer so even from the very start you allow yourself to be indoctrinated into this unit become one with these people so any idea of objective journalism is would sign your name to to do the programming that's out the window and that my great. great free so that they will again market. matter. how white or. what they're really hurting the billion we have like the stockholm syndrome when your life becomes dependent upon these people how can you possibly not be heavily heavily influenced by that in your writing and then of course we have the very very re

al jazeera had given the coordinates of the office several times to the pentagon maybe that was their first mistake later the same day the u.s. tanks shot at the palestine hotel where around one hundred international journalists were staying the attack killed jose couso a camera man for the spanish tell us think and tired as a veteran reuters cameraman. around the room number. thirty one. i have a friend a colleague who was at the palestine when it was shot when the reuters office was shot by the take which the u.s. military claimed that. the take had drawn fire i've personally seen these tapes they showed the tape for several minutes before fire there was no gunfire anywhere everyone knows that the palestine is the journalist hotel that whole compound is for journalists the real message through actions from the pentagon is that we will make your life more hazardous and it's not just you know independent journalists and people on the left who have made this charge we've had many mainstream organizations like the committee to protect journalists expressing concerns sending letters havi

it is not the pentagon papers. we still need the pentagon papers of afghanistan and iraq on the decision making. for that matter, the pentagon papers were not that adequate. what we need is classified documents that were shown to bob woodward for his latest book. possibly, he could contribute to all of the documents he was shown. that would be very worthwhile. short of that, one of his researchers could give those documents to wikileaks. that would be very worthwhile. if not one of his researches, someone within the administration should give the material to wikileaks. bradley manning is accused of doing what he could to end this war. he did what he could. what he is needed is for people who lack access to information that will help us understand this war in a way that will enable us to understand it to show us what they know with documents, and actually, wikileaks offers itself as the best vehicle for their doing that. >> what we are going to do now is not run a fall of ", which was booked here, four simple reason

our round table is back and ready to tackle a discussion about the cost savings drive for the pentagon and the cost drive for the afghanistan war. joining me to talk about these issues are john donnelly and lauren thompson and john barry and john bennett. welcome to the show. john bennett, let me start with you. the savings drive. they want to save $101 billion over the next five years. ash taylor has put together issues. what is next in the process of saving this much money in the coming years? >> they are in the implementation phase. several task forces are moving along with how they go about instituting what secretary gates wants to do. that goes through mid-december. at the same time, the services are coming up with their own plans of organizations and commands to cut and scale back generals to fire. i think that is where the fight is really going to be on the hill. that will be rolled out with the 2012 budget in february. >> let me ask you about the joint forces command. secretary gates wants to show he can cut the staff as well as one of the pentagon information agencies he wants

now for a closer look at this leak and what it all means i'm joined by a former senior pentagon correspondent at c.n.n. and blogger for the line of departure jamie mcintyre and press that chatter the investigative journalist and senior fellow at the center for american progress gentlemen think thank you so much for being here and welcome now i want to start with you there's so much information and in these leaks from torture to allegations of innocent lives lost what is the takeaway lesson the what do you walk away with what impressions do you have from the cumulative effect of these. remember these the role field reports the hof a million of them if you count of going to stand in iraq it gives us a grand view a wall a soldier's view of war it's not an iraqi view and often view it tells you what the soldiers and the soldiers what the soldiers sometimes of course it's not even necessarily accurate i mean they convey something that they witnessed and that's jenny more accurate sometimes things i mean not be very accurate it is the stuff of history and it has to be filtered and it has to be unde

of top secret documents known as the pentagon papers. those stories next. captioning by vitac, underwritten by fireman's fund ♪ >> belva: good evening. and welcome to "this week in northern california." i'm belva davis. joining me tonight on our news panel are bob egelkgelko, legal reporter for the "san francisco chronicle." josh richman, legal and political affairs reporter for the "oakland tribune." and carla marinucci, political reporter with the "chronicle." well, carla, the debates were this week. so we'll start out to find out, did voters learn any more than they knew before about the candidates? >> i think debates are always a good thing. we did see carly fiorina and barbara boxer again. well, heard them. they were on the radio. they had some pretty sharp exchanges on abortion and other issues. but the real show was meg whitman and jerry brown in davis. this was their first get-together. and it was a show. jerry brown came out of the box hitting her as a billionaire who is going to roll back tax that's would benefit her and her rich friends. and sh

