Losing the Media War
 
The United States is in danger of losing the war in Afghanistan, at least in the hearts and minds of people around the world. They will get their overwhelming military victory, but through sheer stupidity of actions in front of the news cameras, it will be of no avail.

The Pentagon has legions of spin doctors, psychops, propaganda experts, and plain PR managers. They are world masters at restricting media access, and doctoring information, given to the news media. So it comes as a surprise that they photograph their own stupidity, and give the results out, copyright free, for the world to see.

The current fiasco is the images of Taliban prisoners, drugged, shackled, blindfolded, wearing gags, and earmuffs, being dragged off a plane, dumped on their knees, against a fence, then thrown into animal cages. With all the temporary shelters available to the military, and with all the empty bases at their disposal, which clown chose animal cages, in the open, in Cuba.

The Islamic community is already making comparisons, " Soviet Jews are pardoned, given land, houses, and billions in aid, for killing Americans, Christians get comfortable prisons, but if you are Islamic, you are thrown into an animal cage in Cuba."

A few weeks earlier the pair of CIA interrogators, on camera, who ripped up the Geneva Convention, threatened the prisoners, and announced that few prisoners would be kept, started the collapse of the media campaign. In the USA some damage control was created, by giving the one dead CIA Agent, a stage managed funeral. Had it been a full scale war, his sheer stupidity in front of the news crew, resulting in global backlash would have resulted in a far lesser honor.

The release of the edited "Black Hawk Down", edited to exclude the massacre of the Somalia Elders, tagged as a "War Council" by bad intelligence, which created the atmosphere of retaliation, causing the unfortunate loss of those 18 US soldiers, is another example of flawed media management. The film shows the horror of war. The bravery, and achievements of the US Soldiers speak for themselves, despite being hung out to dry, by the Pentagon Brass, and President Clinton.

Hollywood signs up for the propaganda war
 
Yet again the Pentagon is rewriting history, in the hope that it can fool the public. It worked with "The Gulf of Tonkin Incident" but does not work today. The producers of Black Hawk Down held a packed News Conference, and when questioned,  admitted they had cut the earlier scenes, on the advice of the Pentagon.

If we are going to play to the audience, create such fantasy show titles a "Restore Democracy", in Kuwait, then do it properly. If the idea is to give the lead to the Chinese, to seize Diplomats, soldiers, and anyone else, drug, shackle, and fly them thousands of miles to hostile islands, deny access to the Red Cross, and Diplomats, throw prisoners into outdoor cages, try them in secret military tribunals, followed by secret executions, then be prepared for others to reciprocate. Consider the outcry if the "Terrorists" seized in the US Embassy in Tehran had been flown to China, and treated the same, then the US would be the first to scream, and react.

That is probably far from the intentions of Washington. Yet to the world that is the perception the pictures create. And perception is everything, to the average person, who has no access to the truth.

Alan Simpson - ComLinks - Washington DC

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