RUPERT CORNWELL reports on a new propaganda initiative from America's defence chiefs.
WASHINGTON - In a move worrying some United States defence officials, the Pentagon is developing a major covert news and disinformation campaign to help Washington win the propaganda war against the terrorists, especially in the all-important Islamic world.
The plan is being developed by the Office of Strategic Influence (OSI), a recently created unit funded from an extra $US10 billion of emergency funds voted by Congress to the Pentagon after the September 11 terrorist attacks.
The main target audience is in the Islamic countries of the Middle East and Asia, but it may also be directed at Western Europe, where criticism has grown sharply in recent weeks of the Bush Administration's strategy to combat terrorism.
Little is known of the OSI other than that it is headed by an Air Force general, Brigadier-General Simon Worden, and is being advised by a high-powered Washington-based communications consultancy, the Rendon Group. Its budget and staffing are unknown.
Rendon has previously worked for the CIA, the Kuwaiti Government and the Iraqi National Congress opposition group, and is being paid fees of around $US100,000 a month, according to the New York Times which disclosed the existence of the OSI yesterday.
The blueprint for the new propaganda offensive is being studied by the Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, and by Pentagon lawyers, and has not yet been formally approved by President George W. Bush.
But Rumsfeld is said broadly to back the idea - and Rendon's background is further evidence of how Bush intends to ratchet up the pressure to oust Saddam Hussein and achieve "regime change" in Iraq.
Nonetheless, there are misgivings within the Pentagon at its seemingly imminent venture into an area traditionally the preserve of the CIA and the State Department.
The main fear is that by feeding slanted and possibly false information to foreign Government officials and the international media, the OSI might undermine the credibility of the Pentagon's official press department.
"We shouldn't be in that business. Leave the propaganda leaks to the CIA, the spooks," one Defence Department official said. "If we get the reputation for spreading false information, then what is anyone to believe and not believe that comes out of this building?"
Other officials fear that the initiative might actually weaken support for the US among its allies.
Victoria Clarke, the official Pentagon press spokeswoman, said her department was not involved with the OSI, calling it "a work in progress". Though the Pentagon has been far from generous with information about the war, Rumsfeld has more or less kept his promise not to lie to reporters.
The New York Times said the plan, if approved, would embrace "black" disinformation and other covert activities in addition to accurate news releases. It would feature e-mail messages pushing US policies, and attacking unfriendly Governments. Much of the output could be distributed by an outside source, so that its Government origin would be concealed.
- INDEPENDENT
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Pentagon ready to lie to win over Islam
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