We are in a Propaganda War against Iraq ...and we are LOSING!

Great Debates
1

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/wnt/World/iraq_arabopinion030328.html

I find this so hard to believe and its infuriating! Why is the US helping this propaganda war. The points made in this article are so true. Why would anyone believe the US coalition when they spit out sensational news that are only refuted or proven wrong afterwards. Everyone knows about the mistakes of:

*Scuds flying towards Kuwait
*Chemical WoMD factories found
*Mass Surrenders and defections
*A few day war.

How are anyone going to believe the

*Iraqi civilians being fired upon by Paramilitary
*Iraqi’s own missile hitting civilian areas
*The downfall of Baghdad.

Why are we allowing State sponsored propaganda to continue in Iraq? We should bomb every radio and TV transmitter being used by the regime. Shut them up and let the people decide why they arent talking now. Everytime the Iraqi people hears an official broadcast, it just reinforces the idea that Saddam is still in power.

Who the hell is spouting these unconfirmed, unsubstantiated unreliable newsflash only to be shot down by Al Jezeera and the rest of the Arab news service?! They make the US look like fools and we’re letting it happen over and over. Any embedded news service that transmit bullshit information should be taken out of where they are embedded and and made to telecast the war from the States. These people are supposed to be JOURNALISTS! they should verify and confirm before they say anything on the air. and so should Rumsfeld, the Joint chiefs of staff and the rest of the military commanders.

There should be frontline videomen, taking action and intelligence information and sending them back for analysis and anything that can be confirmed should be shown on the news. There should be a military information management that handles this. This may be called official propaganda but if you stick a video of an Iraqi paramilitary soldier shooting iraqi civilians in the news, this war will have very few detractors.

2

Why? Because that wonderful document that protects the right of POW’s, The Geneva Convention, requires the protection of civilian structures, and a TV/Radio Station is considered one, as attacking it would be the deliberate targetting of civilians.

I agree with the rest of your post, as in the western media are doing everything possible to convince us to ignore them. I mean Umm Qasr fell 9 times according to the BBC. How can you believe reports about other cities.

3

In great debates at least, it appears to be the vigorously pro-war faction doing the rumor spouting. Fox news has also been heavily involved. Friendly fire doesn’t always come in the form of bullets and bombs.
The plans for Shock and Awe deliberately spared Baghdad television so that the crumbling of the regime would be visible to the Iraqi people. Too bad it didn’t work out that way. (sorry, no cite on that. the story is buried in the avalanche of war news)

4

Also, according to news reports, we have been “steadily advancing on Baghdad” since last Saturday, yet we can’t seem to get closer than 50 miles away.:confused:

5

The geneva convention cannot protect the civilians of a radio to TV station if said station is being utilized in state sponsored propaganda. Every broadcast made by the regime is a call to arms against the coalition. That fortifies the enemy and those stations now become legitimate targets. Once a civilian facility is used for the regimes purposes, it ceases to be innocent or civilian.

Here are the articles of the Geneva convention with regard to treatment of civilians. I find no language there that would automatically designate a radio or TV station as non-military civilian no bomb zones.

http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/92.htm

6

Yeah i wanna know whats up with FOX news… The only reason I turn it on is to laugh at its blatent bias. “FOX news you decide”, has somehow turned into “FOX news- we will save you the trouble of making your own decision and also every 5 minutes we will break to tell you how unprecedented this coverage is and what a great job we are doing”… truly laughable IMO. FOX is more of an entertainment news than fact-based, just one step away from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart on comedy central- which is pretty damn funny by the way…

But anyway, I tend not to believe anything that either side says until i get some hard evidence of it. I kinda find it hard to believe that some people take these news reports as fact. I like like to hear up to date reports but i also want to hear where the info came from, what it is based on, what has been confirmed etc… but many stations just throw it all out there sometimes with bias, and you cant tell how true it is

7

Don’t knock the Daily Show – I find that it offers are more reliable look at major news stories (at least those stories that today’s media considers major) than the news shows themselves.

8

OH, no way am i knocking the daily show- i love it! I only compared it to FOX because i find FOX to be more entertaining than factual…

9

Great post. I completely agree. People should incorporate the information from various media outlets before forming an opinion. Unfortunately, on both sides, people often seem to prefer to be spoon-fed one POV…easier to digest (and regurgitate) I suppose.

Fox News, however, is just laughable – and scary how many people swear by it as “The Truth.”

10

Well, what else is one to expect from a network run by political hack Roger Ailes? [See http://www.fair.org/extra/0108/fox-main.html ]

11

I think they have mislabelled the photo at the ABC link. That’s not a victory sign but a peace sign.[/hijack of the hijack]

12

Whilst I can’t vouch for the meaning of the young person in the picture. The “V” for victory sign predates the “peace” sign by many years.

