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Today's
Stories
September 2, 2003
Paul de Rooij
Predictable
Propaganda: Four Monts of US Occupation
Recent
Stories
August 30 / Sept. 1,
2003
Alexander Cockburn
Handmaiden
in Babylon: Annan, Vieiera de Mello and the Decline and Fall
of the UN
Saul Landau
Schwarzenegger
and Cuban Migration
Standard Schaefer
Who
Benefited from the Tech Bubble: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Gary Leupp
Mel Gibson's Christ on Trial
William S. Lind
Send the Neocons to Baghdad
Augustin Velloso
Aznar: Spain's Super Lackey
Jorge Mariscal
The Smearing of Cruz Bustamante
John Ross
A NAFTA for Energy? The US Looks to Suck Up Mexico's Power
Mickey Z.
War is a Racket: The Wisdom of Gen. Smedley Butler
Elaine Cassel
Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Show Isn't Winning Many Converts
Stan Cox
Pirates of the Caribbean: the WTO Comes to Cancun
Tom and Judy Turnipseed
Take Back Your Time Day
Adam Engel
The Red Badge of Knowledge: a Review of TDY
Adam Engel
An Eye on Intelligence: an Interview with Douglas Valentine
Susan Davis
Northfork,
an Accidental Review
Nicholas Rowe
Dance
and the Occupation
Mark Zepezauer
Operation
Candor
Poets' Basement
Albert, Guthrie and Hamod
Website of the Weekend
Downhill
Battle
August 29, 2003
Lenni Brenner
God
and the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party
Brian Cloughley
When in Doubt, Lie Your Head Off
Alice Slater
Bush Nuclear Policy is a Recipe for National Insecurity
David Krieger
What Victory?
Marjorie Cohn
The Thin Blue Line: How the US Occupation of Iraq Imperils International
Law
Richard Glen Boire
Saying Yes to Drugs!
Bister, Estrin and Jacobs
Howard Dean, the Progressive Anti-War Candidate? Some Vermonters
Give Their Views
Website of the Day
DirtyBush
August 28, 2003
Gilad Atzmon
The
Most Common Mistakes of Israelis
David Vest
Moore's
Monument: Cement Shoes for the Constitution
David Lindorff
Shooting Ali in the Back: Why the Pacification is Doomed
Chris Floyd
Cheap Thrills: Bush Lies to Push His War
Wayne Madsen
Restoring the Good, Old Term "Bum"
Elaine Cassel
Not Clueless in Chicago
Stan Goff
Nukes in the Dark
Tariq Ali
Occupied
Iraq Will Never Know Peace
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Behold, My Package
Website of the Day
Palestinian
Artists
August 27, 2003
Bruce Jackson
Little
Deaths: Hiding the Body Count in Iraq
John Feffer
Nuances and North Korea: Six Countries in Search of a Solution
Dave Riley
an Interview with Tariq Ali on the Iraq War
Lacey Phillabaum
Bush's Holy War in the Forests
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Website of the Day
The Dean Deception
August 26, 2003
Robert Fisk
Smearing the Dead
David Lindorff
The
Great Oil Gouge: Burning Up that Tax Rebate
Sarmad S. Ali
Baghdad is Deadlier Than Ever: the View of an Iraqi Coroner
Christopher Brauchli
Bush Administration Equates Medical Pot Smokers with Segregationists
Juliana Fredman
Collective Punishment on the West Bank: Dialysis, Checkpoints
and a Palestinian Madonna
Larry Siems
Ghosts of Regime Changes Past in Guatemala
Elaine Cassel
Onward, Ashcroft Soldiers!
Saul Landau
Bush:
a Modern Ahab or a Toy Action Figure?
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD
August 25, 2003
Kurt Nimmo
Israeli Outlaws in America
David Bacon
In Iraq, Labor Protest is a Crime
Thomas P. Healy
The Govs Come to Indy: Corps Welcome; Citizens Locked Out
Norman Madarasz
In an Elephant's Whirl: the US/Canada Relationship After the
Iraq Invasion
Salvador Peralta
The Politics of Focus Groups
Jack McCarthy
Who Killed Jancita Eagle Deer?
