Geopolitics
- Thread starter Mciahel Goodman
- Start date
For sure, and in many more ways than one. Dude works for Sputnik, Serbian history was birthed in genocide. The whataboutery spiral has no bottom and the endless hypocrisy is there for all to see. For America it's plain on the banner, for the crowd it's in the memory of each singer and for the account it's in what he focusses on and what he chooses to omit.
This is ‘whataboutism’ level 11. I’m sure someone will be along to be suitably appalled any minute
Doubling Down On Double Standards – The Ukraine Propaganda Blitz
What a strange feeling it was to know that the cruise missile shown descending towards an airport and erupting in a ball of flame was not fired by US or British forces.
Millions of Westerners raised to admire the ultimate spectacle of high-tech, robotic power, must have quickly suppressed their awe at the shock – this was Russia’s war of aggression, not ‘ours’. This was not an approved orgy of destruction and emphatically not to be celebrated.
Rewind to April 2017: over video footage of Trump’s cruise missiles launching at targets in Syria in response to completely unproven claims that Syria had just used chemical weapons, MSNBC anchor Brian Williams felt a song coming on:
In 1991, the ‘white heat’ of our robotic weaponry was ‘beautiful’ because it meant that ‘we’ were so sophisticated, so civilised, so compassionate, that only Saddam’s palaces and government buildings were being ‘surgically’ removed, not human beings. This was keyhole killing. The BBC’s national treasure, David Dimbleby, basked in the glory on live TV:
By contrast, the morning after Russia launched its war of aggression on Ukraine, front pages were covered, not in tech, but in the blood of wounded civilians and the rubble of wrecked civilian buildings. A BBC media review explained:
Former Guardian journalist Jonathan Cook noted:
Another front-page BBC article asked:
Generating The Propaganda Schwerpunkt
On 27 February, the first 26 stories on the BBC’s home page were devoted to the Russian attack on Ukraine. The BBC website even typically features half a dozen stories on Ukraine at the top of its sports section.
On 28 February, the Guardian’s website led with the conflict, followed by 20 additional links to articles about the Ukraine crisis. A similar pattern is found in all ‘mainstream’ news media.
The inevitable result of this level of media bombardment on many people: Conflict in Ukraine is ‘our’ war – ‘I stand with Ukraine!’
Political analyst Ben Norton commented:
As if the whole world belongs to ‘us’, our righteous rage on Ukraine is such that we apparently forget that we are not actually under attack, not being bombed; our soldiers and civilians are not being killed. Nevertheless, RT (formerly Russia Today), Going Underground and Sputnik have been shut down on YouTube and Google as though the US and UK were under direct attack, facing an existential threat.
Certainly, we at Media Lens welcome the idea that powerful state-corporate media should be prevented from promoting state violence. It is absurd that individuals are arrested and imprisoned for threatening or inciting violence, while journalists regularly call for massive, even genocidal, violence against whole countries with zero consequences (career advancement aside). But banning media promoting state violence means banning, not just Russian TV, but literally all US-UK broadcasters and newspapers.
Confirming the hypocrisy, The Intercept reported:
According to our ProQuest search, the Guardian has made no mention of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion in the last week – as it most certainly would have, if Ukraine were an Official Enemy of the West. ProQuest finds a grand total of three mentions of the Azov Battalion in the entire UK national press – two in passing, with a single substantial piece in the Daily Star – in the last seven days. ‘Impressive discipline’, as Noam Chomsky likes to say.
‘Russia Must Be Broken’
Britain and the US have been waging so much war, so ruthlessly, for so long, that Western journalists and commentators have lost all sense of proportion and restraint. Neil Mackay, former editor of the Sunday Herald (2015-2018), wrote in the Herald:
For describing his comment as ‘obscene’, Mackay instantly blocked us on Twitter. His brutal demand reminded us of the comment made by columnist Thomas Friedman in the New York Times:
On Britain’s Channel 5, BBC stalwart Jeremy Vine told a caller, Bill, from Manchester:
MSNBC commentator Clint Watts observed:
Professor Michael McFaul of Stanford University, also serving with the media’s 101st Chairborne Division, appeared to be experiencing multiple wargasms when he tweeted:
‘Shockingly Arrogant Meddling’ – The Missing History
So how did we get here? State-corporate news coverage has some glaring omissions.
In February 2014, after three months of violent, US-aided protests, much of it involving neo-Nazi anti-government militias, the president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, fled Kiev for Russia. Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) provide some context:
In a rare example of dissent in the Guardian, Ted Galen Carpenter, senior fellow for defence and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, wrote this week:
The pattern persists today. When Fox News recently spoke about the Russia-Ukraine crisis with former US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, one of the key perpetrators of the illegal invasion-occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, she nodded her head in solemn agreement when the presenter said:
Noam Chomsky highlights one obvious omission in Western media coverage of Ukraine, or any other crisis involving NATO:
Starmer had previously waxed Churchillian on Twitter:
In the Guardian, George Monbiot contributed to the witch-hunt, noting ominously that comments made by John Pilger ‘seemed to echo Putin’s speech the previous night’. By way of further evidence:
Earlier, Monbiot had tweeted acerbically:
Conclusion – ‘Whataboutism’ Or ‘Wearenobetterism’?
Regardless of the history and context of what came before, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a major international crime and the consequences are hugely serious.
Our essential point for over 20 years has been that the public is bombarded with the crimes of Official Enemies by ‘mainstream’ media, while ‘our’ crimes are ignored, or downplayed, or ‘justified’. A genuinely free and independent media would be exactly as tough and challenging on US-UK-NATO actions and policies as they are on Russian actions and policies.
To point out this glaring double standard is not to ‘carry water for Putin’; any more than pointing out state-corporate deceptions over Iraq, Libya and Syria meant we held any kind of candle for Saddam, Gaddafi or Assad.
As Chomsky has frequently pointed out, it is easy to condemn the crimes of Official Enemies. But it is a basic ethical principle that, first and foremost, we should hold to account those governments for which we share direct political and moral responsibility. This is why we focus so intensively on the crimes of our own government and its leading allies.
We have condemned Putin’s war of aggression and supported demands for an immediate withdrawal. We are not remotely pro-Russian government – we revile Putin’s tyranny and state violence exactly as much as we revile the West’s tyrannical, imperial violence. We have repeatedly made clear that we oppose all war, killing and hate. Our guiding belief is that these horrors become less likely when journalism drops its double standards and challenges ‘our’ crimes in the same way it challenges ‘theirs’.
Chomsky explained:
But why speak up now, in particular? Shouldn’t we just shut up and ‘get on board’ in a time of crisis? No, because war is a time when propaganda messages are hammered home with great force: ‘We’re the Good Guys standing up for democracy.’ It is a vital time to examine and challenge these claims.
What critics dismiss as ‘Whataboutism’ is actually ‘Wearenobetterism’. If ‘we’ are no better, or if ‘we’ are actually worse, then where does that leave ‘our’ righteous moral outrage? Can ‘compassion’ rooted in deep hypocrisy be deeply felt?
Critics dismissing evidence of double standards as ‘whataboutery’, are promoting the view that ‘their’ crimes should be wholly condemned, but not those committed by ‘Us’ and ‘Our’ allies. The actions of Official Enemies are to be judged by a different standard than that by which we judge ourselves.
As we pointed out via Twitter:
Spot all the high-profile commentators who condemn Russia’s aggression against Ukraine…
…and who remain silent about or support:
* Invasions of Afghanistan & Iraq
* NATO’s destruction of Libya
* Saudi-led coalition bombing of Yemen
* Apartheid Israel’s crushing of Palestinians
The question has to be asked: Is the impassioned public response to another media bombardment of the type described by Howard Zinn at the top of this alert a manifestation of the power of human compassion, or is it a manifestation of power?
Are we witnessing genuine human concern, or the ability of global state-corporate interests to sell essentially the same story over and over again? The same bad guy: Milosevic, Bin Laden, Saddam, Gaddafi, Assad and Putin; the same Good Guys: US, UK, NATO and ‘our’ obedient clients; the same alleged noble cause: freedom, democracy, human rights; the same means: confrontation, violence, a flood of bombs and missiles (‘the best ones’). And the same results: control of whole countries, massively increased arms budgets, and control of natural resources.
Ultimately, we are being asked to believe that the state-corporate system that has illegally bombed, droned, invaded, occupied and sanctioned so many countries over the last few decades – a system that responds even to the threat of human extinction from climate change with ‘Blah, blah, blah!’ – is motivated by compassion for the suffering of Ukrainian civilians. As Erich Fromm wrote:
What a strange feeling it was to know that the cruise missile shown descending towards an airport and erupting in a ball of flame was not fired by US or British forces.
Millions of Westerners raised to admire the ultimate spectacle of high-tech, robotic power, must have quickly suppressed their awe at the shock – this was Russia’s war of aggression, not ‘ours’. This was not an approved orgy of destruction and emphatically not to be celebrated.
Rewind to April 2017: over video footage of Trump’s cruise missiles launching at targets in Syria in response to completely unproven claims that Syria had just used chemical weapons, MSNBC anchor Brian Williams felt a song coming on:
TV and newspaper editors feel the same way. Every time US-UK-NATO launches a war of aggression on Iraq, Libya, Syria – whoever, wherever – our TV screens and front pages fill with ‘beautiful pictures’ of missiles blazing in pure white light from ships. This is ‘Shock And Awe’ – we even imagine our victims ‘awed’ by our power.
In 1991, the ‘white heat’ of our robotic weaponry was ‘beautiful’ because it meant that ‘we’ were so sophisticated, so civilised, so compassionate, that only Saddam’s palaces and government buildings were being ‘surgically’ removed, not human beings. This was keyhole killing. The BBC’s national treasure, David Dimbleby, basked in the glory on live TV:
Might makes right! This seemed real to Dimbleby, as it did to many people. In fact, it was fake news. Under the 88,500 tons of bombs that followed the launch of the air campaign on January 17, 1991, and the ground attack that followed, 150,000 Iraqi troops and 50,000 civilians were killed. Just 7 per cent of the ordnance consisted of so called ‘smart bombs’.
By contrast, the morning after Russia launched its war of aggression on Ukraine, front pages were covered, not in tech, but in the blood of wounded civilians and the rubble of wrecked civilian buildings. A BBC media review explained:
‘Our’ wars are not greeted by such headlines, nor by BBC headlines of this kind:
The fear and destruction ‘we’ cause are not ‘our’ focus.
Former Guardian journalist Jonathan Cook noted:
A BBC video report was titled:
Hard to believe, but the text beneath read:
For the entire morning of March 2, the BBC home page featured a Ukrainian civilian throwing a lit Molotov cocktail. The adjacent headline:
In other words, civilians armed with homemade weapons were facing heavily-armed elite troops. Imagine the response if, in the first days of an invasion, the BBC had headlined a picture of a civilian in Baghdad or Kabul heroically resisting US-UK forces in the same way.
Another front-page BBC article asked:
The answer is ‘yes,’ of course – Russia’s attack is a textbook example of ‘the supreme crime’, the waging of a war of aggression. So, too, was the 2003 US-UK invasion and occupation of Iraq. But, of course, the idea that such an article might have appeared in the first week of that invasion is completely unthinkable.
Generating The Propaganda Schwerpunkt
On 27 February, the first 26 stories on the BBC’s home page were devoted to the Russian attack on Ukraine. The BBC website even typically features half a dozen stories on Ukraine at the top of its sports section.
On 28 February, the Guardian’s website led with the conflict, followed by 20 additional links to articles about the Ukraine crisis. A similar pattern is found in all ‘mainstream’ news media.
The inevitable result of this level of media bombardment on many people: Conflict in Ukraine is ‘our’ war – ‘I stand with Ukraine!’
Political analyst Ben Norton commented:
This is no small matter. Norton added:
Some 15.6 million Yemenis live in extreme poverty, and 8.6 million suffer from under-nutrition. A recent United Nations report warned:
Over half of Saudi Arabia’s combat aircraft used for the bombing raids on Yemen are UK-supplied. UK-made equipment includes Typhoon and Tornado aircraft, Paveway bombs, Brimstone and Stormshadow missiles, and cluster munitions. Campaign Against the Arms Trade reports:
Despite the immensity of the catastrophe and Britain’s clear legal and moral responsibility, in 2017, the Independent reported:
The Independent added:
On Twitter, Dr Robert Allan made the point that matters:
We can be sure that Instagram, YouTube and Tik Tok will never be awash with the sentiment: ‘I stand with Yemen!’
As if the whole world belongs to ‘us’, our righteous rage on Ukraine is such that we apparently forget that we are not actually under attack, not being bombed; our soldiers and civilians are not being killed. Nevertheless, RT (formerly Russia Today), Going Underground and Sputnik have been shut down on YouTube and Google as though the US and UK were under direct attack, facing an existential threat.
Certainly, we at Media Lens welcome the idea that powerful state-corporate media should be prevented from promoting state violence. It is absurd that individuals are arrested and imprisoned for threatening or inciting violence, while journalists regularly call for massive, even genocidal, violence against whole countries with zero consequences (career advancement aside). But banning media promoting state violence means banning, not just Russian TV, but literally all US-UK broadcasters and newspapers.
Confirming the hypocrisy, The Intercept reported:
In 2014, the Guardian’s central and eastern Europe correspondent, Shaun Walker, wrote:
The report continued:
Perhaps the hundreds of journalists who attacked Jeremy Corbyn for questioning the removal of an allegedly anti-semitic mural – which depicted a mixture of famous historical and identifiable Jewish and non-Jewish bankers – with the single word, ‘Why?’, would care to comment?
According to our ProQuest search, the Guardian has made no mention of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion in the last week – as it most certainly would have, if Ukraine were an Official Enemy of the West. ProQuest finds a grand total of three mentions of the Azov Battalion in the entire UK national press – two in passing, with a single substantial piece in the Daily Star – in the last seven days. ‘Impressive discipline’, as Noam Chomsky likes to say.
‘Russia Must Be Broken’
Britain and the US have been waging so much war, so ruthlessly, for so long, that Western journalists and commentators have lost all sense of proportion and restraint. Neil Mackay, former editor of the Sunday Herald (2015-2018), wrote in the Herald:
If nothing else, Mackay’s comment indicated just how little impact was made by the deaths of 500,000 children under five when the US and Britain saw to it that the Iraq economy was ‘broken’ by 13 years of genocidal sanctions.
For describing his comment as ‘obscene’, Mackay instantly blocked us on Twitter. His brutal demand reminded us of the comment made by columnist Thomas Friedman in the New York Times:
We can enjoy the ‘shock and awe’ of that comment, if we have no sense at all that Serbian people are real human beings capable of suffering, love, loss and death exactly as profound as our own.
On Britain’s Channel 5, BBC stalwart Jeremy Vine told a caller, Bill, from Manchester:
Unlike his celebrated interviewer, Bill, clearly no fan of Putin, had retained his humanity:
Vine’s sage reply:
We all know what would have happened to Vine if he had said anything remotely comparable of the US-UK forces that illegally invaded Iraq.
MSNBC commentator Clint Watts observed:
The strangest thing is media commentators reflexively imagining that US-UK-NATO can lay any moral or legal claim to act as an ultra-violent World Police.
Professor Michael McFaul of Stanford University, also serving with the media’s 101st Chairborne Division, appeared to be experiencing multiple wargasms when he tweeted:
Two hours later:
Echoing Mackay, McFaul raved (and later deleted):
Courageous words indeed from his Ivy League office. Disturbing to note that McFaul was ambassador to Russia under Barack Obama, widely considered to be a saint.
‘Shockingly Arrogant Meddling’ – The Missing History
So how did we get here? State-corporate news coverage has some glaring omissions.
In February 2014, after three months of violent, US-aided protests, much of it involving neo-Nazi anti-government militias, the president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, fled Kiev for Russia. Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) provide some context:
The BBC reported Nuland picking the new Ukrainian leader:
FAIR continues:
We can read between the lines when Nuland described how the US had invested ‘over $5 billion’ to ‘ensure a secure and prosperous and democratic Ukraine’.
In a rare example of dissent in the Guardian, Ted Galen Carpenter, senior fellow for defence and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, wrote this week:
Carpenter concluded:
Within days of the 2014 coup, troops loyal to Russia took control of the Crimea peninsula in the south of Ukraine. As Jonathan Steele, a former Moscow correspondent for the Guardian, recently explained:
The New Yorker magazine describes political scientist John Mearsheimer as ‘one of the most famous critics of American foreign policy since the end of the Cold War’:
Mearsheimer argues that Russia views the expansion of NATO to its border with Ukraine as ‘an existential threat’:
Mearsheimer adds:
In 2014, then US Secretary of State John Kerry had the gall to proclaim of Russia’s takeover of Crimea:
Senior BBC correspondents somehow managed to report such remarks from Kerry and others, without making any reference to the West’s invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.
The pattern persists today. When Fox News recently spoke about the Russia-Ukraine crisis with former US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, one of the key perpetrators of the illegal invasion-occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, she nodded her head in solemn agreement when the presenter said:
The cognitive dissonance required to engage in this discussion and pass it off as serious analysis is truly remarkable.
Noam Chomsky highlights one obvious omission in Western media coverage of Ukraine, or any other crisis involving NATO:
It is sobering to read the dissenting arguments above and recall Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer’s warning to MPs last week:
The Independent reported that Starmer’s warning came ‘after leading left-wingers – including key shadow cabinet members during the Jeremy Corbyn-era key, John McDonnell and Diane Abbott – were threatened with the removal of the whip if their names were not taken off a Stop the War letter that had accused the UK government of “aggressive posturing”, and said that Nato “should call a halt to its eastward expansion”’.
Starmer had previously waxed Churchillian on Twitter:
Clearly, that liberty does not extend to elected Labour MPs criticising NATO.
In the Guardian, George Monbiot contributed to the witch-hunt, noting ominously that comments made by John Pilger ‘seemed to echo Putin’s speech the previous night’. By way of further evidence:
Remarkably, Monbiot offered no counter-arguments to ‘Pilger’s claims’, no facts, relying entirely on smear by association. This was not journalism; it was sinister, hit and run, McCarthy-style propaganda.
Earlier, Monbiot had tweeted acerbically:
In fact, for years, Pilger reported – often secretly and at great risk – from the Soviet Union and its European satellites. A chapter of his book, ‘Heroes’, is devoted to his secret meetings with and support for Soviet dissidents (See: John Pilger, ‘Heroes’, Pan, 1987, pp.431-440). In his 1977 undercover film on Czechoslovakia, ‘A Faraway Country’, he described the country’s oppressors as ‘fascists’. He commented:
Three days before Monbiot’s article was published in the Guardian, Pilger had tweeted of Ukraine:
Pilger is one of the most respected journalists of our time precisely because he has taken a principled and consistent stand against all forms of imperialism, including Soviet imperialism, Chinese imperialism (particularly its underpinning of Pol Pot), Indonesian imperialism (its invasion of East Timor), and so on.
Conclusion – ‘Whataboutism’ Or ‘Wearenobetterism’?
Regardless of the history and context of what came before, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a major international crime and the consequences are hugely serious.
Our essential point for over 20 years has been that the public is bombarded with the crimes of Official Enemies by ‘mainstream’ media, while ‘our’ crimes are ignored, or downplayed, or ‘justified’. A genuinely free and independent media would be exactly as tough and challenging on US-UK-NATO actions and policies as they are on Russian actions and policies.
To point out this glaring double standard is not to ‘carry water for Putin’; any more than pointing out state-corporate deceptions over Iraq, Libya and Syria meant we held any kind of candle for Saddam, Gaddafi or Assad.
As Chomsky has frequently pointed out, it is easy to condemn the crimes of Official Enemies. But it is a basic ethical principle that, first and foremost, we should hold to account those governments for which we share direct political and moral responsibility. This is why we focus so intensively on the crimes of our own government and its leading allies.
We have condemned Putin’s war of aggression and supported demands for an immediate withdrawal. We are not remotely pro-Russian government – we revile Putin’s tyranny and state violence exactly as much as we revile the West’s tyrannical, imperial violence. We have repeatedly made clear that we oppose all war, killing and hate. Our guiding belief is that these horrors become less likely when journalism drops its double standards and challenges ‘our’ crimes in the same way it challenges ‘theirs’.
Chomsky explained:
Our adding a tiny drop of criticism to the tsunami of Western global, billion-dollar-funded, 24/7 loathing of Putin achieves nothing beyond the outcome identified by Chomsky. If we have any hope of positively impacting the world, it lies in countering the illusions and violence of the government for which we are morally accountable.
But why speak up now, in particular? Shouldn’t we just shut up and ‘get on board’ in a time of crisis? No, because war is a time when propaganda messages are hammered home with great force: ‘We’re the Good Guys standing up for democracy.’ It is a vital time to examine and challenge these claims.
What critics dismiss as ‘Whataboutism’ is actually ‘Wearenobetterism’. If ‘we’ are no better, or if ‘we’ are actually worse, then where does that leave ‘our’ righteous moral outrage? Can ‘compassion’ rooted in deep hypocrisy be deeply felt?
Critics dismissing evidence of double standards as ‘whataboutery’, are promoting the view that ‘their’ crimes should be wholly condemned, but not those committed by ‘Us’ and ‘Our’ allies. The actions of Official Enemies are to be judged by a different standard than that by which we judge ourselves.
As we pointed out via Twitter:
Spot all the high-profile commentators who condemn Russia’s aggression against Ukraine…
…and who remain silent about or support:
* Invasions of Afghanistan & Iraq
* NATO’s destruction of Libya
* Saudi-led coalition bombing of Yemen
* Apartheid Israel’s crushing of Palestinians
The question has to be asked: Is the impassioned public response to another media bombardment of the type described by Howard Zinn at the top of this alert a manifestation of the power of human compassion, or is it a manifestation of power?
Are we witnessing genuine human concern, or the ability of global state-corporate interests to sell essentially the same story over and over again? The same bad guy: Milosevic, Bin Laden, Saddam, Gaddafi, Assad and Putin; the same Good Guys: US, UK, NATO and ‘our’ obedient clients; the same alleged noble cause: freedom, democracy, human rights; the same means: confrontation, violence, a flood of bombs and missiles (‘the best ones’). And the same results: control of whole countries, massively increased arms budgets, and control of natural resources.
Ultimately, we are being asked to believe that the state-corporate system that has illegally bombed, droned, invaded, occupied and sanctioned so many countries over the last few decades – a system that responds even to the threat of human extinction from climate change with ‘Blah, blah, blah!’ – is motivated by compassion for the suffering of Ukrainian civilians. As Erich Fromm wrote:
https://www.medialens.org/2022/doubling-down-on-double-standards-the-ukraine-propaganda-blitz/
One of the most important parts of a well written article. It's not only easy to condemn official enemies, it is also, for the most part, pointless (Orwell's "two minutes of rage"). Your task is to hold your own government to account, not other governments.
https://thecradle.co/Article/columns/8170
Four signs that a US-Gulf 'divorce' is in the making
If any good has come out of the Ukraine war for the Arab world, it is the diminished status and influence of the US in West Asia. Washington is losing many of its traditional allies in the region, especially in the Persian Gulf, and this trend looks like it will accelerate.
Four recent developments illustrate this.
First, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s visit to the UAE on Friday. The warm welcome laid on for him by its leaders was a slap in the face of the US administration, its strongly stated objections to the visit, and its sanctions aimed at de-legitimizing the Syrian government.
Second, the growing defiance of US hegemony by Saudi Arabia and the UAE, OPEC’s two largest oil producers. Most notable was their rejection of US President Joe Biden’s pleas to increase oil production in order to push down prices and provide extra supplies to enable western sanctions of Russian oil and gas imports.
Third, the failure of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s visit – on Washington’s behalf – to Abu Dhabi and Riyadh, where he conveyed veiled threats to the two countries should they fail to toe the western line on Ukraine, join in imposing economic sanctions on Russia, and break their oil production agreements with it.
Fourth, Saudi Arabia’s invitation to China’s President Xi Jinping for an official visit and Riyadh’s openness to pricing its oil sales to Beijing in yuan. This signals that the kingdom and possibly other Gulf states may be willing to join the new global financial system Russia and China are developing as an alternative to the western one.
Of the four developments, the reception accorded to Syrian President Assad in Abu Dhabi and Dubai was the clearest sign of this Gulf rebellion against the US and its domination. The visit didn’t need to take place now; that it did, shows more about the mood in the Gulf’s centers of power than anything else.
Moreover, Saudi Arabia and the UAE have reportedly declined to receive US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, who is keen to follow up Johnson’s visit to try to succeed where he failed. Instead, in a snub seen the world around, the UAE’s foreign minister Sheikh Ahmad Bin-Zayed visited Moscow for talks with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov. The public show of bonhomie they displayed there was bound to rub salt into the American wound.
The timing of Assad’s trip – on the 11th anniversary of the start of the US-led war on Syria aimed at toppling its government, and three weeks into the Russian invasion of Ukraine – and the UAE’s indifference to the angry US reaction, are further signs of the start of divorce proceedings with an abusive partner that fleeces and cheats on its allies.
Assad’s visit to the UAE provided important gains for both countries and their leaders. It broke Syria’s official isolation in the Arab world and heralds the breaking of the US embargo imposed on the country. This caps a broader process of Arab ‘normalization’ which is set to see Damascus regain its membership of the Arab League and role in collective Arab decision making, and take part in the Arab summit to be held in Algiers in November.
This bold step also benefits the UAE in many ways. It helps offset the hugely negative impact on its image that resulted from its signing of the so-called Abraham Accords and enthusiastic courtship of the Israeli enemy.
Building bridges of trust and cooperation with the Axis of Resistance via Syria, Iran’s closest ally, could also help the UAE and Saudi Arabia find ways out of their quagmire in Yemen. It may be no coincidence that Riyadh is proposing to host an all-party Yemeni dialogue and has officially invited the Houthi Ansarullah movement to take part.
In short, what we are seeing today are manifestations of a revolt against US hegemony in the Arab world by the axis of Arab ‘moderation’ led by the Egyptian-Emirati-Saudi trio. It is open for other Gulf and Arab states such as Iraq, Algeria, and Sudan to join should they wish. This new axis may take clearer shape at the Algiers summit in the Fall.
The process of Arab normalization with Israel is bound to slow down. It is the most grievous error the normalizing countries – old and new – could have made, and should be halted completely. But there is optimism in this regard, as turning against the US also implies turning against Israel.
Meanwhile, Assad’s presidential plane, which over the past decade has only flown to Moscow and Tehran, looks set to do a lot more travelling in the coming weeks and months. Its next destination after Abu Dhabi could be Riyadh or Cairo, despite the US’ best efforts to bar its way
Four signs that a US-Gulf 'divorce' is in the making
If any good has come out of the Ukraine war for the Arab world, it is the diminished status and influence of the US in West Asia. Washington is losing many of its traditional allies in the region, especially in the Persian Gulf, and this trend looks like it will accelerate.
Four recent developments illustrate this.
First, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s visit to the UAE on Friday. The warm welcome laid on for him by its leaders was a slap in the face of the US administration, its strongly stated objections to the visit, and its sanctions aimed at de-legitimizing the Syrian government.
Second, the growing defiance of US hegemony by Saudi Arabia and the UAE, OPEC’s two largest oil producers. Most notable was their rejection of US President Joe Biden’s pleas to increase oil production in order to push down prices and provide extra supplies to enable western sanctions of Russian oil and gas imports.
Third, the failure of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s visit – on Washington’s behalf – to Abu Dhabi and Riyadh, where he conveyed veiled threats to the two countries should they fail to toe the western line on Ukraine, join in imposing economic sanctions on Russia, and break their oil production agreements with it.
Fourth, Saudi Arabia’s invitation to China’s President Xi Jinping for an official visit and Riyadh’s openness to pricing its oil sales to Beijing in yuan. This signals that the kingdom and possibly other Gulf states may be willing to join the new global financial system Russia and China are developing as an alternative to the western one.
Of the four developments, the reception accorded to Syrian President Assad in Abu Dhabi and Dubai was the clearest sign of this Gulf rebellion against the US and its domination. The visit didn’t need to take place now; that it did, shows more about the mood in the Gulf’s centers of power than anything else.
Moreover, Saudi Arabia and the UAE have reportedly declined to receive US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, who is keen to follow up Johnson’s visit to try to succeed where he failed. Instead, in a snub seen the world around, the UAE’s foreign minister Sheikh Ahmad Bin-Zayed visited Moscow for talks with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov. The public show of bonhomie they displayed there was bound to rub salt into the American wound.
The timing of Assad’s trip – on the 11th anniversary of the start of the US-led war on Syria aimed at toppling its government, and three weeks into the Russian invasion of Ukraine – and the UAE’s indifference to the angry US reaction, are further signs of the start of divorce proceedings with an abusive partner that fleeces and cheats on its allies.
Assad’s visit to the UAE provided important gains for both countries and their leaders. It broke Syria’s official isolation in the Arab world and heralds the breaking of the US embargo imposed on the country. This caps a broader process of Arab ‘normalization’ which is set to see Damascus regain its membership of the Arab League and role in collective Arab decision making, and take part in the Arab summit to be held in Algiers in November.
This bold step also benefits the UAE in many ways. It helps offset the hugely negative impact on its image that resulted from its signing of the so-called Abraham Accords and enthusiastic courtship of the Israeli enemy.
Building bridges of trust and cooperation with the Axis of Resistance via Syria, Iran’s closest ally, could also help the UAE and Saudi Arabia find ways out of their quagmire in Yemen. It may be no coincidence that Riyadh is proposing to host an all-party Yemeni dialogue and has officially invited the Houthi Ansarullah movement to take part.
In short, what we are seeing today are manifestations of a revolt against US hegemony in the Arab world by the axis of Arab ‘moderation’ led by the Egyptian-Emirati-Saudi trio. It is open for other Gulf and Arab states such as Iraq, Algeria, and Sudan to join should they wish. This new axis may take clearer shape at the Algiers summit in the Fall.
The process of Arab normalization with Israel is bound to slow down. It is the most grievous error the normalizing countries – old and new – could have made, and should be halted completely. But there is optimism in this regard, as turning against the US also implies turning against Israel.
Meanwhile, Assad’s presidential plane, which over the past decade has only flown to Moscow and Tehran, looks set to do a lot more travelling in the coming weeks and months. Its next destination after Abu Dhabi could be Riyadh or Cairo, despite the US’ best efforts to bar its way
Yes! It's probably the best way to model strategies for things like this.
Interesting thread on the West during the time of the Chechen wars.
I've stopped here because it's just silly - "Completely unproven"
Cruise missiles were launched early hours of 7th April 2017. This was the day after tests carried out by Turkish doctors confirmed the presence of by-products of Sarin in patients that had been transported there.
The article lists a whose who of has-beens none/few of whom will even hold security clearance any longer or at the time. The OPCW-UN Joint Investigation found both chemical markers of Sarin and attributed them to the Syrian government later on. This is neither unproven nor claims, it is a fact.
Revisionism is a hell of a drug.
Not sure what the background is for all this, except there is some trace of a scandal as to that instance with the OPCW being involved.
It's something that recurs in various independent journalists' writing but which I have largely ignored because I don't think it would have altered the course in Syria either way. Seems overblown. I.e., not a case that convinces me nor one that seems as important as is made out, but not pulled from nowhere either, albeit from fringe.
What's the revisionist aspect there?
Glenn's a funny one never seen anyone farm so much hate
I meant in the revisionist state sense. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revis...ist state is a term,end to the current system.
And I say "hell of a drug" because launching a brutal war on a smaller country is a particularly sadistic way of trying to signal the change in the world order (although this isn't the first time it has been done), and especially because Russia is blundering and seemingly failing at winning the war they chose to undertake, directly undermining their claim that the world order should be altered to better reflect their (phony) strength.
Oh, I thought you meant the content.
Yeah, but then that's if you buy this guy's analysis. And if you do then end result is that all roads lead to China with Russia being much sidelined.
Interesting perspective here:
In short: “Vietnam’s 1978 alliance with the Soviets put it in a stronger position to deter and defend against China than Ukraine’s alignment with NATO.”
In short: “Vietnam’s 1978 alliance with the Soviets put it in a stronger position to deter and defend against China than Ukraine’s alignment with NATO.”
From Democracies and War Propaganda in the 21st Century
In general academics, politicians and publics do not have a very strong grasp of the role of propaganda within democracies. Indeed, across elite groups in society, which include politicians, journalists who work for the corporate media and major public service outlets and academics, the idea that propaganda is central to democratic societies is usually met with laughter or anger. The idea that the public mind is being manipulated by powerful actors is sometimes treated as absurd or simplistic. At the same time, those people who are a part of the elite political centre ground perceive themselves as free from the influences of propaganda, uniquely positioned to understand what is true and what is false in the world around them. Propaganda might be something that the extreme right or the extreme left partake in, or it might be a problem with respect to foreign interference (witness the claims regarding alleged Russian meddling in Western politics), but it is not a problem vis-à-vis ‘mainstream’ media and political discourse.
This chapter takes issue with this belief so far as it applies to war and conflict and argues that war propaganda is central to contemporary democracies and, in fact, so central that democratic credentials of those states is in doubt. The chapter starts by defining what is meant by the term propaganda, describing its historical roots and helping explain the current lack of awareness of propaganda. The chapter then explores the case of the 2011-2019 Syrian war in order to highlight some of the key features of propaganda activities in contemporary democracies (focusing on the United Kingdom). This exploratory case study, based upon on-going research, indicates the multiple sites at which propaganda can be seen to be generated and, more broadly, helps us to understand how and why publics have been misled as to the reality of Western government involvement in the Syrian war. In conclusion, it is argued that it is untenable to see the Syrian War propaganda as an aberration or unique case and that, instead, it is indicative of a malaise in contemporary democracies. Until these propaganda activities are properly addressed, genuinely democratic politics involving honest and consensual debate will remain out of reach.
What is Propaganda?
Over time the term propaganda has come to be understood to mean highly manipulative and deceptive persuasive communication that occurs mainly in authoritarian political systems or, in a democracy during the exceptional conditions of war. The academic study of propaganda reflects this understanding with a large volume of literature exploring propaganda during wartime (especially World Wars One and Two, and now increasingly the Cold War era) or exploring propaganda in non-democratic states. As argued elsewhere (Bakir, Herring, Miller and Robinson 2019) this perception is incorrect. In fact, propaganda has been an integral feature of democratic political systems since the early 20th century. Propaganda, or non-consensual organized persuasive communication (Bakir et al 2019), involves organized attempts to promote particular agendas through a complex array of communicative techniques which are principally manipulative in nature and involve various forms of deception as well as incentivization and coercion. For example, deception can occur through straightforward lying but also, and more commonly, through omission, distortion of facts and misdirection (Bakir et al 2019). As such, the promotion of one-sided interpretations of an issue can be profoundly deceptive via omissions and distortions. At the same time when sources present themselves as independent and neutral, whilst actually being funded and supported by particular political actors, this is also a form of propaganda through deception. Propaganda can also include incentivization and coercion. An example of the former is the promise of tax cuts during election campaigns. An example of the latter is the dropping of surrender leaflets in battle zones whereby the threat of lethal force is part of persuading combatants to surrender (Bakir et al, 2019). The latter two propaganda tactics also highlight the fact that propaganda is about more than just messaging via linguistic and visual communication but can also involve action in the ‘real’ world and so-called ‘propaganda of the deed’. The common thread throughout all of these persuasive communication techniques is that they involve a non-consensual process of persuasion: people are persuaded to believe something or to act in a particular way either through deception or because they have been incentivized or coerced. In short, their beliefs or actions are not freely chosen. Propaganda, then, is primarily manipulative in nature and, in general terms, incompatible with democratic requirements pertaining to free debate and citizen autonomy. Citizens who have been deceived, incentivized or coerced cannot be accurately described as having formed their opinions freely.
A reason why contemporary elites and publics have insufficient awareness of quite how undemocratic their supposedly democratic political systems actually are is that propaganda has been obfuscated by a euphemism industry which has sought to relabel propaganda as public relations (PR) or strategic communication, to name two of many examples. Indeed, the 20th century propagandist Edward Bernays recollected that ‘propaganda got to be a bad word because of the Germans … using it [during the First World War]. So what I did was to … find some other words. So we found the words Counsel on Public Relations’ (Bernays cited in Miller and Dinan, 2008: 5). Philip Taylor noted how a euphemism industry has prevailed across Western democracies whereby terms such as public relations, strategic communication and perception management have come to be used to label activities that would have historically been referred to as propaganda (Taylor 2002). He states that this rebranding exercise has been used to conceal the fact that democracies use propaganda. With respect to ‘business propaganda’, otherwise known as advertising, Carey (1997) notes that its success ‘in persuading us, for so long, that we are free from propaganda is one of the most significant achievements of the twentieth century’. In short, although ubiquitous to modern democracies, awareness of propaganda has been largely erased from our collective consciousness.
Running hand-in-hand with this lack of awareness is a relatively weak understanding of the number and range of institutions in modern democracies that can and do become involved in propaganda activities. Often, when people think of propaganda, they think of governments and states as its primary source. However, as detailed recently (Miller and Robinson 2019; Robinson 2018; 2019), many institutions can become involved in either the production or relaying of propaganda. For example, Herman and Chomsky (1988) have famously described how mass media function largely as propaganda tools for powerful political and business interests whilst universities, for a similar set of reasons, can also become a part of propaganda activities (Herring and Robinson, 2003). Both journalists and academics work within large organisations with commercial imperatives and shared interests with other powerful actors (e.g. government and big business) and this inevitably creates a broad structural-level constraint on their activities. Both are also frequently reliant upon ‘official sources’ for information and, when putting forward arguments that challenge power, can be subjected to unfair criticism or ‘flak’. Think tanks (Parmar, 2004; Scott-Smith, 2014) and NGOs (non-governmental organisations) can also be involved in propaganda, pushing manipulated and deceptive information into the public sphere in order to promote particular agendas. Finally, across popular culture, propaganda and ideological imperatives have been identified, which include associations between the intelligence services and media industries (Schou 2016: Secker and Alford, 2019). None of this is to say that all of these institutions are inherently propagandistic. Only that they can and do become caught up in propaganda activities and in ways which are incompatible with normal and justified expectations regarding their roles in a democratic society: we reasonably expect mass media to relay truthful and accurate news, that our universities are places for independent and rigorous research and teaching free from the influences of power, that think tanks and NGOs when promoting an issue do so in a way that avoids manipulative communication (such as deception, incentivization or coercion). Examples of propaganda across some of these ‘sites of production’ will be highlighted in the subsequent section that explores propaganda and the case of the 2011-19 war in Syria.
As is in all wars (Taylor, 1992), the Syrian conflict has been accompanied by sharply differing perspectives and extensive propaganda. The focus of this exploratory case study is to identify some of the key mechanisms through which Western public perceptions of the war have been shaped. However, before doing so it is necessary to briefly describe the war and the predominant ways in which it has been presented to Western audiences.
Background to the War and Western Political and Media Narratives
Civil disturbances and violence started in Syria in 2011 and occurred against the backdrop of the so-called ‘Arab Spring’. By 2012, violence had escalated and a leaked US Department of Defense report stated that the conflict was taking a ‘clear sectarian direction’, that ‘the Salafist, the Muslim Brotherhood, and AGI are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria’ and that multiple external actors were involved: ‘The West, Gulf countries, and Turkey support the opposition; while Russia, China, and Iran support the regime’.[ii] One important element of the war, at least from the perspective of understanding the position of Western governments, is the US-Saudi covert operation known as Timber Sycamore. The operation was described by the New York Times as a ‘$1 Billion Secret C.I.A war in Syria’ (Mazzetti, Goldman and Schmidt, 2017) and involved an agreement between the CIA and Saudi Arabia aimed at supporting groups seeking to overthrow the Syrian government (see also Berger 2016 and Porter 2017). Recent work published by investigative journalist Maxime Chaix (2019) claims that Operation Timber Sycamore can actually be traced as far back as October 2011 when the CIA was operating via the UK’s MI6 intelligence service in order to avoid having to seek Congressional approval. Today, after eight years of war, it appears that the Syrian government is close to regaining control of most of its territory although the future dynamics of the conflict remain uncertain.
In broad terms, Western politicians and mainstream/corporate media have largely presented the war as a simple struggle between pro-democratic rebels and a ruthless regime. This representation of the war has emphasized allegations of war crimes against the Syrian government (alleged use of chemical weapons against civilians and torture) and downplayed both the sectarian nature of opposition groups and the extensive involvement of external actors other than Russia and Iran. Other perspectives have remained marginalized across Western media. For example, Syrian, Russian and Iranian claims that the Syrian government has been engaged in a legitimate fight against domestic and foreign-backed ‘terrorists’ have been well within the ‘sphere of deviance’ (Hallin 1986), rarely articulated in Western mainstream media and political debate. A recent study (Frohlich, 2018), based upon an extensive analysis of media reporting, government ‘public relations’ and NGO communications across a series of conflicts including Syria, confirmed that Western media reporting tended to reinforce government positions (Frohlich and Jungblot, 2018: 103). One chapter in this study noted the absence of Russian media and Russian perspectives from European parliamentary debates responding to the alleged use of a biological weapon in Syria, 2013 (Berganza, Herrero-Jimnez and Carratala, 2018). Another recent study, on war correspondents, noted how coverage of the death of journalist Marie Colvin by CNN ‘focused heavily on the apparently ahistorical evil of the Assad regime, glossing over any tough questions about the international politics that may have contributed to the war in Syria (Palmer, 2018: p. 152). Palmer also notes the political bias in Colvin’s own reporting:- ‘Colvin herself was also aligned with western political sentiments in this report … Rather than serving as an objective eyewitness, then, in death Colvin was linked to a very distinctive political perspective’ (Palmer 2018: 154 & 157).[iii]
That Western media have aligned themselves with those of Western governments should come as no surprise. Academic works have repeatedly and consistently evidenced the close proximity between media and government positions especially during war (e.g. Paletz and Bennett, 1994; Hallin, 1986; Robinson et al 2010) as well as the prevalence of war propaganda (Taylor, 2002) in which conflicts are cast in simplistic and dichotomous terms, good vs. evil. It would be very surprising if future studies of western media coverage of the Syrian war would find any evidence that significantly diverges from the two studies described above.
But what has contributed to the dominant ‘narrative’ regarding Syria? What follows is a preliminary outline of what we understand to be important elements of how the information environment has been shaped with respect to the war in Syria and the focus here is on elements associated with the UK.
https://www.researchgate.net/public...racies_and_War_Propaganda_in_the_21st_Century
Interesting chapter for any with time to read it and bears directly on the current situation insofar as you see people's heightened hysteria regarding "Russian propaganda".
In general academics, politicians and publics do not have a very strong grasp of the role of propaganda within democracies. Indeed, across elite groups in society, which include politicians, journalists who work for the corporate media and major public service outlets and academics, the idea that propaganda is central to democratic societies is usually met with laughter or anger. The idea that the public mind is being manipulated by powerful actors is sometimes treated as absurd or simplistic. At the same time, those people who are a part of the elite political centre ground perceive themselves as free from the influences of propaganda, uniquely positioned to understand what is true and what is false in the world around them. Propaganda might be something that the extreme right or the extreme left partake in, or it might be a problem with respect to foreign interference (witness the claims regarding alleged Russian meddling in Western politics), but it is not a problem vis-à-vis ‘mainstream’ media and political discourse.