military and the pentagon. the documents we've seen and have been reported so far reveal that the u.s. military knew that iraqi security forces beat, tortured and murdered detainees. but those u.s. military forces were actually under orders not to intervene so instead they looked the other way. in one instance, an american helicopter gunship shot and killed a group of iraqis who were attempting to surrender. other documents also reveal that hundreds of iraqi civilians were killed at u.s. military checkpoints. a number far higher than previously reported. and in a five-year period, some 66,000 iraqi civilians were killed, even though all along the u.s. military and pentagon claimed they never kept such statistics. the pentagon fears there may be the names of more than 300 iraqi informants working hand in glove with the american military. so tonight, the u.s. military in iraq is working with the iraqis to track down and warn each and every one of them that their lives may now be at risk. brian? >> all right, jim

it's stopped by the filibustering of the entire pentagon. because of that filibuster, as it stands now it's not authorize by the united states congress for the first time in 48 years. that seems rather unsustainable. in the military the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and the defense secretary have both said they are against the policy. the chairman of the joint chiefs puts his policy in passionate and personal terms. >> it goes to the terms of the fundamental principle with me which is everybody counts and part of the struggle back to the institutional integrity aspect of this -- >> wait, now, i appreciate that. >> and putting individuals in a position that every single day they wonder whether today's going to be the day and de valle ewing them in that regard just as inconsistent with us as an institution. i have served with homosexuals since 1968. senator mccain spoke to that in his statement. everybody in the military has. and we understand that. so it is a number of things which cumulatively for me personally get me to this positio

the website released the documents despite the pentagon saying it puts the line of the u.s. troops and their coalition partners at risk. as you just mentioned a short time ago, in london the group spoke to reporters defending the decision to make the classified documents to the public. they say the disclosure is about the truth. >> we hope to correct some of that attack on the truth that occurred before the war, during the war and which has continued on since the war officially concluded. >> we believe that having received these, wikileaks was right to publicly release these. >> among the 400,000 documents released yesterday are reports of abuse on iraqi forces and the failure to do anything about them. the documents outline u.s. forces failing to follow-up on credible evidence that iraqi forces killed their captives. the material describes america officers as being caught up in a complicated situation where they often could do little but report allegations of abuse to their superiors. although the documents appear to be authentic, so far that has not been confirmed. >> i'm

what is the pentagon -- has the pentagon done to mitigate the fallout? >> well, what the pentagon has done is there is a task force pulled together in the region, washington, d.c. region, going through every, single document. you can -- now you have 5, 600,000 documents, you have to go through and they are analyzing them and they'll determine if there is fallout and if there is any activity, that needs to be investigated. or not. and they are taking the appropriate action and you can imagine the strain that this puts on the bureaucracy and the pentagon and on the intelligence community to try to, a, the first priority is to take care of our troops down range and are trying to figure out whether or not there is information that is harmful and whether or not sources are being named and you have to pull them off the front lines. and take care of our troops first. and the next priority is to figure out has something been reported that wasn't fully looked into or investigated and i think that's a second priority to try and take care of our troops first. >> ju

forces are already stretched thin overseas and just last year the pentagon funded study found that seventy five percent of american youth were unfit to serve up for health reasons alone making it all the more difficult for the military to meet its quota it actually amazes me that. that there isn't more of an uproar than there actually is because we're talking about thirteen year old kids right now it borders on if it isn't actually indoctrination. of our youth into this very violent culture but folks are starting to be outraged and turning that outreach into actual. salaries for all at the school where her son was recruited went from teacher to activist she's worked for years now in trying to raise awareness about recruiting methods in public high schools she told me that she wants to be the last mother to see her. son return home in a box. but the questions remain is it enough i just look at that and i got the impression that you know jason stank and i'm invincible i was bulletproof and they're really not you know they're everybody's very fragile or is it too late what would you tell some

and the pentagon has said they will do so. and warned troops, don't come out, don't change your behavior in any way because there's always the possibility that this injunction could be stayed or essentially removed by a higher federal court, which would put the policy back in place. in which case investigations and discharges could start again. >> rationalize for so many that don't understand the reasoning behind how this is going to end needs to be defined in a certain way for the obama administration. >> yeah. well, the preference for the obama administration is to see the house and senate included in the annual defense authorization bill. the big bill that basically outlines the pentagon policy for the year. and approves things like big expensive fighter jets and sort of changes the policy. the house approved it back in may. and it included a repeal of the policy in there. the senate tried last month. didn't get enough votes to continue with the debate, so they had to table it until after the election. the theory is that de

