Word
Gems
What is a
man but the sum of his thoughts?
Deception
& Propaganda:
Franklin
Foer:
CNN
& Saddam
CNN's Access of Evil
The network of record covered Saddam's repression
with propaganda.
BY FRANKLIN FOER
Monday, April 14, 2003 12:01 a.m. EDT WSJ
As Baghdad fell last week, CNN announced that it too had been liberated. On the
New York Times' op-ed page on Friday, Eason Jordan, the network's news chief, admitted
that his organization had learned some "awful things" about the Baathist
regime--murders, tortures, assassination plots--that it simply could not broadcast
earlier. Reporting these stories, Mr. Jordan wrote, "would have jeopardized the lives
of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff." ...
To be fair, CNN was not the only organization to play this game. But as the
network of record, soi-disant, they have a longer trail than most. It makes rich
reading to return to transcripts and compare the CNN version of Iraq with the reality that
has emerged. For nearly a decade, the network gave credulous treatment to orchestrated
anti-U.S. protests. When Saddam won his most recent "election," CNN's Baghdad
reporter Jane Arraf treated the event as meaningful: "The point is that this really
is a huge show of support" and "a vote of defiance against the United
States." After Saddam granted amnesty to prisoners in October, she reported, this
"really does diffuse one of the strongest criticisms over the past decades of Iraq's
human-rights records."
For long stretches, Ms. Arraf was American TV's only Baghdad correspondent. Her
work was often filled with such parrotings of the Baathist line. On the Gulf War's 10th
anniversary, she told viewers, "At 63, [Saddam] mocks rumors he is ill. Not just
standing tall but building up. As soon as the dust settled from the Gulf War, and the
bodies were buried, Iraq began rebuilding." She said little about human-rights
violations, violent oppression, or festering resentment towards Saddam. Scouring her oeuvre,
it is nearly impossible to find anything on these defining features of the Baathist epoch.
Reading Mr. Jordan now, you get the impression that CNN had no ethical option
other than to soft-pedal. But there were alternatives. CNN could have abandoned Baghdad.
Not only would they have stopped recycling lies, they could have focused more intently on
obtaining the truth about Saddam. They could have diverted resources to Kurdistan and
Jordan (the country), where recently arrived Iraqis could speak without fear of death.
They could have exploited exile groups with underground contacts.
There's another reason why Mr. Jordan doesn't deserve applause. He says nothing
about the lessons of Baghdad. After all, the network still sends correspondents to such
countries as Cuba, Burma and Syria, ruled by dictators who impose media
"guidelines." Even if CNN ignores the moral costs of working with such regimes,
it should at least pay attention to the practical costs. These governments only cooperate
with CNN because it suits their short-term interests. They don't reward loyalty. It wasn't
surprising, then, that the Information Ministry booted CNN from Baghdad in the war's first
days. In a way CNN's absence at this pivotal moment provides a small measure of justice:
The network couldn't use its own cameras to cover the fall of a regime that it had treated
with such astonishing respect.
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