“Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play.”
“The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly - it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over” — Josef Goebbels
A New York Times article exposes the Bush Administration’s Goebbellian methods and its use of so-called military analysts to play its tune over the television networks, the tune being the selling of its war in Iraq. A recent Pentagon study labeled the Iraq war a “major debacle,” but you wouldn’t have known that based on the happy song sung by the analysts.
Behind Military Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand:
To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.
Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.
The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.
~~~
Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks.
~~~
Internal Pentagon documents repeatedly refer to the military analysts as “message force multipliers” or “surrogates” who could be counted on to deliver administration “themes and messages” to millions of Americans “in the form of their own opinions.”
Though many analysts are paid network consultants, making $500 to $1,000 per appearance, in Pentagon meetings they sometimes spoke as if they were operating behind enemy lines, interviews and transcripts show. Some offered the Pentagon tips on how to outmaneuver the networks, or as one analyst put it to Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense secretary, “the Chris Matthewses and the Wolf Blitzers of the world.” Some warned of planned stories or sent the Pentagon copies of their correspondence with network news executives. Many — although certainly not all — faithfully echoed talking points intended to counter critics.
“Good work,” Thomas G. McInerney, a retired Air Force general, consultant and Fox News analyst, wrote to the Pentagon after receiving fresh talking points in late 2006. “We will use it.”
The depth of the contempt this administration has for a free press, constitutional rights, and basic democratic institutions will not be truly revealed until after they have left office and operations like the one the NYTimes was forced to sue to reveal have been fully investigated.
The article details how the Pentagon organized its cadre of military analysts not to filter information, but to amplify the administration’s pro-war message, starting in the days leading up to the Iraq invasion, and how many of those analysts had financial or ideological interests in advocating the Iraq invasion. The network analysts functioned essentially as government propagandists rather than independent journalists, concerned with pushing administration talking points rather than providing objective information, explaining facts, or giving impartial analysis.
In the fall and winter leading up to the invasion, the Pentagon armed its analysts with talking points portraying Iraq as an urgent threat. The basic case became a familiar mantra: Iraq possessed chemical and biological weapons, was developing nuclear weapons, and might one day slip some to Al Qaeda; an invasion would be a relatively quick and inexpensive “war of liberation.”
At the Pentagon, members of Ms. Clarke’s staff marveled at the way the analysts seamlessly incorporated material from talking points and briefings as if it was their own.
“You could see that they were messaging,” Mr. Krueger said. “You could see they were taking verbatim what the secretary was saying or what the technical specialists were saying. And they were saying it over and over and over.” Some days, he added, “We were able to click on every single station and every one of our folks were up there delivering our message. You’d look at them and say, ‘This is working.’ ”
Yes, it worked fabulously, unless you happen to be one of the thousands of soldiers killed, or tens of thousands maimed. The extent to which the administration got the major news organizations, with few exceptions, to pimp fear, sell the war and create the opportunity for Bush, Rumsfeld and their cohorts to create the major debacle which is Iraq is unmatched in modern history, with just a few ugly exceptions.
Our military establishment, in conjunction with the Bush administration, used the “free” press to deliver “themes and messages” to the tragic detriment of this nation and the people both were sworn to serve.