jim, what's the pentagon's reaction? >> reporter: lester, pentagon officials have condemned the wikileaks release of military secrets. nearly 400,000 reports from battlefield commanders on the front lines iraq, while much has been pretty much reported to some extent the massive leaks provides an even deeper look into the darkest side of the iraq war. the leaked documents cover the deadliest years of the iraq war and for the first time provide evidence iraqi civilians suffered the heaviest losses. the secret records show in all 109,000 iraqis were killed. but more than half, 66,000 were civilians, higher than previously disclosed. at a news conference today in london, wikileaks founder julian assange accused the u.s. of hiding the truth. >> iraq, as we can see, was a bloodbath on every corner. >> reporter: according to the documents, many died at the hands of the americans. 681 civilians were killed at u.s. military checkpoints alone. pentagon officials insist, however, u.s. military tactics have improved. >> we have gott

. >>> shots were fired at the pentagon. we'll tell you what investigators are saying. >>> a policy change was announced about gays in the military, as leaders bait for -- wait for another ruling. >>> rain is in the forecast, steve paulson will be around to tell us if there is a serious chance. >> reporter: when you cross the bridge, caltrans has a warning for you. >>> federal authorities say someone fired shots at the pentagon this morning. pentagon police heard at least five shots, two struck the building itself, but that part of the building was unoccupied. they are looking looking for the shooter and have shut down areas near the pentagon in their search. this incident comes after shots were fired into the marine marine corps museum about 30 miles away. police don't know if there is a connection between the shoots. >>> a federal judge is expected to issue a ruling today on a government request to delay the lifting of the don't ask/don't tell policy. the judge in southern california said she would review the arguments but

it is not the pentagon papers. we still need the pentagon papers of afghanistan and iraq on the decision making. for that matter, the pentagon papers were not that adequate. what we need is classified documents that were shown to bob woodward for his latest book. possibly, he could contribute to all of the documents he was shown. that would be very worthwhile. short of that, one of his researchers could give those documents to wikileaks. that would be very worthwhile. if not one of his researches, someone within the administration should give the material to wikileaks. bradley manning is accused of doing what he could to end this war. he did what he could. what he is needed is for people who lack access to information that will help us understand this war in a way that will enable us to understand it to show us what they know with documents, and actually, wikileaks offers itself as the best vehicle for their doing that. >> what we are going to do now is not run a fall of ", which was booked here, four simple reason

the pentagon has requested a stay of enforcement of that injunction. haven't heard yet from judge phillips on that. and what the problem here is, for the pentagon, is what do you do in the meantime? and we are told that the pentagon, the military officials, unofficially, are advising that no gay or lesbian currently in the military out themselves, declare themselves gay or lesbian, because if, in fact, there is a stay put in place or if this ruling from judge phillips is overturned eventually, the pentagon claims it will have a right to go back and force them out or attempt to force them out of the military. the reality, in the meantime, chuck, though, is that for several months, the pentagon, the military have not aggressively been enforcing don't ask, don't tell in the first place after defense secretary gates issued this -- his own ruling, which he had the right to do, to say that they were going to treat this more humanely and not force people out of the military who were outed voluntari outed involuntarily. but as i said, this presents a huge poli

your story on pentagons is a big half answer. i'll get to that later. look, we have something called a business cycle. and i'm going to presume you as a businesswoman know about the business cycle. we get booms and we get busts. in the recessionary period, unemployment goes up. we've come back, seven time since world war ii we've been in recession and always come back. we did create new jobs. yes, we're in a recession. two years later, california was booming again, as we will. if we make the tough decisions and live within our means. >> this is an opportunity for me to engage in something called a fact check. i looked up the numbers, at the end of mr. brown's term as governor of california, it was in the middle of the ronald reagan recession. and there were four republican states, illinois, ohio, michigan, and -- or indiana and tennessee, all had republican governors and higher unemployment rates at that time because of the recession, so you have information on that. we've been through a torturous process in the state of california, took 100 days for th

