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COURAGE TO RESIST Supporting the troops who refuse to ght! www.couragetoresist.org 484 Lake Park Ave #41, Oakland CA 94610 510-488-3559 August 2014 National Newsletter facebook.com/couragetoresist “The Fog Machine of War” Chelsea Manning on the US Military and Media Freedom, as published by the New York Times By Chelsea Manning, former US Army secrecy make it impossible for Americans intelligence analyst. June 14, 2014 to grasp fully what is happening in the When I chose to disclose classifi ed wars we fi nance. information in 2010, I did so out of a love If you were following the news for my country and a sense of duty to during the March 2010 elections in Iraq, Supporter of al-Maliki with a poster depicting others. I’m now serving a sentence of 35 you might remember that the American inked fi ngers being hanged. Photo printed by the years in prison for these unauthorized press was fl ooded with stories declaring NYT’s alongside Chelsea Manning’s Op-Ed. disclosures. I understand that my actions the elections a success, complete with violated the law. upbeat anecdotes and photographs of crackdown against political dissidents by However, the concerns that Iraqi women proudly displaying their the Iraqi Ministry of Interior and federal motivated me have not been resolved. As ink-stained fi ngers. The subtext was police, on behalf of Prime Minister Nuri Iraq erupts in civil war and America again that United States military operations Kamal al-Maliki. Detainees were often contemplates intervention, that unfi nished had succeeded in creating a stable and tortured, or even killed. business should give new urgency to the democratic Iraq. Early that year, I received orders question of how the United States military Those of us stationed there were to investigate 15 individuals whom the controlled the media coverage of its long acutely aware of a more complicated federal police had arrested on suspicion involvement there and in Afghanistan. I reality. of printing “anti-Iraqi literature.” I learned believe that the current limits on press Military and diplomatic reports that these individuals had absolutely no freedom and excessive government coming across my desk detailed a brutal ties to terrorism; they were publishing a scholarly critique of Mr. Maliki’s administration. I forwarded this fi nding to the offi cer in command in eastern Our new call to resist illegal war Baghdad. He responded that he didn’t need this information; instead, I should and illegitimate authority assist the federal police in locating more “anti-Iraqi” print shops. By Courage to Resist. July 3, 2014 I was shocked by our military’s Courage to Resist calls on all complicity in the corruption of that United States military personnel to resist election. Yet these deeply troubling details any effort to pursue a new military attack fl ew under the American media’s radar. on Iraq via troops, bombs, drones or any It was not the fi rst (or the last) other means. In keeping with our Mission time I felt compelled to question the Statement, we affi rm that just as there way we conducted our mission in Iraq. was never any legitimate reason for the We intelligence analysts, and the offi cers US to send military forces to Iraq in the to whom we reported, had access to a past, there is not now any reason for the comprehensive overview of the war that US to participate militarily in the affairs of Troops, bullets, bombs, mines, and other few others had. How could top-level the people of Iraq. The refugees created weapons will continue to kill, maim, and decision makers say that the American every day by the wars in Iraq need breed hatred in the people of Iraq. More public, or even Congress, supported the humanitarian aid. The solution to the warfare cannot do anything positive for confl ict when they didn’t have half the problems in Iraq lies in the nations and the men, women, and children of Iraq. story? parties involved talking it out. Every US service person has a Among the many daily reports The US destroyed Iraq. Sending conscience. Every member of every I received via email while working in US troops and/or weapons again cannot branch of the US military service is bound Iraq in 2009 and 2010 was an internal improve the situation. It can only cause to obey that conscience, and the oath public affairs briefi ng that listed recently more unnecessary death and destruction. continued on back continued on inside “The fog machine of war” by Chelsea Manning cont. published news articles about the American mission in Iraq. One of my regular tasks was to provide, for the public affairs summary read by the command in eastern Baghdad, a single- sentence description of each issue covered, complementing our analysis with local intelligence. The more I made these daily comparisons between the news back in the States and the military and diplomatic reports available to me as an analyst, the Hundreds marched on behalf of Manning in LGBT events around the world in June. Cities with parade more aware I became of the disparity. In contingents included: San Francisco (photos above & below), NYC, Seattle, Twin Cities, Oklahoma City, contrast to the solid, nuanced briefi ngs we London (UK), Dublin (Ireland). Manning was the offi cial Honorary Grand Marshal of SF PRIDE 2014! created on the ground, the news available to the public was fl ooded with foggy Less well known is that journalists there was no constitutionally protected speculation and simplifi cations. whom military contractors rate as right to be an embedded journalist. One clue to this disjunction lay likely to produce “favorable” coverage, The embedded reporter program, in the public affairs reports. Near the based on their past reporting, also get which continues in Afghanistan and top of each briefi ng was the number preference. This outsourced “favorability” wherever the United States sends troops, of embedded journalists attached to rating assigned to is deeply informed American military units in a combat each applicant is by the military’s zone. Throughout my deployment, I used to screen out experience of how never saw that tally go above 12. In other those judged likely media coverage shifted words, in all of Iraq, which contained 31 to produce critical public opinion during million people and 117,000 United States coverage. the Vietnam War. The troops, no more than a dozen American Reporters who gatekeepers in public journalists were covering military succeeded in obtaining affairs have too much operations. embed status in Iraq power: Reporters The process of limiting press access were then required to naturally fear having to a confl ict begins when a reporter sign a media “ground their access terminated, applies for embed status. All reporters rules” agreement. so they tend to avoid are carefully vetted by military public Army public affairs controversial reporting affairs offi cials. This system is far from offi cials said this was that could raise red unbiased. Unsurprisingly, reporters who to protect operational fl ags. have established relationships with the security, but it also The existing military are more likely to be granted access. allowed them to terminate a reporter’s program forces journalists to compete embed without appeal. against one another for “special access” There have been numerous to vital matters of foreign and domestic cases of reporters’ having their access policy. Too often, this creates reporting terminated following controversial that fl atters senior decision makers. A reporting. In 2010, the late Rolling Stone result is that the American public’s access reporter Michael Hastings had his access to the facts is gutted, which leaves them pulled after reporting criticism of the with no way to evaluate the conduct of Obama administration by Gen. Stanley A American offi cials. McChrystal and his staff in Afghanistan. A Journalists have an important Pentagon spokesman said, “Embeds are a role to play in calling for reforms to the privilege, not a right.” embedding system. The favorability of If a reporter’s embed status a journalist’s previous reporting should is terminated, typically she or he is not be a factor. Transparency, guaranteed blacklisted. This program of limiting press by a body not under the control of access was challenged in court in 2013 public affairs offi cials, should govern the by a freelance reporter, Wayne Anderson, credentialing process. An independent who claimed to have followed his board made up of military staff members, agreement but to have been terminated veterans, Pentagon civilians and journalists after publishing adverse reports about the could balance the public’s need for How Chelsea Manning sees herself. By Alicia Neal, confl ict in Afghanistan. The ruling on his information with the military’s need for in cooperation with Chelsea herself, commissioned case upheld the military’s position that by the Chelsea Manning Support Network. continued on back Veterans welcome home Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl By Gerry Condon, on behalf of Veterans disappointed that the president has for Peace, at the National Press Club and continued the aggressive foreign policies The White House. June 10, 2014 of the Bush Administration. But today we Five more US soldiers were killed can thank President Obama for a couple in Afghanistan yesterday. They were killed steps in the right direction. by a NATO airstrike, so-called “friendly President Obama did the right thing fi re.” Who is to blame for these deaths? when he brought home a US prisoner of Certainly not Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who did war from Afghanistan. not order US troops into an endless and President Obama did the right thing pointless war in Afghanistan.