@@ U.S. is said to pay to plant articles in Iraq papers @@
Arash
December 1, 2005
U.S. Is Said to Pay to Plant Articles in Iraq Papers
By Jeff Gerth & Scott Shane
Washington -- Titled "The Sands Are Blowing Toward a Democratic Iraq", an article
written this week for publication in the Iraqi press was scornful of outsiders'
pessimism about the country's future.
"Western press and frequently those self-styled 'objective' observers of Iraq are
often critics of how we, the people of Iraq, are proceeding down the path in
determining what is best for our nation", the article began. Quoting the Prophet
Muhammad, it pleaded for unity and nonviolence.
But far from being the heartfelt opinion of an Iraqi writer, as its language implied,
the article was prepared by the United States military as part of a
multimillion-dollar covert campaign to plant paid propaganda in the Iraqi news media
and pay friendly Iraqi journalists monthly stipends, military contractors and
officials said.
The article was one of several in a storyboard, the military's term for a list of
articles, that was delivered Tuesday to the Lincoln Group
(http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Lincoln_Group), a Washington-based public
relations firm paid by the Pentagon, documents from the Pentagon show. The
contractor's job is to translate the articles into Arabic and submit them to Iraqi
newspapers or advertising agencies without revealing the Pentagon's role. Documents
show that the intended target of the article on a democratic Iraq was Azzaman, a
leading independent newspaper, but it is not known whether it was published there or
anywhere else.
Even as the State Department and the United States Agency for International
Development pay contractors millions of dollars to help train journalists and promote
a professional and independent Iraqi media, the Pentagon is paying millions more to
the Lincoln Group (http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=12840) for work that
appears to violate fundamental principles of Western journalism.
In addition to paying newspapers to print government propaganda, Lincoln Group has
paid about a dozen Iraqi journalists each several hundred dollars a month, a person
who had been told of the transactions said. Those journalists were chosen because
their past coverage had not been antagonistic to the United States, said the person,
who is being granted anonymity because of fears for the safety of those involved. In
addition, the military storyboards have in some cases copied verbatim text from
copyrighted publications and passed it on to be printed in the Iraqi press without
attribution, documents and interviews indicated.
In many cases, the material prepared by the military was given to advertising
agencies for placement, and at least some of the material ran with an advertising
label. But the American authorship and financing were not revealed.
Military spokesmen in Washington and Baghdad said Wednesday that they had no
information on the contract. In an interview from Baghdad on November 18, Lieutenant
Colonel Steven A. Boylan, a military spokesman, said the Pentagon's contract with the
Lincoln Group was an attempt to "try to get stories out to publications that normally
don't have access to those kind of stories." The military's top commanders, including
General Peter Pace, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, did not know about the
Lincoln Group contract until Wednesday, when it was first described by The Los
Angeles Times, said a senior military official who was not authorized to speak
publicly.
Pentagon officials said General Pace and other top officials were disturbed by the
reported details of the propaganda campaign and demanded explanations from senior
officers in Iraq, the official said.
When asked about the article Wednesday night on the ABC News program "Nightline",
General Pace said, "I would be concerned about anything that would be detrimental to
the proper growth of democracy".
Others seemed to share the sentiment. "I think it's absolutely wrong for the
government to do this", said Patrick Butler, vice president of the International
Center for Journalists in Washington, which conducts ethics training for journalists
from countries without a history of independent news media. "Ethically, it's
indefensible".
Patrick Butler, who spoke from a conference in Wisconsin with Arab journalists, said
the American government paid for many programs that taught foreign journalists not to
accept payments from interested parties to write articles and not to print government
propaganda disguised as news.
"You show the world you're not living by the principles you profess to believe in,
and you lose all credibility", he said.
The Government Accountability Office found this year that the Bush administration had
violated the law by producing pseudo news reports that were later used on American
television stations with no indication that they had been prepared by the government.
But no law prohibits the use of such covert propaganda abroad.
