U.S. Military Covertly Pays to Run Stories in Iraqi Press

[Siegmund]

U.S. Military Covertly Pays to Run Stories in Iraqi Press
Troops write articles presented as news reports. Some officers object to the practice.

By Mark Mazzetti and Borzou Daragahi, Times Staff Writers


WASHINGTON — As part of an information offensive in Iraq, the U.S. military is secretly paying Iraqi newspapers to publish stories written by American troops in an effort to burnish the image of the U.S. mission in Iraq.

The articles, written by U.S. military "information operations" troops, are translated into Arabic and placed in Baghdad newspapers with the help of a defense contractor, according to U.S. military officials and documents obtained by the Los Angeles Times.

Many of the articles are presented in the Iraqi press as unbiased news accounts written and reported by independent journalists. The stories trumpet the work of U.S. and Iraqi troops, denounce insurgents and tout U.S.-led efforts to rebuild the country.

Some people have noted the underlying duplicity:

"Here we are trying to create the principles of democracy in Iraq. Every speech we give in that country is about democracy. And we're breaking all the first principles of democracy when we're doing it," said a senior Pentagon official who opposes the practice of planting stories in the Iraqi media.

But others have taken a more typically American, pragmatic "ethical" perspective:

Daniel Kuehl, an information operations expert at National Defense University at Ft. McNair in Washington, said that he did not believe that planting stories in Iraqi media was wrong. But he questioned whether the practice would help turn the Iraqi public against the insurgency.

"I don't think that there's anything evil or morally wrong with it," he said. "I just question whether it's effective." ...

The storyboards, several of which were obtained by The Times, read more like press releases than news stories. They often contain anonymous quotes from U.S. military officials; it is unclear whether the quotes are authentic.

"Absolute truth was not an essential element of these stories," said the senior military official who spent this year in Iraq.

[Entire article, three web pages long]

[Dr. Solar Wolff]

This story doesn't say so but we have found out that the CIA actually funded this project out of a black budget so it would never show up if someone was looking for a money-trail.

It is not widely known but the CIA devotes huge amounts of money into the mass media. They influence news stories, make up news, plant magazine articles, radio and TV broadcasts and even buy whole magazines and possilbly other forms of media.

To the CIA, a free press means they are free to buy as much as they want.

[Corvin]

Hello dear Friends

The reality is that by definition any source of information is a weapon. We want it or not, if CIA or other services use information sources for their own benefit, this is Legal with respect to the action that they carry out. What I am trying to say, is that we are here right now because of this type of policy allow us to build and use an information network simple because we are interrested in things that the rest of people do not want to listen or acknowledge, thus they are responsible for what they want to be served. Lets not be angry with the use of the other information networks in this way. When we will build (if ever) our ideal world, then we can decide if we need information sources at all.

Truly yours
Corvin Von Amber