If Bradley Manning had obtained direct knowledge of illegal actions throughout the course of his normal duties, he would probably have a valid argument for being a "whistleblower", but only if he went to a higher authority with the information (like his congressman) and even then, it would still require that he only released the information that was pertinent to the illegal actions in question.<p>What Bradley Manning actually did was far worse. He was unhappy with being in the Army so he accessed a bunch of classified information that had nothing to do with his military duties. He went directly to a foreign national and handed over SEVERAL HUNDRED THOUSAND classified documents. Even if some of the documents disclosed illegal activity, what about the 699,999 documents that didn't?