13

You start off blasting the US and the coalition for mismanaging the propaganda war. You follow it with four examples, but only the last two are theirs. The first two are issues with jounalists.

Then you ask, “How are anyone going to believe”, list three examples, and frankly, I haven’t added the first two to the known fact list yet. As for the third, I quote the link in your OP:

So punish Iraqi state TV? I doubt the Iraqis are watching CNN and losing confidence in us by comparing the two.

I’m sure there are many good reasons to take out Iraqi state TV, I have no problem with that. Probably not be the best way to raise our popularity in Iraq, though.

We’re certainly losing the Arab street, outside Iraq, to al Jazeera, no doubt about it. In 1991, much of the Gulf got the story from CNN. What a difference a decade makes.

I hope you don’t suggest we expel embedded reporters for mistakes, and publish one only side the story through an official military information service. That would only cost more credibility (how expensive can Iraqi Fedayeen uniforms be? or better, if the bad guys and the good guys are both wearing civies, who’s zooming who?)

We’re getting scooped by independent Arab news services, and not Iraqi propaganda.

The solution is for the executors of this war to be honest and straightforward, and cut the BS, hyperbole, and arrogance.

And for the journalists to remember what their job is, and how to do it.

[tongue in cheek]
For everyone else, watch more al Jazeera. Let the free market forces work.[/tic]

14

Are we losing it? By whose standards are we losing it? Your standards?

15

We lost the proaganda war the first Army boot touched Iraqi sand. We are a vastly superior fighting force attacking a soveriegn nation that has not even threatened us, much less attacked. With very careful manipulation, we may be able to keep the world in general merely despising us, rather than loathing us with every fiber of thier being. We started out with the most amazingly stupid premise so far this century: that disliking Saddam would instantly equate with loving us. This does for “stupid” what the Pacific does for “wet.”

Right now, Al Jazz is streaming video of mangled Iraqi children into every TV set in the Muslim world. Remember your visceral reaction to those videos of the airplanes crashing into the towers?

Couple that with the blindingly dumb decision to let reconstruction contracts to Fearless Misleader’s business buddies with revenues from the Iraqi oil that we’re “holding in trust” and Colin Powell’s blithe insistence on a “dominant” role - what a marvelously ham-fisted word choice! - it becomes clear that the “propaganda war” is the greatest debacle since Cornpone’s Defeat, Cornpone’s Rout, and Cornpone’s Utter Humiliation.

I can’t believe we’re this fucking stupid! I see it, I know its true, but I still can’t believe it.

16

“Right now, Al Jazz is streaming video of mangled Iraqi children into every TV set in the Muslim world. Remember your visceral reaction to those videos of the airplanes crashing into the towers?”

Do you really think the Arab nations will hate us MORE because of propaganda? (Propaganda w/Iraq was the subject of this thread). They already hated us and will continue to do so (even as they enjoy our revenues for their oil).

You want to leave Saddam in power because you think we are losing the propaganda war?

I couldn’t spell kat if you spotted me the c. How does one spell propaganda?

17

Yes. Read this.

18

I read it. It didn’t impress me. “We are in a propaganda war with Iraq, and…” Some think we are losing. I disagree. When Iraq has been liberated, you’ll see the Iraqis (who haven’t been killed by Saddam or our troops) celebrating their liberation. When they are dancing on the streets of Baghdad, that will be propaganda aplenty. JMHO.

I ask again: “You want to leave Saddam in power because you think we are losing the propaganda war?”

You could always answer my question.

19

When your streets are full of heavily armed foreigners, expressing your heartfelt joy at the thier presence comes under the heading of a real good idea. Case in point: when the Germans entered the Ukraine in WWII, they were welcomed with open arms by the people, glad to be freed from Stalin. Didn’t last.

As to “leaving Saddam in power” it comes down to a question of whether or not that is our call to make. Who died and made us God?

20

(Originally posted by** ThoughtPolice**)
**Do you really think the Arab nations will hate us MORE because of propaganda? **

**“Yes”, responded an English Gentleman in Ireland, “Read this”… **
(Followed by some Straight Dope comments by a man with the BBC)

As for me Thoughtpolice, I would add to your remark…

Well sure they hate us. But Hey! Not as much as the BBC.

A curiosity: No one here saw fit to address “reality”.

*Iraqi women and children are still being held hostage by Iraqi soldiers while their menfolk are forced to fight the infidels.

Indeed, an entire population is being held prisioner, away from food and water, while we here type prissy words on our keyboards.*

And the beat goes on…