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Is Julian Assange a real-life Bond villain?
It’s a question that has been bouncing around certain corners of the interweb for a while but which has become even more urgent in the days leading up to his arrest in London.
What follows is an objective analysis of the question drawing on all the Bond movies on the one hand and Assange’s known behavior on the other. Because of the transparency campaigner’s concern with secrecy the latter evidence is relatively limited, though a handful of internal Wikileaks emails published by the essential Wired.com are quite revealing as to his personality.
1. Assange is the creator of a secretive international organization said to be involved in espionage and criminal activity, but unaligned with any particular country or ideology. This right away puts him in the same category as Auric Goldfinger, Sir Hugo Drax (Moonraker) and above all SPECTRE founder and white-cat stroker Ernst Stavro Blofeld (six films beginning with From Russia with Love – in which he is referred to only as “Number 1″)
2. Like Goldfinger and company, Assange hates the United States. Indeed Assange clearly wants to be an even bigger threat to America than the previous top candidate for real life Bond villain: Osama bin Laden. Assange’s transformation of Wikileaks over the last year into an organization that solely targets the USA has apparently prompted a series of rebellions in and defections from Wikileaks.
3. Like Blofeld in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Assange has an army of gullible young assistants who probably do not understand his real goals or his political obsessions. They believe his stated objective of transparency even though he does not practice what he preaches.
4. Indeed, like Drax and Blofeld, Assange is a man with a hidden past. Though it is hard to imagine the use of such information by any of the police and intelligence agencies he claims are after him. After all, it is all but impossible to find such basic information as what degrees Assange has received, where he lived or what he did for a living before founding Wikileaks in 2006. Something of a hypocrite when it comes to the transparency he champions in public, he is secretive not just about the membership and funding of Wikileaks but about the most ordinary details of his own life.
5. Like Karl Stromberg in The Spy Who Loved Me, Assange is an idealistic misanthrope with a superman complex. He believes he is wiser than any mere government when it comes to deciding what should be secret and what should be made public, and as shown by his willingness to reveal the names of NATO’s informers in Afghanistan, he has no qualms about collateral damage when it comes to pursuing his notion of the greater good. (Stromberg was more ruthless or rather more ambitious: to protect his beloved oceans he planned to provoke a nuclear war between the USA and USSR that would wipe out all of civilization except for his undersea city ‘Atlantis’.)
6. Like all of the Bond villains and in particular Hugo Drax in Moonraker (who has his disloyal pilot chased and killed by his Doberman dogs), Assange rules the Wikileaks organization tyrannically and is ruthless when confronted by insubordination and dissent. When his senior staffer and primary spokesman Daniel Domscheit-Berg dared question his leadership Assange immediately suspended him. To quote a (leaked) email to a Wikileaks volunteer: “I am the heart and soul of this organization, its founder, philosopher, spokesperson, original coder, organizer, financier and all the rest. If you have a problem with me, piss off.“
7. On the other hand, unlike Goldfinger and his ilk, Assange seems to take little or no pleasure in houses, clothes, luxury or black tie parties. Though, he has raised millions for Wikileaks and allegedly sold the information it has been given to various newspapers (against the wishes of his colleagues), he seems to have no personal interest in money and lives extremely simply, often sleeping on couches and going for days without washing or changing clothes. He is puritanically devoted to the cause, and expects his comrades and employees to be likewise.
8. Assange does like women though and is not above using his now-enhanced status as the Scarlet Pimpernel/James Bond of the hacking world to impress them into bed. However, his sexual tastes or manners are apparently of a kind that alienate and upset liberated Swedish women to the extent that they file charges of rape. That puts him back in the territory of almost all Bond villains.
9. More superficially, like Assange, many if not most Bond movie villains have white hair. This includes Emilio Largo (Thunderball), Blofeld (at least as played by Max von Sydow in Never Say Never Again and Charles Gray in Diamonds are Forever) and Karl Stromberg (The Spy Who Loved Me).
