Weapons of Mass Deception: The Uses of Propaganda in Bush's War on Iraq

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Summary: we need more books like this one
Review: ah, the joys of college. i had to buy this book and read it for my ethnic studies class. i don't know that i would have read this book if it wasn't for that class, not because i'm not interested, but basically because i don't think i would have heard about it. anyhow, this book exposes what basically most people WANT to keep secret. it's obvious so much is going on in this country, and in the world in general right now, so it's easy for people to be misled by information. this book does a great job at showing exactly what information is false and/or incorrect. a must read if you want an alternative p.o.v.

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Summary: A Necessary Wakeup Call
Review: America's first Nobel Prize winner for literature, Sinclair Lewis, penned a novel in the thirties called "It Can't Happen Here" which was a wakeup call to his fellow citizens in that troubled period. He demonstrated in fiction what he feared could happen in reality, that the United States could be lulled into a right wing dictatorship in the belief that the government was operating to keep us safe from tyranny abroad.

Lewis' book was penned in the Hitler period, when the specter of war loomed before a foreboding world. Now a current wakeup call has been provided with this important book. Authors like Vance Packard were understandably concerned with the way that Madison Avenue was ruling the lives of Americans in the fifties and sixties. They were concerned about packaging desires through a blinding mass consumption of symbols and advertisements. Now the situation is far more critical as the authors inform us about the packaging of a war, sending young men and women abroad on the basis of lies served up by an administration that seeks hegemony in an important oil region on the pretext of fighting world terrorism and saving the Iraqi people from brutal dictatorship, and ultimately, to deprive the hated Saddam Hussein from using weapons of mass destruction on Americans.

The fact that Madison Avenue was incorporated into battle to sell the war to Americans at home is a highly disturbing event that must be addressed. Fortunately the authors courageously address this urgent point. Previously American presidents such as Roosevelt and Truman demonstrated the necessity for war by laying out the dangers to Americans with blunt talk based on then available information. They did not hire public relations spinmeisters to convince the people they had to go to war for reasons that were being manufactured in order to sell their product. War is too dangerous a product to be marketed in the manner of toothpaste and videos.

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Summary: Executive deception and media complicity
Review: As is becoming clear to more and more people every day, the Bush administration deftly managed to turn the tide of American opinion toward support of the Iraq invasion through a continuous barrage of unsubstantiated allegations about Iraq's weapons programs, Saddam's suppposed connections to the 9-11 attacks, and the ridiculous claim that Saddam Hussein's regime posed an threat to the lives and safety of Americans. As the CIA, frustrated by the near media blackout of agents and analysts who contradicted Bush's claims, tried to point out, there was little evidence to support these allegations.

In this book, Rampton and Stauber focus on the role of the corporate media and the PR industry in bolstering the public perception of the administration's weakly supported case through an uncritical acceptance of, and even editorial assistance to, the neoconservative agenda. In particular, the role of private PR firms in the government's presentation of the case for both Gulf Wars came as a revelation: right-wing think tanks, Arab royalty, Iraqi exiles, and oil companies, in their efforts to sway public opinion, have all employed the services of professionals who specialize in substituting "branded" image for substantial facts.

As another reviewer has pointed out, this book is biased, in a sense, in that it virtually passes over the role of the Clinton administration in the continuation of Bush I's brutal, cruel sanctions against Iraq. These only served to strengthen Mr. Hussein, relative to his people, who were plunged into dire poverty and widespread starvation. Not to mention the continuous bombings throughout the 90s.
This is a valid point, and a more complete picture could be painted of the continnum from Reagan and Bush I's military assistance to Saddam during the 80s (including chemical and biological weapons, which they knew he was using), to Bush II's escalation into outright belligerence, could have been painted if the authors had admitted the complicity of both parties in this foreign policy folly.

Nonetheless, this book is focused on current events. Since the current administration seems to feel it can remake the Mideast through outright aggression, there is an urgent need for Americans to learn about the way those in power can mislead the public. Vigorous public debate about the wisdom of these policies, with a focus on facts, instead of opportunistic fearmongering, is necessary top maintain the (failing?) health of our democracy.

