Consider, for example, the remarks that public relations consultant John Rendon — who, during the past decade, has worked extensively on Iraq for the Pentagon and the CIA — made on February 29, 1996, before an audience of cadets at the U.S. Air Force Academy.
“I am not a national security strategist or a military tactician,” Rendon said. “I am a politician, and a person who uses communication to meet public policy or corporate policy objectives. In fact, I am an information warrior and a perception manager.” He reminded the Air Force cadets that when victorious troops rolled into Kuwait City at the end of the first war in the Persian Gulf, they were greeted by hundreds of Kuwaitis waving small American flags. The scene, flashed around the world on television screens, sent the message that U.S. Marines were being welcomed in Kuwait as liberating heroes.
“Did you ever stop to wonder,” Rendon asked, “how the people of Kuwait City, after being held hostage for seven long and painful months, were able to get hand-held American, and for that matter, the flags of other coalition countries?” He paused for effect. “Well, you now know the answer. That was one of my jobs then.”
Propaganda is all-encompassing when it comes to war, of course. The trick is to try to recognize when you’re being fed facts, and when you’re being fed propaganda. The above article is excerpted and adapted from Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush’s War on Iraq, which looks to be very interesting, and worth picking up.
(via Tom Tomorrow)
Herr Goebbels vermeintlich stolz sein.