There is already talk of movies based on Assange’s life and career – what little is known of it. But rather than making a Scarlet Pimpernel/James Bond hero out of him, Hollywood should give him a chance to step into the shoes of Donald Pleasance, Charles Gray and the rest, and play Ernst Stavro Blofeld (the movie-land character he most resembles) in a future Bond film. (Those who have only seen the Bond films may not be aware that according to the Ian Fleming books, Blofeld actually made his first fortunes by selling stolen top-secret telegrams to the Third Reich before World War II, and later, when based in Turkey by selling information to both sides…)
This would of course have to be once Assange gets out of the Swedish criminal justice system and any other legal trouble he is headed for. But given MGM’s bankruptcy and the postponement of the next Bond movie the timing could be perfect.
Hardly Bond, more like Internet revolutionary or as he says scientific journalist!
Instead of Wikileaks it is “Setec Astronomy”
Assange is more like Mother from the movie Sneakers
Twenty years later, Martin (Robert Redford) runs a tiger team of “security specialists” that use unorthodox methods of testing physical and electronic security for companies in San Francisco. The team includes Donald Crease (Sidney Poitier), a former CIA agent and a high-strung family man; “Mother” (Dan Aykroyd), a conspiracy theorist with unsurpassed technical skills and dexterity; Carl Arbogast (River Phoenix), a young genius; and Erwin ‘Whistler’ Emory (David Strathairn), a blind man with superb hearing. One day, Martin is approached by two National Security Agency agents, Dick Gordon and Buddy Wallace (Timothy Busfield, Eddie Jones), who reveal they are aware of Martin’s former life. In exchange for overlooking his past, as well as a sizeable cash payment, they ask Martin to recover a “black box” decoder device that mathematician Gunter Janek (Donal Logue) has been developing for the Russian government under the guise of a company called “Setec Astronomy” – one that the NSA can’t even find, let alone steal or duplicate. Martin’s team, along with the help of his former girlfriend, Liz (Mary McDonnell), are ultimately successful in locating and retrieving the box, which was disguised as an answering machine on Janek’s desk.
As the team celebrates, Whistler becomes curious as to the box’s function and begins to examine it with the help of Mother. They learn that the box contains an advanced algorithm that can essentially break any encryption code, a theory they prove by using it to break into the computer systems of the FAA, national power grid, and other heavily fortified networks. At the same time, Martin & Liz, along with Crease and his wife, figure out while playing Scrabble that an anagram of “Setec Astronomy” is “Too many secrets”
This article is intended as sarcasm, right?
http://www.amconmag.com/blog/2010/12/09/the-conservative-case-for-wikileaks/
Thank you octopussy
“Assange is an idealistic misanthrope with a superman complex.”
If he was a misanthrope, he wouldn’t be risking all that he’s risked by trying to get what he sees as the truth out …
here’s a reasoned approach from The American Conservative that supports Wikileaks … http://www.amconmag.com/blog/2010/12/09/the-conservative-case-for-wikileaks/
I wonder why Foreman didn’t mention the Jonathan Pryce character from The World is Not Enough? I know the Pryce character was roughly modeled on rightwing bogeyman Rupert Murdoch, and that Assange is a lefty, but the Pryce character’s cold-blooded vanity and his twin obsessions with technology and information, along with his loathing of the U.S. and other world superpowers, make him just as strikingly similar to Julian Assange as any of the 007 villians named above.
Assange is not a villain he is a journalist….He scooped every other journalist in the world and the mainstream media has developed a severe case of….Envy – is best defined as an emotion that occurs when a person lacks another’s (perceived) superior quality, achievement, or possession and either desires it or wishes that the other lacked it.”
He did their job!!
“To the press alone, chequered as it is with abuses, the world is indebted for all the triumphs which have been gained by reason and humanity over error and oppression”
James Madison
“The liberty of the press is most generally approved when it takes liberties with the other fellow, and leaves us alone”
Edgar Watson Howe
“A free press can of course be good or bad, but, most certainly, without freedom it will never be anything but bad. . . .
