IRAQ

Media Downplaying Iraq Successes

John Jessup
Capitol Hill Correspondent

November 24, 2004

CBN.com – Coalition forces in Iraq have launched a new offensive to clamp down on the insurgency.

It's the third such offensive this month, and they're apparently making some significant finds.

This week U.S. soldiers uncovered one of the largest weapons caches to date.

But success stories like that aren't making the headlines, and some people say the military is also fighting a war against the media.

Since the military's recent campaign to occupy Fallujah, thousands of insurgents have been killed or are on the run.

And coalition forces are making critical gains in gathering intelligence.

Van Hipp, a former top Pentagon official, says a high-level commander in Iraq told him he's encouraged by the results in Fallujah.

"He told me we are now able to trace their signature. They're making mistakes. And ... people on the ground reluctant to talk in the past are now talking,” Van Hipp said.

But that isn't the story being told by the media, according to Brent Bozell of the Media Research Center

"I have maintained for a long time that the number one impediment that George Bush faces is not a hostile Democratic Congress, it's the media," Bozell said.

The MRC tracks the press and Bozell says he's not surprised by the lop-sided coverage in Iraq.

The MRC offers the following examples:

Earlier this month when U.S. forces announced they controlled 70-percent of Fallujah, the headlines read:

“Assault on Fallujah Meets Resistance"

"Invasion Sets Off Clashes"

and "Iraqi Insurgents Shoot Down U.S. Army Helicopter"

Another example is the video footage broadcast last week showing a marine shooting and killing an apparently wounded Iraqi in a mosque.

Hipp says these stories don't provide an accurate picture or take into account guerrilla warfare against enemies who don't follow the rules of war.

“You can always count on the ACLU crowd and the blame America first crowd and the al-Jazeera network to come out with those kinds of things,” Hipp said. “But, again, it's a hostile fire zone. And what they always leave out in the reporting is that our troops were being fired upon from the very same mosque the day before.

Bozell says that kind of reporting hurts the media in the long run.

“I think there's a backlash to these types of stories…where they just have this Jihad that they're launching. I think the average person is looking at the New York Times story and saying, that's the New York Times, what do you expect,” he said.

Bozell says the public is becoming more savvy when it comes to media spin, but he also says the administration should do a better job fighting the opposition to balance what many see as media bias.

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