US military to silence indie reporters in Iraq

[peter2002]

The Pentagon has threatened to fire on the satellite uplink positions of independent journalists in Iraq, according to veteran BBC war correspondent, Kate Adie. In an interview with Irish radio, Ms. Adie said that questioned about the consequences of such potentially fatal actions, a senior Pentagon officer had said: "Who cares.. ..They've been warned."

http://www.gulufuture.com/news/kate_adie030310.htm

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That's a great idea for freedom lovers. We don't want the world to see the carnage. The US did the same in Gulf War I. Controlling the media is important to sustain support for the war machine. The military doesn't want the kind of negative PR it got in Vietnam.

Pete

 

[Mr. Anderson]

Re: US military to silence indie reporters in Iraq

Originally posted by peter2002
"Who cares.. ..They've been warned."

Well, if they have been warned, its not really our fault. The issue here is that if they're willing to take out the reporters uplinks, they're probably concerned or have info on Iraqi systems that would use that as a ploy to get their systems working. Instead of try and figure out if the uplink trailer is an Iraqi undercover or a real reporter, just take it out.

Knocking out the communications is essential in the war.

D

 

[groovebuster]

But it also could be that they just don't want the world public to be too nosy about what they are doing inside of Iraq. That way they can control the information that's getting outside the country and don't have to deal with unexpected reports of little mistakes they might be doing in the campaign. Propaganda is way easier to spread when you have the media under control and you are able to manipulate the information before it's getting into public...

Just a thought.

groovebuster

 

[Mr. Anderson]

Originally posted by groovebuster
But it also could be that they just don't want the world public to be too nosy about what they are doing inside of Iraq.
Just a thought.

There are going to be mistakes, and conspiracy theorists will absolutely love this one. But even if the uplinks are destroyed, all that means is that we won't necessarily see 'live' coverage from Iraq. It will still be shipped out and seen the next day or so. So I don't believe the reason is for cover ups of 'mistakes' or black ops. They're making sure that the Iraqis don't have a com net.

D

 

[groovebuster]

Next day is maybe a little bit too optimistic. If you can't get the information out with an uplink to a satellite, how else you gonna do it? Send the video-tape by snail-mail through the enemy lines? Even if the person would survive that it would take days if not weeks to get a tape out of Iraq and to make it available to the rest of the world. And the older the material is the more it loses it's relevance.

So what we gonna see then is only material approved by the US military and government. I remember the balkan war when we were in a similar situation.

groovebuster

 

[drastik]

Originally posted by dukestreet
There are going to be mistakes, and conspiracy theorists will absolutely love this one. But even if the uplinks are destroyed, all that means is that we won't necessarily see 'live' coverage from Iraq. It will still be shipped out and seen the next day or so. So I don't believe the reason is for cover ups of 'mistakes' or black ops. They're making sure that the Iraqis don't have a com net.

D

I agree, the world is too tightly wired for a big issue to go unoticed. It might take awhile, but we will getthe news. I wish they'd use an emp type weapon, though, that would kill communication just fine. Of course, then our news organizations would freak because they couldn't broadcast.

 

[Mr. Anderson]

Originally posted by drastik
I agree, the world is too tightly wired for a big issue to go unoticed. It might take awhile, but we will getthe news. I wish they'd use an emp type weapon, though, that would kill communication just fine. Of course, then our news organizations would freak because they couldn't broadcast.

Don't count it out - one of the things this little war will allow us to do it try out all our new weapons in a combat situation. I'm sure there will be all sorts of interesting things deployed - and most we won't even hear about.

All the bombs and guided munitions are so much more accurate than that dropped last time - using GPS guidance. Only one problem is that Sadam can jam the signal, so the bombs go from being accurately placed with in a meter to 50 meters.

It will be interesting - even if its going to be ugly, both on and off the battlefield.

D

 

[jethroted]

Another amazing victory for the U.S. gov't campaign for freedom of speech!

 

[leprechaunG4]

If anything were being violated it would be freedom of press not freedom of speech, but anyways moving on. There is no violation of such freedoms since the government is not saying what can or cannot be reported, they are not censoring newspapers. They simply can't allow uplink stations because all communication station in the area must be taken out as part of the offensive. By not interferring with the need to take out communications more innocent lives will be saved. I would think the media could understand this and accept their stories being a few days behind real time in order to protect innocent life. The constitution gives the media a right to print without being censored, it does not give them the right to interfere with a military action.

 

[Mr. Anderson]

The loss of civilian life will also include some of those moronic 'human shields'. They might acutally be up for the Darwin Awards...

Why would someone willing put themselves in harms way like that is something I just don't understand.

D

 

[3rdpath]

if you control the information, you control the public perception. this isn't anything new...especially during war.

the turning point for the vietnam war was the release of graphic pictures of mangled women and children, napalm victims and the like. public support eroded and we withdrew shortly thereafter.

and both sides of the field will be playing up whatever best supports their cause...once again, nothing new. its a p.r. game.

i don't think the u.s. will be able to encapsulate the information nearly as much as they'd like...we'll see.

 

[unixinit]

Okay, Safari has crashed two times when trying to post my response to this article. Does that mean, then, that there's a secret conspiracy by Apple to silence my opinion??

Probably not, but then again, it sounds like what this site is peddling as 'news'. One must consider the SOURCE when examining incredible claims like this one. And when we do that in this case, we find news 'headlines' such as 'is the world ending?', advertisements for amazing herbal cure-alls, etc. While there is certainly room for skepticism regarding the current administrations policies, it is NO reason to turn to shoddy, sensationalistic reporting, pseudo-science, and conspiracy theories to explain current events!!

If you're interested in this subject, I suggest you check out the Washington Post Online. They have an entire section devoting to what the Pentagon is referring to as 'embedding', that is, allowing reporters to travel with U.S. troops in the case of a conflict inside of Iraq. See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/nation/nationalsecurity/abroad/iraq/field/ and in particular the sidebar 'What is embedding' which has links to the actual Pentagon policy documents describing their position toward embedding reporters.

I had a lot more to say, unfortunately, I don't feel like retyping it all. But please don't believe everything you read/see/hear -- remember, extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. Unless you evaluate everything with that mindset, you'll end up with tin foil around your head (and perhaps plastic sheathing duct-taped around your house).