Gareth Porter has an excellent piece up on Inter Press Service, “Fiction of Marja as City Was U.S. Information War,” in which he breaks down the media disinformation campaign on the size of Marja:
Marja is not a city or even a real town, but either a few clusters of farmers’ homes or a large agricultural area covering much of the southern Helmand River Valley.
“It’s not urban at all,” an official of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), who asked not to be identified, admitted to IPS Sunday. He called Marja a “rural community”.
“It’s a collection of village farms, with typical family compounds,” said the official, adding that the homes are reasonably prosperous by Afghan standards.
Porter is right on, and you should read the whole thing for an idea on exactly how these disinformation campaigns are spread, but I’m afraid in the case of Marja, we might be missing the point. We’re complaining that Marja is only an excuse for a propaganda victory while at the same time complaining that the victory won’t be worth anything because it’s not a city.
As Woody Allen said on a much different topic, “This food is terrible, and such small portions!”
On Wednesday Russia, fulfilling an agreement in principle reached four weeks ago, announced that it plans to buy four Mistral-class warships from France.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy said that, with the first deal between a NATO member and a former Soviet state, he wanted to turn the page on the Cold War; Russia must be a partner, not a threat. Sarkozy added that the deal will build trust at a time when West is seeking Russian support on issues such as Iran’s nuclear programme:
2200 GMT: The Dilemma. Paused when I read this statement from Trita Parsi: “Here is the central dilemma of Iranian policy: Iran’s greens need time, but Washington does not seem to think it can afford to wait.”
2150 GMT: Political Prisoner News. Reports that journalist Payman Aref has been released for ten days on a $100,000 bail.
2140 GMT: Today’s Super Spy Case. Here is one to watch: Italian authorities have rounded up five Iranians and two Italians (according to Associated Press, the BBC says two Iranians and five Italians), with two more Iranians being sought, on charges of sending arms to Iran in violation of the international embargo. Amongst those detained is the Rome correspondent of Iranian state television, Hamid Masouminejad.
Pajhwok News Agency reports that on Tuesday, the Afghanistan senate deplored the foreign airstrikes that killed 21 innocent civilians in the province of Daikundi on Sunday, and demanded that NATO avoid any repetition of this sort of error.
But some senators went farther, demanding that NATO or US military men responsible for the deaths be executed. Senator Hamidullah Tokhi of Uruzgan complained to Pajhwok that the foreign forces had killed civilians in such incidents time and again, and kept apologizing but then repeating the fatal mistake: “Anyone killing an ordinary Afghan should be executed in public.”
Lawmaker Fatima Aziz of Qunduz concurred, observing, “We saw foreign troops time and again that they killed innocent people, something unbearable for the already war-weary Afghans.”
The head of US Central Command, General David Petraeus, appeared on NBC Television’s Meet the Press, first to walk viewers through the US interventions in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq and then to take a tour around other issues from Iran to Guantanamo Bay to the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy on gays and lesbians in the military.
In contrast to previous appearances, when Petraeus was fighting his own President to get his version of US foreign and military policy, this was a stay-the-course interview behind agreed approaches. The message on Afghanistan was long-haul effort to win. On Pakistan, it was supporting Pakistani forces to vanquish the Taliban. He spoke in generalities about maintaining pressure on Iran, and beyond his main agenda, on the tricky issues like Guantanamo Bay and “enhanced interrogation” (torture), he evaded any definitive statements.
MR. DAVID GREGORY: General David Petraeus joins us live from U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Florida.
General, welcome to MEET THE PRESS.
GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS: Thanks, David. Good to be with you.
2140 GMT: The Evin Protests. Once again, families of detainees have protested outside Evin Prison. The demonstrations have been occurring almost every evening in recent weeks.
2030 GMT: US To Israel “No Attack”? A bit of a tangled message from Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, during his visit to Tel Aviv today. On the one hand, Mullen declared, “The outbreak of a conflict will be a big, big, big problem for all of us, and I worry a great deal about the unintended consequences of a strike.” On the other, he still put out the escape clause for military action, “We haven’t taken off any option from the table.”
1735 GMT: Blogger and rights activist Ali Kalayi has been released from detention after posting $50,000 bail. Kalayi was arrested last Sunday for publishing a statement alleged to be from the Army in support of the Iranian people.
1710 GMT: Pardon This Interruption. To Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the US House of Representatives: you’re a blowhard who should be remembered fo r what you did to your first wife rather than any “contribution” to US foreign policy. Especially when your approach to Iran is based on tired 1930s hyperbole rather than any approximation of knowledge.
Israel’s Ayalon on Peace: On Saturday, in an interview with the London-based Arabic daily Asharq al-Awsat, Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon talked about the conditions of the peace process with Palestinians. He pointed towards two demographically “pure” states with the swap to Palestine of Israeli Arab towns and villages in the north (except Nazareth) in exchange for Palestinians relinquishing the “right of return” to their former lands in Israel.
Ayalon denied that this was an attempt to rid Israel of the country’s Arabs: “Israel’s Arabs who are moved to Palestine will also help the Palestinian state economically”.
Ayalon also said that Israel is willing to give up land for peace and that the claim that settlements affect peace is an exaggeration; however, he did not specify how many settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem that Israel would relinquish.
Gareth Porter has an excellent piece up on Inter Press Service, “Fiction of Marja as City Was U.S. Information War,” in which he breaks down the media disinformation campaign on the size of Marja:
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