The Lincoln contract with the American-led coalition forces in Iraq has rankled some
military and civilian officials and contractors. Some of them described the program
to The New York Times in recent months and provided examples of the military's
storyboards.
The Lincoln Group (http://www.prwatch.org/node/4235), whose principals include some
businessmen and former military officials, was hired last year after military
officials concluded that the United States was failing to win over Muslim public
opinion. In Iraq, the effort is seen by some American military commanders as a
crucial step toward defeating the Sunni-led insurgency.
Citing a "fundamental problem of credibility" and foreign opposition to American
policies, a Pentagon advisory panel last year called for the government to reinvent
and expand its information programs.
"Government alone cannot today communicate effectively and credibly", said the report
by the task force on strategic communication of the Defense Science Board. The group
recommended turning more often for help to the private sector, which it said had "a
built-in agility, credibility and even deniability".
The Pentagon's first public relations contract with Lincoln Group was awarded in 2004
for about $5 million with the stated purpose of accurately informing the Iraqi people
of American goals and gaining their support. But while meant to provide reliable
information, the effort was also intended to use deceptive techniques, like payments
to sympathetic "temporary spokespersons" who would not necessarily be identified as
working for the coalition, according to a contract document and a military official.
In addition, the document called for the development of "alternate or diverting
messages which divert media and public attention" to "deal instantly with the bad
news of the day".
Laurie Adler, a spokeswoman for the Lincoln Group, said the terms of the contract did
not permit her to discuss it and referred a reporter to the Pentagon. But others
defended the practice.
"I'm not surprised this goes on", said Jew Michael Rubin
(http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/1345), who worked in Iraq for the Coalition
Provisional Authority in 2003 and 2004. "Informational operations (IO) are a part of
any military campaign", he added. "Especially in an atmosphere where terrorists and
insurgents - replete with oil boom cash - do the same. We need an even playing field,
but cannot fight with both hands tied behind our backs".
Two dozen recent storyboards prepared by the military for Lincoln Group and reviewed
by The New York Times had a variety of good-news themes addressing the economy,
security, the insurgency and Iraq's political future. Some were written to resemble
news articles. Others took the form of opinion pieces or public service
announcements.
One article about Iraq's oil industry opened with three paragraphs taken verbatim,
and without attribution, from a recent report in Al-Hayat, a London-based Arabic
newspaper. But the military version took out a quotation from an oil ministry
spokesman that was critical of American reconstruction efforts. It substituted a more
positive message, also attributed to the spokesman, though not as a direct quotation.
The editor of Al-Sabah, a major Iraqi newspaper that has been the target of many of
the military's articles, said Wednesday in an interview that he had no idea that the
American military was supplying such material and did not know if his newspaper had
printed any of it, whether labeled as advertising or not.
The editor, Muhammad Abdul Jabbar, 57, said Al-Sabah, which he said received
financial support from the Iraqi government but was editorially independent, accepted
advertisements from virtually any source if they were not inflammatory. He said any
such material would be labeled as advertising but would not necessarily identify the
sponsor. Sometimes, he said, the paper got the text from an advertising agency and
did not know its origins.
Asked what he thought of the Pentagon program's effectiveness in influencing Iraqi
public opinion, Muhammad Abdul Jabbar said, "I would spend the money a better way".
The Lincoln Group, which was incorporated in 2004, has won another government
information contract. Last June, the Special Operations Command in Tampa awarded
Lincoln and two other companies a multimillion-dollar contract to support
psychological operations. The planned products, contract documents show, include
three- to five- minute news programs.
Asked whether the information and news products would identify the American
sponsorship, a media relations officer with the special operations command replied,
in an e-mail message last summer, that "the product may or may not carry 'made in the
U.S.' signature" but they would be identified as American in origin, "if asked".
* Eric Schmitt contributed reporting from Washington for this article, and Kirk
Semple and Edward Wong from Baghdad.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/01/politics/01propaganda.html?ex=1291093200&en=15a916a52cb04281&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss