The War the Media Won’t Show You
When our soldiers retook a village from al Qaeda near Baqubah, Michael Yon was there to show us, in extremely graphic images, what the terrorists did to the men, women, and childen who once lived there, and even to their animals. The Times and the Post were not there and won’t show you images like this. They won’t show you the al Qaeda that kills Iraqis in Iraq, Britons in Britain, Spaniards in Spain, and Americans in America.
We seem not to have internalized the fact that this enemy does not negotiate, respects no borders, and will not coexist with us. If we won’t fight them there, they will fight us somewhere else — only there will be more of them, with more money, with better training, and with more horrific weapons to use against us. It’s become a defensive axiom that dissent is patriotic. I don’t know who ever said otherwise, but surrender to this certainly isn’t.
Related: More Iraqis turning their guns on al Qaeda.
They’re supposed to do what Michael Yon is doing.
Besides, the media is not picking up on the story now that Michael Yon has brought it to light.
It does not fit their template of stories that they are looking for.
Yet if it had been an atrocity by U.S. troops, it would be headline news in every single news publication nationwide (not to mention internationally).
Anyways, not too far from the village the media was releasing false stories of atrocities that extremists planted in order to stoke sectarian violence.
http://www.mnf-iraq.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=12611&Itemid=128
The linked article concludes by stating, “Ultimately, media reporting based on verifiable sources will reduce the possibility of misinformation unnecessarily alarming citizens”
Through partisan journalism and sloppy reporting things like this happen.
I was thinking yesterday, the media and education and other elite intellectual-type professions have done a great job since 2002. Today, we are really getting to recognize they have turned any potential tide coming after 9/11. They are firmly in control of the national mind-set here in the US.
And I’m not being flippant.
Because, it took a major effort to achieve this. It took them working together – more along the lines of group think and subconsciously than overtly (or covertly) – to get this done.
It took a “natural” instinct in the press to ignore stories like this one and play up others.
It took a major effort to dig up the corpse of Al Gore and turn him into a superstar.
It is taking a significant effort to keep Hillary off the rocks.
Things like the John Edwards’ wife vs. Ann Coulter – sheer stroke of brillance…
Canonizing Obama. Amazing.
I think 50 years from now, and I am being dead serious about this, historians will look back at the 2000 election. They will look at how close it was, and they will replay the short period of hysteria such a close election created — AND — they will look at what a certain segment of our society – the intellectual and pseudo-intellectual elite – the elite in places like the media, Hollywood, the humanities departments at college, including media and secondary school teaching departments, and so on —-
—- and they will conclude that the manner in which the 2000 played out —- spurred this segment of the society to become much more active in keeping a more united front.
In South Korea, the advent of the Sunshine policy, especially the 2000 Summit, resulted in the phenomenon of burying the truth about the North. Some of it was government led. Some of it was clearly coordinated. But, a good bit of it was also simply like a rock being dropped in a pond — as waves ripple outward. Burying harsh words on North Korea just seemed “natural” – no matter how abnormal.
I think the future will conclude that the 2000 election just made it “natural” for certain elements in our society to work together as they have the last 6 or so years…
(conversly, I’d say the forced resignation of Nixon followed by the victory of an idealist like Jimmy Carter, and then the failure of his presidency, spurred the right of center in the US to spend much collective time and energy throughout the 1980s vilifying “liberals” until they sucessfully turned “liberal” into a 4 letter word even liberals were running away from)…
“We seem not to have internalized the fact that this enemy does not negotiate, respects no borders, and will not coexist with us. If we won’t fight them there, they will fight us somewhere else — only there will be more of them, with more money, with better training, and with more horrific weapons to use against us.”
I’m confused. I thought secular Saddam didn’t like Al-Qaeda, and that Al-Qaeda expanded operations from Afghanistan into Iraq AFTER we invaded. So in other words, by toppling Saddam and occupying Iraq, we simply added another fighting front that wasn’t there before. I’ve also read that the war in Iraq has attracted a large number of foreign fighters, so it seems like there are “more of them” now than there were before we invaded.
I have been reading the book Korea Witness and I have been amazed reading this book and comparing the difference in reporters during the Korean War and now. The reporters during the Korean War were zooming all around the frontlines in Jeeps taking enemy fire. They didn’t go whine about the lack security for journalists you see today and many of them were in fact killed with some taken as POWs by the enemy. Yet the reporters did not leave the frontlines and go hide in a hotel in Japan. In fact the reporters in Korea that reported from the frontlines looked down on what they called “Tokyo Commandoes”.
The big reason for the bravery shown by these people to report from the front is because many of the journalists back then had served in World War II. They understood war and weren’t afraid their risk their lives on the battlefield to report on what was going on.
