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Military's Information War Is Vast and Often
Secretive
By JEFF GERTH
12/11/05 "New
York Times" -- -- The media center in Fayetteville,
N.C., would be the envy of any global communications company.
In state of the art studios, producers prepare the daily mix of
music and news for the group's radio stations or spots for friendly
television outlets. Writers putting out newspapers and magazines in
Baghdad and Kabul converse via teleconferences. Mobile trailers with
high-tech gear are parked outside, ready for the next crisis.
The center is not part of a news organization, but a military
operation, and those writers and producers are soldiers. The
1,200-strong psychological operations unit based at Fort Bragg turns
out what its officers call "truthful messages" to support the United
States government's objectives, though its commander acknowledges
that those stories are one-sided and their American sponsorship is
hidden.
"We call our stuff information and the enemy's propaganda," said
Col. Jack N. Summe, then the commander of the Fourth Psychological
Operations Group, during a tour in June. Even in the Pentagon, "some
public affairs professionals see us unfavorably," and inaccurately,
he said, as "lying, dirty tricksters."
The recent disclosures that a Pentagon contractor in Iraq paid
newspapers to print "good news" articles written by American
soldiers prompted an outcry in Washington, where members of Congress
said the practice undermined American credibility and top military
and White House officials disavowed any knowledge of it. President
Bush was described by Stephen J. Hadley, his national security
adviser, as "very troubled" about the matter. The Pentagon is
investigating.
But the work of the contractor, the Lincoln Group, was not a rogue
operation. Hoping to counter anti-American sentiment in the Muslim
world, the Bush administration has been conducting an information
war that is extensive, costly and often hidden, according to
documents and interviews with contractors, government officials and
military personnel.
The campaign was begun by the White House, which set up a secret
panel soon after the Sept. 11 attacks to coordinate information
operations by the Pentagon, other government agencies and private
contractors.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, the focus of most of the activities, the
military operates radio stations and newspapers, but does not
disclose their American ties. Those outlets produce news material
that is at times attributed to the "International Information
Center," an untraceable organization.
Lincoln says it planted more than 1,000 articles in the Iraqi and
Arab press and placed editorials on an Iraqi Web site, Pentagon
documents show. For an expanded stealth persuasion effort into
neighboring countries, Lincoln presented plans, since rejected, for
an underground newspaper, television news shows and an
anti-terrorist comedy based on "The Three Stooges."
Like the Lincoln Group, Army psychological operations units
sometimes pay to deliver their message, offering television stations
money to run unattributed segments or contracting with writers of
newspaper opinion pieces, military officials said.
"We don't want somebody to look at the product and see the U.S.
government and tune out," said Col. James Treadwell, who ran
psychological operations support at the Special Operations Command
in Tampa.
The United States Agency for International Development also masks
its role at times. AID finances about 30 radio stations in
Afghanistan, but keeps that from listeners. The agency has
distributed tens of thousands of iPod-like audio devices in Iraq and
Afghanistan that play prepackaged civic messages, but it does so
through a contractor that promises "there is no U.S. footprint."
As the Bush administration tries to build democracies overseas and
support a free press, getting out its message is critical. But that
is enormously difficult, given widespread hostility in the Muslim
world over the war in Iraq, deep suspicion of American ambitions and
the influence of antagonistic voices. The American message makers
who are wary of identifying their role can cite findings by the
Pentagon, pollsters and others underscoring the United States'
fundamental problems of credibility abroad.
Defenders of influence campaigns argue that they are appropriate.
"Psychological operations are an essential part of warfare, more so
in the electronic age than ever," said Lt. Col. Charles A. Krohn, a
retired Army spokesman and journalism professor. "If you're going to
invade a country and eject its government and occupy its territory,
you ought to tell people who live there why you've done it. That
requires a well-thought-out communications program."
