Winds of Change.NET: Speaking Of Propaganda

May 4, 2008

Speaking Of Propaganda

by Armed Liberal at May 4, 2008 11:12 PM

Here's Dave Meyer at OpenLeft getting it pretty much - from my point of view - completely wrong:

I'm not exactly surprised that the administration's military propaganda program has received so little attention. The establishment has never demonstrated any understanding of the war in Iraq, of why it's such an incoherent, doomed venture. The propaganda program revealed last Monday is not a sideshow. It's an essential component of the only remaining strategic rationale for the continuation of the war -- preventing damage to America's image.

In the last year of her life, Hannah Arendt offered a retrospective on Vietnam; Home to Roost is printed in the Responsibility and Judgment collection published back in 2003. Her prescient insight was that the entire "not very honorable and not very rational enterprise was exclusively guided by the needs of a superpower to create for itself an image which would convince the world that it was indeed 'the mightiest power on earth.'" Eventually, the war was maintained solely "to avoid admitting defeat and to keep the image...intact."

Well, yes, that's partly true. But it stops a little too soon, because it doesn't ask why it matters that we had the image as the mightiest power on earth. Because that answer matters more than a bit; and the simple answer is that as Handel talks about Sun Tzu in Masters of Modern Warfare:

Among the force multipliers recommended by Sun Tzu are maneuver; reliance on intelligence; the extensive use of deception and diversionary measures to achieve surprise; the 'indirect approach'; and the use of psychological measures to undermine the enemies will to fight.

We were, in the 1960's and 1970's, in a conflict which was very real. Winning that conflict - as we did - could have involved the direct application of force, which in the case of two nuclear-armed superpowers would have been catastrophic, and so there were a series of indirect, smaller conflicts of which Vietnam was one.

Now I've talked about Vietnam more than once, and will talk about it again soon. But let's accept for a moment that that's what Vietnam was actually about, and put aside the legitimate moral qualms about pushing back the Soviets over the bodies of dead Vietnamese for later discussion.

But let's not - as Meyers does - casually dismiss the issue of 'image' as something that's really about the self-image of a bunch of leaders (although it is, as well), but as one of the tools in any conflict or negotiation.

The official obsession with image developed over time in the Vietnam era.

That's just so historically inaccurate that I don't know what to say except 'bullshit'. We officially started shaping image in World War I, but Lincoln was active in doing it doing the Civil War, and John Adams did a little bit of it himself.

With Iraq, it was central from the beginning. Before the war, Andy Card told Elisabeth Bumiller that "from a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August." Tom Friedman thought invading Iraq would communicate a useful "Suck. On. This." Jonah Goldberg glowingly attributed to Michael Ledeen the idea that "every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business." There are countless examples, from high government officials to low pundits, of endorsements of Iraq for the message it would send, as an easy way to dispel the myth of American weakness. The Iraq war is a multi-trillion dollar public relations campaign, aimed at persuading hostile forces of our "strength."

Well, that could be seen as a good thing. Here's noted pro-war commentator Armed Liberal in March 2003, just before the invasion:

The reality is that Clinton's team was highly focused on terrorism...but on terrorism as crime, as opposed to as an instrument of war. We focused on identifying the actual perpetrators, and attempting to arrest them or cause their arrest.
This is pretty much the typical liberal response to 9/11. Send in SWAT, pull 'em out in cuffs, and let's sit back and watch the fun on Court TV.
I've been ambivalent about whether this is a good strategy conceptually, and looking at the history...in which we're batting about .600 in arresting and trying Islamist terrorists...I have come to the realization that the fact is that it hasn't worked. The level and intensity of terrorist actions increased, all the way through 9/11 and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan.
And a part of what I have realized is that as long as states - particularly wealthy states - are willing to explicitly house terrorists and their infrastructure, or implicitly turn a blind eye to their recruitment and funding, we can't use the kind of 'police' tactics that worked against Baader-Meinhof or the Red Army Faction. The Soviet Union and it's proxies offered limited support to these terrorist gangs, but they didn't have a national population to recruit from and bases and infrastructure that only a state can provide.
So unless we shock the states supporting terrorism into stopping, the problem will get worse. Note that it will probably get somewhat worse if we do...but that's weather, and I'm worried about climate.

There are a number of engines fueling the Islamist movement, one of which is the belief by its members that they can win, and by their state sponsors that supporting them is a good idea.

Now I'll point out that the latter hasn't worked out so well so far, for a variety of reasons - one of which is, in fact, the fact that we are so deeply divided internally about this war. Now the antiwar left can shrug and suggest that saying this is a variant of the 'Green Lantern' theory (there hasn't been a Green Lantern movie yet, so I'm not 100% sure how this metaphor works) but they need to own up to the notion that it's real (it may be that they were right - I'm not presuming that as a condition of my argument, because if they are right or wrong about the war, it's still true that public opposition to the war isn't without impact).

So let's not discount public-relations campaigns; and let's accept the fact that shaping the views of our opponents may be more important and effective than killing them.

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Comments

#1 from Dave at 2:21 am on May 05, 2008

So let's not discount public-relations campaigns; and let's accept the fact that shaping the views of our opponents may be more important and effective than killing them.

There is a dramatic difference between shaping other nations views, and shaping our own. Promoting via schools, support of Democracy, reestablishing the USIA as independent from State would help.
Don't forget that the statements of the favored Generals were then used by the Administration to buttress their own arguments and marginalize those that disagreed - not just to inform the people. That's a bit more than what you make it seem.

The administration chose to go about this in a dishonest way - instead of being open about what they were doing, and perhaps changing it with the knowledge it would be in sunshine.

_divided internally about this war. _
Doesn't it interest you that a large part of this stems in part from the 'public relations campaign' from 5-6 years ago(WMD etc), along with the 'public relations campaign' that those who were not in the support of the administration should be marginalized, insulted, and made to feel less of an American?

#2 from Jeff Medcalf at 2:56 pm on May 05, 2008

Dave,

#3 from The Unbeliever at 4:03 pm on May 05, 2008

I generally agree with you, but this sticks out a bit:

There are a number of engines fueling the Islamist movement, one of which is the belief by its members that they can win, and by their state sponsors that supporting them is a good idea.

Isn't the problem that the Islamist's belief is fueled by religious assurances and the promises of martyrdom instead of cold, calculating, rational assessments of the odds of victory? I don't see how putting up the image of a global superpower would deter them. States, on the other hand, are supposed to be better at making these calculations, and they would be the proper targets of this image.

(there hasn't been a Green Lantern movie yet, so I'm not 100% sure how this metaphor works)

And God willing, there never will be a Green Lantern movie. Unfortunately we're at the point where special effects have caught up to the comic book depictions of the ring's powers, right when superhero movies are big. So I am more pessimistic about the odds of a horrible GL movie coming out, than I am that displaying iron will in the global theatre is a bad national policy, especially when faced with tactics (terrorism) which are specifically designed to publicly break an opponent's will.

#4 from Sepp at 5:11 pm on May 05, 2008

How do you reconcile all of this with the idea that the war in Iraq has done the US a great deal of harm on the propaganda front?

Propaganda cannot change reality completely, only bend it a little.

#5 from Davebo at 5:31 pm on May 05, 2008

Submitted without comment other than to say I agree. TPMCafe

#6 from Armed Liberal at 5:59 pm on May 05, 2008

I largely - but not entirely - agree as well.

A.L.

#7 from Armed Liberal at 6:02 pm on May 05, 2008

A.L.

#8 from J Aguilar at 8:39 pm on May 05, 2008

It's been about facts, more than propaganda.

