“Don’t do what I did. Don’t wait until the bombs have fallen.”
DANIEL ELLSBERG
The Forefather of Whistleblowing
Daniel Ellsberg (1931-2023) was a former US-military analyst who became a whistleblower of unparalleled significance. In 1971, Daniel Ellsberg disclosed the McNamara report on US decision making in Vietnam (1971), later publicly known as the ‘Pentagon Papers‘, thereby exposing the lies of several US governments. While the disclosure helped to accelerate the end of the war, Daniel Ellsberg was subjected to a fierce campaign of prosecution and character defamation.
Despite these severe repercussions, Daniel Ellsberg maintained his unwavering dedication to non-violent anti-war activism, integrity, and democratic responsibility. The international Ellsberg Whistleblowing Award honors his legacy by supporting individuals and organizations who courageously disclose information that enhances public or scientific discourse, thereby strengthening democracy and upholding the public’s right to know.
Daniel Ellsberg’s Life in Detail
Read Daniel Ellsberg’s extended biography here.
Vietnam War and the Rand Cooperation
Daniel Ellsberg was born 1931 in Chicago. After an exceptional academic career, inter alia at Harvard and Cambridge, focusing on economics and decision theory, Ellsberg joined the Rand Corporation in 1959, a non-profit research organization that consulted governmental institutions. Ellsberg became deeply involved in defense and strategic studies, working closely with the US Department of Defense and the White House.
In 1964 Ellsberg left RAND to join the US Department of Defense, tasked with analyzing the increasing US-military involvement in Vietnam. One year later and very much convinced of the legitimacy of the war, Ellsberg volunteered to serve as State Department Officer in Vietnam. However, there he witnessed firsthand the disconnect between the positive public portrayals of progress in the war and the grim reality on the ground. Ellsberg returned to the United States in 1967 and rejoined the RAND Cooperation.
Change of Mind
His experience in Vietnam left Ellsberg disillusioned about the prospects of winning the war. A couple of years prior, in 1965, Ellsberg had already made the acquaintance of Patricia Marx, a radio journalist and activist who would later become his wife. On their first date, Patricia insisted that they would attend a student anti-war rally to which Ellsberg reluctantly agreed, hoping that none of his colleagues at the Pentagon would recognize him on a live broadcast.
Thanks to Patricia Marx, Ellsberg got more and more involved in the anti-war movement. In 1969, Ellsberg attended an anti-war conference organized by War Resisters International where he heard Randy Kehler speak on his willingness to go to prison to stop the Vietnam War.
Ellsberg later described this moment as an epiphany: “It was as though an axe had split my head, and my heart broke open. But what had really happened was that my life had split in two”. There and then, Ellsberg decided to follow Kehler’s example and put everything on the line to help end the war.
Blowing the Whistle on the ‘Pentagon Papers’
At that time, Ellsberg was working on a top-secret report titled ‘United States-Vietnam Relations, 1945-1967’ on US Decision Making in Vietnam commissioned by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara – the report that would later become known as the Pentagon Papers.
The findings of the report reaffirmed Ellsberg’s opposition to the war, revealing years of deception and misinformation by both Democratic and Republican administrations. Ellsberg later called the Pentagon Papers “evidence of a quarter-century of aggression, broken treaties, deceptions, stolen elections, lies, and murder”.
Consequently, in 1969, he began photocopying the approximately 7000 pages containing evidence and analyses.
He disclosed the report to several members of Congress, but nobody chose to act on it. In 1971, after many failed attempts of convincing the congress to act, Daniel Ellsberg decided to leak the report to the New York Times and other newspapers which started publishing excerpts as the then so-called ‘Pentagon Papers‘ on June 13th, 1971.
Personal Consequences for the Ellsbergs
Once the Pentagon Papers had gone public, Daniel and Patricia Ellsberg went into hiding for two weeks. In the meantime, he had disseminated the Pentagon Papers also to the Washington Post and other newspapers. After those two weeks, Ellsberg turned himself in together with his colleague and supporter Anthony Russo in Boston.
Fearing that Ellsberg might have more documents that would incriminate the current administration, Nixon filed criminal accusations against Ellsberg based on the 1917 Espionage Act, including espionage, theft, and conspiracy, that could have resulted in a staggering prison sentence of up to 115 years.
However, the trial concluded in 1973 with the dismissal of all charges against Ellsberg given gross governmental misconducts prior to the court proceedings. These misconducts included wiretapping Ellsberg and his lawyers as well as a CIA-planned breaking into Ellsberg’s psychiatrist’s office by the so-called team of plumbers: A special investigations unit of the White House established to stop Ellsberg’s leaks (that was later also involved in the Watergate scandal) hoping to find incriminating information to discredit the whistleblower. Additionally, Nixon’s trusted advisor John Ehrlichman met with the presiding judge of Ellsberg’s trial to offer him a director’s post at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
While cleared of all charges, the Ellsbergs had to come up with approximately a million dollars to cover the trial – for which they received a staggering amount of 25,000 donations.
