Bu-lat-lat (boo-lat-lat) verb: to search, probe, investigate, inquire; to unearth facts Issue No. 35 October 14 - 20, 2001 Quezon City, Philippines |
TV News: A Militarized Zone BY
NORMAN SOLOMON
Back to Bulatlat.com Alternative Reader Index When
the bombing of Afghanistan resumed Monday night [Oct. 8], retired
generals showed no fatigue at their posts under hot lights at network
studios. On CNN, former NATO supreme commander Wesley Clark teamed up
with Maj. Gen. Don
Shepperd to explain military strategies; they were sharing
their insights as employees of AOL Time Warner. Far away, missiles are
flying and bombs are exploding -- but in
televisionland, a sense of equilibrium prevails. The tones are calm; the
correspondents are self-composed. News bulletins crawl across the bottom
of the screen, along
with invitations to learn more. "Take a 3-D look at U.S.
military aircraft at CNN.com." At
Pentagon briefings, carried live, the secretary of defense bears a
chilling resemblance to a predecessor named McNamara. But the language of
Donald Rumsfeld is thoroughly modern, foreshadowing a war without end:
"In this battle
against terrorism, there is no silver bullet." But there will
be many bullets, missiles and bombs. We hear the customary assurances
that air strikes will
be surgical, and Rumsfeld echoes the metaphor: "Terrorism
is a cancer on the human condition." The
reports about the bombing are laced with references to airborne food
drops. Details have been sketchy. But self-congratulation has been
profuse on
television, now a free-fire zone for war propaganda. Sunday night [Oct. 7], on
"Larry King Live," a bipartisan panel of senators affirmed their
loyalty to the president. The ranking GOP member of the
Senate Armed Services Committee, a former secretary of the navy,
illuminated our goodness. Sen. John Warner said: "This, I think, is
the first time in contemporary military history where a military operation is
being conducted against the government of a country, and simultaneously, with
the troops carrying out their mission, other troops are trying to take care of
the innocent victims who all too often are caught in harm's way."Hours
after Warner's explanation of American saintliness, the UN's World Food Program
halted its convoys of emergency aid to Afghanistan because of the bombing
campaign. Meanwhile, private relief workers voiced escalating alarm. A news
release, put out by my colleagues at the Institute for Public Accuracy (www.accuracy.org),
quoted the president of the humanitarian aid organization Conscience
International, Jim Jennings: "Food drops from high altitudes alone
absolutely cannot provide sufficient and effective relief that is urgently
necessary to prevent mass starvation." The
U.S. government sent two C-17 planes to drop rations. Jennings, who has been
involved in humanitarian work around the world for two decades, was not
impressed. At a single camp inside Afghanistan, in Herat, "there are
600,000 people on the verge of starvation," he said. "If you provide
one pound of food per day, the minimum for bare survival, it would take 500
planeloads a month to supply the one camp in Herat alone, and Afghanistan is the
size of Texas. The administration has stated that two aircraft are being used
for food relief so far -- for all of Afghanistan." Avowedly,
the main targets of the bombing are the people in the Bin Laden network. But the
rhetorical salvoes will be understood, all too appropriately, in wider contexts.
"We will root them out and starve them out," Rumsfeld said, just
before closing a news conference with a ringing declaration: "We are
determined not to be terrorized." "That
last quote says it all," MSNBC anchor Brian Williams interjected a moment
later, before going to "NBC military analyst" Bernard Trainor, a
former Marine Corps general. Like the other ex-generals on network payrolls,
Trainor consistently uses the word "we" to describe U.S. military
actions. ("We now have the capability...") High-tech maps and video
graphics are profuse during the explications of war-game scenarios.Former
diplomats can play too. On NBC, Richard Holbrooke -- a media favorite who
engineered the diplomatic runup to the bombing of Yugoslavia in spring 1999 --
chatted with Tom Brokaw while using a pointer and a bright-lit map to elucidate
geopolitical dynamics.Constantly crawling across TV screens, snippets of quotes
blur together... Bin Laden saying that believers will triumph, Bush declaring
"may God continue to bless America," the Taliban accusing the U.S. of
"terrorist" attacks... As time goes on, the adversaries increasingly
seem to be talking each other's language. The
on-screen logos, spangled in red-white-and-blue, exude pride in a nation
resurgent. CBS has opted for "America Fights Back." NBC and MSNBC are
using "America Strikes Back." At times, MSNBC switches to an alternate
buzz phrase: "Homeland Defense."Supposedly, bombing Afghanistan is
going to make us safer back here in the USA. Yet hours after the attacks began
on Oct. 7, the FBI called for heightened alerts across the United States --
because the risk of another deadly attack in this country had just increased. If
war can be peace, why can't greater danger bring us greater security?By Monday
afternoon, networks were showing bombers taking off from aircraft carriers, en
route to Afghanistan. MSNBC's viewers saw footage of warheads with "NYPD"
scrawled on them; in the background, an American Flag fluttered on deck. And
so, a bait-and-switch process of patriotic imagery is near completion. For
weeks, in the aftermath of the horrendous events of Sept. 11, the public
embraced Old Glory as a symbol of grief, human solidarity and love of country.
Now the ubiquitous American Flag is being affixed to military means of
destruction. "This
will be a long war," George W. Bush promised on Monday. From all
indications, the TV networks are ready to do their part for the military
operation that has been named Enduring Freedom. But far from the comforts of
televisionland, many people will be enduring our freedom to kill.
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