A judge on Tuesday will announce the verdict in the case against Army Pfc. Bradley Manning, who was court martialed on charges of aiding the enemy, punishable by life in prison without parole, for sending more than 700,000 classified government documents to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks.

The verdict will be announced at 1 p.m. and sentencing is tentatively set for some time on Wednesday. Aiding the enemy is the most serious of the 21 counts Manning is contesting. He also is charged with eight federal Espionage Act violations, five federal theft counts and two federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act violations, each punishable by up to 10 years; and five military counts of violating a lawful general regulation, punishable by up to two years each.

Legal observers said it was highly likely that Manning, who in March pleaded guilty to lesser charges related to sharing the documents in 2010, will be found guilty on at least some of the 21 criminal counts.

"The difficult part is did he know that the information was going to al-Qaeda and the Taliban?" said Richard Rosen, a professor of law at the Texas Tech University School of Law and a former military lawyer. "If he's not found guilty of that charge, the punishment is going to be a lot less severe in my opinion."

Manning is being tried by a judge alone, which was his choice. The trial began June 3.

The 25-year-old has admitted to sending more than 470,000 Iraq and Afghanistan battlefield reports, 250,000 State Department diplomatic cables and other material including several battlefield video clips to WikiLeaks while working as an intelligence analyst in Iraq in early 2010.

The video included footage of a 2007 U.S. Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad that killed at least nine men, including a Reuters news photographer and his driver. Manning claims he sent the material to expose war crimes and deceitful diplomacy. In closing arguments last week, defense attorney David Coombs portrayed Manning as a naive whistleblower who never intended the material to be seen by the enemy. Manning claims he selected material that wouldn't harm troops or national security.

Prosecutors called him an anarchist hacker and traitor who indiscriminately leaked classified information he had sworn to protect, knowing it would be seen by al-Qaeda. They showed that al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden obtained copies of some of the documents WikiLeaks published before bin Laden was killed by U.S. Navy Seals in 2011.

Manning pleaded guilty in February to 10 counts, including less serious military versions of all the federal charges. His admitted offenses carry prison terms punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Prosecutors accepted just one of his pleas and chose to continue prosecuting Manning for the greater offenses.

Lawyers for the low-level intelligence analyst said Manning was well-intentioned but naive, hoping that his disclosures would provoke a more intense debate in the United States about diplomatic and military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

More than three years after Manning's arrest in May 2010, the U.S. intelligence community is reeling again from leaked secrets, this time exposed by former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, who has been holed up in the transit area of a Moscow airport for more than a month despite U.S. calls for Russian authorities to turn him over.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has surfaced again as a major player in the newest scandal, this time aiding Snowden in eluding authorities to seek asylum abroad.

The cases of Manning and Snowden, a former contractor for a U.S. spy agency, illustrate the difficulties of keeping secrets at a time the internet makes them very easy to share widely and quickly. In addition, more people are granted access to classified data.

"The bar has become very low for what the government has to prove in order to convict someone for disclosing classified information to the media," said Elizabeth Goitein, a security specialist at New York University's Brennan Center for Justice.

She said that military courts had made it easier to convict people on charges of aiding the enemy.

"There has been a heightened standard of intent that has been required," Goitein said. "We're really starting to see the court chip away at this."

Al Jazeera and wire services