Albert Camus
“Freedom of the press is not an end in itself but a means to the end of [achieving] a free society.”
Felix Frankfurter
“The power of the periodical press is second only to that of the people.”
Alexis de Tocqueville
“The press is like the peculiar uncle you keep in the attic – just one of those unfortunate things.”
G. Gordon Liddy
“A cantankerous press, an obstinate press, a ubiquitous press, must be suffered by those in authority in order to preserve the right of the people to know.”
Murray I. Gurfein
Bennett: I agree with you: I don’t think Julian Assange is literally a villain, only that he shares certain intellectual and personal characteristics with a fictional villian.
But that’s just my take. Whether or not Jonathan Foreman considers Assange an actual villian, I have no idea.
urbangoper
I’m fascinated by the whole thing and it always plays out that one mans villain is another mans hero.
I agree with Madison, Adams & Jefferson
I say we follow the advice of James Madison — that the very purpose of the First Amendment was to expose government corruption. Madison wrote:
“Nothing could be more irrational than to give the people power, and to withhold from them information without which power is abused. A people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with power which knowledge gives. A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy, or perhaps both.”
When the Founding Fathers adopted the Bill of Rights guaranteeing that “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press,” few could possibly have forseen that any person of modest means could publish a truth accessible to the entire world (via the world wide web) to be read or viewed by potentially hundreds of millions.
In fact, the Founders had much more respect for newspapers than they did for the very federal government they established. “The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people,” Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1787, “the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”
Jefferson maintained this opinion despite being mercilessly criticized by the press during his presidency. “The advertisements,” he bitterly wrote to Nathaniel Macon several years after his term had ended, “contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper.” But Jefferson never changed his view that, as he explained in an 1823 letter to John Adams, “the light which has been shed on mankind by the art of printing has eminently changed the condition of the world.”
wastate, yeah, I am with you. Publishing information related to corruption is a great idea, what our first amendment is all about and why we have whistleblower laws, downloading a ton of government diplomatic data and just dumping it is nuts. It is like these people can’t distinguish between reporting about Al Qaeda, and the negative effects of reporting the name of a spy that infiltrates Al Qaeda. I have zero doubt that Assange would publish the name in a second regardless if the spy is killed on the spot. There is absolutely no discernment, that diplomats and their documents have been considered inviolable for thousands of years, that the best preventative against war is negotiation and that negotiation can only occur with some element of confidentiality and trust.
But Assange doesn’t care. He doesn’t care that many state department personnel will now have to be reassigned, he is an enemy of the United States. And those that support him are enemies as well.
jg bennett. Do you believe that the US diplomatic personnel are all useless, that every US embassy should just be dedicated to Citizens services and Visas? It ain’t that simple. The US has vital interests all around the world which you benefit from.
“he doesn’t care that many state department personnel will now have to be assigned…”
You’re probably right that he doesn’t care. I also agree with you that his wholesale document dumps are indiscriminate and, if he intends them as serious geo-political activism, totally sloppy. Assange’s work would be a lot more effective and meaningful if he actually tried to seperate the useful information from the useless.
I feel bad for serious diplomats — those who are spending their every waking hour dealing with stubborn and shady characters in an attempt to make the U.S. and the world more secure– who have been thrown under the bus by Wikileaks. But what about these rogue diplomats whose ‘diplomacy’ has included filching personal information (like credit card numbers) from rival diplomats? Do you seriously feel bad that they’ll have to be “reassigned”? I don’t. When a diplomat starts to take on the activities of a spy, don’t you see how he is undermining his diplomatic mission?
less & WaState,
“a ton of government diplomatic data and just dumping it is nuts.”
“I also agree with you that his wholesale document dumps are indiscriminate”
Actually there was no wholesale dumping of documents they went through them and redacted stuff and kept out the most sensative stuff, just like the newspapers that also published them did. In addition, they offered to work with U.S. government about sensative information and the U.S. government rejected the offer.
