Edward Snowden leaked selectively, Bradley Manning did not But in their actions, there is a crucial distinction. Bradley Manning began handing files to WikiLeaks on a specific basis, leaking detailed logs from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and video of an Apache gunship killing civilians in Baghdad. But from there he graduated to much less discriminant disclosure and eventually passed over en masse hundreds of thousands of classified State Department cables. As PJ Crowley, the former State spokesman who resigned after criticising the Army's treatment of Manning, put it to me: "There's simply no way one can person can have known everything that was in that archive." Manning's lawyers argue that he knew the roughly 250,000 diplomatic cables were not of the highest level of secrecy and therefore less likely to harm US national security. But there's no disguising that at some point he simply threw open the box and hoped for the best. We don't know quite how much Edward Snowden has passed to The Guardian (and you can imagine the US government is desperately trying to figure it). But it seems clear that his leaking was more targeted than Manning's. Unlike the soldier, whose lawyers argue he was "young, naive, but good-intentioned," Snowden appears to have known exactly what he was passing on and to have understood its significance. Even opponents of both leakers are prepared to acknowledge a difference. "I don't condone Snowden's actions under any circumstances, but whether you agree or disagree with his political agenda it seems that he at least knew what he was getting himself into," said a former defence official. Manning was reckless and literally put people's lives at risk. When asked about Manning in a Guardian interview, Snowden described him as "a classic whistleblower" who was "inspired by the public good." Daniel Ellsberg, who 40 years ago leaked the Pentagon Papers to expose the scale of US involvement in Vietnam, hails both men as heroes. Snowden, like Manning, may also one day find himself charged with crimes against his country. But in their actions - and arguably in their judgment - the pair are very different.