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Censorship in the Empire
Michael Gaddy
"All the news that's new and approved by the US
Army, the sweetest-smelling army in the world."
~ Robin Williams as Adrian Croneaur, Good
Morning Vietnam
The Neocon American State-Corporatocracy learned
its lessons well from Vietnam Their "lessons learned" acknowledged
truth from the war zone could be hazardous for those who desire
continuous wars for peace. They also realized the blind dedication
of military personnel is essential to creating an empire.
Therefore, "perfumed princes" are much more desirable in uniform
than warriors. Thus the reason for the dismissal of General Eric
Shinseki as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the rise to power of
General Richard Meyers at the onset of the Dubya administration in
2001.
Knowing full well that the constant video and
unfettered news reports from the war zone and pictures of coffins
returning to America bearing the fruits of war were detrimental to
their efforts, the Bush administration moved to ensure such
reporting did not occur in "their" war. As a result, the War
Department created and carried out the idea of embedded reporters.
Embedding reporters with military units made it wonderfully easy to
control media and therefore the news, subjecting them to censorship
at the base level of operation.
The Department of Continual War for Peace would
have everyone believe the "embedding" was done to facilitate the
dissemination of truth to the masses. The exact opposite was their
desired goal.
The Secretary of Defense contended in his
directive, "that media will have long-term minimally restrictive
access to air, ground and naval forces through embedding." The DOD
document also states, "We need to tell the factual story – good or
bad – before others seed the media with disinformation and
distortions…" The DOD and the military are providing disinformation
and distortion from the war in Iraq to the citizens of the US as
standard operating procedure. (See the DOD directive on embedded
reporters)
A prime example of suppressing the truth and
ignoring the DOD directive is exemplified in the actions of a
particular military unit and its commander in the Iraq Theater of
Operations. While these actions may or may not be typical, they are
revealing.
A Stryker Squadron of the 25th Infantry Division,
commanded by a Lt. Colonel, provides great insight into how the
media has actually been handled, how they are controlled, and what
happens to them when they do not toe-the-line. From the very
beginning of this unit’s deployment to Iraq in October of 2004, the
SCO (squadron commander) had a standing policy with embedded
reporters that any story for publication must be submitted to him
and his staff for approval before it was transmitted to the
reporter’s employers.
In January of 2005, a traffic control patrol of
this unit, accompanied by embedded reporter Chris Hondros,
encountered a car coming towards them on the streets of Tal-Afar.
For some reason the driver of the car did not stop as directed and
was met with a hail of gunfire. When the car came to rest it was
found to contain Iraqi parents and their children. The parents were
killed in the gunfire, but the children miraculously survived with
only minor injuries. Pictures from that tragic event can be found
here.
Returning to the Forward Operating Base (FOB
Sykes) in Tal-Afar, Hondros filed his report and pictures without
approval from the Colonel or his staff. When the Colonel learned of
this he called Brigade (25th Infantry Division) in Mosul and told
them Hondros was not playing ball and had him sent back to Brigade--
so much for telling the factual story – good or bad. Sources tell
me Hondros asked for permission to return and do a follow-up on the
story but was told he would have to do it on his own without any
military escort to accompany him in Iraq. Hondros recently received
an award for his reporting of the incident.
Later in the spring of 2005, a bus loaded with
Iraqi Army personnel was hit by an IED between Sinjar and Tal-Afar,
resulting in a large number of casualties. Another reporter
embedded with the above-mentioned unit asked for permission to be
taken to the scene and file a report but permission from the
Colonel was denied. The reporter proceeded to the scene anyway. The
Colonel had him arrested and sought to have him placed in the
detention center in Tal-Afar, but the officer in charge of the
facility refused to place the reporter in the same center with
suspected terrorists. The Colonel had the reporter placed under
guard at all times until he had him removed from his area of
operations and returned to Brigade headquarters in Mosul.
Obviously, Brigade was beginning to see a pattern and "embeds"
assigned to this unit became extremely rare.
One of the greatest examples of hypocrisy in this
war involved this unit and their commander. The Colonel was
conducting a sweep of an area in Tal-Afar. One of the tactics
employed in this sweep was the placing of pro-American propaganda
posters on the walls of Iraqi businesses. The Colonel noticed a
poster written in Arabic on the door of a market and asked his
interpreter what the poster said. The interpreter replied that it
was anti-American in nature. The Colonel had the owner of the
market brought to him and asked about the poster. When the owner
replied that he did not put up the poster, the Colonel asked why he
had not removed it and he replied he did not want to have his head
chopped off. The commander had the storeowner placed under arrest
and put in the unit’s detention facility as a suspected insurgent.
The Colonel ordered the market left unsecured. Looters immediately
entered the store and it was emptied in a matter of minutes. When
the storeowner was being interrogated at the FOB, he asked if the
United States was conducting a war in Iraq to bring the people
freedom and democracy, why was he denied the right to freedom of
speech and expression? Game, set, match, Iraqi businessman.
Many were the soldiers, both officer and enlisted,
who questioned the conduct of this commander in the theater of
operations during his unit’s tour of duty in Iraq. One officer
actually gave the Colonel a copy of the Geneva Convention when he
was ordered to do something he felt was illegal. The Colonel fired
the officer and had him reassigned to Brigade. Command and DOD
obviously found nothing wrong with the Colonel’s battlefield
conduct; he was promoted to full Colonel (O-6) shortly after
returning to the US.
This Colonel was not the only commander seeking to
keep the truth of his conduct from being reported; his Brigade had
three Majors, three Captains and approximately one dozen enlisted
personnel whose entire job was to spin the truth into palatable
form for dissemination to the American public plus managing the
information that was published by our lackeys in the Iraqi media.
They were known as the IO, or information operation. Many of these
military personnel were trained and specialized in psychological
warfare.
Our government actually trains military personnel
to obscure the truth from the citizens it claims to defend. This
makes a mockery of the DOD’s professed goals as stated in their own
directives. Surely these soldiers’ talents could be better used in
a combat zone. Creating "all the news that is new and approved" for
their enemies and their fellow countrymen should be a subject of
concern for all Americans who claim an allegiance to the First
Amendment.
June 29, 2006
Michael Gaddy, an Army veteran of Vietnam,
Grenada, and Beirut, lives in the Four Corners area of the American
Southwest.
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Previous Articles by Michael Gaddy
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At What They Do
06.13.06
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07.25.05
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The Dynamics Of Wars Sired By Liars
06.01.05
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