Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

"The Radicalisation of Bradley Manning" – Review

Ben Griffin | 13.04.2012 10:57

The Radicalisation of Bradley Manning opened last night in Tasker Millwood School, Haverford West, Wales. This is the school that Bradley Manning (BM) attended during his teenage years. I have been in West Wales this week along with other activists to organise around the play in an effort to raise the issue of BM.

There is a general awareness in the area that BM went to school here and that he is facing serious charges in the US but this is yet to form into a wider campaign of solidarity. It is my hope that this play will help to humanize BM and spur people into action.

The play has been written by Tim Price. I met Tim last year at Occupy London during a talk given by Michael Ratner on the plight of BM. He was obviously passionate about the case and we met up again outside the Supreme Court during a vigil for Julian Assange and again outside the US Embassy at a vigil for BM.

The performance begins as soon as the audience enters the school with sounds of the playground mixed in with the sounds of army training. On entering the school hall actors in combat dress with helmets and weapons distribute polyprop seats and commands to sit in designated positions. The stage is in the centre of the hall with a tall CCTV pillar in each corner. At the base of each pillar monitors are piled up which are used to convey messages and footage throughout the play. The seating is arranged into four banks around the stage and the whole scene reminded me of a boxing arena.

The play is not chronological with the action moving at a fast pace between BM’s school years to Army training, Iraq, Incarceration and back again.The cast is constantly in view with costume changes worked into the action. The actors are completely immersed into the story.

The school scenes build an argument that BM could have been influenced by radical Welsh movements like the Rebecca Riots and Chartists. The pressures applied to the young BM are the hypocritical authority of the teacher and the bullying peer pressure of his classmates. These two pressures from authority and peers are constant throughout the play and build into an almost unbearable intensity.

There are scenes depicting BM working in mundane jobs in the US and wishing that he could afford to go to college. This leads him to turn to his father with a request for help with college fees. The father convinces Bradley to join the Army by telling him that they will pay his college fees. The scenes with his father bring out the wider issue of how young people from economically depressed areas are recruited into the military. West Wales is a prime recruiting ground for the British Army.

The scenes depicting Army training and service in Iraq are authentic. The chaotic nature of the war in Iraq ring true, I served in Iraq in 2005 with US forces in Baghdad. I particularly like a scene in which BM works out that some detainees labeled as insurgents are in fact political protesters, his superior tells him that his job is to find more insurgents not reduce their numbers.

The pressure on BM builds and builds as he goes round after round with authority and peers with their lust for perpetuating all that is wrong in the world fueling his sense of duty to do the right thing. The play climaxes with a wonderfully uplifting scene. BM is on the computer downloading what will become the Collateral Murder Video, Afghan War Diaries, Iraq War Logs and Cablegate. The rest of the cast launches into a Lady Gaga number which culminates in hundreds of pieces paper with classified information printed on it being hurled into the air. I was genuinely moved by this scene.

Scenes portraying BM’s incarceration are disturbing and highlight the inhumane treatment amounting to torture that this young man has been subjected to.

The play is in essence a celebration of a small (BM is 5’2″ and 105 lbs) young (22 when fist incarcerated) homosexual man who won’t accept the world as it is and does something truly incredible about it.

The play is running in Haverford West, Cardiff and Conors Quay. It will also be live streamed from saturday. More details can be found on the NTW Website

Veterans for Peace UK is campaigning for the charges against Bradley Manning to be dropped and for his immediate release.

Ben Griffin

Ben Griffin
- Homepage: http://veteransforpeace.org.uk/

Comments

Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech