WAR: U.S. Military Pays Iraqi Newspapers to Run Pro U.S. Stories

curme-

I do not appreciate my statements being implied to say something they do not. I DID NOT say that "to do anything to win a war is bad for insurgents, but ok for the US." I stated that there are agreements between nations that are good, concerning the restriction of cruelty, genocide, etc. These laws are for eliminating things that are not any necessary part of war. However, these agreements do not and should not restrict psychological warfare, nor do they restrict any other action the US has taken in waging the Iraq war or in resolving the ongoing conflict. Why? Because they are part of the reality of war. As I stated already, denying reality doesn't change it. It is, however, a dishonorable and shameful way to live.

Originally posted by ShakyaHeir

Originally posted by Nygdan
For the people actually fighting and dying, winning has allways been the utmost concern. Its also not the concern of a government to have integrity, its supposed to get the job done, thats it.

Maybe coming from a Machiavellian perspective, but I think you'll find that most people think that the government should have integrity and that integrity should not be sacrificed to "get the job done". Of course the American government doesn't have a very good track record of putting integrity over doing whatever the hell they want...

"....the American government doesn't have a very good track record of putting integrity over doing whatever the hell they want".

'm sure Hitler had the same viewpoint.

Originally posted by marg6043

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
When did 'winning' become more important than integrity?

It was a time when I felt just like you, but it only got me depress the more I though about it.

I finally got out of it, is not worthed trying to figure out others, I came to the realization that many American people are just naive when it comes to the political leaders they think they are choosing out of free will.

I don't blame them anymore and I try no to be angry anymore, it's just that some no matter how wonderful they are they are just slower when it comes to see the light.

Originally posted by Nygdan
For the people actually fighting and dying, winning has always been the utmost concern. Its also not the concern of a government to have integrity, its supposed to get the job done, thats it.

Yes Nydgan fighting for a good cause it should always be to win at all cost. But when the good battler has been a corrupted battler from the beginning it will never end in victory but more than often it end up in the worst human waste in the history of the world.

The problem with governments to have a job done at all cost is that it tends to forget the mission that they were set up to accomplish, specially when it was not an honest mission to start with.

Sorry to say that so far the last thing that the Bush administration has done is to get the job done.

You can not win wars on ideology history has prove that already.

You can not earn public trust on lies and deception.

"You can not win wars on ideology history has prove that already".
False: Hitler, and Britain are but two examples.

Lies and deception? ... read, then the rest of the story at the link:

In the last 24 hours, DEBKAfile went back to its most reliable intelligence sources in the US and the Middle East, some of whom were actively involved in the subject before and during the Iraq war. They all stuck to their guns. As they have consistently informed DEBKAfile and DEBKA-Net-Weekly , Saddam Hussein’s unconventional weapons programs were present on the eve of the American-led invasion and quantities of forbidden materials were spirited out to Syria. Whatever Dr. Kay may choose to say now, at least one of these sources knows at first hand that the former ISG director received dates, types of vehicles and destinations covering the transfers of Iraqi WMD to Syria.

www.debka.com...

www.debka.com...

Saddam-Al-Qaeda connections:

www.weeklystandard.com...

www.freerepublic.com...

Please, DEBKA is about the most unreliable "source" I can think of, excepting perhaps the Weekly World News. They have an almost perfect record of inaccuracy and are little more than a propaganda rag.

The "Iraqi weapons in Syria" canard is a bad joke by people who think they can sucker the US into another war. The real story of "Iraq's WMD" is that they were destroyed towards the close of the first Gulf War because Saddam expected to get nuked by the US. He kept playing games with the inspectors in order to bluff Iran, who he believed intended to attack him.

This has been confirmed by the postwar interrogation of Iraqi officials liike Tariq Aziz, and in actuality, the US had reliable intel supporting this view by the mid-1990's. Unfortunately it wasn't what anyone wanted to hear.

