The Post (2017)

Matthew Rhys: Daniel Ellsberg

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Quotes 

• Ben Bagdikian : They're going to lock you up, Dan.

  Daniel Ellsberg : Wouldn't you go to prison to stop this war?

  Ben Bagdikian : Theoretically, sure.

  Daniel Ellsberg : You are gonna publish these documents?

  Ben Bagdikian : Yeah.

  Daniel Ellsberg : Even with the injunction.

  Ben Bagdikian : Yes.

  Daniel Ellsberg : Well, then. It's not so theoretical then, is it?

• Daniel Ellsberg : Someone said this at some point about why we stayed when we knew we were losing. Ten percent was to help the South Vietnamese. Twenty percent was to hold back the Commies. Seventy percent was to avoid the humiliation of an American defeat. Seventy percent of those boys just to avoid being humiliated? That stuck with me.

• Daniel Ellsberg : Someone said this, at some point, about why we stayed when we knew we were losing. Ten percent was to help the South Vietnamese. Twenty percent was to hold back the Commies. Seventy percent was to avoid the humiliation of an American defeat. Seventy percent of those boys just to avoid being humiliated? That stuck with me.

• Daniel Ellsberg : But it didn't take him long to figure out, well, for us to figure out if the public ever saw these papers they would turn against the war. Covert ops, guaranteed debt, rigged elections? It's all in there. Ike, Kennedy, Johnson... they violated the Geneva Convention. They lied to Congress and they lied to the public. They knew we couldn't win and still sent boys to die.

  Ben Bagdikian : What about Nixon?

  Daniel Ellsberg : He's just carrying on like all the others, too afraid to be the one who loses the war on his watch.

• Daniel Ellsberg : The study had 47 volumes. I slipped out a couple at a time. It took me months to copy it all.

• Ben Bagdikian : They're going to come after you, you know. I got to be honest, the bread crumbs weren't too hard to follow.

  Daniel Ellsberg : I know.

• Daniel Ellsberg : I was struck, in fact, by President Johnson's reaction to these revelations as close to treason. Because it reflected to me the sense that what was damaging to the reputation of a particular administration, a particular individual, was in itself treason. Which is very close to saying, "I am the State".