But covert information battles may backfire, others warn, or prove
ineffective. The news that the American military was buying
influence was met mostly with shrugs in Baghdad, where readers tend
to be skeptical about the media. An Iraqi daily newspaper, Azzaman,
complained in an editorial that the propaganda campaign was an
American effort "to humiliate the independent national press." Many
Iraqis say that no amount of money spent on trying to mold public
opinion is likely to have much impact, given the harsh conditions
under the American military occupation.
While the United States does not ban the distribution of government
propaganda overseas, as it does domestically, the Government
Accountability Office said in a recent report that lack of
attribution could undermine the credibility of news videos. In
finding that video news releases by the Bush administration that
appeared on American television were improper, the G.A.O. said that
such articles "are no longer purely factual" because "the essential
fact of attribution is missing."
In an article titled "War of the Words," Defense Secretary Donald H.
Rumsfeld wrote about the importance of disclosure in America's
communications in The Wall Street Journal in July. "The American
system of openness works," he wrote. The United States must find
"new and better ways to communicate America's mission abroad,"
including "a healthy culture of communication and transparency
between government and public."
Trying to Make a Case
After the Sept. 11 attacks forced many Americans to recognize the
nation's precarious standing in the Arab world, the Bush
administration decided to act to improve the country's image and
promote its values.
"We've got to do a better job of making our case," President Bush
told reporters after the attacks.
Much of the government's information machinery, including the United
States Information Agency and some C.I.A. programs, was dismantled
after the cold war. In that struggle with the Soviet Union, the
information warriors benefited from the perception that the United
States was backing victims of tyrannical rule. Many Muslims today
view Washington as too close to what they characterize as
authoritarian regimes in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and elsewhere.
The White House turned to John Rendon, who runs a Washington
communications company, to help influence foreign audiences. Before
the war in Afghanistan, he helped set up centers in Washington,
London and Pakistan so the American government could respond rapidly
in the foreign media to Taliban claims. "We were clueless," said
Mary Matalin, then the communications aide to Vice President Dick
Cheney.
Mr. Rendon's business, the Rendon Group, had a history of government
work in trouble spots, In the 1990's, the C.I.A. hired him to
secretly help the nascent Iraqi National Congress wage a public
relations campaign against Saddam Hussein.
While advising the White House, Mr. Rendon also signed on with the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, under a $27.6 million contract, to conduct
focus groups around the world and media analysis of outlets like Al
Jazeera, the satellite network based in Qatar.
About the same time, the White House recruited Jeffrey B. Jones, a
former Army colonel who ran the Fort Bragg psychological operations
group, to coordinate the new information war. He led a secret
committee, the existence of which has not been previously reported,
that dealt with everything from public diplomacy, which includes
education, aid and exchange programs, to covert information
operations.
The group even examined the president's words. Concerned about
alienating Muslims overseas, panel members said, they tried
unsuccessfully to stop Mr. Bush from ending speeches with the
refrain "God bless America."
The panel, later named the Counter Terrorism Information Strategy
Policy Coordinating Committee, included members from the State
Department, the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies. Mr. Rendon
advised a subgroup on counterpropaganda issues.
Mr. Jones's endeavor stalled within months, though, because of furor
over a Pentagon initiative. In February 2002, unnamed officials told
The New York Times that a new Pentagon operation called the Office
of Strategic Influence planned "to provide news items, possibly even
false ones, to foreign news organizations." Though the report was
denied and a subsequent Pentagon review found no evidence of plans
to use disinformation, Mr. Rumsfeld shut down the office within
days.
The incident weakened Mr. Jones's effort to develop a sweeping
strategy to win over the Muslim world. The White House grew
skittish, some agencies dropped out, and panel members soon were
distracted by the war in Iraq, said Mr. Jones, who left his post
this year. The White House did not respond to a request to discuss
the committee's work.
What had begun as an ambitious effort to bolster America's image
largely devolved into a secret propaganda war to counter the
insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Pentagon, which had money
to spend and leaders committed to the cause, took the lead. In late
2002 Mr. Rumsfeld told reporters he gave the press a "corpse" by
closing the Office of Strategic Influence, but he intended to "keep
doing every single thing that needs to be done."
The Pentagon increased spending on its psychological and influence
operations and for the first time outsourced work to contractors.
One beneficiary has been the Rendon Group, which won additional
multimillion-dollar Pentagon contracts for media analysis and a
media operations center in Baghdad, including "damage control
planning." The new Lincoln Group was another winner.
Pentagon Contracts
It is something of a mystery how Lincoln came to land more than $25
million in Pentagon contracts in a war zone.
The two men who ran the small business had no background in public
relations or the media, according to associates and a résumé. Before
coming to Washington and setting up Lincoln in 2004, Christian
Bailey, born in Britain and now 30, had worked briefly in California
and New York. Paige Craig, now 31, was a former Marine intelligence
officer.
When the company was incorporated last year, using the name Iraqex,
its stated purpose was to provide support services for business
development, trade and investment in Iraq. The company's earliest
ventures there included providing security to the military and
renovating buildings. Iraqex also started a short-lived online
business publication.
In mid-2004, the company formed a partnership with the Rendon Group
and later won a $5 million Pentagon contract for an advertising and
public relations campaign to "accurately inform the Iraqi people of
the Coalition's goals and gain their support." Soon, the company
changed its name to Lincoln Group. It is not clear how the
partnership was formed; Rendon dropped out weeks after the contract
was awarded.
Within a few months, Lincoln shifted to information operations and
psychological operations, two former employees said. The company was
awarded three new Pentagon contracts, worth tens of millions of
dollars, they added. A Lincoln spokeswoman referred a reporter's
inquiry about the contracts to Pentagon officials.
The company's work was part of an effort to counter disinformation
in the Iraqi press. With nearly $100 million in United States aid,
the Iraqi media has sharply expanded since the fall of Mr. Hussein.
There are about 200 Iraqi-owned newspapers and 15 to 17 Iraqi-owned
television stations. Many, though, are affiliated with political
parties, and are fiercely partisan, with fixed pro- or anti-American
stances, and some publish rumors, half-truths and outright lies.
From quarters at Camp Victory, the American base, the Lincoln Group
works to get out the military's message.
Lincoln's employees work virtually side by side with soldiers. Army
officers supervise Lincoln's work and demand to see details of
article placements and costs, said one of the former employees,
speaking on condition of anonymity because Lincoln's Pentagon
contract prohibits workers from discussing their activities.
"Almost nothing we did did not have the command's approval," he
said.
The employees would take news dispatches, called storyboards,
written by the troops, translate them into Arabic and distribute
them to newspapers. Lincoln hired former Arab journalists and paid
advertising agencies to place the material.
Typically, Lincoln paid newspapers from $40 to $2,000 to run the
articles as news articles or advertisements, documents provided to
The New York Times by a former employee show. More than 1,000
articles appeared in 12 to 15 Iraqi and Arab newspapers, according
to Pentagon documents. The publications did not disclose that the
articles were generated by the military.
A company worker also often visited the Baghdad convention center,
where the Iraqi press corps hung out, to recruit journalists who
would write and place opinion pieces, paying them $400 to $500 as a
monthly stipend, the employees said.
Like the dispatches produced at Fort Bragg, those storyboards were
one-sided and upbeat. Each had a target audience, "Iraq General" or
"Shi'ia," for example; an underlying theme like "Anti-intimidation"
or "Success and Legitimacy of the ISF;" and a target newspaper.
Articles written by the soldiers at Camp Victory often assumed the
voice of Iraqis. "We, all Iraqis, are the government. It is our
country," noted one article. Another said, "The time has come for
the ordinary Iraqi, you, me, our neighbors, family and friends to
come together."
While some were plodding accounts filled with military jargon and
bureaucratese, others favored the language of tabloids:
"blood-thirsty apostates," "crawled on their bellies like dogs in
the mud," "dim-witted fanatics," and "terror kingpin."