The reporters during the Korean War also provided plenty of context. For example many of the journalists back then did report on civilian casualties but notice none of them tried to spin a story to create an emotional reaction and a sense of scandal like the AP did with No Gun Ri story in 1999. Civilian casualties were reported within the context of what was going on which reporters back then understood since many of them had military experience.
Very few of today’s journalist ever served in the military much less ever served during a war. Many are liberal elitists that prefer to sit back in a hotel and have stringers deliver the news to them. This was the type of reporting that a reporter during the Korean War would have derided. Yet today guys like Yon are actually looked down upon by the media elites because he spends so much time on the frontlines. They claim these guys can’t report objectively because they emotionally bond with the soldiers they are with.
I guess taking false reports of headless bodies and burned mosques is more “objective” journalism than being on the frontlines seeing for yourself what is going on.
The fact is that many of these reporters lack the personal courage to actually report from the frontlines thus they have to find a way to discredit those that do.
Guys like Michael Yon as well as Bill Roggio are truly commendable and why the major media outlets want syndicate reports like what these guys have been delivering is beyond me. False reports of headless bodies and burned mosques I guess sells more newspapers.
Note: above I meant “won’t syndicate” not “want syndicate”
I’ll be running pretty much daily articles from the Korean War period. It should be interesting to compare.
Speaking of “syndicate,” I put up a feed of your site in my right sidebar because there’s so much there of interest to readers of this site. Hope you don’t mind, and please e-mail if you’d prefer I took it down. Thanks.
Joshua,
No problem, I was actually wondering what was causing a slight up tick in site traffic.
I concede that invading both Afghanistan and Iraq was a short-term recruiting boon for AQ. Do you deny that 9/11 was, too? Would you not have invaded Afghanistan? Zarkawi, who spent most of his time east of Halabja cooking up chem / bio weapons, was periodically welcomed in Baghdad, then the capital of the second-most controlling state on earth. Since we’re now both making light of the idea that secular and fundamentalist Muslims could never join in murderous collaboration against us, would you have left him there? Had you been told what every intelligence agency in the West believed — what most Republicans and half the Democrats also believed — would you really have rejected that counsel, accepted that risk, and accepted the responsibility for it?
Now, those are hard questions to which I don’t expect you to offer easy answers. But anything we do to try to prevent or respond to attacks against us — and even the terrorist attacks themselves — draws more recruits for a while, as long as the terrorists can point to or promise victory. Surely you don’t suggest that the answer to this is to let them attack us with impunity. If we hadn’t invaded Iraq, I posit that Afghanistan and 9/11 were still there to inspire these losers who are obsessed by the single goal of becoming the winners they will never be in life, through jihad. Those who went to Iraq would have gone to Afghanistan instead. Just as they would now if we withdraw from Iraq. And when we turn on the military and this-or-that politican, declare the war in Afghanistan lost, and demand the next retreat, where will they follow us next? It’s vividly obvious that our own country will be one of the battlefronts.
I think it’s a remarkable thing that we’ve not had a serious attack in this country, whereas AQ continues to go after certain states in Europe where they perceive political vulnerabilities. Clearly, one reason for that is the very different ways some Europeans react (ransom, appeasement, withdrawal, and “understanding”). Look no further than Cho Seung Hui for evidence of how easy it is for anyone to kill dozens of us. Why haven’t they? Probably because AQ knows how the American people would react. This suggests that for AQ, our invasions of their havens were an unintended consequence, and that they thought they could attack us here with impunity. AQ’s primary goal is to get us out of Iraq, which raises two questions: how and why? In response to the first, they win by using the media. It took only one attack to knock Spain out of the war, but with us, they have to use a daily drip of news coverage that feeds our own political short-sightedness (how desperately we need a president who can articulate a cogent response to that). Why? Well, why indeed if Iraq is the best thing that ever happened to AQ? Because they need a new haven to be what Afghanistan was in 2000. Because the short-term boons of 9/11, Iraq, and Afghanistan will be lost, probably forever, if they lose the wars there, which we agree can only happen if Iraqis turn against them. Fortunately, Iraqis are turning against them, and the new plan shows signs of progress.
It’s up to us, now. The consequences of surrender couldn’t be greater. There is no way to mask this: our primary foe in Iraq is Al-Qaeda, and running away from Al-Qaeda means more war, more terror, and more genocide, not less. That’s why politicians who speak of “ending the war” are either unqualified for office or lying. You can’t compare the status quo to the halcyon days of 1999 that we all wish we could go back to. You have to compare the status quo to the spreading hell on earth would follow a retreat.
“Do you deny that 9/11 was, too? Would you not have invaded Afghanistan?”
The invasion of Afghanistan was justified. The ruling Taliban was aiding and abetting Al-Qaeda, which attacked us on our own soil.