[edit on 12/8/05 by xmotex]

However, these agreements do not and should not restrict psychological warfare, nor do they restrict any other action the US has taken in waging the Iraq war or in resolving the ongoing conflict. Why? Because they are part of the reality of war. As I stated already, denying reality doesn't change it. It is, however, a dishonorable and shameful way to live.

Let us try to follow exactly the same train of thougts you depict here so vividly.

As we all know by now, George W. Bush and his staff, have an eery resemblance to Saddam Hussain and his staff.

Both managed to declare wars based on pure greed, didn't care about the truthfull basis of the declaration of their wars, and don't give a damn about the lifes of their fighting men and women.
Both men are born liars, cruel and obviously not gifted with abundant intelligence.
Both give a damn about their citizens, or for what its worth, the rest of the world.
Both wrestled their way into power with abhoric tactics, and tend to keep that power, with all means.
Both are fond of scare tactics, and love an iron fist policy to keep their population in grips.
Both strongly support the thought that the end justifies the means.
Both act as religious man in public, but as heathens in private.
Both strive to amount as much fortune as possible, by all means.
Both were and are obnoxious of the needs of their citizens, they solely lined the pockets of close allies.
Both rely on a by far too huge army, and their appurtenances, such as totally non-cost effective military-industrial complexes.

Those seem enough reasons to declare war on George W. Bush, and neglect that little problem of the rest of those americans, since the precedent is layed infront of our eyes, GWB declared war on Saddam Hussain. Nobody else.
That is the only true reason left from that pack of lies told to the United Nations of the world. And that bit of oil.

Let's go and get him, he has the blood of uncountable thousands of people on his hands, and he's a fricken dictator.
And while we are there, let's forget for the moment why we came there, (to free those poor americans ofcourse, but damnit, they keep shooting at us and blowing us up, let's quickly label all of them as fricken terrorists), let's accept the status quo, for the sake of reality, and don't fall for tiny details like why in the first place we set off to invade a souvereign nation and fortify ourselfs in that once great country, untill those bloodthirsty americans can enjoy at last real democracy.
Oh yeah, let's not forget to "nationalize" all their oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and in Texas, we have to be compensated for all the effort we took to free those damn ungratefull americans.
And let's train those poor americans, who will do everything to feed their families, to become the next thought-police men, to keep the lid on all the rest of their unwilling countrymen.
And ofcourse we can't trust them for a long time to come, so we have to stay with a strong standing army, to protect all goodwilling americans.
And to protect the flow of their oil, we need a lot of compensation for our good intentions.


A little comparison can make "small" details a lot more comprehensible.

Why is it that anyone is surprised by this? The US Government has been doing this everywhere in the World, one more place isn't much of a surprise.

The US Government holds the reins on the US newspapers too, so one more isn't going to hurt. We don't hear 1/2 the stuff happening around the World anymore because of this, & somebody needs to do something about it.

It seems that the USA plans to continue the pro-Iraq-war propaganda because it 'might' work, even though 3/4 of US citizens think it's wrong.

It seems a bit two-faced when when people are crying about the use of 'anti-war' propaganda, Cindy Sheehan and Anti-Bush propaganda. If it's all well and good to use pro-USA, pro-Bush and pro-war propaganda by our own government and military, then it's fair to blast as much anti-war propaganda out there as anyone wishes.

They can't have it both ways.

How Useful is the US Propaganda in Iraq?

In a USA Today/CNN/Gallup survey released just before Christmas Day, 72 percent of Americans thought that it was "wrong for the US to pay Iraqi newspapers and journalists to publish and write stories about US efforts in Iraq." USA Today reported earlier this month, however, that the US actually plans to continue with the program and expand it to other countries, spending more than $300 million in the effort.

But somehow I don't think the US is going to benefit from this in the LONG RUN, which is something our government doesn't seem to be concerned with at all.

Clarke says the revelations have undermined the goal of the overall mission: to create a free Iraq and free Iraqis. That can't happen if burgeoning Iraqi newspapers are seen as tools of the United States or anyone else.