An Army of Propaganda

By Kari Lydersen, AlterNet. Posted March 31, 2003.

Embedded reporters. Weapons of mass destruction. Surgical strikes.

It's no coincidence that Americans, and others around the world, are echoing the exact same phrases and news bites at the same times with near-military precision. It's the result of a slickly orchestrated public relations campaign on the part of the military and the U.S. government that is borrowing the best practices of the corporate PR world.

In an effort coordinated by the White House Office of Global Communication (which also coordinated press coverage of the war in Afghanistan), everyone connected to the government during the war on Iraq is echoing a pre-scripted message of the day.

According to PR Week, a trade publication of the PR industry: "The OGC, an office born out of post-September-11 efforts to combat anti-American news stories emerging from Arab countries, will be key in keeping all U.S. spokespeople on message. Each night, U.S. embassies around the world, along with all federal departments in DC, will receive a 'Global Messenger' e-mail containing talking points and ready-to-use quotes."

The PR industry, as many may know, was actually started by the military during World War I, when persuasive techniques were developed to recruit soldiers.

"After the war a lot of those people went to work for the private sector and are seen as the grandfathers of PR," says Laura Miller, associate editor of PR Watch (www.prwatch.org), a corporate and media watchdog group. "They were very up front about the fact that [in their opinion] in a democracy, public opinion needs to be controlled by a small number of people who know what's best for the public."

In the case of the war against Iraq, that means that there should be no confusion or dissent about the aims and progress of the war. In what was apparently meant as a compliment to the OGC network, PR Week noted that, "The network is intended not only to disseminate, but also to dominate news of the conflict around the world."

Sanitizing the Conflict

One aspect to this kind of domination of the news is the control and manipulation of viewpoints and information coming directly from the government.

The Bush administration has also been hard at work on limiting and ideally silencing opposing or challenging viewpoints and factual narratives coming from other sources. The administration has attacked Al-Jazeera, the Qatar-based and state-funded media outlet which is the primary news source for much of the Arab world.

On March 25 the New York Stock Exchange revoked Al-Jazeera's credentials. Meanwhile hackers have prevented either its Arab or English-language sites from being accessible in the U.S. And the administration has pressured Qatar amir, Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani, to force Al-Jazeera to give more emphasis to their versions of events.

Far from being anti-U.S. or pro-Saddam Hussein, media critics note that Al-Jazeera is widely seen as a moderate, balanced outlet that offers plenty of airtime to U.S. officials. Al-Jazeera actually drew the ire of the Iraqi government for reporting on Hussein's lavish birthday celebration.

It has drawn intense fire from the U.S. for airing video of the interrogation of American POWs, which the U.S. says violates the Geneva Convention.

"The POW footage has been shown by numerous TV stations around the world, yet Al-Jazeera was singled out by the U.S. government and demonized," said Lamis Andoni, an independent journalist and analyst who has covered the Middle East for over two decades. "They [the U.S. administration] want one story line to be out there, but they cannot control the story line when there are other stories like Al-Jazeera's."

A sanitized view of the conflict serves an important political purpose for the U.S. administration, both in downplaying the vulnerability of U.S. troops and dehumanizing and de-emphasizing Iraqi casualties, especially of civilians. In keeping with this strategy not only is it unacceptable to show video of the American POWs, but also images of death in general.

Erich Marquardt, editor and publisher of YellowTimes.org, found this out when his site was shut down by its Internet provider after posting photos of U.S. prisoners of war and dead Iraqi civilians. Journalism professors and media experts note that while there has not yet been widespread blatant censorship, U.S. media outlets in step with the government have practiced their own form of carrot and stick self-censorship.

Stars and Stripes Forever

A few high-profile journalists with anti-war or anti-administration sentiments have suffered actual retribution for their views. Talk show host Phil Donahue had his show pulled by MSNBC because, according to inside memos leaked to the press, his anti-war and left-leaning views were contrary to the current patriotic fever. Meanwhile MSNBC recently awarded a show to right-wing shock jock Michael Savage, who among many other things has referred to young urban gunfire victims as "ghetto slime."

While actual demotions or firings like Donahue's are relatively rare, University of Texas journalism professor Robert Jensen notes that ambitious journalists are made all too aware of how their coverage of the war could affect their future careers.

"This is more a system that rewards those who comply than punishes those who don't," said Jensen, author of the book "Writing Dissent." "There are only a couple dramatic cases where people were punished, but then it doesn't take many demonstration cases to scare people away. And the rewards the system offers are quite tangible -- if you play the game you'll get this; if you don't play the game you might just get that."

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