“Since we’re now both making light of the idea that secular and fundamentalist Muslims could never join in murderous collaboration against us, would you have left him there? Had you been told what every intelligence agency in the West believed — what most Republicans and half the Democrats also believed — would you really have rejected that counsel, accepted that risk, and accepted the responsibility for it?”
That’s quite a presumptious statement. All but one Republican and half the Democrats did vote “yes” on the resolution supporting an invasion of Iraq, but that does not mean they all believed in or agreed with all of the intel put out by the administration. As I recall, one 2008 candidate, McCain? admitted he had not read the report to Congress before voting “yes.” I’m sure he’s not the only member of Congress who failed to do so.
“I think it’s a remarkable thing that we’ve not had a serious attack in this country, whereas AQ continues to go after certain states in Europe where they perceive political vulnerabilities. Clearly, one reason for that is the very different ways some Europeans react (ransom, appeasement, withdrawal, and “understandingâ€). Look no further than Cho Seung Hui for evidence of how easy it is for anyone to kill dozens of us. Why haven’t they? Probably because AQ knows how the American people would react. “
It seems remarkable, yet it really isn’t Al-Qaeda first struck in 1993 and then again in 2001, nine years later. The 2004 Madrid bombing and last year’s London transport bombings were the first major attacks by Al-Qaeda in those countries. Both of those attacks were horrifically successful. It is apparent that Al-Qaeda does not act hastily but rather takes its time in planning and executing attacks. Cho’s deadly rampage set a new awful record in mass shootings, but his 33 victims is a fraction of the numbers who died in Madrid and on 9/11 and still less than the London bombings.
And how would the American people react, Joshua? What is Al-Qaeda afraid we’re going to do?
Having to go to the secular vs radical-religio argument has always shown a lack of understanding though it is a common argument out there in the intellectual community. It is classroom talk. Talk that fails to look around too much at the real world.
Besides what Joshua said, we know for an unambigious fact Iraq was directly funding suicide bombings in Israel, and unless you want to argue Israel should mean much less in US foreign policy, particularly Middle Eastern policy, then that funding of the families of suicide bombers – and whatever other aid Iraq gave Hamas and Hezbollah — we know with 100% certainty that Iraq was in deed funding terrorism.
But but but Al Qaeda is not Hamas nor Hezbollah…..See…Bush just wanted….
If these are the depths we have to go to find a way to chip away at the stated basis for invading Iraq pre-war, we have fallen far. Well, not really fallen. We’ve been down in the gutter for a long time…
Iraq was a threat to the region and thus to the US due to the importance of that region to the direct well-being of the US.
It is absolutely clear Hussein wanted the world (including his own people) to believe he had WMDs on hand.
It is clear Iraq under Hussein was our enemy.
The no fly zones were a typical bullshit policy of politicians.
I do not regret the move into Iraq at all. I hope we end up successful. Regardless, we took a huge bite out of the threat that Iraq offered – WMD production, even if just capability, is gone as well as the ability of a solidified state to back terrorist cells and groups.
Goodie.
And we have not paid an overwhelming price in Iraq.
That is another bullshit creation of the press and intellectual community – and they have finally sold it to the American people.
I guess that is all fine for them since we no longer face a Soviet-type threat…
Because, there is no way in hell we could do something as meaningful as saving South Korea or making it through WWII.
Hitler’s people would still be in charge of a unified Germany had today’s generations been in charge….
(Just as we let Kim Jong Il sit on his throne)
our media as most of the worlds is liberal
but as we just saw our enemy is no longer uneducated poor muslim youth with no way out of a bad situation
being misled by radical clerics
we are now faced with upper-middle class muslim dr’s trying to kill us
the enemy is islam plain and simple
those who have not realized this yet are clueless
10,000 men died or wounded on the first day of the normandy invasion
we have tragically lost 3500 soldiers in 4 plus years of fighting in iraq
which isnt a war its a bunch of maniac barbarian 13th century living morons who are guided by a book of BS and who think that book of BS applies to every person on this planet
oh by the way
Al-Zawahiri predicts our doom in a fire side chat
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/07/04/zawahiri.video/index.html
okay buddy thanks for the heads up!!!
McNut, are you advocating some sort of Crusade or Final Solution?
Nobody can stomach that nowadays, so there will be no end to this.
The koran has passages calling for subjugation of non-Moslems (“dhimmi”), including a tax on non-believers (“jizya”) , imposition of islamic law (“sharia”) and perpetual agression against all nonbelievers until they “submit” to islam (i.e., jihad).
Islam goes fundamentally against the open, democratic societies of the West and unless it is radically reformed there will be no end to terrorism in its name.
http://www.vexen.co.uk/religion/islam_unbelievers.html
http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/