8: Further Reading and References

Books:

Ariely, Dan., 2012. The (Honest) Truth about Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone – Especially Ourselves. HarperCollins, New York.

Ekman, Paul, 1985. Telling Lies: Clues to Deceit in the Marketplace, Politics, and Marriage. Norton, New York.

Mearscheimer, John. J., 2001, Why Leaders Lie: The Truth about Lying in International Politics. Oxford University Press, New York.

Weaver, Paul H., 1994. News and the Culture of Lying. Free Press, New York.

Articles:

Coelhno, C. 2013, ‘Iraq War: 190,000 lives, $2.2 trillion’ Costs of War Project, Brown University, March 14, viewed 10 June 2013, <http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2013/03/warcosts>

Dickinson, T, Stein, J. 2006, ‘Lie by Lie: A Timeline of How We Got Into Iraq: Mushroom clouds, duct tape, Judy Miller, Curveball, Recalling how Americans were sold a bogus case for invasion’ MotherJones, September/October Issue, viewed 6 June 2013, <http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/12/leadup-iraq-war-timeline>

Froomkin, D. 2010, ‘The Two Most Essential, Abhorrent, Intolerable Lies of George W. Bush’s memoir’ 22 November, viewed 6 June 2013, <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/22/the-two-most-esssential-a_n_786219.html>

Goldenberg, S. 2008, ‘Iraq War my biggest regret, Bush admits’ The Guardian 2 December, viewed 10 June 2013,

<http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/dec/02/george-bush-iraq-interview>

Greenslade, R. 2003 ‘Their master’s voice’ The Guardian, 17 February, viewed 6 June 2013, <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2003/feb/17/mondaymediasection.iraq>

Isikoff, M. 2013, ‘Building momentum for regime change’: Rumsfeld’s secret memos’ 16 February, viewed 10 June 2013 <http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/02/16/building-momentum-for-regime-change-rumsfelds-secret-memos/>

Martin, B. 2003-2004, ‘Telling lies for a better world?’ Social Anarchism, No. 35, pp 27-39, viewed 27 May 2013,  <http://www.bmartin.cc/pubs/03sa.html>

Reuters, 2013, ‘Iraq War: Iconic images’ Slideshow, viewed 6 June 2013, <http://www.reuters.com/news/pictures/slideshow?articleId=USRTR3F759#a=11>

Rice, C. 2003, ‘Why We Know Iraq is Lying’ The New York Times, January 23, viewed 1 June 2013, <http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/23/opinion/why-we-know-iraq-is-lying.html?pagewanted=2&src=pm>

Scheer, C. 2003 ‘War on Iraq’ Alternet, 26 June, viewed 6 June 2013, <http://www.alternet.org/story/16274/ten_appalling_lies_we_were_told_about_iraq>

Stone, G. 2007 ‘When the Government Lies’ The Huffington Post, 27 February viewed 4 June 2013, <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/geoffrey-r-stone/when-the-government-lies_b_1035956.html>

The Daily Take, The Thom Hartmann Show, 2013, ‘How the Media Fueled the War in Iraq’ Op-Ed, Truth Out, 20 March, viewed 6 June 2013, <http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/15234-how-the-media-fueled-the-war-in-iraq&gt;

 

7: Dialogue

The following dialogue is a fictional conversation. It takes place between three family members, one of which is a University of Wollongong student currently completing her BCM390: Media, War and Peace Project Report. Her younger brother has just been caught out by their parents having lied to them about going to a friend’s birthday party. He was told he was not allowed to attend the party because they had heard there might be underage drinking. He lied to his parents, telling them he was going to another friends house but instead, went to the party. He did not engage in any underage drinking and was home by his curfew but is still being reprimanded by his parents for deceiving them. BCM student Zoe walks in on her brother and mother arguing about whether lying is wrong in the kitchen…

 

—–

 

Zoe (Z): Can you two please keep it down I’m trying to finish my report!

 

Mother (M): Sorry Zoe, we’ll keep it down as soon as your brother understands why lying to your father and I is wrong.

 

Brother (B): Its not like I actually did anything wrong. I didn’t get into any trouble and didn’t do anything you didn’t want me to d—

 

Mother interjects

 

M: Except go to the party and lie to us about it! What have we always told you two!? You will get into more trouble for lying to us than doing the wrong thing, we always need to know where you are and what’s happening, its for your own good!

 

Z: ….she does actually always say that.

 

B: Great help you are Zo, thanks.

 

Z: Well she does… Can you just admit it was the wrong thing to do so I can get some peace and quiet? I still have like 1000 words to write.

