Prosecute US Corporate Media For War Crimes

Joanne98

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Sun Jul-29-07 08:50 AM
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Prosecute US Corporate Media For War Crimes

Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda, would have seen no difference between his methods and objectives and those of the neocon cabal in power

CLASSIC ARTICLES | Originally published April 22, 2003
The presentation of an illegal invasion of a foreign country as a “preventative” or pre-emptive war did not originate with Bush, Cheney or Rumsfeld.
BY DAVID WALSH

The ongoing US aggression in the Middle East raises the most serious questions about the role of the mass media in modern society. In the period leading up to the invasion, the American media uncritically advanced the Bush Administration’s arguments, rooted in lies, distortions and half-truths, for an attack on Iraq. It virtually excluded all critical viewpoints, to the point of blacking out news of mass anti-war demonstrations and any other facts that contradicted the propaganda from the White House and Pentagon.

The obvious aim was to misinform and manipulate public opinion, and convince the tens of millions within the US who were opposed to the Administration’s war policy that they constituted a small and helpless minority.

Now, as if on cue, the US media has obediently turned its attention to Syria evidently the next target of the US military. If the focus of the White House and Pentagon should shift to North Korea or Iran, the appropriate items will begin to appear about the dire threat represented by those regimes to the security of the American people.

In the American media, there is barely a trace of serious analysis concerning the political and social realities of the Middle East. It long ago abandoned any sense of responsibility for educating and informing the public or carrying out the critical democratic function traditionally assigned to the “Fourth Estate,” i.e., serving as a watchdog and check on government abuses and falsifications. Instead it slavishly carries out the function assigned it by the ruling elite: to confuse, terrorize and intimidate the American public, rendering it less able to resist the reactionary program of the right- wing clique in Washington.

The television networks and leading newspapers are the prime source of news and information for tens of millions of people in the US. However, these public resources are in the hands of giant firms, controlled by fabulously wealthy individuals who will stop at nothing to defend their profits and property. The corpses of thousands, or, if necessary, millions of Iraqis, , Syrians, Iranians and others are a small price to pay, as far as the media billionaires are concerned, for achieving American military and economic domination of the globe.

This makes the US media an accessory before and after the fact to crimes carried out in Iraq and future crimes against other peoples in the region and around the world. Sitting far from the ravaged Iraqi cities, in well-appointed boardrooms, the media moguls may believe they will never face such charges. There are, however, historical parallels and precedents to the contrary.

The Nuremberg Precedent

The role of propaganda and propagandists figured prominently at the Nuremberg war crimes tribunal, convened to render judgment on the Nazi leaders following World War II. The tribunal was an institution organized by the victorious Allied governments, serving in the final analysis the ruling classes of those countries.

Nonetheless, in their arguments US prosecutors set forth a democratic legal principle derived from the international experience of a half- century of carnage: that planning and launching an aggressive war constituted a criminal act and that those who helped prepare such a war through their propaganda efforts were as culpable as those who drew up the battle plans or manufactured the munitions.

The case made against Hans Fritzsche, one of the individuals chiefly responsible for Nazi newspaper and radio propaganda, is particularly significant. Fritzsche, born in Bochum, Westphalia in 1900, served in the German Army in World War I and studied liberal arts at university, but left without a degree. He began a career as a journalist working for the Hugenberg Press, a newspaper chain that supported the right-wing “national” parties, including the Nazis.

Fritzsche began commenting on radio in September 1932, discussing political events on his own weekly program, “Hans Fritzsche Speaks.” That same year the regime of Franz von Papen appointed him head of the Wireless (Radio) News Department, a government agency. Fritzsche was generally sympathetic to the Nazi cause, but not a member of the party.

Underlining the importance http://www.bestcyrano.org/cyrano/?p=114

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Jim Sagle

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Sun Jul-29-07 11:02 AM
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1. You need to cut this down to 4 or 5 paragraphs to avoid a copyright violation.

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Joe Chi Minh

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Sun Jul-29-07 11:29 AM
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2. The headline alone is compelling, mind you.

I found it interesting to hear on a cable historical programme, today, called Hitler's Henchmen - in this case, Doenitz - that, at the end, Hitler thought Goebbel's children should be fostered out, but Goebbels thought it would be a better idea to poison them.

Perhaps the one small thing that could be said in Hitler's favour is that he wasn't quite as nerdy as his most 'loyal', most sycophantic henchmen, such as Goebbels, Doenitz (the ultimate cypher), etc. Of course, I don't think it quite counterbalances his 'demerits'...

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