Waging the PR battle


"The lens of Vietnam" is getting old
Busy day today, and my trusty Palm m515 chose today to give up the ghost. So I have been running perpetually behind since this morning.

One of the things that has been bugging me is the assumption in the press that every crime committed by any member of the U.S. military is proof positive that all military types are baby-killing rapists just waiting to be unleashed, betting each other on the depraved atrocities they will commit.

I am not making excuses for the crimes making the headlines. Nor are the military authorities. But they are exceptions to the rules, not "business as usual." Just in case people have forgotten, the reason the press has learned of most of the crimes (including Abu Ghraib) is because of information made available by the military while investigating those same crimes.

Daniel Henninger makes the same observation.

The reason for viewing Haditha through the moral sextant of My Lai is that My Lai significantly altered the political status of Vietnam in the U.S. It became a totem for U.S. behavior in Vietnam. So it is only natural that the My Lai template, however ill-fitting, would be pressed against Haditha to see if this one lurid story would break the back of the entire Iraq enterprise. And so the chairman of the Joint Chiefs shows up on TV the Fourth of July--going on PR offense like any corporate product manager to ensure this isn't the one event that burns down the whole company. Fair or not, these are the new rules of political engagement in wartime America, and the government learns to play by them or risk being rolled off the field.

But what about the soldiers themselves? Nearly anyone who gets sucked into the media vortex--celebrity, CEO, sports hero--becomes mere cannon fodder, so assume the same for GIs involved in abuse or murder allegations. The Marines implicated in the Haditha incident are largely anonymous now, but each is being auditioned to play this war's Lt. William Calley. But first they have to be convicted of something.

The innocence or guilt of the individual soldiers implicated in Haditha or the other alleged abuse incidents is a lower-order concern to those fighting a PR war for the hearts and minds of the American people on Iraq. In the first effusion of media coverage of these events, the impression is weighted toward assuming guilt, and so when the pollsters call to ask about support for the war, the numbers fall. Mission accomplished--unless a Gen. Pace can jump quickly enough on the other side of the public-impression teeter-totter.

Shouldn't we know what happened before passing judgment?

It seems to me that the press and certain progressives are so dead set on destroying the Iraq war that they are willing to pay any price to do so. Even if it means overlooking the facts.

I believe that will backfire on them later.

— NeoWayland

Posted: Fri - July 7, 2006 at 05:35 PM  Tag


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