8 Responses to Western Media Persists in Propaganda About Iraq’s Purported WMD

1. 

   AZHAR MASOOD

   July 3, 2009 at 10:19 pm

   Jeremy,
   When I was in Baghdad during the war,US forces had taken over Baghdad and they had shifted their military operations to Takrit,home town of Saddam Hussain.
   A staffer of USA TODAY ,I will not place his name here for couple of reasons,was living in same hotel where me and my crew were housed.
   That Reporter of USA TODAY became very friendly with me.We would dine every evning and discuss the situation.
   One day he took me to the Headquarters of Saddam’s Intelligence Mukhabrat.I was infact bit nervous going.But he said,”I am trying to find out how many Iraqi generals have been detained here.
   Later my Driver Omar told me in broken English,”many Americans come here to find name of Donald Rumsfeld because his name was on Saddam’s agents’ list.I did not belive.Later a former Iraqi diplomat whom Saddam had jailed Professor Gailan,told me at Hotel Palestine,”yes Donald had received money from Saddam Hussain in exchange for the supply of Satellite imagery of Iran and Chemical weapons”.
   I was amazed to get twisting nature of world politics.
   Please get some info on this subject.
   • 

     Jeremy R. Hammond

     July 4, 2009 at 2:06 am

     The U.S. supplied satellite imagery and other battlefield intelligence to both Iraq and Iran during the war. I don’t know if Iraq paid for the intelligence or not, but Rumsfeld went to Iraq twice to shore up relations with Iraq. The second time he was sent to ensure Saddam that President Reagan’s condemnation of his use of chemical weapons wouldn’t affect their relationship. The State Department approved the sale to Iraq of chemical precursors use to make CBW, including anthrax.
2. 

