Books of note: Flat Earth News by Nick Davis

How the Spooks Took over the News

By Nick Davies, The Independent UK
Posted on February 19, 2008, Printed on February 19, 2008
http://www.alternet.org/story/77281/

Editor's note: This is an edited excerpt from Nick Davies' book, Flat Earth News: An Award-Winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media (Chatto & Windus). Davies' book has created enormous controversy in the UK, where many of the newsmakers Davies discusses in the book have fired back with op-eds accusing Davies of relying on the same anonymous sourcing that he condemns the commercial press for using in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq.

It’s not surprising that the book strikes a tender spot among many a news-maker. It is the deepest examination of the links between the "public diplomacy" -- sometimes known as propaganda -- pushed by the Bush administration and its allies, and the media’s uncritical repetition of the claims made to justify the invasion.

It's easy to forget just how easy it was to sell an unprovoked attack on a sovereign state. It was the media, after all, that promulgated the novel idea that if Saddam Hussein possessed "weapons of mass destruction," that was in and of itself a justification to go to war. How did the issue of "WMD" become a proxy for the more important question of whether Iraq was a credible threat to the United States and its allies. At the time of the invasion, there were close to 40 countries suspected of having an illicit weapons program. Twelve of them were considered "hostile" to the United States and its allies. Yet, the administration claimed that possession of old chemical or biological munitions was a de facto justification for attacking the only country among the twelve that was well-contained; a country whose air-space and imports and exports were under international control. The media embraced the idea uncritically, never mind that Saddam Hussein had not been rattling his saber or threatening any offensive action against another state.

Hussein was in a great position for a tin-pot dictator -- he and his cronies had extracted over $10 billion in corporate kick-backs and bribes which the Right spun as a UN scandal rather that what it was: the largest corporate bribery scandal in history -- and he was able to blame all of his country’s domestic woes on the U.S./British sanctions program that strangled the country.

It’s always been a curiosity that public opinion could be manipulated so comprehensively, and Davies provides one more piece of the puzzle explaining where our media culture is today.

***

How the Spooks Took Over the News

by Nick Davies

On the morning of 9 February 2004, The New York Times carried an exclusive and alarming story. The paper's Baghdad correspondent, Dexter Filkins, reported that US officials had obtained a 17-page letter, believed to have been written by the notorious terrorist Abu Musab al Zarqawi to the "inner circle" of al-Qa'ida's leadership, urging them to accept that the best way to beat US forces in Iraq was effectively to start a civil war.

The letter argued that al-Qa'ida, which is a Sunni network, should attack the Shia population of Iraq: "It is the only way to prolong the duration of the fight between the infidels and us. If we succeed in dragging them into a sectarian war, this will awaken the sleepy Sunnis."

Later that day, at a regular US press briefing in Baghdad, US General Mark Kimmitt dealt with a string of questions about the New York Times report: "We believe the report and the document is credible, and we take the report seriously… It is clearly a plan on the part of outsiders to come in to this country and spark civil war, create sectarian violence, try to expose fissures in this society." The story went on to news agency wires and, within 24 hours, it was running around the world.

There is very good reason to believe that that letter was a fake -- and a significant one because there is equally good reason to believe that it was one product among many from a new machinery of propaganda which has been created by the United States and its allies since the terrorist attacks of September 2001.

For the first time in human history, there is a concerted strategy to manipulate global perception. And the mass media are operating as its compliant assistants, failing both to resist it and to expose it.

The sheer ease with which this machinery has been able to do its work reflects a creeping structural weakness which now afflicts the production of our news. I've spent the last two years researching a book about falsehood, distortion and propaganda in the global media.

The "Zarqawi letter" which made it on to the front page of the New York Times in February 2004 was one of a sequence of highly suspect documents which were said to have been written either by or to Zarqawi and which were fed into news media.

This material is being generated, in part, by intelligence agencies who continue to work without effective oversight; and also by a new and essentially benign structure of "strategic communications" which was originally designed by doves in the Pentagon and Nato who wanted to use subtle and non-violent tactics to deal with Islamist terrorism but whose efforts are poorly regulated and badly supervised with the result that some of its practitioners are breaking loose and engaging in the black arts of propaganda.

Like the new propaganda machine as a whole, the Zarqawi story was born in the high tension after the attacks of September 2001. At that time, he was a painful thorn in the side of the Jordanian authorities, an Islamist radical who was determined to overthrow the royal family. But he was nothing to do with al-Q'aida. Indeed, he had specifically rejected attempts by Bin Laden to recruit him, because he was not interested in targeting the West.

Nevertheless, when US intelligence battered on the doors of allied governments in search of information about al-Q'aida, the Jordanian authorities -- anxious to please the Americans and perhaps keen to make life more difficult for their native enemy -- threw up his name along with other suspects. Soon he started to show up as a minor figure in US news stories -- stories which were factually weak, often contradictory and already using the Jordanians as a tool of political convenience.

Then, on October 7, 2002, for the first time, somebody referred to him on the record. In a nationally televised speech in Cincinnati, President George Bush spoke of "high-level contacts" between al-Q'aida and Iraq and said: "Some al-Q'aida leaders who fled Afghanistan, went to Iraq. These include one very senior al-Q'aida leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad this year, and who has been associated with planning for chemical and biological attacks."