This chapter takes issue with this belief so far as it applies to war and conflict and argues that war propaganda is central to contemporary democracies and, in fact, so central that democratic credentials of those states is in doubt. The chapter starts by defining what is meant by the term propaganda, describing its historical roots and helping explain the current lack of awareness of propaganda. The chapter then explores the case of the 2011-2019 Syrian war in order to highlight some of the key features of propaganda activities in contemporary democracies (focusing on the United Kingdom). This exploratory case study, based upon on-going research, indicates the multiple sites at which propaganda can be seen to be generated and, more broadly, helps us to understand how and why publics have been misled as to the reality of Western government involvement in the Syrian war. In conclusion, it is argued that it is untenable to see the Syrian War propaganda as an aberration or unique case and that, instead, it is indicative of a malaise in contemporary democracies. Until these propaganda activities are properly addressed, genuinely democratic politics involving honest and consensual debate will remain out of reach.
What is Propaganda?
Over time the term propaganda has come to be understood to mean highly manipulative and deceptive persuasive communication that occurs mainly in authoritarian political systems or, in a democracy during the exceptional conditions of war. The academic study of propaganda reflects this understanding with a large volume of literature exploring propaganda during wartime (especially World Wars One and Two, and now increasingly the Cold War era) or exploring propaganda in non-democratic states. As argued elsewhere (Bakir, Herring, Miller and Robinson 2019) this perception is incorrect. In fact, propaganda has been an integral feature of democratic political systems since the early 20th century. Propaganda, or non-consensual organized persuasive communication (Bakir et al 2019), involves organized attempts to promote particular agendas through a complex array of communicative techniques which are principally manipulative in nature and involve various forms of deception as well as incentivization and coercion. For example, deception can occur through straightforward lying but also, and more commonly, through omission, distortion of facts and misdirection (Bakir et al 2019). As such, the promotion of one-sided interpretations of an issue can be profoundly deceptive via omissions and distortions. At the same time when sources present themselves as independent and neutral, whilst actually being funded and supported by particular political actors, this is also a form of propaganda through deception. Propaganda can also include incentivization and coercion. An example of the former is the promise of tax cuts during election campaigns. An example of the latter is the dropping of surrender leaflets in battle zones whereby the threat of lethal force is part of persuading combatants to surrender (Bakir et al, 2019). The latter two propaganda tactics also highlight the fact that propaganda is about more than just messaging via linguistic and visual communication but can also involve action in the ‘real’ world and so-called ‘propaganda of the deed’. The common thread throughout all of these persuasive communication techniques is that they involve a non-consensual process of persuasion: people are persuaded to believe something or to act in a particular way either through deception or because they have been incentivized or coerced. In short, their beliefs or actions are not freely chosen. Propaganda, then, is primarily manipulative in nature and, in general terms, incompatible with democratic requirements pertaining to free debate and citizen autonomy. Citizens who have been deceived, incentivized or coerced cannot be accurately described as having formed their opinions freely.
A reason why contemporary elites and publics have insufficient awareness of quite how undemocratic their supposedly democratic political systems actually are is that propaganda has been obfuscated by a euphemism industry which has sought to relabel propaganda as public relations (PR) or strategic communication, to name two of many examples. Indeed, the 20th century propagandist Edward Bernays recollected that ‘propaganda got to be a bad word because of the Germans … using it [during the First World War]. So what I did was to … find some other words. So we found the words Counsel on Public Relations’ (Bernays cited in Miller and Dinan, 2008: 5). Philip Taylor noted how a euphemism industry has prevailed across Western democracies whereby terms such as public relations, strategic communication and perception management have come to be used to label activities that would have historically been referred to as propaganda (Taylor 2002). He states that this rebranding exercise has been used to conceal the fact that democracies use propaganda. With respect to ‘business propaganda’, otherwise known as advertising, Carey (1997) notes that its success ‘in persuading us, for so long, that we are free from propaganda is one of the most significant achievements of the twentieth century’. In short, although ubiquitous to modern democracies, awareness of propaganda has been largely erased from our collective consciousness.
Running hand-in-hand with this lack of awareness is a relatively weak understanding of the number and range of institutions in modern democracies that can and do become involved in propaganda activities. Often, when people think of propaganda, they think of governments and states as its primary source. However, as detailed recently (Miller and Robinson 2019; Robinson 2018; 2019), many institutions can become involved in either the production or relaying of propaganda. For example, Herman and Chomsky (1988) have famously described how mass media function largely as propaganda tools for powerful political and business interests whilst universities, for a similar set of reasons, can also become a part of propaganda activities (Herring and Robinson, 2003). Both journalists and academics work within large organisations with commercial imperatives and shared interests with other powerful actors (e.g. government and big business) and this inevitably creates a broad structural-level constraint on their activities. Both are also frequently reliant upon ‘official sources’ for information and, when putting forward arguments that challenge power, can be subjected to unfair criticism or ‘flak’. Think tanks (Parmar, 2004; Scott-Smith, 2014) and NGOs (non-governmental organisations) can also be involved in propaganda, pushing manipulated and deceptive information into the public sphere in order to promote particular agendas. Finally, across popular culture, propaganda and ideological imperatives have been identified, which include associations between the intelligence services and media industries (Schou 2016: Secker and Alford, 2019). None of this is to say that all of these institutions are inherently propagandistic. Only that they can and do become caught up in propaganda activities and in ways which are incompatible with normal and justified expectations regarding their roles in a democratic society: we reasonably expect mass media to relay truthful and accurate news, that our universities are places for independent and rigorous research and teaching free from the influences of power, that think tanks and NGOs when promoting an issue do so in a way that avoids manipulative communication (such as deception, incentivization or coercion). Examples of propaganda across some of these ‘sites of production’ will be highlighted in the subsequent section that explores propaganda and the case of the 2011-19 war in Syria.
As is in all wars (Taylor, 1992), the Syrian conflict has been accompanied by sharply differing perspectives and extensive propaganda. The focus of this exploratory case study is to identify some of the key mechanisms through which Western public perceptions of the war have been shaped. However, before doing so it is necessary to briefly describe the war and the predominant ways in which it has been presented to Western audiences.
Background to the War and Western Political and Media Narratives
Civil disturbances and violence started in Syria in 2011 and occurred against the backdrop of the so-called ‘Arab Spring’. By 2012, violence had escalated and a leaked US Department of Defense report stated that the conflict was taking a ‘clear sectarian direction’, that ‘the Salafist, the Muslim Brotherhood, and AGI are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria’ and that multiple external actors were involved: ‘The West, Gulf countries, and Turkey support the opposition; while Russia, China, and Iran support the regime’.[ii] One important element of the war, at least from the perspective of understanding the position of Western governments, is the US-Saudi covert operation known as Timber Sycamore. The operation was described by the New York Times as a ‘$1 Billion Secret C.I.A war in Syria’ (Mazzetti, Goldman and Schmidt, 2017) and involved an agreement between the CIA and Saudi Arabia aimed at supporting groups seeking to overthrow the Syrian government (see also Berger 2016 and Porter 2017). Recent work published by investigative journalist Maxime Chaix (2019) claims that Operation Timber Sycamore can actually be traced as far back as October 2011 when the CIA was operating via the UK’s MI6 intelligence service in order to avoid having to seek Congressional approval. Today, after eight years of war, it appears that the Syrian government is close to regaining control of most of its territory although the future dynamics of the conflict remain uncertain.