   PressWatch

   July 5, 2009 at 5:56 pm

   World press freedom in the eyes and ears of the beholder
   By Trish Schuh May 30, 2007 Mehr News
   UNITED NATIONS – On the 14th anniversary of World Press Freedom Day, which was celebrated in May, UNESCO hosted an event for journalists called “Press Freedom, Safety of Journalists and Impunity” at the United Nations headquarters in New York.
   Under Article 1 of its Constitution, UNESCO is the only United Nations agency with a mandate to defend freedom of expression and press freedom.
   United Nations Correspondent Association President Tuyet J. Nguyen spoke about the life-threatening danger faced by journalists covering such war zones as Rwanda and Iraq where the media is controlled by special interests or armed political parties.
   Mr. Georges Malbrunot of France’s neocon Le Figaro spoke of newsgathering under various “vicious surveillance” states. In contrast, Malbrunot’s embedding with American forces in Iraq was “not a bad solution”, but opened embeddees to paranoid Arab charges of being “a spy… It’s one of the major blames addressed to the foreign press today… Of course, this blame is 99.9% wrong, but in the minds of these people who suffer from ‘conspiracy theory’, this accusation is serious and can cost a journalist his life. “There is a lot of work to do to convince these groups that the journalist is not a spy.” Malbrunot added that it is the work of Muslim imams, scholars, leaders, etc., to persuade their Muslim flock of this fact… “Only then will the fate of the global war against terror be dramatically changed.” This writer asked the panel if journalists themselves could ever be partly responsible for such suspicions. Citing CNN’s Anderson Cooper, who admitted spending his earlier summers working for the CIA: “Doesn’t this kind of moonlighting put other journalists at risk?”
   No response from the panel.
   Representing half a million media professionals around the world on behalf of the International Federation of Journalists was Judith Matloff, a professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and a member of the International News Safety Institute. Professor Matloff implored the international community to uphold UN Security Council Resolution 1738, which prohibits the killing and targeting of media personnel and protects free speech and freedom of the press globally. In a follow-up conversation by telephone on May 25, I asked Prof. Matloff for her opinion on how UN Security Council Resolution 1738 applies to Lebanon’s Al Manar TV and the LMG communications network — Lebanese media outlets bombed by Israel during the 2006 war, and officially censored as a “terrorist organization” by the U.S. Congress? Regarding this unprecedented, landmark free speech/censorship law, Ivy League academic Matloff said she was “unfamiliar with these situations” and refused to comment on Middle East issues. “I am an Africa specialist.” But wasn’t free speech protected equally around the world under Resolution 1738? In the Middle East, as well as in Africa? Being a media expert, could she comment on what a law equating the media with “terrorism” could mean for freedom of the press? Concurrent with Bush’s admitted deliberate bombing of Al Jazeera in Afghanistan and Iraq?
   “I never heard of that,” Matloff said. With her credentials, shouldn’t such Katrina-scale censorship have caught her eye? Or perhaps she could assess how the mainstream media’s advocacy of falsehoods promoted an illegal war in Iraq? “The New York Times has apologized,” she said, referring to a full page ‘mea culpa ad’. But isn’t the NYT repeating the same misleading tactics to promote the next war?
   With this and similar questions, Matloff responded like a true press “pro”: avoiding ethical implications, defending her product — the status quo, and referring most answers to “other supervisors” or experts. Her refrain of “I don’t know”, “don’t remember”, “can’t comment” captured the essence of a White House press briefing. As a trainer of America’s next generation of government “privatized propaganda contractors”, (tomorrow’s ‘mercenary press’) Matloff diverted the subject, passed the buck, and expertly earned her tenure…
   On Press Freedom Day, I spoke briefly to New York Times correspondent Warren Hogue about the media, Iraq, and World Press Freedom Day. Q: It’s World Press Freedom Day and I just wanted to ask if you have any comments about The New York Times and their reporting in the runup to the Iraq War, and if you feel any kind of responsibility?
   A: I can’t talk about that -– we’ve already said everything about that to be said in the paper, and I really don’t want to add to it. I mean, The New York Times — more than most newspapers — has absolutely admitted what we thought was faulty and what was not. There’s just nothing I can add to that at all. And I certainly don’t want to talk about that on Press Freedom Day when our thoughts are with Alan Johnston and other journalists that are being killed. Q: Well my thoughts are also with the Iraqis. There are half a million dead — thanks in part to your newspaper-
   A: Oh come on.
   Q: Your newspaper was one of the primary advocates for the war.
   A: Oh come on, I can’t talk to you.
   Q: Your newspaper was primary — yes it was — Judith Miller got a security clearance from Donald Rumsfeld, sir.
   A: The New York Times is not responsible for any dead Iraqis. I won’t listen to that. Q: None of the other American journalists but Judith Miller from your paper got a security clearance from the U.S. defense secretary himself. How is this different from working for the government?
   A: You are defiling Press Freedom Day — Shut up! This is about press freedom, this is not about defiling the press. We’ve just come back from a demonstration for Alan Johnston for journalists being killed and that’s what this day is about — press freedom. Perhaps BBC World News Editor Jon Williams best summarized the outcome of shutting up journalists: “We must not stand by and allow the intimidation of journalists — wherever it happens. If we do, we will pay a heavy price… There will be no eyes or ears telling us what’s going on. We won’t have the insight from those able to make sense of it.”
   But then, that may be just how the Powers That Be really want it.
3. 

   Joe Gall

   July 5, 2009 at 8:47 pm

   Said it at the time: Bush was a fool or a liar (along with the rest of his regime).

   Take your pick.

   Then apologize to Iraq and the rest of the world . . . for murdering a million innocent human beings.
4. 

   FingerBang

   July 6, 2009 at 5:29 am

   Time to take out CNN.
5. 

   tim mccarthy

   July 7, 2009 at 8:29 pm

   This is a story that I have been waiting on for some time. The story about Saddam’s interview seemed to me to be a plant to back up the many citations in the press about his posturings. The story line is always something about how we were fooled into thinking there were such weapons and so we invaded. All his fault. My recollections have always been that Iraq repeatedly denied any such weapons and I have never been able to understand how seemingly competent reporters could state otherwise. Thanks
   • 

     Jeremy R. Hammond

     July 8, 2009 at 12:15 am

     Your recollections are accurate, Tim. This is sheer propaganda and utter nonsense, and nothing more.
6. 

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   May 30, 2010 at 4:18 am

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