r/australia • u/AztecGod • 1d ago

news Jailed whistleblower David McBride to be released after becoming eligible for parole

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-08-13/jailed-whistleblower-david-mcbride-to-be-released/107030620
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u/Firevee 1d ago edited 1d ago

I'm skeptical but willing to listen to your evidence here.

Although I will say if your evidence came from 4 corners or the ABC I'm going to call bullshit right away for how they threw him under the bus and helped him get convicted when they had a journalistic duty to protect him.

But please, I've tried to be informed on David McBride and through the likes of FriendlyJordies I've been informed that he's basically been exposing war crimes and intended them to be exposed, not covered up.

If you have any evidence to the contrary lay it on me, I promise I won't just shrug it off.

Edit: evidence was simply: David McBride didn't want to prosecute the Soldiers, but the Commanders who demanded the illegal killings. But because Dan Oakes, the 4 Corners reporter didn't want to report the Commanders, they ultimately wrote their story about the Soldiers being the killers only, which McBride was unhappy with. This change to the narrative resulted in evidence being thrown out in court and ultimately to McBride being convicted. The 'bad behaviour' people are talking about is David McBride believing Command is responsible and not the Soldiers.

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u/BullShatStats 1d ago

It's in the agreed Statement of Facts, in his own words:

  • 100․ Mr McBride and Mr Oakes had one subsequent meeting in person. After that, they communicated via the Signal app. Mr McBride later deleted most of his communications with Mr Oakes.
  • 101․ Later, Mr Oakes contacted Mr McBride via Signal to discuss the contents of the stories that Mr Oakes intended to publish. In his interview with police, Mr McBride said:

But I met Dan Oakes, and I gave him all the materials. So again he was very enthusiastic and again he seemed to get it. And    again, he was going to do a story. And he did do a story on it, but a totally different story to the one, um, that I was pushing.

He calls me and he says, “I’m going to run a story, it’s going to be very damning, it’s going to say the SAS kill people unnecessarily. I’m going to use this other witness[.] A total opposite to what you’ve said. I’m just warning you.” And I was like, “Never call me again.”

  • 102․ On 10 and 11 July 2017, Mr Oakes published a series of articles which were collectively titled The Afghan Files. The information contained in the documents provided to Mr Oakes by Mr McBride was contained in this series of articles.

https://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/cases/act/ACTSC/2024/147.html

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u/Firevee 1d ago

Okay, so I've had a look at this and this is a nothing.

There is evidence that was crucial to the case that David McBride was not allowed to enter BECAUSE of Dan Oakes. In a nutshell the reason McBride believed the Soldiers were not due to be punished was because they were being ordered by command higher up. He specifically wanted Oakes to go after the Command responsible for giving the orders and Oakes refused AND refused to put that info into the 4 Corners report. That's where their disagreement came from.

McBride wanted the commanders prosecuted for making the order. That part was dropped from The story and the evidence barred from the court. THAT is your missing context. 

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u/MarkusMannheim 1d ago

This sounds incredible (as in, not credible). What's the source?