Most of you have probably read about the
Washington Post story which discusses the U.S. military psy-ops operation to paint Abu Musab al Zarqawi as a much more significant figure in the Iraqi resistance than he actually is. There are two aspects to this story worth extra emphasis here. The first is how the
Post attempts to cover up the clear violation of U.S. law represented by the story (emphasis added):
One briefing slide about U.S. "strategic communications" in Iraq, prepared for Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, describes the "home audience" as one of six major targets of the American side of the war.
That slide, created by Casey's subordinates, does not specifically state that U.S. citizens were being targeted by the effort.
It doesn't? Which "home audience" who aren't U.S. citizens was it referring to then - undocumented immigrants? Please.
The second is the attempt by New York Times reporter Dexter Filkins to cover his behind (again, emphasis added):
One slide in the same briefing, for example, noted that a "selective leak" about Zarqawi was made to Dexter Filkins, a New York Times reporter based in Baghdad. Filkins's resulting article, about a letter supposedly written by Zarqawi and boasting of suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the Times front page on Feb. 9, 2004.
Leaks to reporters from U.S. officials in Iraq are common, but official evidence of a propaganda operation using an American reporter is rare.
Filkins, reached by e-mail, said that he was not told at the time that there was a psychological operations campaign aimed at Zarqawi, but said he assumed that the military was releasing the letter "because it had decided it was in its best interest to have it publicized." No special conditions were placed upon him in being briefed on its contents, he said. He said he was skeptical about the document's authenticity then, and remains so now, and so at the time tried to confirm its authenticity with officials outside the U.S. military.
Well, that's fascinating. Unfortunately I don't have access to the original
Times story, so I can't read it. But I
did find a Feb. 9, 2004 CNN interview of Filkins by Soledad O'Brien in the InfoTrac OneFile database. I can't link it, but let me just reprint the beginning:
O'BRIEN: You talk about American officials holding onto a document that they believe was written by a Jordanian operative in Iraq. And basically, it's asking al Qaeda for help in waging this sectarian war. What do you think this memo says about the relationship between al Qaeda and the folks in Iraq?
FILKINS: Well, it doesn't really prove anything other than the fact that these operatives in Iraq want some help. And to me, that was the fascinating thing about the document. It was sort of part business plan and part plea for help. I mean, basically, they were saying, it's really hard here. We're not getting a lot of support. We think we're losing. Here is this sort of last-ditch plan that we can come up with. Can you help?
O'BRIEN: Paint the scenario, the kind of help that they are asking for in this memo.
FILKINS: Well, it's a little complicated, but what they are saying is -- I mean, predominantly al Qaeda and the religious extremists, who are believed to be operating in Iraq, are Sunni Muslims. They are a majority here. And the Shiite Muslims are the majority.
And what the plan says is, we'll start doing suicide bombings and start attacking the Shiites, and we'll attack them so hard and so often that they'll crack down on the Sunnis, and then the Sunnis will come to us and they'll flock to us. And this was basically a plea to al Qaeda for their approval and for possibly for their support.
So, I think the other thing they said, which was kind of interesting, was they said we are running out of time. We need to do this quickly. We need to do it before we lose, and we need to do it before the Americans transfer sovereignty to the Iraqis on June 30.
So, it was -- again, to me, what was so fascinating about the document, assuming it was authentic, was that it was a stark admission that things were not going very well for them.
Filkins does throw in a quick "assuming it was authentic." However there is
nothing which would suggest to the viewer the slightest skepticism about that authenticity on Filkins' part; the entire interview, which continues on at greater length, simply takes it as factual with the exception of those four words. If Filkins had any real skepticism about the authenticity of the letter, he certainly fails to convey it to the listener in this interview.
Reprinted from Left I on the News