by hanshan » Fri Nov 18, 2005 2:33 pm
<br>...<br><br>Bamford - <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Body of Secrets</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.namebase.org/books28.html" target="top">www.namebase.org/books28.html</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>Bamford has written an astute article <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>(The Man Who Sold the War )</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> concisely<br>delineating the scope of the MSM as an exercise<br>in psy-ops & mindwar.<br>As folks are busy will highlight aspects:<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em> His job, he says, is to counter false perceptions that the news media perpetuate because they consider it "more important to be first than to be right." In modern warfare, he believes, the outcome depends largely on the public's perception of the war -- whether it is winnable, whether it is worth the cost. "We are being haunted and stalked by the difference between perception and reality," he says. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>"Because the lines are divergent, this difference between perception and reality is one of the greatest strategic communications challenges of war.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->"</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br><br>emphasis added ( pg 7). <br><br>Key point. Perception is <br>reality. Peception is contextualized through experience.<br>This con't be overemphasized in a culture (american) that values vicarious stimulation/experience over actuality. It's antiseptic. Disneyland.<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Three weeks after the September 11th attacks, according to documents obtained from defense sources, the Pentagon awarded a large contract to the Rendon Group. Around the same time, Pentagon officials also set up a highly secret organization called the Office of Strategic Influence. Part of the OSI's mission was to conduct covert disinformation and deception operations -- planting false news items in the media and hiding their origins. "It's sometimes valuable from a military standpoint to be able to engage in deception with respect to future anticipated plans," Vice President Dick Cheney said in explaining the operation. Even the military's top brass found the clandestine unit unnerving. "When I get their briefings, it's scary," a senior official said at the time.</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>According to the Pentagon documents, the Rendon Group played a major role in the IOTF. The company was charged with creating an "Information War Room" to monitor worldwide news reports at lightning speed and respond almost instantly with counterpropaganda. <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>A key weapon, according to the documents, was Rendon's "proprietary state-of-the-art news-wire collection system called 'Livewire,' which takes real-time news-wire reports, as they are filed, before they are on the Internet, before CNN can read them on the air and twenty-four hours before they appear in the morning newspapers, and sorts them by keyword.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> The system provides the most current real-time access to news and information available to private or public organizations."</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>(pg. <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> <br><br>For those newshounds & obsessives this should send a chilling message .<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>The secret targeting of foreign journalists may have had a sinister purpose. Among the missions proposed for the Pentagon's Office of Strategic Influence was one to "coerce" foreign journalists and plant false information overseas. Secret briefing papers also said the office should find ways to "punish" those who convey the "wrong message." One senior officer told CNN that the plan would "formalize government deception, dishonesty and misinformation."</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>(pgs. 8-9)<br><br>Did anyone say it wasn't hardball?<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Rendon was also charged with engaging in "military deception" online -- an activity once assigned to the OSI. The company was contracted to monitor Internet chat rooms in both English and Arabic -- and "participate in these chat rooms when/if tasked." Rendon would also create a Web site "with regular news summaries and feature articles. Targeted at the global public, in English and at least four (4) additional languages, this activity also will include an extensive e-mail push operation." These techniques are commonly used to plant a variety of propaganda, including false information.</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>(pg 9)<br><br><br>Heh. Ministry of Information. Autodidacts all<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Never before in history had such an extensive secret network been established to shape the entire world's perception of a war. "It was not just bad intelligence -- it was an orchestrated effort," says Sam Gardner, a retired Air Force colonel who has taught strategy and military operations at the National War College. "It began before the war, was a major effort during the war and continues as post-conflict distortions."</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>(pg.9)<br><br>'Tis a maze, a blizzard. The teacup world.<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>As the war in Iraq has spiraled out of control, the Bush administration's covert propaganda campaign has intensified. According to a secret Pentagon report personally approved by Rumsfeld in October 2003 and obtained by Rolling Stone,<!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong> the Strategic Command is authorized to engage in "military deception" -- defined as "presenting false information, images or statements." The seventy-four-page document, titled "Information Operations Roadmap," also calls for psychological operations to be launched over radio, television, cell phones and "emerging technologies" such as the Internet.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> In addition to being classified secret, the road map is also stamped noforn, meaning it cannot be shared even with our allies.</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>emphasis added<br><br>(pgs10-11)<br><br>Conclusions:<br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>"We lost control of the context," Rendon warned. "That has to be fixed for the next war."</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>(pg.11)<br><br>Perpetual war is not simply a cute aphorism.<br>It appears to be the <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>m.o.</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> of a <br>psychopathological cabal currently running the country.<br><br><br>....<br> <p></p><i></i>