MEDIA ROOTS – The Pentagon disseminates propaganda through many different avenues: embedded reporting, press conferences, active cooperation with Hollywood, and through American Forces Press Service. The capstone of AFPS is a daily report known as “Face of Defense,” which glorifies the fighter, omits the horrors of war, and hypes creative accounts of military life. Examples include:

“Passion for Cooking Drives Marine’s Service”
“Nebraska Native Mentors Afghan Farmers”
“Airman Saves Little Girl at Beach”
“Togolese-born Army NCO Lives His Dream”

The Pentagon also issues daily reports through AFPS, which are intended to quantify the individuals detained and killed by the U.S. military, and the weaponry it confiscates during operations in Afghanistan. One may deem them Detained-Killed reports for convenience. Through the distillation of all fifteen Detained-Killed reports, which were issued in March 2012, many lessons are deduced regarding the Pentagon’s choice of nomenclature, the locations of its battles with the Afghan resistance, and its professed reasons for occupying Afghanistan.

Use of Nomenclature  

In keeping with the Pentagon’s desire to arrogate progress in Afghanistan, each report described all operations as “Afghan-led” or led by “Afghan special units.” In extremely gratuitous cases, reports referred to “Afghan provincial response team with coalition mentors” or “an Afghan provincial response company advised by coalition forces.” However, in most instances, reports stuck with the standard reference to Afghan-led and coalition-supported forces.

In total, the Pentagon used thirteen distinct labels to describe the individuals it detained. These labels include Haqqani leader, Taliban leader, senior Taliban leader, Taliban facilitator, Taliban weapons supplier, Taliban insurgent, Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan leader, IED manufacturer, insurgent, insurgent leader, suspected insurgent, insurgent commander, and suspect. Despite this great variety, the reader is left with no understanding of the standards the Pentagon uses to label its captives. In fact, Wired.com reports that the Pentagon has no formal criteria to delineate “leaders” from general insurgents. While the Detained-Killed reports provide some understanding of why certain individuals were detained, they don’t provide any indication of what distinguishes accused insurgents from suspects, facilitators from suppliers, or leaders from commanders.

Questions arise when assessing the variety of labels that are applied to these individuals. Once detained, is the humanity of an individual’s treatment gradated in proportion to the severity of his assigned moniker? For instance, are generic insurgents treated with the same disdain as confirmed Taliban members? How many of these detainees have access to any semblance of legal procedures or due process? When was the last time a confirmed, genuine Al-Qaeda member was captured in Afghanistan?

Locations and Reasons

These thirteen distinct types of enemy were detained across thirty-one specific locations throughout Afghanistan. The most active provinces where captures occurred were Helmand and Kandahar. Fourteen separate captures occurred in Helmand and seven separate captures occurred in Kandahar. The most active district was Nad ‘Ali in Helmand province, where individuals were captured on six separate instances.

The Pentagon’s Detained-Killed reports provide many reasons to justify capturing individuals. Some of the reasons for capture are quite specific. For example, in one instance Afghan judicial officials had issued an arrest warrant for a suspect who was linked forensically to IED components. In another instance, an individual was wanted for participation in illegal drug trafficking. Another individual was an alleged supervisor of Taliban finances. Aside from these examples, justifications for capturing the enemy were blurry.

The Pentagon’s reports didn’t distinguish how activities are qualified. For example, different individuals were arrested for allegedly organizing roadside bombings, overseeing the construction of roadside bombs, coordinating roadside bombings, and preparing suicide bombers. Although these descriptions vary, the Pentagon reports never clarify the difference between organizing, overseeing, coordinating, and preparing a bombing. One may speculate that the Pentagon keeps these lines blurred in order to provide Afghan/Coalition Forces (ACF) with sufficient flexibility to detain anyone they wish.

According to the cumulative total of these press releases, every individual was detained because of alleged involvement in plots or attacks against the foreign militaries, which occupy Afghanistan. Moreover, nobody was detained for plotting against the U.S. mainland or any other country. The implications of these statements are manifold.

Others individuals are captured simply because they’re “suspects.” One individual was suspected to have planned suicide attacks, while another was suspected of involvement in a bombing at Jalalabad airfield. Six individuals were captured for allegedly attacking or targeting ACF. Twenty-six individuals were captured for allegedly planning, coordinating, organizing, directing, or controlling insurgent attacks. Seventeen others were captured for allegedly providing or supplying weaponry, materiel, or funds to insurgents. No information was given regarding how the Pentagon determined the intent of the individuals who were detained for simply “planning” attacks.