an ongoing challenge for the pentagon. martha, thank you. >>> and speaking of the pentagon, joining us now from there is the spokesman, geoff morrell. geoff, good morning to you. and thanks for getting up to talk to us this morning. >> not a very good morning over here, dan. >> how bad is the damage in your view? >> listen. this is an extraordinarily concerning release of classified information. we have been assessing this potential impact for quite some time. we believe that our primary exposure here is in the fact that our enemies will be now able to mine, perhaps, up to 500,000 classified documents, which could reveal how our forces operate in the field. how they respond in certain combat situations. the capabilities of our quind sabilities of our we know in the wake of the afghan document released in july, the taliban and other terrorist organizations urged their members to mine that database. to look for vulnerabilities how we operate and exploit that in the field. this, now, is four-times as large, as you mention. it

quite extraordinary at the pentagon. they seemed to be caught flat-footed by this injunction but the judge had said a month ago she would issue this worldwide injunction on enforcing don't ask/don't tell. so today a letter came out that said you can did, you probably shouldn't say if you're a gay or liz byan soldier because you don't know. gwen: which note -- we note for service members that altering their personal conduct in this uncertain legal environment may have adverse consequences for themselves and others should the court be reversed. >> right what i'm concerned about, all the slog of the two wars and how tired we hear military families are and then you have now this, you know, the lack of clarity and with a warning lane attached, what is this going to do for recruitment? >> in the immediate, if someone comes into a recruiting office and says i want to join the united states military, they're still not allowed to ask what someone's sexual orientation is. the real problem is if someone calms -- comes in this week

. >> the pentagon makes a decision comply. >> the pentagon makes a decision >>> welcome back. in our top stories, two montgomery county police officers are on leave after the death of the man they had tasered. ali resisted as officers tried to escort him from the white oak apartment complex on sunday. they tased him and pepper sprayed him and he stopped breathing. >>> three of the 33 men rescued from the chilean mine have been released from the hospital. the others are doing very well. one of them has pneumonia and other needs dundalk, but none of them have severe problems. >>> obama and biden will be in delaware today to rally support for chris koons. koons faces christine o'donnell. >>> just as to promise officials will appeal a court ruling that would end the u.s. military "don't ask, don't tell" policy. one of the plaintiffs is speaking. now the story. >>> two days after the "don't ask, don't tell" policy would continue, the obama administration urged the judge to let the military continue its ban on gays serving openly as the appeals process plays out. later the president

access to the parking lot and the pentagon building have since been reopened. all lanes of southbound 101 in morgan hill are back up this morning. it took more than 12 hours to remove the overturned tanker. the tanker flipped over 3:00 just south of coyote. three lanes were blocked for hours, creating mile-long backups. the tanker was carrying 43,000 gallons of wax. when they went to haul away the truck, the tow truck driver ran into problems and that extended the reopening of that final lane. and part of the san mateo bridge is back open. two westbound lanes were closed. so caltrans crews put the material on there to keep it from cracking again. >>> paul chambers is at at&t and we understand crowds are gathering. >> reporter: kraig, that's so true. right now we've mosqued inside. because the earlier it gets the more fans we're seeing out here. take a look. fans are out here. they are really excited. let's take a live look where we're for the game between the giants and philadelphia. i was able to catch up with both sides to hear their game on the -- to hear th

. >> it starts and end at the pentagon. we'll run across memorial bridge, down constitution and up virginia avenue, come back down rock creek park by the kennedy center, behind the lincol memorial on independence avenue up to the capitol. come back over the 14th street bridge and hov lanes and end at the pentagon. for those that want to couldn't and cheer on run theers, three great locations. number one is the memorial bridge. you'll see runners coming and going. number two out by the capitol. third independenceavenue. then obviously the best place to be is the finish line at the pentagon. >> of course. they always appreciate a boisterous crowd. tell us the eventsoing on today that are almost as exciting, especially the black dagger, the elite parachute team. tell us when they are descending on the district. >> race weekend starts on friday. the festivities kick off at the d.c. armory where we have the big po. we're expecting 35,00 people. we have exhibitors, products and services for runners in the military. we also have t

the pentagon says exposing them is putting lives at risk. how did this happen and what do the records reveal >>> terror from the deep, a rare shark attack kills a young man off the coast of california, leaving beaches closed and many fearful of stepping into the water. >>> and lucky lohan, instead of jail time it's back to reh for the oubled young actress. the judge could have ordered her behind bars for months. why did she catch a break? "today," satury october 23rd, 2010. captions paid for by nbc-universal television >>> good morning, everyone. weome to "today" on a saturday morning. i'm lester holt. >> and i'm amy robach. wikileaks is calling this the largest classified military release in history. >> the government knew it was coming, and in this case we're talking about tens of thousands of secret documents in the war in iraq. the defense department's firing back. we're going to take a look at what's been revealed and talk live wit the pentagon spokesman coming up a bit later on this morning. >>> then it's down to the wire for the midte

getting a gallon of gas to afghanistan cost the pentagon about $400. each of the services have experimented with energy-saving technology, alternative fuels, but until now, the pentagon has lacked a coordinating office. that office was established in july. and our next guest is its director, sharon burke. welcome to the show. >> thank you, it's great to be here. >> let's start off with energy efficiency, as we discussed just a moment ago is just not in the u.s./military's dna. how do you change that dynamic over the long term? >> you know, to say it's not in the dna, it could be. for example, if you look at an aircraft carrier, it's a resource constraint environment and people watch what they consume. it is in our dna, just not necessarily in terms of thinking about saving energy for the sake of saving energy. >> right. >> and i think how you go about changing that for the long term is that you look for the points of the leverage can which are coming currently from deployed forces. we've been getting messages from iraq and from afghanistan consistently

and the pentagon jump on that. there is nothing yet to suggest people in a in a san have been objects of retribution. but these people are made more vulnerable than people in afghanistan and now iraq. >> thanks. earlier i spoke with one person from the "new york times." he explained the role of iraq. >> it is not a surprise to people part of the iraq war that iran has been providing certain things to the shiite militants in trading them in iran. what is funky about the document is the scale of the effort and that it continued during the first year of the obama administration. that is the first time the american administration is reaching out to tehran. >> what about the and the filing for the tension once u.s. troops leave? >> we vetted the documents and worked through them as carefully as we could. we posted about 20 documents not for hundred thousand. we extracted names from anything that could pose a security risk to american forces were put iraqi lives in danger. they did not ask us to make any additional cuts.

and once they separate, the pentagon doesn't necessarily know where they live or send the money. if they send the check to the wrong address, it bounces around. they want to know where it is. but it is, in essence free money. >> and time is running out. >> time is running out. >>> okay. so when you collect that cash, what are you going to spend it on? well, neiman marcus has a few ideas for you. one of a kind gifts to be sure featured in their latest over the top holiday catalog. how about a his and hers house boat for a cool quarter of a million. or the swimming pool lit from the bottom with hand blown glass. wow. created by a name we can't pronounce. i don't think he's wearing socks. what do you think? [ laughing ] . >> i don't think it matters. >> i don't think so. that is quite the -- >> stre nice. >>> all right. another provocative campaign for breast cancer awareness. in january women posted red, blue or polka dot. >> now they're getting racier with another facebook campaign that as brittany morehouse says is not very important. >> what would you do if your mother posted on

jennifer is at the pentagon. this has to be a source of frustration at the pentagon, the pakistani intelligence sources double game here. >>reporter: that is right. a lot of frustration at the pentagon and at the white house and on capitol hill today. the wall street journal quotes a taliban commander saying that he is receiving orders from pakistan intelligence to continue fighting against nato forces and he was a commander in afghanistan, and, today, a pentagon spokesman says that there is great concern that pakistan's intelligence service is still connected in some way to terrorist organizations. that is a view that was echoed by senator kerry as he was visiting the state department today. >> the isi's continued involvement with various entities, some of which we find troubling. s an issue of concern between us. >>reporter: that means "very frustrated." >>shepard: and a white house report to congress suggesting the relationship is going downhill with the pakistanis. >>reporter: take a look at the number of att

the pentagon's secret network, supposedly airgapped, has been penetrated, according to the pentagon. the control systems for the power distribution grid, which they say is separate from the internet, people have penetrated by moving from the internet to the corporate internet -- intranet and then to the gird. we have -- to the grid. we have to come to grips with the fact that everything we do all day long is computer- dependent. is not just cyber criminals who are taking advantage of that -- it is not just cyber criminals or cyber spies who were taking the advantage of that. it is beginning to the who are taking advantage of that. the defense's we have deployed do not work. until the country comes to understand that, we will continue to be under attack. >> thank you so much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> this is cyber awareness month. i think dick is doing his part to make us aware. he has raised a number of issues that will give us a lot to think about. again, please go to our website ww