 

B: Nah I won’t, plus you’re not one to talk, you’re doing a whole report on lying! I read some of your notes that you left in the study the other day, not once do you say that lying is wrong… and neither do those nerd people whose quotes you had written down.

 

Z: I hardly think you can use that as an argument—

 

Brother interjects

 

B: Nah totally can, plus one of them said that when people lie they are doing it for the greater good! That’s all I was doing, lying to Mum and Dad for the greater good of them not having to worry about me… if I’d gotten away with it they would not be stressin’ out over this, I reckon it’s a good thing.

M: Hey, hey wait a minute, I thought you were doing this report on the Iraq War Zo, what’s going on? And why are you reading anything that says lying is good? I’m not sure I like this…

 

Z: Oh chill out I explained this to Dad the other day, in my report I’m talking about the Iraq War yeah, but that’s only a small part of it. I’m meant to put together… like… a type of info pack for someone to read if they wanted to know about a certain topic and how the media talks about it or portrays it so I’m talking about institutional lying.

 

Mother looks blankly at Zoe and sighs

 

M: Okay… so what exactly is that?

 

Z: It’s when someone lies on behalf of a big group of people, like a company or when the government lies. The most interesting examples are definitely when the government lies, you would have no idea how many times its happened! Like the American government has lied… or tried to I guess… a heap of times to get support to go to war! I was so surprised by that, there must be so many things governments keep secret…

 

B: OH! Is that like the movie Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter!? He was the American President and he lied to start the Civil War! He said it was about equality and getting rid of slavery or some crap but it really was to kill all the vampires in the South!

 

M and Z: (in unison) THAT WASN’T REAL.

 

B: yeah sure…

 

Z: It was a movie bro. No that’s why I’m talking about the Iraq War because George Bush and his administration, like his… like the people who are front benchers in the Australian parliament… they came up with all these lies as reasons to invade Iraq and get rid of Saddam Hussein, I mean granted he wasn’t the nicest bloke and he’d caused all kinds of trouble as President of Iraq but yeah, they said he had weapons of mass destructions, like nuclear weapons and that and even though they said he didn’t they invaded him anyway and in the end they found nothing, not one missile and then they had to explain all that…

 

M: Make excuses is more like it, that’s such a big topic though Zo, there’s so much info out there on it, couldn’t you have chosen something easier?

 

Z: Yeah I guess but I found this so interesting, I mean it happened 10 years ago, I was in like Year 8. Plus the Iraq War didn’t just affect their country it affected ours too. It could have gone so much worse! Plus we have to talk about how the media dealt with the lies… most of the other cool examples I’ve found, they didn’t know the government was lying for a while or it didn’t really matter in the long run, like when FDR lied to try and get the US into WW2, then Pearl Harbour happened and they went anyway… this whole war was based on lies, intentional ones!

 

M: (to brother) See what can happen when you lie?

 

B: Um Mum, I don’t think I’m going to be starting any wars anytime soon.

 

M: No just a Civil one in this house!

 

Z: Alright calm down guys… anyway yeah, like you said Mum, there’s so much info out there for me to choose from. That’s kind of why I’m not finished yet, like I got a heap of books from the library which helped me understand the whole ‘lying’ aspect of it, like why people lie, and how the news lies, and how governments lie and all that but there isn’t really anything completely specific on institutional lying… I think I’ve got that worked out but…

 

(looks uneasily at her Mother and Brother)

 

Z: …but trying to summarize the Iraq War and trying to explain how the media portrayed it, there’s just so much! I mean, US troops only left Iraq two years ago. even after they elected a new government, so much was going on to be reported on. Most of the information on the part of it is online, articles from big publications and smaller opinion pieces, and there’s lots of studies available… This year was the 10 year anniversary of the invasion so there’s a lot of retrospective stuff… it helps me to understand the conflict and the repercussions but not really the media’s role… (Sighs)

 

M: Maybe it will help if you explain it to us?

 

Brother tries to sneak out of the kitchen

 

M: (to brother) Hey! Get back here… you might learn something and if you don’t… well consider it punishment.

 

Z: Haha… okay. Well the whole thing got unprecedented media coverage in the US but one of the biggest problems with that was FOX News. They were pretty much the biggest outlets for news on the Iraq war and they are really right wing and conservative.

 

M: Well Rupert Murdoch owns FOX so that can’t surprise you, he’s as conservative as they get.

 

Z: I know! Looking back you can see the problems, so many of the people working at FOX and even other networks took what the government was saying and just broadcasted it to so much of the American population, it was almost like they indoctrinated the public. Of course they would sometimes have guests on that were anti-war but they would just make fools of them. It was like the mainstream media forgot what their role was in society, they weren’t questioning anything the government was doing, it was like patriotism went into overdrive!

 

M: Well that explained it fairly well to me… how about you just try the best you can to show it from that side? It’s fairly important to the whole thing I think

 

B: …um yeah I guess I kinda got it. So the media made it easier for the government to go start a war in Iraq because they helped tell the lies? Like they just believed  them and didn’t try an check if they were true?

 

Z: Yeah pretty much, I mean some people tried but lots of them would get called un-American or unpatriotic which wasn’t really cool.

 

B: I can’t believe Australia was involved in that, I’d never stand for our government doing anything like that I don’t reckon hey

 

M: Well no because you would never lie would you?

 

B: …yeah alright, I’m sorry I lied Mum, it wasn’t the best… I mean right thing to do.

 

M: Alright Zo go finish that report its performing miracles in here!

6: How the media fueled the war in Iraq

In his book ‘Why Leaders Lie: The Truth about Lying in International Politics’ John J. Mearsheimer notes that those individuals on the Bush administration who pushed for the US to invade Iraq are not the only ones to blame. Many proponents of the war who were not involved in the administration frequently repeated the claims of the Bush’s key players creating a ‘chorus of hawkish voices’ that helped convince many Americans that it was essential to disarm Iraq and depose Saddam Hussein. The media played a large role in convincing the American people that the Iraq War was one of necessity.

The invasion of Iraq involved unprecedented U.S. media coverage,  particularly by FOX News.[15] Due to the media’s repeated claims that Iraq and Saddam Hussein were immediate threats to the US nation, in the weeks leading up to the invasion, nearly three-quarters of Americans believed the lie promoted by Donald Rumsfeld that Saddam Hussein was somehow involved in the attacks of 9/11.[16]

In 2003, a study released by Fairness and Accuracy Reporting (FAIR) stated that American network news disproportionately focused on pro-war sources and left out many anti-war sources. According to the study, 64% of total sources were in favor of the Iraq War.[17] FAIR also conducted a similar study in February 2004. According to the study current or former government or military officials accounted for 76% of all 319 sources for news stories about Iraq which aired on network news channels.

The New York Times in January 2003 even published an opinion piece written by Condoleeza Rice titled ‘Why we know Iraq is Lying‘ in which she outlined how the Bush administration knew Iraq was hiding something and that their time to provide answers was running out. [18] In 2007, the NY Times editors published an apology for its coverage of Hussein’s alleged weapons programs, acknowledging that ‘we wish we had been more aggressive in re-examining the claims (related to Iraqi weapons programs) as new evidence emerged — or failed to emerge.’ [19]

Despite this open apology, ten years after going to a war based on intentional lies, and after thousands of American lives have been lost, the majority of the media has yet to offer any semblance of an apology for being so wrong, and for not playing the real role of journalism and questioning
the Bush administration as rigorously as they should have.

____________________________________________________________________________________________

[15] FOX News is owned by Ruper Murdoch, a strong supporter of the war.

[16] ‘How the media fueled the war in Iraq’ ‘http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/15234-how-the-media-fueled-the-war-in-iraq

[17] Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR) is a progressive media criticism organization based in New York City, founded in 1986. FAIR describes itself on its website as ‘the national media watch group’ and defines its mission as working to ‘invigorate the First Amendment by advocating for greater diversity in the press and ‘by scrutinizing media practices that marginalize public interest, minority and dissenting viewpoints.’ Statistic taken from FAIR studies: ‘Amplifying Officials, Squelching Dissent FAIR study finds democracy poorly served by war coverage’ http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/amplifying-officials,-squelching-dissent/ ‘If News From Iraq Is Bad, It’s Coming From U.S. Officials: Study Data’ http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/if-news-from-iraq-is-bad,-its-coming-from-u.s.-officials/

[18] ‘Why we know Iraq is Lying.’ Opinion, Condoleeza Rice  http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/23/opinion/why-we-know-iraq-is-lying.html?pagewanted=2&src=pm

[19] ‘The Times and Iraq.’ New York Times ‘The Editors’ http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/26/international/middleeast/26FTE_NOTE.html?ex=1400990400&en=94c17fcffad92ca9&ei=5007&partner=USERLAND

5: Weapons of Mass Destruction, 9/11, and Al Qaeda? How the Bush administration lied.

“Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere!”
— President Bush, joking about his administration’s failure to find WMDs in Iraq as he narrated a comic slideshow during the Radio & TV Correspondents’ Association dinner, March 25, 2004

(Cartoon courtesy of The Statesman: http://www.thestatesman.net/)

A weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to a large number of humans and/or cause great damage to man-made structures (e.g. buildings), natural structures (e.g. mountains), or the biosphere in general.[10]

There is no evidence in the public record that Saddam Hussein tried to convince the United States, or the world for that matter that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction.

The Bush administration told four major lies in the run-up to the Iraq War. (Mearscheimer, 2011, p. 5)

1. Key figures in the administration falsely claimed that they new with complete certainty that Iraq had WMD[11]
2. They also lied when they said that they had foolproof evidence that Saddam Hussein was closely allied with Osama Bin Laden [12]
3. They made various statements that falsely implied that Saddam bore some responsibility for the September 11 attacks on the United States
4. Various individuals in the administration, including President Bush himself, claimed that they were still open to peaceful resolution of their dispute with Saddam Hussein when in fact they decision to go to war had already been made

(Declassified documents show that Bush administration officials wanted Saddam Hussein out of Iraq and were ready to start a war in order to achieve it. An excerpt from Bush’s Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld sated 27 November 2001. The memo outlines how the Bush administration was trying to deal with the issue of how to start a war with Iraq, mentioning ‘Dispute over WMD inspections?’ as an option. http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/02/16/building-momentum-for-regime-change-rumsfelds-secret-memos)

 Ultimately as a response to not finding any WMD in Iraq it was claimed  that Saddam Hussein had simply been bluffing.[13] This claim is merely an assertion and no facts are provided to back it up. In fact, he said on a number of occasions that he has no WMD and he was telling the truth.

 ____________________________________________________________________________________________

[10]  The scope and application of the term weapons of mass destruction has evolved and been disputed, often signifying more politically than technically. Coined in reference to aerial bombing with chemical explosives, it has come to distinguish large-scale weaponry of other technologies, such as chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear.

[11] on September 6 2002, General Tommy Franks briefed President Bush he stated ‘Mr President we’ve been looking for Scud missiles and other weapons of mass destructions for ten years and havent found any yet so I can’t tell you that I know that there are any specific weapons of mass destruction anywhere. I haven’t seen a scud one.’ Nor did the intelligences agencies have hard evidence that Iraq possessed WMD. Between 2002-2003 UN weapons inspectors were unable to find any hard evidence Iraq had WMD, despite having the freedom to look anywhere they wanted inside Iraq. (Mearscheimer, 2011, p. 51) Despite all this Vice-President Dick Cheney stated that ‘there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.’

[12] Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld stated in 2002 he had ‘bulletproof’ evidence that Saddam was closely allied with Osama Bin Laden.  Similarly Secretary of State Colin Powell claimed before the war that Bin Laden was ‘in partnership with Iraq’ and that there was a ‘sninster nexus between Iraq and the Al Qaeda terrorist network.’ (Mearscheimer, 2011, p. 50)

[13] This line of argument is laid out in the ‘Duelfer Report’ released in September 2004 by the Iraq Survey Group, an international team comprised of more than one thousand members that were tasked with finding Iraq’s WMD. George Tenet, the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) stated ‘we had no previous experience with a country that did not possess such weapons but pretended that it did… before the war we didn’t understand that he was bluffing.(‘http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/GPO-DUELFERREPORT/content-detail.html)

4: The Players

George W. Bush and his inner circle, photographed in the Cabinet Room of the White House in December 2001. From left: Secretary of State Colin Powell, Vice President Dick Cheney, the president, National-Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, White House chief of staff Andrew Card, C.I.A. director George Tenet (seated), and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

(Photo by Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair – http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/02/bush-oral-history200902)

3: The Iraq War

“The Iraqi dictator must not be permitted to threaten America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gases and atomic weapons.”
— George Bush, Oct. 7, 2002, in a speech in Cincinnati.

On March 20, 2003, U.S and British forces invaded Iraq in what they said was a mission to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction.[6] 21 days later the world watched Saddam Hussein’s rule crumble after 24 years of dictatorship.

(U.S. Marine Corp Assaultman Kirk Dalrymple watches as a statue of Iraq’s President Saddam Hussein falls in central Baghdad’s Firdaus Square, April 9, 2003. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic)

Over the rest of 2003 the coalition forces began to hunt down and capture all government figures from the Saddam regime, this included the capture of Saddam Hussein himself in December 2003.

After the Americans ousted Mr. Hussein, they searched for evidence in Iraq to bolster both claims but found nothing.

It has been estimated that over the next 6 years, as a result of the war in Iraq there were close to 190,000 casualties. Of those 190,000, 70% (134,000) were Iraqi civilians. [7]

The war will ultimately cost U.S. taxpayers at least $2.2 trillion dollars. [8]

The last remaining U.S. troops left Iraq in 2011, leaving Iraqi security forces in charge of protecting the populace. As attacks from terrorist groups such as al Qaeda in Iraq continue, the country is mired in a political crisis and the prospect of a growing sectarian divide looms.[9]

____________________________________________________________________________________________

[6] Throughout 2002 and 2003, President George Bush cited the possibility of Saddam Hussein acquiring chemical, biological and nuclear weapons as the main rationale for a pre-emptive invasion of Iraq. He and other senior American officials also said Mr. Hussein had direct ties to the Al Qaeda terrorist organization founded by Osama bin Laden, also implying he contributed to the 9/11 attacks.

[7] In 2013, Brown University released a report on their project entitled Costs of War about the Iraq War, five days before its tenth anniversary. The report only includes figures from direct war-related violence. U.S. losses totalled 4,488 military personnel and 3,400 security contractors. Coalition losses included 319 deaths. Allied Iraqi military and police suffered 10,819 deaths. Approximately 36,400 were Sadaam loyalist forces or terrorist insurgents. Figures include 62 humanitarian workers and 231 journalists. (Brown University ‘Costs of War’ Project’ http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2013/03/warcosts)

[8] Brown University ‘Costs of War’ Project’ http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2013/03/warcosts

[9] There are two predominant factions in Iraq today, the Shi’ites and the Sunnis. Both are arabic speaking, the Sunnis played an essential part in Iraqi politics since 1638 and the Ottomon Sunni domination of Iraq. The Coalition invasion in 2003 and their subsequent establishment of government ended this century long dominance of power by the minority Sunnis, placing the majority Shi’ites in power. The Iraqi society was largely not sectarian during the rule of Hussein. Certain elements of the Iraqi insurgency and foreign terrorist organizations who came to Iraq during the American invasion have targeted Shias in sectarian attacks. In turn, this caused a full sectarian civil war in Iraq mostly due to instigation by American forces. Following the civil war which lasted from 2006-2008, the Sunnis have complained of discrimination by Iraq’s Shia majority government, which is bolstered by the fact that Sunni detainees were allegedly discovered to have been tortured in a compound used by government forces on November 15, 2005. This sectarianism has fueled a giant level of emigration and internal displacement.

2: Institutional Lying

(President George W. Bush, along with his administration have been accused of actively participating in institutional lying. Photograph courtesy of Reuters, 2008, iraq.reuters.com)

When lies are made on behalf of large groups, this can be called institutional lying.

Ultimately, individuals create institutional lies, though responsibility can be difficult to assign (Martin, 2003).[2]

Government-related politics is a prime area for institutional lying (Edelman, 1971).It is commonly accepted that politicians regularly lie. It is also acknowledged that politicians will regularly deny such behaviour. As a result there are rarely serious implications for such behaviour despite the fact that lying at an institutional level significantly heightens the chance of harm.[3]

Institutional lying is pervasive in war time, and often the existence of censorship and disinformation is acknowledged. (Martin, 2003). Many well-informed people now believe that the Bush administration engaged in institutionally lying, deceiving the American people in the run-up to the Iraq War, which ultimately turned into a strategic disaster for the United States.[4]

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

[2] Institutional lying can also be referred to as ‘public lying’ as it occurs mainly in the public sphere as opposed to individual lying, which typically occurs in the private sphere, and not on a public stage.

[3] There is a long list of notable examples of politicians engaging in institutional lying. Hitler performed some of the most infamous and deceits in history, even convincing British President Neville Chamberlain a year prior to WWII beginning in Europe that he was a man that could be relied upon. President Richard Nixon denied all knowledge of the Watergate Affair and eight years after his resignation at US President maintained he did not lie but was dissembled, another example of using soft, euphemistic language in the place of the label ‘liar.’ Both Presidents Franklin D Roosevelt and Lyndon B Johnson have been accused of ‘lying America in war’ by fabricating enemy incidents in order to gain congressional support to enter WWII and the Vietnam War.

[4] The key individuals in the Bush administration who pushed hard for the US to invade Iraq maintained that they were certain Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction. Their claims, they said, were based on hard evidence. Proponents of the way who were not directly involved in or with the administration repeated those claims, permeating the public consciousness helping to convince the American people that it was was necessary for the government to invade and disarm Iraq.  When no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq the government were forced to explain how they could have been so wrong. (Mearsheimer, 2011, p. 3)