A former Lincoln employee said the ploy of making the articles
appear to be written by Iraqis by removing any American fingerprints
was not very effective. "Many Iraqis know it's from Americans," he
said.
The military has sought to expand its media influence efforts beyond
Iraq to neighboring states, including Saudi Arabia, Syria and
Jordan, Pentagon documents say. Lincoln submitted a plan that was
subsequently rejected, a Pentagon spokesman said. The company
proposed placing editorials in magazines, newspapers and Web sites.
In Iraq, the company posted editorials on a Web site, but military
commanders stopped the operation for fear that the site's global
accessibility might violate the federal ban on distributing
propaganda to American audiences, according to Pentagon documents
and a former Lincoln employee.
In its rejected plan, the company looked to American popular culture
for ways to influence new audiences. Lincoln proposed variations of
the satirical paper "The Onion," and an underground paper to be
called "The Voice," documents show. And it planned comedies modeled
after "Cheers" and the Three Stooges, with the trio as bumbling
wannabe terrorists.
The Afghan Front
The Pentagon's media effort in Afghanistan began soon after the
ouster of the Taliban. In what had been a barren media environment,
350 magazines and newspapers and 68 television and radio stations
now operate. Most are independent; the rest are run by the
government. The United States has provided money to support the
media, as well as training for journalists and government spokesmen.
But much of the American role remains hidden from local readers and
audiences.
The Pentagon, for example, took over the Taliban's radio station,
renamed it Peace radio and began powerful shortwave broadcasts in
local dialects, defense officials said. Its programs include music
as well as 9 daily news scripts and 16 daily public service
messages, according to Col. James Yonts, a United States military
spokesman in Afghanistan. Its news accounts, which sometimes are
attributed to the International Information Center, often put a
positive spin on events or serve government needs.
The United States Army publishes a sister paper in Afghanistan, also
called Peace. An examination of issues from last spring found no bad
news.
"We have no requirements to adhere to journalistic principles of
objectivity," Colonel Summe, the Army psychological operations
specialist, said. "We tell the U.S. side of the story to approved
targeted audiences" using truthful information. Neither the radio
station nor the paper discloses its ties to the American military.
Similarly, AID does not locally disclose that dozens of Afghanistan
radio stations get its support, through grants to a London-based
nonprofit group, Internews. (AID discloses its support in public
documents in Washington, most of which can be found globally on the
Internet.)
The AID representative in Afghanistan, in an e-mail message relayed
by Peggy O'Ban, an agency spokeswoman, explained the nondisclosure:
"We want to maintain the perception (if not the reality) that these
radio stations are in fact fully independent."
Recipients are required to adhere to standards. If a news
organization produced "a daily drumbeat of criticism of the American
military, it would become an issue," said James Kunder, an AID
assistant administrator. He added that in combat zones, the issue of
disclosure was a balancing act between security and assuring
credibility.
The American role is also not revealed by another recipient of AID
grants, Voice for Humanity, a nonprofit organization in Lexington,
Ky. It supplied tens of thousands of audio devices in Iraq and
Afghanistan with messages intended to encourage people to vote. Rick
Ifland, the group's director, said the messages were part of the
"positive developments in democracy, freedom and human rights in the
Middle East."
It is not clear how effective the messages were or what recipients
did with the iPod-like devices, pink for women and silver for men,
which could not be altered to play music or other recordings.
To show off the new media in Afghanistan, AID officials invited Ms.
Matalin, the former Cheney aide and conservative commentator, and
the talk show host Rush Limbaugh to visit in February. Mr. Limbaugh
told his listeners that students at a journalism school asked him
"some of the best questions about journalism and about America that
I've ever been asked."
One of the first queries, Mr. Limbaugh said, was "How do you balance
justice and truth and objectivity?"
His reply: report the truth, don't hide any opinions or "interest in
the outcome of events." Tell "people who you are," he said, and
"they'll respect your credibility."
Carlotta Gall and Ruhullah Khapalwak contributed reporting from
Afghanistan for this article.
Copyright 2005The New York Times Company
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