WikiLeaks' First Casualty: Transparency

After the tumble of news stories describing the content of WikiLeaks’ latest document dump—a trove of diplomatic cables sent to the U.S. State Department—what will be the spill’s effect on foreign policy? Newsweek writer Christopher Dickey argues that the leak, far from creating the more transparent government that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange envisions, will actually make honest communication more difficult. “The problem the State Department faces now is not just the difficulty of having frank conversations with allies or secret negotiations with enemies who think—who know—it leaks like a sieve. It will also be harder to have frank exchanges within the United States government itself,” Dickey writes.