Phil Taylor's papers
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BACK TO : PROPAGANDA AND THE GLOBAL 'WAR' ON TERROR (GWOT) Years 1 and 2, ie 9/11-2003
Winning hearts and minds by J G Hicket 
Winning hearts and minds: the Bush administration has launched a war of words in addition to its military strikes in an attempt to sway the people of the Middle East to the side of the United States. (Nation: Psyops). Insight on the News, Nov 12, 2001, by Jennifer G. Hickey President George W. Bush has chosen a number of forums in which to enunciate U.S. objectives of the war on terrorism. Whether it was in front of a joint session of Congress, at a formal White House press conference or at one of many daily briefings, he has concentrated on securing support for his war policy and urging patience as well as resolve. The shameful attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, witnessed by every American and by millions overseas, made garnering support for a firm response easier than it might otherwise have been. The United States is at war. Whether it is fought by the military through psychological operations (psyops) or by the State Department's public-diplomacy posts, the war of words already is an important part of the broader conflict. In the days immediately following the first terrorist attacks the Army deployed its 4th Special Operations Command from Fort Bragg, N.C., to begin dropping informational leaflets and to develop radio/TV programming for the region. Also deployed was the 193rd Special Operations Wing of the Air National Guard, with its EC-130 Commando Solo aircraft, which earlier played an active psyops role for military engagements in Haiti, Panama and Bosnia. As in Afghanistan today the communications in Bosnia were all but completely down. Psyops supported by Commando Solo aircraft were instrumental not only in delivering radio signals but in jamming what few Serbian transmissions there were or simply replacing them with other programming. In areas of eastern Bosnia out of transmission range, informational leaflets that included quotations from Plato to Thomas Jefferson were dropped. During the Persian Gulf War, leaflets were dropped instructing Iraqi soldiers in the proper way to surrender, which many promptly did. As effective as psychological operations were in the gulf war and in Bosnia, a report by the Defense Science Board at the U.S. Department of Defense has suggested that the Special Operations Command is too dependent on outdated technology and that the delivery systems of the Command Solo program should be abandoned in favor of delivering the psyops messages from unmanned aircraft. Analysts with whom Insight spoke said atrophy and a heavily bureaucratic State Department that has failed to focus beyond the most recent engagement have hampered the public-diplomacy mission. "Public diplomacy has always had a very low priority in the minds of senior policymakers in the United States, but suddenly we are confronted with a situation which demands an effective and sophisticated program. ... I think the administration has done a very good job of trying to create a short-term, crisis-related public-diplomacy initiative," says Harold C. Pachios, a public-affairs officer in both the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. Winning the military war and losing the war of words, or failing effectively to rebut misconceptions about the United States and its policies, can have damaging long-term effects. Iraq provides a case in point. A 1998 report issued by the U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy determined that while coalition forces won the first battle -- the gulf war itself -- Saddam Hussein was victorious in the long run. After blocking U.N. inspectors from determining the state of Iraq's weapons capabilities, Saddam fought back. The report says Saddam -- beaten in 1991 -- had by 1998 "embarked on a concerted campaign to divert world media attention from his weapons to images of sick and hungry Iraqi children." How successful was the campaign? Three years later, in an interview with Qatar-based al-Jazeera television, U.S. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice actually had to explain the reasons for continuing sanctions on Iraq, at last challenging the Iraqi propaganda that Saddam's regime, not U.S. sanctions, were responsible for the continuing distress of Iraq's people. So why was Rice appearing on al-Jazeera? Pachios, who also is chairman of the U.S. Commission on Public Diplomacy, says "Al-Jazeera has enormous influence primarily because it is not state broadcasting and is therefore seen as being somewhat independent." Independence does not mean it does not have a point of view. Despite its contention that the attacks on New York City and the Pentagon were provoked by U.S. policy and that violence is only a terrorist act when there is "no cause," the network is viewed by large numbers throughout the Middle East, where satellite dishes have become common. A number of administration officials, including Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell, have given interviews to al-Jazeera as a part of U.S. public diplomacy. "As a long-term solution to the profound problems of cultural misunderstanding, there will be no substitute for public diplomacy. It must be a key component of our long-term effort to eradicate terrorism," said Charlotte Beers, undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs at the State Department, in recent testimony before the House International Relations Committee. The department has established an around-the-clock task force dedicated to the effort, including close monitoring of international media reaction to ensure a prompt response from administration officials when needed. In addition, foreign-service professionals are working out of U.S. embassies with local media to keep administration voices and policies fresh in the minds of foreign audiences. Beers, a former J. Walter Thompson and Ogilvy & Mather ad executive, has approached the Ad Council to develop public-service announcements related to the war against terrorism to be aired in the United States and overseas and is contemplating launching an ad campaign to be aired on al-Jazeera television. According to Advertising Age's Website, Beers has cobbled together an advisory council of Arab and Muslim leaders to assist in crafting the U.S. message. "All of a sudden, we are in this position of redefining who America is, not only for ourselves under this kind of attack, but also for the outside world" Beers says. As important as it is to redefine the perception of "who America is," it also is important to define what America's policy is. Elie Krakowski, a senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council, president of EDK Consulting and deputy secretary of defense in the Reagan administration, argues that the problem is not slick salesmanship so much as a lack of definition in U.S. foreign policy. "In order to do effective public policy, we need to have an effective [foreign-policy] strategy. So, what we are confronting is not so much that we are not doing the public diplomacy correctly. Actually, there is an ambivalent attitude toward America," says Krakowski, who last was in Afghanistan in April. Rather, the resentment stems from the belief that the United States reacts suddenly and militarily when provoked and then retreats completely once the bombing is done, as was the case in 1998 when the Clinton administration bombed Afghanistan. Sean K. Anderson, an assistant professor of political science at Idaho State University and a specialist in counterterrorism, tells Insight it is important to engage in a dialogue about terrorism with figures within Islamic society who carry a natural legitimacy. "What I think they ought to be doing is to talk to the heads of states in the Middle East and get competent religious leaders, such as Sheik Alazar in Cairo, one of the most competent religious mujtahid [legal scholars], to issue a fatwa saying that people who do these things defame Islam and are apostates." Furthermore, says Anderson, the administration should speak frankly to Muslim heads of state and Arab leaders about what their role should be and how their interests best would be served by heading off the rise of extremist sentiment which is causing unrest in Pakistan, Indonesia and elsewhere. National Security Adviser Rice has said Bush will use the Asia-Pacific Economic Conference to address many of these issues with world leaders. Even so, Anderson warns of misconceptions fostered by a tendency among some in the Middle East to subscribe to conspiracy theories. "Their histories are filled with hidden actions and plots, and the Islamic world is awash with rumors," says the coauthor of The Historical Dictionary of Terrorism. This predilection was demonstrated in the wake of the Sept. 11 attack when rumors were rampant that 4,000 Jews who worked in the twin towers were told secretly not to show up for work the day of the attack. Conspiratorial skepticism also was evident in the wake of the crash of Egypt Air Flight 990. The BBC reported that some in the Egyptian press credited the speed with which the FBI determined that the pilots deliberately crashed the plane to hyperactivity resulting from the American diet of fast food. Anderson and Krakowski both agree that at the base of the public-diplomacy pyramid must be a sense of legitimacy and a consistency of policy. "We must remember the values, mores and policies of this country and that it is better to be respected than loved," concludes Krakowski. Jennifer G. Hickey is a writer for Insight. COPYRIGHT 2001 News World Communications, Inc. COPYRIGHT 2001 Gale Group |