Social and Political Impact
The Nixon administration not only sued Ellsberg but also aggressively sought to stop the publication of the Pentagon Papers after the very first day, citing national security concerns. Therefore, the US Department of Justice obtained a cease-and-desist order against the publishing newspapers.
The subsequent legal battle spiraled into the landmark Supreme Court case titled ‘New York Times Co. v. United States’ and ‘Washington Post v. United States’ which resulted in the court upholding the First Amendment’s safeguarding of press freedom. This ruling affirmed the right of the newspapers to publish the Pentagon Papers.
The public opinion on Ellsberg’s whistleblowing was divided. Some accused him of endangering American lives. Until now, however, there has not been a single piece of evidence that Ellsberg’s whistleblowing put anyone but himself at risk.
To the contrary, Ellsberg always justified his whistleblowing by asserting that the American public “had a right to know”. The Pentagon Papers strengthened the anti-war movement and led the American and international public to further question the integrity of the US-government.
Ellsberg later described his whistleblowing to have been “part of a chain of events that got Nixon removed from office for his criminal actions and that made it possible to end the war, even if just out of fear of further leaks.”
Further Activism
Despite severe federal prosecution and personal hardship, Daniel Ellsberg never regretted his whistleblowing. To the contrary, Ellsberg said that he only regretted not blowing the whistle sooner. To the same end, he often recited a poem called “guilt” by Albrecht Haushofer, a German resistance fighter against Nazi-Germany.
The Ellsbergs maintained their unwavering dedication to peace and democratic responsibility. As anti-war and anti-nuclear weapons activists they continued to fight for human lives and our future on this planet.
Daniel Ellsberg was arrested more than 70 times for his participation in non-violent acts of civil disobedience. He frequently spoke at manifestations, remained a renowned scholar and lecturer, co-founded the Freedom of the Press Foundation, and wrote several books, for example Secrets and The Doomsday Machine.
Daniel Ellsberg was a fierce resister against the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and frequently called for whistleblowers to come forward to help end the killing – like he did during the Vietnam War.
Supporting Whistleblowers
In general, Daniel Ellsberg supported many whistleblowers that came after him like Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, Daniel Hale, Katherine Gun, and publisher Julian Assange.
As he described in an interview with Democracy Now: “I identify with them more than virtually anyone. We’ve gone through the same process of disillusion and the same decision as to what to do, and I feel very, very close to them […]”. Ellsberg not only testified in their defence, but in the case of Julian Assange even asked the US Department of Justice to indict him alongside Assange for also possessing the very same documents as the Wikileaks founder.
Until his passing in 2023, Ellsberg encouraged others to blow the whistle if necessary: „The cost is likely to be great […] but a war full of lives is at stake. So does that justify risking prison? Of course. It seems obvious.“
Legacy
Until today, the Ellsbergs stand as an inspiring example for the power of individual conviction to uphold truth and transparency for the common good. The Ellsberg Whistleblower Award honors that legacy by supporting individuals and organizations who courageously disclose information that enhances public or scientific discourse, thereby strengthening democracy and upholding the public’s right to know. By amplifying the voices of courageous whistleblowers and their supporters, the award encourages society to commit to political, social, economic, and environmental integrity.
Trailer: Ellsberg Whistleblower Award
Watch the trailer of our short documentary about Daniel and Patricia Ellsberg and the Ellsberg Whistleblower Award (coming soon).
German Subtitles
For German subtitles please watch this video on our official YouTube channel.
Credits
Special Thanks to our Interviewees
- Christian Appy (Head of the Ellsberg Iniative for Peace and Democracy, Professor of History at the University of Massachusetts Amherst)
- Heidi Kitrosser (Professor of Law at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law)
- Annegret Falter (Chair of Whistleblower Network, Member of the Executive Board of the Ellsberg Whistleblower Award)
Material
- Archive material of the Ellsbergs: © Ellsberg Archive Project of the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Licensed under Credo (2024). Special thanks to Jeremy Smith.
- Daniel Ellsberg at Der Spiegel: © Der Spiegel, “Wartet nicht, bis die Bomben fallen” by Charlotte Schönberger and Leonie Voss (2019). Used with special permission. Special thanks to Leonie Voss.
- Daniel Ellsberg reciting the poem called “Schuld” by German resistance fighter Albrecht Haushofer (1944) at the 2005 National Security Whistleblower Conference: © Alchymediatv. Licensed under Creative Commons BY.
Music
- Royalty free music of artist.io
Production: Haifischbaby Medienbissness (2024).
© Whistleblower Network (2024). All rights reserved.