Uri Avnery
A Drug
for the Addict
August 23/24, 2003
Forrest Hylton
Rumsfeld
Does Bogota
Robert Fisk
The Cemetery at Basra
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity
Insults to Intelligence
Andrew C. Long
Exile on Bliss Street: The Terrorist Threat and the English Professor
Jeremy Bigwood
The Toxic War on Drugs: Monsanto Weedkiller Linked to Powerful
Fungus
Jeffrey St. Clair
Forest
or Against Us: the Bush Doctor Calls on Oregon
Cynthia McKinney
Bring the Troops Home, Now!
David Krieger
So Many Deaths, So Few Answers: Approaching the Second Anniversary
of 9/11
Julie Hilden
A Constitutional Right to be a Human Shield
Dave Lindorff
Marketplace
Medicine
Standard Schaefer
Unholy Trinity: Falwell's Anti-Abortion Attack on Health and
Free Speech
Catherine Dong
Kucinich and FirstEnergy
José Tirado
History Hurts: Why Let the Dems Repeat It?
Ron Jacobs
Springsteen's America
Gavin Keeney
The Infernal Machine
Adam Engel
A Fan's Notations
William Mandel
Five Great Indie Films
Walt Brasch
An American Frog Fable
Poets' Basement
Reiss, Kearney, Guthrie, Albert and Alam
Website of the Weekend
The Hutton Inquiry
August 22, 2003
Carole Harper
Post-Sandinista
Nicaragua
John Chuckman
George Will: the Marquis of Mendacity
Richard Thieme
Operation Paperclip Revisited
Chris Floyd
Dubya Indemnity: Bush Barons Beyond the Reach of Law?
Issam Nashashibi
Palestinians
and the Right of Return: a Rigged Survey
Mary Walworth
Other People's Kids
Ron Jacobs
The
Darkening Tunnel
Website of the Day
Current Energy
August 21, 2003
Robert Fisk
The US
Needs to Blame Anyone But Locals for UN Bombing
Virginia Tilley
The Quisling Policies of the UN in Iraq: Toward a Permanent War?
Rep. Henry Waxman
Bush Owes the Public Some Serious Answers on Iraq
Ben Terrall
War Crimes and Punishment in Indonesia: Rapes, Murders and Slaps
on the Wrists
Elaine Cassel
Brother John Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Salvation Show
Christopher Brauchli
Getting Gouged by Banks
Marjorie Cohn
Sergio Vieira de Mello: Victim of Terrorism or US Policy in Iraq?
Vicente Navarro
Media
Double Standards: The Case of Mr. Aznar, Friend of Bush
Website of the Day
The Intelligence Squad
Hot Stories
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
William Blum
Myth
and Denial in the War on Terrorism
Standard Schaefer
Experimental Casinos: DARPA and the War Economy
Uzma
Aslam Khan
The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War:
What America Says Does Not Go
Paul de Rooij
Arrogant
Propaganda
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
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September
2, 2003
Predictable Propaganda:
Four
Months of US Occupation of Iraq
By PAUL de ROOIJ
In a low monotonous voice, the BBC's terrorism
expert stated that "foreign terrorists" were streaming
into Iraq [1]. This is very likely another fabricated
story, created to justify naming the resistance against the US
occupation of Iraq as "terrorism". Furthermore, the
death toll is increasing gradually, and the lies about that are
increasing apace. The body bag chart tells its own story. We
are witnessing an escalation of propaganda designed to divert
attention from increasingly grim events occurring in Iraq.
Old Chestnuts
The latest propaganda emanating from
both the Pentagon and the US media is that there is an increasing
presence of foreign terrorists in Iraq. Analysts study the residues
of the bomb used against, say, the UN building and establish
the size, type and provenance of the bomb. They also claim some
of these bombs were planted by foreign terrorists--because "the
bombs are too sophisticated" On the face of it, this is
a very unlikely explanation at such an early stage of the investigation
of any of the latest bombings.
To understand why these propaganda elements
should appear, it helps to examine some historical precedents.
At the height of the military repression in Brazil during the
early 1970s, General Garastazu Medici stated that there were
"foreign influences" among the Leftist groups opposing
the military dictatorship. After all, if Brazilian opponents
of the military were being killed or tortured then some uncomfortable
questions would arise. However, if opponents were mere "foreign
terrorists" or "communists" then the repression
wouldn't generate any bad press, and torturing political opponents
was deemed acceptable. In the 1960s, the Americans also engaged
in this type of accusation in Vietnam where "outside forces"
were upsetting their tea party. North Vietnamese fighters or
local guerrillas were considered foreign interference; the fact
that the US was a massive outside influence was, of course, beyond
discussion. In light of these earlier examples, one may be justifiably
skeptical of the current claims of "foreign terrorists"
entering Iraq.
The use of "foreign terrorists"
is taking over from the claims of "foreign communists"
of yesteryear. It is a splendid accusation because it reminds
Americans that the US is still fighting the "war on terror"
-- the false rationale for the war. It is easy to see how Americans
could go sour on the occupation of Iraq, but it is more difficult
for them to reject "the war on terror." One should
expect a marked increase in the "war on terror" refrain,
or its corollary: "foreign terrorists entering Iraq"
[2].
Another reason why "foreign terrorists"
is an unlikely reality is that although Iraq's borders are long,
they are easily controlled because the roads through the deserts
are limited, and the states surrounding Iraq cannot be seen as
aiding and abetting the guerrilla war. Kuwait, Saudi Arabia,
Syria, Jordan, and Turkey are either opposed to any resistance
group in the area, or simply cannot afford to be found assisting
such groups. The situation for Iran is more complicated, but
they will also attempt to avoid confrontation with the US over
the situation in Iraq. But even more importantly, there is also
no need for hordes of fighters to clamber over the Iraqi border;
there are plenty of aggrieved local people who have strong reasons
to oppose the US occupation. And if Iran were interested in getting
involved, all it would take to create serious trouble would be
for a senior Iranian ayatollah to issue a fatwa. An interesting
example comes to mind: in the 1980s ayatollah Khomeini issued
a fatwa, and the next day the American embassy in Pakistan was
burned and severely damaged--and local people did it.
If the occupation in Iraq were viewed
as a major conflict against the Iraqi people, and the impression
were given that most Iraqis are hostile to the US, then this
would have several negative connotations. First, Americans might
start asking when this war will end. A continued occupation under
such circumstances is likely to be a bloody affair, unpopular
with the public, and definitely not good for re-election. It
is therefore necessary for US propaganda to emphasize the "foreign
terrorist" refrain--giving the impression that if it weren't
for the pesky outsiders everything would go according to plan.
Furthermore, if the US has to use force against the local population,
then all sorts of international legal issues arise pertaining
to the duties of the occupying power. The US has all but abrogated
the Fourth Geneva Convention and other international statutes
dealing with torture, etc.--one only needs to look at the prison
it has built in Guantanamo and the way the prisoners are treated
there. However, due to its current international standing, the
US cannot admit this for fear of provoking more hostility. Hence,
the fiction that the US is fighting a "war on terror"
is convenient because it sees no need to observe any international
legal statutes in this self-proclaimed war.
The "foreign terrorist" fiction
also lends itself to restarting its war against countries in
the area. The neocons are fighting among themselves to determine
if Syria or Iran should be next in line. If Syria is the flavor
of the month, then "the terrorists are coming from Syria"!
Hey, the proof is very easy to fabricate: just dangle a few bodies
from a lamppost and claim they came from Syria. This propaganda
ploy is far easier than finding WMD, and less likely to cause
an embarrassment--dead bodies don't talk. Any further American
claims of "foreign terrorists" needs to be handled
with great skepticism.