Rampton and Stauber are obviously experienced journalists, and their book is a concise presentation of the crucial role that propaganda has played in the march to this unnecessary war. One of the one-star reviewers below, without giving an example to support his case, simply pointed out that you can't believe everything you read. This is, of course, exactly the point the authors of this book are making. We've been expected to believe the Bush administration's inconsistent, constantly changing reasons given in their attempts to justify an unprovoked attack on a nation that posed no threat to us. For a while, at least, those who dared to queston their case were branded unpatriotic traitors, and often intimidated into silence. If the case for war had been rock solid, then Bush and his supporters would have had no reason to fear open debate in the mainstream media.

This book, backed up by ample documentation, gives numerous reasons that explain why the war party worked so hard to prevent a balanced look at the facts. Without a doubt, you shouldn't believe everything you read - but you should read everything, then make your own judgements. When the media fail to present both sides of an issue, which has so blatantly been the case in the lead up to this war, the people aren't given the tools they need to make an informed decision.

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Summary: Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain
Review: There's a hilarious bit in an old movie where a wife comes home early and catches her husband in bed with another woman. As she stands there, gaping and furious, the husband and the other woman calmly get dressed. They completely ignore the wife. The woman leaves and the husband goes to the living room, sits in a chair and begins reading a newspaper. The wife eventually shrugs and begins to doubt that she saw what she clearly saw.

George Bush is currently playing the part of the husband and We The People are cast in the role of the wife. Our president has been caught wrong so many times that he no longer even tries to justify his deceptions-he just ignores them and calls us unpatriotic for noticing.

Rampton and Stauber have noticed the lies and documented them. In "Weapons of Mass Deception" they give a lucid account of how the Bush White House spun gold from straw with the help of highly paid public relations proffessionals to create the "need" for war where none existed.

The Bushfolk cooked the intelligence books to come up with a three-pronged rationale for the invasion of Iraq-that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and was actively seeking to develop a nuclear bomb (..."uranium from Africa"), that Hussein was in league with and actively supporting the al-Qaeda terrorists, and that Iraq posed a clear and present danger to the security of the United States-Iraq was an "imminent threat". Bush's PR people then set about selling this to the country in the same manner that laundry detergent is marketed. We wanted "whiter whites" and "sparkling freshness". Stauber and Rampton shred the administration's stated reasons for war as false from the beginning and lay bare the public relations campaign that enabled them to sell Congress and the public a complete bill of goods.

Once everyone caught on that there were no weapons of mass destruction, that the "uranium from Africa" story was completely bogus, that there was no al-Qaeda link and our skies never darkened with Iraqi warplanes, then the Bush rationale for war shifted. For a while the chant was that Saddam Hussein was a bad man and the Iraqi people are better off without him. True enough, but the same could be said about a dozen other dictators in a dozen other countries who just don't happen to be siting on top of one of the world's largest oil reserves. Now, our president seems content to ignore the entire original (fraudulent) reasons that he used to take us to war the same way that he is ignoring those coffins that arrive at Dover Air Force Base daily.

It is an old truism that "In war, truth is the first casualty". But what the Bush people have done here defies description. They have kdnapped the truth, tortured it, killed it, and now deny the truth ever existed. Bravo to the authors of this important work for sounding the alarm.

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Summary: Just try some truth for a change
Review: Americans were misled repeatedly by the Bush administration. We were propagandized into a state of pro-war hysteria. If we didn't blindly support the president, we weren't supporting the troops.

Tell that to the Americans who died so this desperate chickenhawk president can win a second term. Phony flight suit militarism from a man who ducked even his National Guard service after getting a bye from the draft through string-pulling. Other Americans died in the service of their country while this brat was doing his military duty without ever showing up. He was too busy working on political campaigns.

After months of linking Iraq to Al Queda and the WTC attack, they said they'd never said anything like that. Just as Bush said those sailors put up the "Mission Accomplished" sign -- even though both the Navy and the White House say the White House provided the sign.

Don't get me wrong. The American military has done a good job, especially given the inept political leadership of this administration.

We had a well-definied mission in Afghanistan. Track down the people responsible for bombing the WTC. Getting Osama. But then the Chickenhawk-in-Chief gets sidetracked talking about folks who threatened to kill his daddy.

So far, as a result, we've had hundreds of Americans die and the Middle East is in more turmoil than ever. The walk-in-the-park liberation has turned into a mess. We can't get out, but we certainly need someone who can keep his or her eye on the target.

Osama first including the people who DIRECTLY supported him. Then we need to sit down and think about American security in the new age. It shouldn't be so different. Our freedoms are more important that the need for dysfunctional presidents to display their delayed onset manhood.

Bush's father was a decent man who made some mistakes and took some positive steps. His son is a posturing fratboy, surrounded by sycophants who tell him what he wants to hear ... and who lie about more than just weapons of mass destruction.

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Summary: War is Peace and Unarmed=Deadly: Welcome to PRWorld!
Review: Rampton and Stauber of "Toxic Sludge is Good For You" fame have done it again: yet another disturbing account of how PR concerns have hijacked the relationship between the media and the Pentagon. "Weapons of Mass Deception" is a quick but pithy read, exposing such deceptions as the multiple erroneous claims by the administration tagging sanction-starved Iraq as the next Axis power -and the PR-manipulated failure of the media to adequately publicize retractions of these claims in the proper detail. Their references are easily verified, as most are publicly-available internet resources. Although a bit fatalistic at times, Rampton and Stauber's exposition is made even more relevant by recent events, like the outing/attempted silencing of CIA agent and WMD operative Valerie Plame. Disrupting the flow of disinformation means taking the demand for a special prosecutor in this case to the public. For example there's a rally in Seattle, Monday November 3rd, 4pm outside the Federal Courthouse on 5th and Madison. geocities.com/specpros03. Use your First Amendment-given weapons of mass dissension!

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Summary: What Would The Authors Have Us Do?
Review: Rampton and Stauber emphasize that the Arab world doesn't like the US because of 1) it's support for leaders like the Shah and current undemocratic regiemes such as those in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and 2) because of our support for Israel's as a Jewish state.

Apparently they believe that making the Arab world love the US is of pre-eminent importance and should be a major focus of our foreign policy.

But, as they don't say what we should do, should we infer that they wish us to subvert the governments of Egypt and Saudi Arabia, et al? Cut off support for Israel? Issue some sort of official "apology" for supporting Shahs and Kings?

The authors do not consider the possibility that the problem lies with the Arab world, government and populace, which needs to change.

Nevertheless, the authors document very well the propaganda techniques used by the Bush administration and its supporters to manipulate US public opinion - techniques which have been very effective in duping the too credulous populace.

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Summary: The first four chapters were good...
Review: ... but then this book spun into the realm of the ridiculous. What starts as a well-researched look into the role of the Bush administration in continuing the longtime tradition of government propoganda to promote Manifest Destiny takes a sharp left around Chapter 5. I was willing to accept the narrow focus -- we are, after all, dealing with Bush now, and his decisions and the decisions of his advisors are what, in their turn, advise our relationship with the outside world at the moment. As another reviewer has stated, I found the absence of the Clinton administration's influence on the world events which led to September 11 and the wars on Afghanistan and Iraq increasingly disturbing (after all, the premise here is that America was attacked because the world hates our long-standing tradition of throwing our weight around and refusing to live up to our own standards; are we to believe that everyone thought America was great until Dubya took the oath?), but, again, was willing to overlook this because the ambition of the book appeared to be a focused examination of the Bush administration's use of propoganda to further its war effort.

Then comes Chapter 5, where the focus expands exponentially -- and unreasonably -- to include more and more conservatives NOT linked to the Bush administration; the extreme opinions of Ann Coulter, for example, are trotted out as though she were the Secretary of Defense. After this, we are not-so-subtly force-fed the ways in which heroic liberal opposition has been strong and informed, in such a way that a Superman vs. Lex Luthor battle seems more complex in the moral questions it raises. I finally had to put the book down when the authors attempted to use the O'Reilly Factor, a talk show hosted by a conservative blowhard whose bullying and ignorance rival that of Rush Limbaugh, as proof that the news media has done nothing but support the Bush administration's decision for war (also note that CBS, ABC, and NBC, the three largest news agencies in the US, and all three of which are unilaterally considered to have a liberal bent, are conspicuously absent from most of these arguments in favor of pointing out instances where the self-proclaimed "no-bias" Fox news happened to televise Bush without devil-horns on his head).

I finished this book baffled as to why the authors would strive to make better spin-watchers out of their readers, only to provide blatant pro-left spin throughout the latter third of the book. I was left with two options: either the authors didn't realize they were leaning so hard and actually consider themselves unbiased, in which case they are fools (and pompous ones at that, assuming their conclusions to be a warning salvo for America before descending into the dark days of an Orwellian autocracy); or they DID know, in which case they're as despicable as the government they criticize. Neither speaks well for them.

I'm neither pro-conservative nor pro-liberal, which is why I like to get my information from sources I feel won't try to manipulate me with a political agenda. This book is far from that promise. In fact, as much as I was compelled by the first two-thirds of the book in the favor of the authors' argument, after their agenda became so apparent in the back pages, I found myself unable to trust anything I read before, and am now left with little or nothing positive to say about this book. If you're looking for an unbiased view of modern world politics, DO NOT trust these authors to provide it.

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Summary: Brilliant expose' of Bush/Blair warmongering
Review: This book brilliantly exposes the Labour/Republican campaign of systematic mendacity before and during their illegal attack on Iraq.

For example, the authors record that on 7 September 2002, Bush claimed that an IAEA report said that Iraq was six months away from developing a nuclear weapon. An IAEA spokesman said, "There's never been a report like that issued from this agency." It had actually said that it "has found no indication of Iraq having achieved the program goal of producing nuclear weapons or of Iraq having retained a physical capability for the production of weapon-useable nuclear material or having clandestinely obtained such material." This did not stop Bush's spokesman Anthony Blair from repeating the lie. The authors also remind us that, in February, MI6 stated that there were no links whatever between Iraq and Al-Qa'ida, contradicting the other big Labour/Republican lie.

These, and the many other examples that the authors cite, raise the question, what did the working class do about the Labour government's warmongering? In particular, Labour Party members should be asking themselves whether they are complicit in the war crimes of their chosen leader.

Before the war, we all knew that Blair was flying the globe, lying for war. What did Labour Party members do? Then their Parliamentary Party voted for war. Did any members act to stop him, even if only by resigning from the party?

Without the continuing support of his party, Blair could not have taken us to war, against the wishes of the majority of the British people.

At the Labour Party Conference some members feebly tried, months after it would have made any difference, to soothe their guilty consciences by debating the war that they allowed, trying to weasel out of their responsibility for the war that they made possible. Deprived even of this token vote, did they resign? No, the Conference, disgracefully, gave warmonger Blair a 2-minute standing ovation before he spoke, 58 rounds of applause during his speech, and a 7 minute 35 second standing ovation at the end.

Thanks to excellent books like this, no generation has ever been better informed about the wars that we let our rulers wage - but this only increases our responsibility. The United States Committee for a Free Lebanon, staffed by members of the US ruling class, urges 'overwhelming, non-surgical, nonproportional military force' against Sudan, Libya, Iran and Syria. And what if Bush attacks Cuba? What do we plan to do to stop future wars?

Earlier this year, our rulers allowed us to march, meet, petition and play electoral and parliamentary games; we won all the arguments, we won in the opinion polls, but then the rulers attacked Iraq anyway, as if we did not matter. Why did all our efforts make no difference whatsoever?
Because these kinds of activities are all based on the delusion that we live in some sort of democracy. Blair's war against Iraq, waged against our wishes, is the proof that we the people do not rule here yet.

Our capitalist class rulers will make wars till we take away their power to do so. Only revolution, seizure of power by the working class, will do the job.

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Summary: Good Chronicle But Forgets the Democrats
Review: Others have already stated the merits of this book as a chronicle of the Bush administration's lies, half-truths, and manipulation of public opinion in order to garner support for the war on Iraq. I share that opinion and recommend the book.

However, I have a couple of criticisms. One noticeable ommission from the book was an investigation into the Jessica Lynch spectacle which was a contrived made-for-prime time TV spot.

This book was of course about the Iraq war of 2003 and, for that reason, it is natural that it would focus on the present administration's propaganda machine. However, I think it would be a mistake to think that Clinton (and the Democrats) did not make use of similar propaganda tactics during that presidency. Let's not forget that he waged war on Iraq and Serbia during his presidency (not to mention the sanctions that killed thousands of Iraqis). Sure, he got the UN involved and his propganda campaign was perhaps not as pronounced. But those wars were "branded" as humanitarian wars...and let's not forget about the bombing of a sudanese aspirin factory!

However, if Americans think that going to the polls and voting Democratic in the next election is going to qualitatively change all of this, I believe they will soon be disillusioned. Don't forget that most of the Democrats were on board for this war. Only recently have they been critical, because they now think that they can get political mileage out of being against the war.
This is Opportunism.

To its credit, the book did mention how Carter- a so-called liberal- courted the dictatorial Shah of Iran. However, this was a brief mention. I am afraid that the book will give the impression that Bush and the Republicans are the problem and this will give rise to the illusion that the Democrats will save the day. At best, the Democrats may be the lesser of two evils.