The American Daniel Ellsberg, who in 1971 disclosed confidential documents on the planning of the war in Vietnam, the Pentagon Papers, died Friday at the age of 92.
This whistleblower, who helped change the outlook of American public opinion on the conflict in Vietnam, “died of pancreatic cancer, which he had been diagnosed on February 17. He did not suffer and was surrounded by his beloved family,” his wife and children said in a statement.
Daniel Ellsberg, whose story inspired an American television movie in 2003 and a feature film by Steven Spielberg in 2017, had himself announced in March that he was suffering from incurable cancer and that he only had “three to six months to live.
“Hot chocolates, croissants, cakes, poppyseed and smoked salmon bagels gave her extra pleasure during her last months,” her family said. “He also took the opportunity to see his favorite films again, in particular replaying his favorite film several times, Butch Cassidy and the Kid.»
A former analyst for the State Department and the Pentagon-linked RAND Corporation, Daniel Ellsberg rose to fame in the early 1970s after leaking 7,000 classified documents, the Pentagon Papers, which revealed that several US governments had lied to the public. on the Vietnam War.
These documents revealed that, contrary to the assertions of various American officials, the Vietnam War could not be won by the United States and that Washington had nevertheless played the card of military escalation.
Trauma
Revelations which had made it possible to change the opinion of Americans on this conflict of decolonization and the Cold War, from 1955 to 1975, a real trauma for the two countries with 58,000 American soldiers killed and some 3.8 million civilian deaths and military on the Vietnamese side.
In 1969, increasingly revolted by the situation in Vietnam, where he had gone to the scene of the conflict, Ellsberg had obtained a report of 7000 pages. Working for RAND Corporation, he photocopied the report page by page with the help of a couple of friends.
The story, which culminated in the revelation of the lies in the New York Times, then the washington postis told in a film by Steven Spielberg, Pentagon Papers (The Post, according to its original title in the United States), with Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, nominated for the Oscars in 2018.
Another film for American television, The Pentagon Papersfollows the journey of Ellsberg, played by RAND Corporation actor James Spader, through his aborted trial for alleged espionage.
THE New York Times had begun publishing these documents, before the administration of Republican President Richard Nixon (1969-1974) obtained an injunction from a federal court to prevent them from doing so, on national security grounds.
THE washington post had taken over despite the risks of political, economic and legal reprisals.
Daniel Ellsberg won the 2018 Olof Palme Human Rights Prize.