Simply to change the focus in the Middle East from an Arab-Israeli (Muslim-Jew) conflict into a Sunni-Shia one constitue a progress by itself, a change that no Muslim mind will find easy to avoid considering.

Furthermore, America is no longer the country that support the local tyrant, another fact that it cannot help be considered.

Of course, oligarchies and governments will try to cover it up to their populations. Can that be changed?

The question of America being able again of conducting long operations overseas is also an impacting fact, but at another level, the level of the administrators and governors, whether Islamists or not.

#9 from Dave at 1:57 am on May 06, 2008

It's a global information exchange we have now. Care to explain how we can shape foreign images of ourselves without that same information coming back here? When people get upset with the US for putting stories into Iraqi papers (remember that?), even though those stories are true, it is not possible to differentiate between shaping opinion domestically and abroad.
It's legal to plant stories in Iraqi papers - unethical if you choose to view it that way, but legal in all ways. The difference is intent - if we intend to produce information for Burma about how Democracy would aid their country, and someone takes a picture of the flyer and posts it on Flickr... Well, it's no different from shortwave operates listening to VOA in the 50s, even though that information could not be distributed in the US. Even now, VOA can be accessed by streaming or podcasts.

Take This , which was aimed at demonizing Zarqawi in Iraq - while saying that the domestic audience was a target as well, not an after effect. Looing back now, it's easy to say we were hoodwinked(well, some of us) into believing he was more influential than in reality.

Dave, I'd be interested in what you think the legitimate boundary in shaping internal discussion is; it's done all the time in matters of domestic policy by the right and the left. Is your assumption that the Administration can't do anything to promote it's views on foreign policy? that's a pretty broad reading of Smith-Mundt, dontcha think?
In no way do I believe they should be banned from promoting foreign policy - for example, I brought up the idea of sunshine, and I had a similar comment in an earlier thread. AS to Smith-Mundt, I'd find it more compelling in the 1912ish law that prohibits publicity experts without being specifically appropriated, as well as the text on many acts that state (paraphrased)'No funds may be used to pay for propoganda or lobby Congress'.

If these Generals (and others more critical) were given access, and then a press bot came out and stated this, and in no way would critical opinions be shunned in the future - how much of this story goes away, and how much more credibility do the statements gain? Even if behind the scenes they lobbied hard in order to make sure criticisms were muted, as often happens. Or asked if there was anything critical if they could sit on it for a couple of days.

As to boundaries? I'd say being truthful, and being upright about the activities - if you cannot meet those it's no longer shaping, it's control.
External is a different beast.

#10 from Alchemist at 2:55 pm on May 06, 2008

I saw this a few days ago, but have had little time to reply, or think this through completely coherently (the new puppy crying at night isn't helping either).

Nonetheless, my not fully-formed idea is that the problem isn't the dessemination of information, but the dissemination of obviously flawed or easily detected misinformation campaigns. Iraqi's will not be optimistic because of fake reports of improving areas if they're still scared of the people hanging out in the streets.

It's like the latest advertising campaigns using viral marketing. Once a customer sees print advertising, hu realizes it's an ad campaign and takes the message with a grain of salt. However, if you hide advertising by making it appear real & natural, it becomes a more convincing argument. However, if that undercover advertisement is revealed, a significant customer backlash is expected.

#11 from J Aguilar at 8:24 pm on May 06, 2008

Iraqis can watch foreign TV, including Al Jazeera, through satellite: misinformation won't help, facts will.

That is a consequence of globalization.

Of course, Iraqi media should give a rose version of what is going on, since almost anyone else will protray the dark side, but you cannot supply misinformation because Iraqis speak Arab and just pointing a two feet dish towards Hotbird - small enough to fit on your camel - you can watch hundreds of channels in Arab.

On the contrary, you should say that what they saw when they zap into an European channel is making true in Iraq: they can live the same way.

IMHO disinformation only works today, beyond the usual dictatorships and tyrannies, if the people is isolated by a language barrier.