The US also can't be seen to be hunting
terrorists all the time, and sometimes it is all too obvious
that the locals are actually the targets. For these reasons,
a new variation on the theme has arisen: "fighting local
criminal gangs." On August 26th US troops sought to capture
a "criminal gang" and thus swooped on a tiny town with
tanks, helicopters, and more than 1,000 soldiers. Wasn't this
a bit of an overkill to capture a criminal gang? Perhaps the
explanation resides in the apparent need to teach an Iraqi town
a lesson for its hostility against the occupiers--kicking in
all doors in the town, and rounding up a few dozen men will probably
send the desired message, and do so in a way that is propaganda
compliant, i.e., just rounding up the hoodlums.
Violent acts perpetrated by the Iraqi
resistance cannot be classified as terrorism and the US response
against the local population is circumscribed by international
legal conventions. These facts are uncomfortable, and thus the
need for the propaganda line that the US is fighting a war on
terrorism, and all the noises it makes must be consistent with
such a story.
Emergence of a general rule: if a claim is made about
the occupation of Iraq, and all that can be provided as proof
are Pentagon statements or monotonous statements by "terrorism
experts", then there is a very high probability that a new
propaganda lie has been fabricated.
The body bag counter
A good barometer of the propaganda in
action is the way US military deaths are reported. Here is a
curious example where a fatality has been reclassified. On August
20th CentCom issued the following communiqué (abridged,
emphasis added):
August 20, 2003 Release Number: 03-08-40
ONE KILLED, ONE INJURED AFTER CONVOY
FIRED UPON
BAGHDAD, Iraq--One 3rd Corps Support
Command soldier was killed and another injured in a two-vehicle
accident while driving south on the main supply route
southeast of the town of Ad Diwaniyah.
The soldiers were driving in a supply
convoy of Palletized Loading System vehicles when they received
small arms fire and struck another vehicle. [...]
Security, medical and recovery assets
were dispatched to the scene. One soldier died as a result of
the accident.
A day later DefenseLink issued the following
confirmation notification (abridged, emphasis added).
Aug 21, 2003 DefenseLink No. 613-03
DoD Identifies Army Casualty.
The Department of Defense announced today
that Spc. Kenneth W. Harris, Jr., 23, [...] was killed on Aug.
20 in Scania, Iraq. Harris was fatally injured in a two-vehicle
accident while driving south on the main supply route.
Another soldier was also injured in the incident.
Presto! A combat death magically becomes
an accidental death so the American and British media will not
need to include this victim in their body count tallies. One
only wonders what the family of the victim will think of this
reclassification.
Given that there is obvious deception
in the admission of US-uk fatalities, it is therefore salutary
to view the post-May 1st body bag chart. For some reason no major
news organization publishes this, although a public attuned to
stock charts should have no trouble interpreting it. CNN and
BBC have a tendency of focusing on the latest victims to the
exclusion of a more general trend.
The data used to generate the graph below
are different from that used by most media networks [3]. It includes:
(i) soldier fatalities in so-called accidents--it is highly likely
that many accidents were actually due to hostile action; and
(ii) civilians working for the military -- at present there are
one British and one American in this category [4]. It excludes:
(i) foreign soldiers, and civilians working for NGOs, e.g., the
UN. It also excludes foreign nationals who have been deliberately
targeted, e.g., the Jordanian embassy -- there are very good
reasons to add such fatalities, but the available data are limited;
(ii) non-Iraqi paramilitary personnel hired by the "security"
companies. These companies are increasingly assuming an important
role in Iraq; they provide the mercenaries who will replace some
functions of the US-uk forces [5].
From May 1st, the official American declaration
of an end to the war and the start of the occupation, until August
31st, there have been 166 US-uk fatalities; it is an average
of 1.3 per day over this period. The trend of the fatalities
is up and it currently stands at 1.6 per day. At the projected
rates, the forecast for the total number of US-uk deaths between
May 1st and December 31st is about 378.
To put these numbers into perspective, one must realize that
most US patrols have been scaled down, and at present, most military
personnel remains within military compounds. Mercenaries are
also taking over duties at checkpoints, something formerly done
by US personnel. These days Gurkhas are prominent among the guards
around Baghdad airport. Even with this lower profile the death
rate is still rising. In other words, the resistance to the occupation
is becoming fiercer.