Assange’s own words:
“WikiLeaks has a four-year publishing history. During that time we have changed whole governments, but not a single person, as far as anyone is aware, has been harmed. But the US, with Australian government connivance, has killed thousands in the past few months alone.
US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates admitted in a letter to the US congress that no sensitive intelligence sources or methods had been compromised by the Afghan war logs disclosure. The Pentagon stated there was no evidence the WikiLeaks reports had led to anyone being harmed in Afghanistan. NATO in Kabul told CNN it couldn’t find a single person who needed protecting. The Australian Department of Defence said the same.”
It is sad many here are just shooting the messenger instead of focusing their anger on what is actually in the cables. Some of it is pretty disturbing.
“he is an enemy of the United States. And those that support him are enemies as well.”
I don’t think you’re right … either that or we have different definition of what constitutes an enemy … we have some in the Middle East and south-eastern Asia who really qualify
Wikileaks gave the State Department an opportunity to scrub names and obviously, didn’t release what he threatened to have released if killed … if he was an enemy, he would have released it all before now.
whether you are for or against him, because of him real news in the headlines everyday. no bias, no talking points, just the things we and the world should know.
Australian Ambassador to Burma Michelle Chan informed CDA that XXXXXXXXXXXX told her the Burma-DPRK connection is not just about conventional weapons. There is a peaceful nuclear component intended to address Burma’s chronic lack of electrical power generation. When Chan cited reports of a Burma-Russia agreement for development of a peaceful nuclear reactor, XXXXXXXXXXXX responded that the agreement with Russia is currently just for “software, training.” The DPRK agreement is for “hardware
another breaking story
The Kremlin’s initial reaction to stories dubbing Russia a corrupt “mafia state” and kleptocracy was, predictably, negative. Last week Medvedev’s spokesman dubbed the revelations “not worthy of comment” while Putin raged that a US diplomatic cable comparing him to Batman and Medvedev to Robin was “arrogant” and “unethical”. State TV ignored the claims.
Subsequent disclosures, however, that Nato had secretly prepared a plan in case Russia invaded its Baltic neighbours have left the Kremlin smarting. Today Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said Nato had to explain why it privately considered Russia an enemy while publicly describing it warmly as a “strategic partner” and ally.
Nato should make clear its position on WikiLeaks cables published by the Guardian alleging that the alliance had devised plans to defend Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia against Russia, Lavrov said.
I said this on another site earlier today. That guy? Please. He is one hairless cat in his lap away from being Dr. Evil.
you dumb cudlips.
Assange is the Chenggis Khan of the Info-War.
Your house of cards is on fucking fire.
The Two Handed Engine.
Make a thousand trails of carnage bloom.
Just found this interesting study. It predicts an increase in authoritarianism, using the government crackdown on Wikileaks as a prime example. The author says, “The WikiLeaks saga could end abruptly if the authoritarian impulse to extinguish the site prevails. Regardless, the struggle between secrecy and transparency—and authoritarianism and anti-authoritarianism—will continue to intensify.” Very interesting read. Highly recommended: http://www.socionomics.net/free-reports/1008/wikileaks-authoritarianism-update.aspx
quell
you need to get more pattonesque
When I want my men to remember something important, to really make it stick, I give it to them double dirty. It may not sound nice to some bunch of little old ladies at an afternoon tea party, but it helps my soldiers to remember. You can’t run an army without profanity; and it has to be eloquent profanity. An army without profanity couldn’t fight its way out of a piss-soaked paper bag. … As for the types of comments I make, sometimes I just, By God, get carried away with my own eloquence.
George S Patton. Remark to his nephew about his copious profanity
jg bennet
Great Patton quote. Copious profanity has been replaced by copious hatred.
What a hideously written article! Trash!
You have absolutely nothing to say, shouldn’t have even bothered!