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US Media Loves War 'Experts' Who Always Get It Wrong
On Jonathan Schell: Who almost always gets it right
In a recent post, I pointed out that, when it comes to America’s wars, you can’t afford to be right. I suggested that those who had foreseen disaster in Iraq and Afghanistan should logically be celebrated in this country and “should be in the Rolodexes of every journalist reporting on American foreign policy, the Iran crisis, or our wars.” But, I asked, “When was the last time you heard from one of them or saw one spotlighted?”
OWS at Zuccotti Park
The interviewee in today’s TomDispatch post is a case in point. When it comes to being right, there may be no journalist, analyst, or writer who has been more on target than Jonathan Schell, whether on Vietnam, the Nixon White House (and its early cult of executive power), nuclear weapons, the Afghan War, or the invasion of Iraq. His is a remarkable and remarkably unblemished record. If you want to know what to expect from the latest in American war, who better to go to than the man who was never wrong?
Now that a possible war with Iran is regularly in the news, every week reporters are scrambling to check in with “experts” who couldn’t have been more mistaken when it came to the invasion of Iraq. Who else should you ask in Washington, where “wrong” is the ticket to media success, a guarantee that your opinion will have value?
As for right? Well, just how many calls a week do you imagine Jonathan Schell gets from reporters wanting his opinion on the latest in American war.
Zero.
Of course, give the media credit. Schell’s record does have a blemish. He wrote a book called The Unconquerable World (and in a world of full disclosure and with great pride let me add that, in my other life as a book editor, I edited it). As TomDispatch Associate Editor Andy Kroll points out in an interview with Schell (“How Empires Fall, Including the American One”), in that volume Schell essentially foresaw the path that would lead to both Tahrir Square and Zuccotti Park, but -- and here’s the blemish -- he didn’t know that. So when those events unfolded, he was as startled as the rest of us. Still, we at TomDispatch thought it our duty to step out of line, do the unpopular thing, and ask someone who has a record for being right, not wrong, about the present moment and how we got to it.
Tom Engelhardt, co-founder of the American Empire Project, runs the Nation Institute's TomDispatch.com. His latest book, co-authored with Nick Turse, is Terminator Planet: The First History of Drone Warfare, 2001-2050. His other most recent book is The United States of Fear (Haymarket Books). Previous books include: The End of Victory Culture: a History of the Cold War and Beyond, The American Way of War: How Bush's Wars Became Obama's, as well as of a novel, The Last Days of Publishing. To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here.
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12 Comments so far
Show All- the Afghan War -
It is wrong to use this term, if you want to end this insanity.
Haven't you heard? TPTB now call this a 'hot battlefield'.
If you are going to use and repeat the verbal constructs of the war-mongering propagandists, you could at least be up to date with your/their terminology.
On the other hand, I Occupy Language - I do not use the words of the Empire.
I call this part of the DAFT war to forever prevent future terrorism.
It's not GWOT, it's not WOT, it's not the Long War or 'kinetic military blah blah' -
it's the Defense against Future Terrorism
Those who continue using the language of our oppressors are sheeple -- baaaaaaaa
After all, the US fights in this 'Afghan War' (which also takes place in Pakistan, but hey) the same enemy that the US fights in Yemen and Somalia and globally.
Wikipedia says "al- Qaeda is a global broad-based militant Islamist organization".
It's a global war, a global insanity. Stop trying to protest 195 separate 'wars' against the same enemy. That strategy, that paradigm, has failed for 10 years.
To continue with a failed strategy is the epitome of uselessness.
Occupy Language!
Stop the DAFT war.
To look at US NATO military 'adventures' in Afghan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iran as separate wars - is like the ole 'Missing the Forest for the Trees' Scenario. These are not different Wars [In WWII they didn't call the US / UK fight w Germany a separate war than w Italy. They didn't even call their fight w Japan a separate war- even though it was literally fought half a World away! - These were called separate fronts of the SAME WAR!]. So like-wise These are also different fronts in the SAME War!
And Al-Qaeda the US is supposedly fighting against less than 50 Al-Qaeda in Afganistan, maybe a few hundred in Yemen -YET- FUK-US NATO & the GCC worked w Al-Qeada elements to over-throw & slaughter Khadaffi in Libya which threw Libya into total chaos -&- are now working w Al-Qaeda elements to try to topple Assad in Syria which could throw Syria into total chaos! The fact is we don't really know who or what the hell Al-Qaeda IS or Is NOT! They are what ever the hell the US, EU, NATO, CIA, MI6, the MSNM Media claim that they are or are NOT!