In broad terms, Western politicians and mainstream/corporate media have largely presented the war as a simple struggle between pro-democratic rebels and a ruthless regime. This representation of the war has emphasized allegations of war crimes against the Syrian government (alleged use of chemical weapons against civilians and torture) and downplayed both the sectarian nature of opposition groups and the extensive involvement of external actors other than Russia and Iran. Other perspectives have remained marginalized across Western media. For example, Syrian, Russian and Iranian claims that the Syrian government has been engaged in a legitimate fight against domestic and foreign-backed ‘terrorists’ have been well within the ‘sphere of deviance’ (Hallin 1986), rarely articulated in Western mainstream media and political debate. A recent study (Frohlich, 2018), based upon an extensive analysis of media reporting, government ‘public relations’ and NGO communications across a series of conflicts including Syria, confirmed that Western media reporting tended to reinforce government positions (Frohlich and Jungblot, 2018: 103). One chapter in this study noted the absence of Russian media and Russian perspectives from European parliamentary debates responding to the alleged use of a biological weapon in Syria, 2013 (Berganza, Herrero-Jimnez and Carratala, 2018). Another recent study, on war correspondents, noted how coverage of the death of journalist Marie Colvin by CNN ‘focused heavily on the apparently ahistorical evil of the Assad regime, glossing over any tough questions about the international politics that may have contributed to the war in Syria (Palmer, 2018: p. 152). Palmer also notes the political bias in Colvin’s own reporting:- ‘Colvin herself was also aligned with western political sentiments in this report … Rather than serving as an objective eyewitness, then, in death Colvin was linked to a very distinctive political perspective’ (Palmer 2018: 154 & 157).[iii]
That Western media have aligned themselves with those of Western governments should come as no surprise. Academic works have repeatedly and consistently evidenced the close proximity between media and government positions especially during war (e.g. Paletz and Bennett, 1994; Hallin, 1986; Robinson et al 2010) as well as the prevalence of war propaganda (Taylor, 2002) in which conflicts are cast in simplistic and dichotomous terms, good vs. evil. It would be very surprising if future studies of western media coverage of the Syrian war would find any evidence that significantly diverges from the two studies described above.
But what has contributed to the dominant ‘narrative’ regarding Syria? What follows is a preliminary outline of what we understand to be important elements of how the information environment has been shaped with respect to the war in Syria and the focus here is on elements associated with the UK.
https://www.researchgate.net/public...racies_and_War_Propaganda_in_the_21st_Century
Interesting chapter for any with time to read it and bears directly on the current situation insofar as you see people's heightened hysteria regarding "Russian propaganda".
I wonder if they'll ban Engels, infact, I wonder if Manchester will be sanctioned for inspiring Marx and Engels
The problem with Niall Ferguson (and I really doubt you would quote an opinion piece, academic text or book of his on other topics) is that he feels the need to always be contrarian. Sometimes it is interesting but it gets a bit tiring when you notice the pattern.
He's talking out of both sides of his mouth so much these days. When it comes to Russia "sanctions won't be enough to cause any change in course", when it comes to Iran "we need maximum pressure and sanctions to force change in course". The only constant is political expediency where he has seemingly entrenched himself as a thinker only for the right, who must therefore take potshots at the US/UK left (regardless of where they land on a broader spectrum) and their actions in government.
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Probably not. But I vetted this one three ways. I would also add that I do less looking at the name of the person writing the piece than I do at the content there written. Redirecting things to a personal level is whataboutism as it actually exists, the way people move from policy to personality because they dislike the policy. Anyway, it seems a legitimate read on the situation according to people who are either very pro-Ukrainian or just pro-Ukrainian. I also don't agree with all of his political opinions and framing but his factual reporting doesn't seem to be in doubt here.
The tweet's point about how the US and NATO will gladly "fight the Russians to every last Ukrainian", I agree with. Whatever else is stated, that is the policy actually being undertaken. Decisions as to how much and how to fight are being left up to Ukraine, all they're being provided are weapons and intel.
The analysis of the military situation I don't know, but I don't think Ferguson necessarily knows either. Again, we have no publicly available intel about the disposition, strength and plans of the Ukrainian military. Negative views, positive views (like the report just now that they have encircled Russian forces NW of Kiev), I'm discounting all of them unless they come with a bit more "meat on the bone" in the form of "these Russian forces are here, have moved this far in x days while defeating/facing no opposition, can encircle Ukrainian forces by linking up with Russian forces over here" type of thing.
The part about the meaning of the hypersonic missile launch is where he really does himself a disfavor. Maybe the Russians did it to prove something, but the message is pointless. To use a weapon or delivery system on a target that could have been hit by an inferior weapons system proves nothing to anyone. In fact you just gave the US their first or a further look at the operational capability of your system. Would be like the US somehow putting a conventional explosive on a Trident SLBM and launching it from the Pacific ocean to Somalia to hit a target that could have been hit by a drone. Woop-de-do, we know you have the weapon, we assume it works, using it when there is no advantage in doing so means very little.
Yeah, I agree with all of that (re military situation, that's fluid and no one except high-level commanders, intel officers, and politicians which overlap with those really know, but here I don't think he's saying much that the NYT isn't; also, I'm taking stories from each side with enormous skepticism).
Based on the image, I'm assuming he's at the stepping off the stool stage of Flying Without Wings.
You could say its a combination of both. Having a psychotic, totalitarian strongman chest pounding atop the world's largest arsenal of nukes is obviously not ideal to anyone, nor is a mass slaughter of civilians in Ukraine.
Goes back to the point regarding what you think (or what the West thinks) Putin's war aims are.
https://www.newsweek.com/putins-bombers-could-devastate-ukraine-hes-holding-back-heres-why-1690494
There isn't a conclusive way of knowing, but as someone else said, do we think retrospectively that Putin thought he could take a country for 44m people with an armed force that is combat hardened and well-funded with only 200k soldiers when the US had about three times that number in Iraq (including allies and Kurds) for a much smaller task?
The above newsweek article is interesting.
Even if his aims in Ukraine were benign (they're obviously not), then it would still be a good idea to get rid of him. No one other than Putin and his inner circle benefit from his continued venal and predatory exploitation of Russia and its neighbors.
Yeah, I don't think his war aims are benign (obviously self-interested to whatever metric you want to weigh it), I just don't see it being easy to get rid of him. Not in the traditional sense of the internal coup, anyway. On the other hand, he is 69 years of age and given the state runs through him, you have to wonder how much longer that can last. Might not be insane to think that he's trying to leave Russia in a steadfast geopolitical position where he can step down and be internally secure (if Russia has to maintain the course Putin and his cadre have set, which seems more likely by the day).
It's the "we make mistakes" or "we're not perfect" line that gets trotted out in defense of Western wars time and time again. It's been a thing for seventy years now.
I did say that China was the primary US target about three or four weeks ago and that the US has pursued a policy of simultaneous containment of each, which was met with ridicule. It's entirely true, in case anyone is wondering.
Not surprised by Wolff saying this. It remains to be seen how much the US is willing to sanction China.