Finally, for the color of the bodies
in the US-uk casualty list, see the following table:
Post May 1st
US/UK Body Colors
| Race/ Ethic Group |
Number |
Percent |
| White |
108 |
65% |
| Afro-origin |
20 |
12% |
| Hispanic |
16 |
10% |
| Other |
2 |
1% |
| NA |
20 |
12% |
Note: for details on the data see footnote 2 of The
Parade of the Body Bags.
And now the elections
Now that the US election campaign is
moving into full swing, the propagandists will seek to hide all
the unpalatable aspects of the occupation of Iraq. There will
be attempts to stoke the usual fears of terrorism or remind the
American public about 9-11 (hence the recent release of the transcripts;
see [2]). At the same time, everything will be done to quash
references to the mounting American death toll, to the generalized
shambles that Iraq finds itself in, and the opprobrium around
the world that this occupation has brought upon the US.
With an election campaign in the offing,
it is a time for a sober assessment of what Shrub (as the inimitable
Texan commentator, Molly Ivins, likes to refer to Bush Jr.) and
the scheming neocons have done for America. Clarity in terms
of the number of soldiers killed, and the reasons for the opposition
to the US-uk troops, is important when evaluating America's foreign
policy and the performance of the Bush regime. One would hope
that our American friends would gain some deeper understanding
of the motivation of their rulers and the way they are being
manipulated. Bush recently stated: "Retreat in the face
of terror would only invite further and bolder attacks. There
will be no retreat." Perhaps Americans may well ponder the
meaning of this--endless wars, mounting US soldier body bags,
massive budget deficits, further erosion of civil liberties,
and ever more deception flung at the people of the United States.
This article is a follow up on The
Parade of the Body Bags.
Paul de Rooij is a writer living in London, and can be reached
at proox@hotmail.com
(attachments will be automatically deleted.)
© 2003 Paul de Rooij
Endnotes
[1] August 26, 2003 BBC Radio Four, Today
Program.
[2] One should view the recent release
of the "Transcripts of frantic calls made as 9/11 victims
tried to flee the burning twin towers" in this light. It
is just an attempt to rekindle the "terrorism" theme,
and to deflect the criticism of the situation in Iraq.
[3] For a more detailed discussion of
the data used here see my: The Parade of the Body Bags, ff. 2.
[4] The American civilian was an interpreter
accompanying US troops. An American soldier who just returned
from Iraq confirmed that the interpreters he saw also wore a
camouflage uniform, so it is odd to class them as civilians and
not count them.
[5] US-UK implies that they are equal
partners in this war and occupation. However, the UK provided
less than 10% of the armed forces for the war and the occupation.
The UK participation is minimal, and therefore the designation
US-uk conveys the relative weighting of the contribution of the
principal members of the "coalition".
Weekend
Edition Features for August 23 / 24, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
Handmaiden
in Babylon: Annan, Vieiera de Mello and the Decline and Fall
of the UN
Saul Landau
Schwarzenegger
and Cuban Migration
Standard Schaefer
Who
Benefited from the Tech Bubble: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Gary Leupp
Mel Gibson's Christ on Trial
William S. Lind
Send the Neocons to Baghdad
Augustin Velloso
Aznar: Spain's Super Lackey
Jorge Mariscal
The Smearing of Cruz Bustamante
John Ross
A NAFTA for Energy? The US Looks to Suck Up Mexico's Power
Mickey Z.
War is a Racket: The Wisdom of Gen. Smedley Butler
Elaine Cassel
Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Show Isn't Winning Many Converts
Stan Cox
Pirates of the Caribbean: the WTO Comes to Cancun
Tom and Judy Turnipseed
Take Back Your Time Day
Adam Engel
The Red Badge of Knowledge: a Review of TDY
Adam Engel
An Eye on Intelligence: an Interview with Douglas Valentine
Susan Davis
Northfork,
an Accidental Review
Nicholas Rowe
Dance
and the Occupation
Mark Zepezauer
Operation
Candor
Poets' Basement
Albert, Guthrie and Hamod
Website of the Weekend
Downhill
Battle
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