Cori E. Dauber

“ By disseminating enemy propaganda without comment or critique, the press is failing its responsibilities, including, in any event, any responsibility to be neutral, for the media do unwittingly facilitate the terrorist’s purposes. ”

“ The war against Islamist insurgents will continue to be, in large part, a war against arguments, symbols, and images. That such a war is being fought in an information context unlike any other only complicates the challenges faced by the U.S. Army, and the U.S. military generally. New information and communication technologies are being used to great synergistic effect by the enemy: the military has to understand how this works and be prepared to make use of such technologies to counter enemy messaging to the extent possible, as quickly as possible. ”

“ That said, the Army has to find ways to go around the press, to reach the American people in particular— and other audiences as well—directly, on the assumption that continuing to depend upon the media, and only the media, to get their message out will continue to be insufficient. The enemy has made today’s technologies work for them; the American military can and should do the same. ”

“ If the truth is known, then military spokespeople need to be proactive, to engage in rapid response or, if at all possible, to get out ahead of stories that are predictable. To be sure, the military has gotten progressively better at this. When two soldiers were kidnapped in 2007, a massive search was underway for them in Iraq. Although the soldiers were not found during that initial search, insurgent video of their military ID cards was.165 86 Rather than get out ahead of that story, the Army waited for the insurgent propaganda video to appear, and then attempted to respond. ”

“ So long as they make clear that they are only able to speak in those limited terms—we cannot be positive yet, we are in the midst of an accountability check to confirm, but we do not believe the claim that marines have been captured—there will be times when doing so will be far less damaging than saying nothing until they are able to speak with absolute certainty. ”

“ PAOs at every level should complain when a story airs involving footage taken from insurgent websites—but should then say, if you’re going to use this material, the least you can do 85 is present it with a disclaimer ”