This coincided with a crucial vote in Congress in which the president was seeking authority to use military force against Iraq. Bush never named the man he was referring to but, as the Los Angeles Times among many others soon reported: "In a speech [on] Monday, Bush referred to a senior member of al-Q'aida who received medical treatment in Iraq. US officials said yesterday that was Abu al Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian, who lost a leg during the US war in Afghanistan."

Even now, Zarqawi was a footnote, not a headline, but the flow of stories about him finally broke through and flooded the global media on 5 February 2003, when the Secretary of State, Colin Powell, addressed the UN Security Council, arguing that Iraq must be invaded: first, to stop its development of weapons of mass destruction; and second, to break its ties with al-Q'aida.

Powell claimed that "Iraq today harbors a deadly terrorist network headed by Abu Musab al Zarqawi"; that Zarqawi's base in Iraq was a camp for "poison and explosive training"; that he was "an associate and collaborator of Osama bin Laden and his al-Q'aida lieutenants"; that he "fought in the Afghan war more than a decade ago"; that "Zarqawi and his network have plotted terrorist actions against countries, including France, Britain, Spain, Italy, Germany and Russia."

Courtesy of post-war Senate intelligence inquiries; evidence disclosed in several European trials; and the courageous work of a handful of journalists who broke away from the pack, we now know that every single one of those statements was entirely false. But that didn't matter: it was a big story. News organizations sucked it in and regurgitated it for their trusting consumers.

So, who exactly is producing fiction for the media? Who wrote the Zarqawi letters? Who created the fantasy story about Osama bin Laden using a network of subterranean bases in Afghanistan, complete with offices, dormitories, arms depots, electricity and ventilation systems? Who fed the media with tales of the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, suffering brain seizures and sitting in stationery cars turning the wheel and making a noise like an engine? Who came up with the idea that Iranian ayatollahs have been encouraging sex with animals and girls of only nine?

Some of this comes from freelance political agitators. It was an Iranian opposition group, for example, which was behind the story that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was jailing people for texting each other jokes about him. And notoriously it was Iraqi exiles who supplied the global media with a dirty stream of disinformation about Saddam Hussein.

But clearly a great deal of this carries the fingerprints of officialdom. The Pentagon has now designated "information operations" as its fifth "core competency" alongside land, sea, air and special forces. Since October 2006, every brigade, division and corps in the US military has had its own "psyop" element producing output for local media. This military activity is linked to the State Department's campaign of "public diplomacy" which includes funding radio stations and news websites. In Britain, the Directorate of Targeting and Information Operations in the Ministry of Defense works with specialists from 15 UK psyops, based at the defense Intelligence and Security School at Chicksands in Bedfordshire.

In the case of British intelligence, you can see this combination of reckless propaganda and failure of oversight at work in the case of Operation Mass Appeal. This was exposed by the former UN arms inspector Scott Ritter, who describes in his book, Iraq Confidential, how, in London in June 1998, he was introduced to two "black propaganda specialists" from MI6 who wanted him to give them material which they could spread through "editors and writers who work with us from time to time."

In interviews for Flat Earth News, Ritter described how, between December 1997 and June 1998, he had three meetings with MI6 officers who wanted him to give them raw intelligence reports on Iraqi arms procurement. The significance of these reports was that they were all unconfirmed and so none was being used in assessing Iraqi activity. Yet MI6 was happy to use them to plant stories in the media. Beyond that, there is worrying evidence that, when Lord Butler asked MI6 about this during his inquiry into intelligence around the invasion of Iraq, MI6 lied to him.

Ultimately, the US has run into trouble with its propaganda in Iraq, particularly with its use of the Zarqawi story. In May 2006, when yet another of his alleged letters was handed out to reporters in the Combined Press Information Center in Baghdad, finally it was widely regarded as suspect and ignored by just about every single media outlet.

Arguably, even worse than this loss of credibility, according to British defense sources, the US campaign on Zarqawi eventually succeeded in creating its own reality. By elevating him from his position as one fighter among a mass of conflicting groups, the US campaign to "villainise Zarqawi" glamorised him with its enemy audience, making it easier for him to raise funds, to attract "unsponsored" foreign fighters, to make alliances with Sunni Iraqis and to score huge impact with his own media maneuvers. Finally, in December 2004, Osama bin Laden gave in to this constructed reality, buried his differences with the Jordanian and declared him the leader of al-Q'aida's resistance to the American occupation.

Nick Davies is a veteran journalist and author of Flat Earth News: An Award-Winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media (Chatto & Windus).

© 2008 The Independent UK All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/77281/

Tonight's feature: Yazd Iran, uranium mine - via CNN

Call me media calloused, but when CNN prints something human about Iran, I am literally shocked. This report took me very much by surprise. A humanesque portrait of an Iranian town put in a CNN news item - must be a mistake.

But at first glance it seemed to be fair. Then I put my thinking cap on and wondered what they were selling.

This is an attempt to put a spotlight on Iran as a nuclear DANGER - this is a poison pill with a chocolate wrapper. Notice you don't see a single Iranian face so you are left with no one to relate to AND you are led to believe that they must be inferior to not want "modernization" AND you are directed to look away from the fear resting in Iranian hearts today - fear of an impending US and the Coalition of the willing attack on the indigenous peoples of Iran/Persia.

THIS IS A SUBTLE PIECE OF PURE PROPAGANDA, A PSYOPS JOB.

Shame CNN! We are not ALL stoopid. Why don't you show us the very frightened women and children in Iran at this hour? Tell us about the unique and spiritual Iranians by letting them speak, don't shove platitudes and political "agendas" in our faces. Why use the word "yellowcake" when you know that it implies WMDs - you are part of the Operation Mockingbird squad that made it that way.

A very tired-of-the-bullshit mother,
Virginia

Yazd: Welcome to the desert

YAZD, Iran (CNN) -- Deep in the desert, the oasis city of Yazd is unlike any other in Iran.

With its historic mosques, minarets and ancient clay buildings Yazd has resisted other Iranian cities' rush for modernity.

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Once an important station on the Silk Road, with its historic mosques, minarets and ancient clay buildings, Yazd has resisted other Iranian cities' rush for modernity.

It may possibly be the most beautiful desert city in the world.

The word "Yazd" means "worship" -- apt since Yazd is known in the Islamic Republic as "the City of Muslims."

Most of its half a million population follow the Islamic faith devoutly. Yet for a city renowned for its religious conservatism, Yazd is far more tolerant and open-minded than cities more accustomed to tourists such as Isfahan and Shiraz.

This may be because Yazd is also the birthplace of the Zoroastrian religion.

Very little is known about Zoroastrianism in the West but its influence is far reaching. It is uniquely important in the history of religion because of its formative links to both western and eastern beliefs.

It is considered by many to be the world's first monotheistic religion, pre-dating Islam and almost certainly influencing Judaism.

Before the Islamic conquests (633 - 656), Zoroastrianism was the state religion of the Persian empire.

"This is a very honest city because Zoroastrianism stresses the importance of truth," said one shopkeeper when asked about the legacy of the faith. "And you'll never get ripped off here!"

Yazd is place where centuries-old traditions remain contemporary, especially in the old part of the city. Vital, beautiful and vast, the old town brings to life an Iran immortalized in ancient scriptures and eloquent poems.

Centuries of history have passed through its streets and alleyways. Alexander the Great marched through Yazd on his way to India, and a dozen or so centuries later Marco Polo dropped by for a visit.

Genuinely frozen in time, unlike in Rome or other historic cities, Yazd's old neighborhood is a poor district that has retained much of its character simply because its inhabitants cannot afford to "improve" on ancient building materials and methods.

It is this sense of archaism that makes the city so unique. The streets are narrow and labyrinthine, leading one moment towards sunset and the next towards sunrise.

They take so many turns and there are so many dead-ends, small hidden squares and bazaars that you can spend hours in one part of a neighborhood and not find your way out.

The fragrance of rare spices and tropical fruits waft around every corner, the sound of laughter and argument coupled with the occasional crowing of roosters can be heard without ever seeing anyone.

Walls are adobe and mud brick, taking on a golden hue under the sunlight and blending naturally into the desert landscape. In fact, the color of clay is the color of the whole city.

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Buildings have stained glass windows which not only soften the unforgiving desert sunlight, but also deter flies from entry. Traditional heavy wooden doors grace many of the older homes. Most still have customary "male and female" knockers. These phallic-shaped knockers generate different tones when used, thus calling the correct party to the door -- remnants of a more prudent time.

The portals seem to open into a world of dark corridors and central courtyards with old trees around small reflecting pools. Most houses have curved ceilings and two entrances, one for men and one for women and the more splendid buildings boast the presence of gorgeous wind-catchers on their roofs.

These wind-catchers or "Badgirs" are one of the city's wonders. They're designed to capture the rare desert breeze and then direct it down to the interior of the house. The trapped air is then intensified as it is blown onto interior pools, which in turn cool the air further and allow it to circulate inside via hallways and passageways to various rooms -- almost like an ancient air conditioning system.

Despite (and perhaps because of) the unmerciful adversities of living in a desert, the people of Yazd have managed to create insurmountable beauty. This is not only represented in their architecture; but also in many other products synonymous with Yazd.

The Termeh, for example, is a gorgeous hand-made silk tapestry, woven for centuries and used in everything from bed spreads to Quran covers.

Confectionery also has a long history in Yazd. Sweets are various and divine, melting on the tongue with hidden flavors of rose-water and pistachio and almonds.

Today, Yazd is also known for "yellow cake," which is not a dessert but an element in the uranium mines. "Yazd would be the first place to be bombed if there is a war," said Behzad, a young university student.

However, beyond all this wonderment and beauty one thing stands out above all others; the people of Yazd.

The kindness and hospitality of Yazdis is yet another remarkable and distinctive aspect of the city. Time spent with people of this city leaves a striking impression that lasts longer than any monument, attraction or landmark. E-mail to a friend