I rarely bother with any M$M at all (given the obvious slant of the bias one needn't bother) ...but am willing to bet that the most relied upon, cherished 'experts' are those from within the military, and/or other right-wing institutions, Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, Cato, Brookings, etc, that OF COURSE continually perpetuate demented, war mongering, fascist ideals within the "liberal" media medium.
It's nothing short of STUNNING considering how many people buy into the "liberal media" mythology that, say, Bill Kristol even admits to being their ("conservatives" i.e. fascists) own strategic creation to manipulate the public mind.
The fascists have indeed gotten incredible mileage from the fact that right-wing tenets and talking points are never accurately identified as such, and instead have gone under the soft, safe, euphemistic, Orwellian "conservative" tag for decades. This, in part, explains how America can be soooo far rightward, yet is largely unable to acknowledge or recognize it. It's a country filled with people who diligently espouse right-wing priorities/positions who don't understand *how or why* those positions *are* right-wing.
As Gore Vidal says, "When foreigners hear the term 'conservatives,' they think of kindly old gentlemen hunting foxes. They're not. They're fascists."
The corporate media's 'war experts' are there to spout and back up the b.s. of the day, not provide cogent analysis. So anyone who goes against the b.s. of the day instantly has the advantage in predicting as they have the advantage of using facts for their pronouncements. What is so complex about this?
I would re-write the headline: U.S. MEDIA LOVES WAR EXPERTS WHO ARE ALWAYS CHEERLEADERS FOR WAR!
Cheerleaders for war indeed! Good article!
I was amazed a couple of weeks ago when an Army colonel, whose name escapes me, was interviewed on the PBS snooze hour and accurately assessed the futility of remaining in Afghanistan, even from a military viewpoint. He was introduced as a "whistleblower" and I doubt if he'll ever be asked his opinion again in the corporate media. He said he was willing to risk his career in order to speak the truth about this situation. I hope he's not risking anything else.
The news stories are one of the most effective operations of the MIC/CIA propaganda machine and has been for decades. Just ask the CFR or the Rand Corporation. It's all just one large "reality show". Old Eddy Bernays and his buddy Satan are celebrating down by the lake of fire while munching on the souls of their fascist followers as they tossed into the pit by the MIC/CIA and the US American Empire. As seen on TV.
More important than any actual "analysis' are the catchy little phrases and terms they use to describe simple things. You know what I mean. Phrases like "boots on the ground" etc, etc. You will see the same "experts" on financial new channels who are even more consistent in being wrong and are even more sought after. But that's the nature of the mis-information business.
The ultimate military buzzworder's buzzword: "metrics".
RCallaghan
It should also be pointed out how the so-called military experts proclaimed that "victory was just around the corner" in Vietnam because they firmly believed that they "could see the light that was [supposedly] at the end of the tunnel".
This is what the so-called military experts have been saying for over ten years in Afghanistan and will probably continue to insist in the days and the weeks and years ahead as the Big Fool says to push ahead in the Big Sandy.
Tom: You can be so naive sometimes. The infiltrated media, that serves up war propaganda is not interested in who is right, only those willing to bang the martial drums. To sustain a military budget that's up into the stratosphere, the threat of war (and where there is no viable threat, Intelligence can be fixed in support of a case for war) must remain a constant.
Let's not forget the MIC is a state-to-state job builder, so the rationale for war is obscenely tied to the mantra of jobs. And who is influential in the halls of government? Who benefits in profits fit for a king, when each war is officially pronounced and sustained?
Plus as an added caveat, all sorts of citizens' rights can be suppressed as is prized by The Right.
Winning a war, along with a valid reason to fight one, no longer fits into the calculus or for the most part... matters. Wrong era, Tom. That's why the MSM does not want to hear from the likes of Schell. Don't you remember: "Truth is the first casualty of war," and the one favored by the make war state where, say it along with me, "Mars rules!" You once framed a resonant sentiment as "Force first."
And lastly, let's not forget the oil, the need to maintain the hegemony of the U.S. dollar, and the geo-political advantages known to those who identify with Empire.