Some individuals were captured as a by-product of search operations undertaken by Afghan/Coalition Forces. These captures occurred when ACF searched for a Haqqani “facilitator” and for a Haqqani “leader.” At least nine individuals were captured when ACF were searching for various Taliban leaders. At least two individuals were captured during searches for Taliban insurgents. Other captures occurred during an ACF search for an Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan leader. No reasons were given for detaining any of these particular individuals.

Manipulation of Paraphernalia

Afghan/Coalition Forces confiscate and destroy certain items, which they encounter during the course of their operations. Sometimes the Detained-Killed reports give little detail and just note that confiscated items were “weapons.” Other times, Detained-Killed reports are quite specific. For example, Afghan/Coalition Forces confiscated 4,500 pounds of ammonium nitrate in Marjah, Helmand on 26 March.

Based on analysis of March’s Detained-Killed reports, everything destroyed or confiscated by Afghan/Coalition Forces fell into two categories: weaponry and “illegal drugs.” The weaponry included shotguns, rifles, hand grenades, ammonium nitrate, blasting caps, detonation cord, pressure plates, “suicide vests,” anti-tank mines, RPGs, and rockets. The “illegal drugs” were opium, heroin, hashish, marijuana, and marijuana seeds. Helmand province led the way with seven separate instances of confiscated weaponry or drugs. Nangarhar, Ghazni, Paktika, and Uruzgan provinces also witnessed confiscations.

Confiscating or destroying drugs that the U.S. government deems “illegal” does not change the fact that Afghanistan is economically dependent upon opium and marijuana cultivation. No amount of American-led destruction or confiscations will change that. Similarly, Afghan/Coalition Forces can seize all the bomb-making equipment they can find in Afghanistan and still not make a dent in the amount of weaponry available in the country. Furthermore, confiscating rifles and ammunition directly violates a fundamental norm of Afghan society; taking away a male’s weapon simultaneously confiscates their perceived masculinity, working against the very “hearts and minds” that the Pentagon’s Counterinsurgency Manual (FM 3-24) claims to help. Over eleven years into the war, these basic issues are still up in the air.

License to Kill

Afghan/Coalition Forces killed individuals during patrols, search operations, and confiscations. In the month of March, ACF killed the following enemy labels: a senior Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan leader, “multiple insurgents,” “several insurgents,” an insurgent leader, eight individual insurgents, and a Taliban bomb maker. After the killings subsided, ACF detained “several suspected insurgents,” a wounded insurgent, and two separate insurgents. Individuals were killed in the provinces of Baghlan, Faryab, Kunar, Kunduz, Laghman, and Uruzgan. Curiously, no deaths were reported from Helmand or Kandahar provinces, even though Helmand and Kandahar witnessed heavy fighting this past spring.

The Detained-Killed reports indicated Afghan/Coalition Forces never initiated hostilities. For example, “insurgents fired on the security force [and] the force returned fire.” Elsewhere, “insurgents engaged the security force with small-arms fire, [so] the force returned fire, killing the insurgents.” In other operations, a man “fired on security forces from behind the women and children, [then] two other insurgents fired at the security force.” These AFPS descriptions give one the impression that Afghan/Coalition Forces had no choice but to respond. Aside from one instance where Afghan/Coalition Forces ordered an airstrike against “insurgents [who] were planting two roadside bombs,” ACF never initiated combat during the month of March 2012, according to these Detained-Killed reports. These reports are also valuable for what they omit; they never mention statistics about individuals and civilians killed during night raids and bombing sorties.

The American Forces Press Service is a swamp of agitprop; it disseminates artful, literary propaganda, with no concern for truths. While analysis of March’s Detained-Killed reports has yielded some hard information about the Pentagon’s activities in Afghanistan, it also raises many questions about Washington’s longest war. The selective content of the Detained-Killed reports – including the Pentagon’s choice of vocabulary, its professed reasons for detaining and killing individuals, and large omissions about fighting in Kandahar and Helmand – is merely a crafty attempt to arrogate progress while the Pentagon solidifies its “enduring presence” in Central Asia.

Christian Sorensen for Media Roots.

Photo provided by Flickr user ISAFMedia

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MEDIA ROOTS – With the second of three presidential debates now over, democracy continues to be victimized by the campaigns of establishment candidates referred to colloquially as “Obamney” or “Robama.” However, viewers of corporate media would not understand this for throughout the coverage, very little was reported on events occurring just outside the spectacle.

Since the historic Kennedy-Nixon debate of 1960, televised presidential debates have been a primary tool for American voters to learn about candidates for office. Over 70 million Americans tuned-in for that first televised debate as well as last night’s orchestrated charade. But while it is widely agreed that Kennedy won the debates because of his favorable on-camera presence, the winner of last night’s debates was more nebulous. For never have these televised debates featured more than the two major candidates nor have additional voices ever been needed more in a presidential election.

Yesterday Dr. Jill Stein and her running-mate, Cheri Honkala, attempted to alter the two-party paradigm by attending the debates without “credentials.” They were promptly arrested after not refusing to leave only to be later released, without charge, shortly after the debates concluded. “We think [the Commission on Presidential Debates] is entirely illegitimate,” Dr. Stein mentioned just prior to their arrest. The physician, author, teacher, and mother continued “that if democracy truly prevailed there would be no such commission, that the debates would still be run by the League of Women Voters, that the debates would be open.”

Adding insult to injury, Time’s Mike Halperin obtained and disseminated an agreement between the two establishment candidates that was signed by representatives of both campaigns on the day of this year’s first debate in Denver. The agreement can now be downloaded in its entirety while below are some of the agreement’s most egregious items, as highlighted this morning in an article on Gawker:

– “The candidates may not ask each other direct questions during any of the four debates.”

– “The candidates shall not address each other with proposed pledges.”

– “At no time during the October 3 First Presidential debate shall either candidate move from his designated area behind the respective podium.”

– For the October 16 town-hall-style debate, “the moderator will not ask follow-up questions or comment on either the questions asked by the audience or the answers of the candidates during the debate….”

– “The audience members shall not ask follow-up questions or otherwise participate in the extended discussion, and the audience member’s microphone shall be turned off after he or she completes asking the questions.”

– “[T]he Commission shall take appropriate steps to cut-off the microphone of any…audience member who attempts to pose any question or statement different than that previously posed to the moderator for review.”

– “No candidate may reference or cite any specific individual sitting in a debate audience (other than family members) at any time during a debate.”

– For the town-hall debate: “Each candidate may move about in a pre-designated area, as proposed by the Commission and approved by each campaign, and may not leave that area while the debate is underway.”

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Photo provided by Flickr user Daquella manera.

Dr. Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala, surrounded by law enforcement officers,

explain to the American people yesterday how the presidential debates are illegitimate and

offers insight into what an appropriate presidential debate would look like.

MEDIA ROOTS – The global petroleum industry has long been the antagonist for environmental and animal-rights advocates. But more recently, “Big Oil” has emerged as a literal threat to democracy for its vast political influence and ability to contrive wars for profit. A report released last month by the National Wildlife Federation exposed to what extent the oil industry, along with coal, affect elections in America.

Speaker of the House John Boehner tops the list of congressman receiving financial aid from the energy industry. Many of these donors stand to benefit from the proposed construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, an ecologically-damaging project that would send diluted bitumen – a tar-like substance – to American oil refineries, and the congressman has repeatedly castigated the president for delaying its permit. If that wasn’t bad enough, the congressman actually owns investments in some of these companies. Congress is exempt from various trade-laws and last year 60 Minutes highlighted Boehner’s record of insider-trading.

More recently, Congress passed a bill referred to as the “Stop the War on Coal Act.” Congressman Johnson, also a Republican from Ohio, authored the bill and explained the bill wasn’t about climate change as much as it was about public health and safety. But dissenters of the bill argue it actually endangers millions of Americans and virtually declares war on public health. Furthermore, the bill could possibly pave way for a similar bill that would further secure the stature of the petroleum industry.

Big Oil should be considered a big country

Seven of the top ten highest-grossing corporations in the world, as ranked by Fortune magazine earlier this year, are of the oil industry. Royal Dutch Shell, the list’s top revenue-generator, is on par with the gross domestic product of Iran. But if it was its own country, it would be the twenty-fifth highest-grossing country in the world.

When considering these seven corporations together, they are the sixth highest-grossing entity worldwide – government or corporate. And because these entities are private corporations, and considered persons by the Supreme Court, they are not subject to the same level of public scrutiny or congressional oversight. While it may not be surprising that over three-quarters of all petroleum refined in the United States produces gasoline, diesel, and jet fuels, it may be news to some just who is consuming these fuels the most.

The petrodollar war, not the terror war

Purchasing over one percent of the world’s refined oil – by far more than any other single entity – is the U.S. Department of Defense. Over half of this consumption is used to fuel jet engines with the Air Force being the branch of greatest oil demand. The department consumes nearly double the amount of fuel annually as the Republic of Ireland and, during the height of battle in Iraq just a half-decade ago, American troops were consuming well over one million gallons of fuel daily making them the highest oil-consuming soldiers in world history. This past year, the military handed taxpayers a $20 billion energy bill which roughly equates to the cost of an automobile tank for every man, woman, and child in the country.

Less than a month after 9/11 several news outlets were reminding readers that oil was actually more of an issue than terrorism. L.A. Weekly pushed the envelope of sensitivity by offering “it’s the oil, stupid” just eight days after terrorists allegedly hijacked four airplanes. These claims are based on the fact that Big Oil has been vying for an Afghan pipeline for decades.

During the Bush-Cheney era, both of whom are previous oil executives themselves, Big Oil lobbied the federal government over $393 million, with nearly a million dollars diverted to Senator Obama during his 2008 campaign for the White House. But as the majority of Americans of all political backgrounds continue to favor renewable energy options, this Congress continues to turn a blind eye and instead demonizes governments – such as those of Iran and Venezuela – that refuse to trade crude oil in U.S. Dollars. “Petrodollar warfare” is the true reason why the U.S. invaded Iraq in 1990, and again in 2003, and is why Iran continues to remain in the military’s crosshairs.

Corporate media complicity

Meanwhile, the corporate media establishment has yet to connect the dots of history for the general public or sound the alarm on the true cause of this grim outlook. In fact, many of these outlets outright support the industry as reported in a Media Matters study earlier this year regarding the coverage of the Keystone XL pipeline. The report showed that while only a quarter of Keystone XL coverage featured the massive demonstrations of people speaking out against the project, the media continued to parrot industry job estimates even though these predictions had already been widely discredited.

Starting in 1980, the FCC began deregulating the media industry which resulted in over 90% of media outlets being owned by just six corporate entities. Already this year over $153 million oil industry dollars have been spent in the corporate media establishment – mere pocket change for this influential group of executives. The result is a misguided society concerned more by the threat of terror than the more realistic threat of economic collapse.

Embedded below is an episode of FTM Daily, a radio program hosted by economist Jerry Robinson, which further explores the extent of the petrodollar system, its influence on the value of the U.S. dollar, and reveals who the major players are.

Oskar Mosco is the managing editor for Media Roots.

Photograph: © 2013 David Oppenheimer – Performance Impressions

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Earlier this year on FTM Daily, Jerry Robinson features an examination of the

Petrodollar system that is what the now-volatile U.S. Dollar is based on.

MEDIA ROOTS – The military-industrial complex encompasses more than the arms and security industries. Now the corporate film industry is used to glorify American military might, stimulate recruitment, and even rewrite history. Most of these films, while claiming to be based on true events, are merely propaganda pieces and allow the modern military establishment to continue to operate with the tacit support of the American people.

While the federal government had often advised filmmakers throughout cinematic history, it wasn’t until the production of Top Gun in 1986 that the marriage of Hollywood and the Pentagon was formally established. Offices at the Department of Defense are now dedicated to supporting production companies – but with a catch. In order to receive military support, scripts must be thoroughly reviewed and often times completely revised; at times omitting passages that are historically accurate but negatively reflecting the American military apparatus.

The English channel of Al Jazeera examined this modern complex in their newsmagazine Empire. Featuring Academy-Award winning directors Oliver Stone and Michael Moore along with Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Chris Hedges, the episode covers the history of the American military-film industrial-complex and offers insight into its long-term influence on world history.

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Originally aired on Al Jazeera English in December 2010, this episode of Empire examines

the relationship of the corporate film industry and the American military apparatus.

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Image provided by Flickr user kevin dooley.

MEDIA ROOTS – In Egypt, street art is quickly painted over and removed from public view. To combat this, photographers have recently teamed up with artists to compile collections for print publication.

Since the resignation of President Mubarak last year, artists’ dissent appears to have grown even more angry and primarily focuses frustrations toward newly elected President Morsi.

 “You are a regime that is frightened by paint brushes and pens,” read one verse recently displayed. “If you were doing the right thing, you would not be afraid of what’s painted.” The Muslim Brotherhood is also a target of the denunciation.

Wall Talk is the newly released collection of graffiti displayed in Egypt over much of the past two years and is now available for free download on Scribd.

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Ottawa Citizen – Wall Talk publisher Sherif Boraie says graffiti was the vehicle that delivered clear, strong and angry messages during the anti-Mubarak uprising and afterward. Now it reflects the depth of frustration over the perceived failure of the revolution to realize its main goals, he said.

“We are in a difficult period, and the youth are very angry, while avenues for expression for the mare limited. Will the anger continue to simmer indefinitely without boiling over? I don’t think so.”

To read more about how graffiti artists are creatively spreading information in Egypt, read the full article in today’s Ottawa Citizen.

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Image provided by Flickr user Gigi Ibrahim.