Information Warfare: Iraq Blogs Contradict the Mass Media

Strategy Page ^ | 2005 Sep 21 | Harold C. Hutchison

[Wiz]

September 21, 2005: With the retirement of Arthur Chrenkoff from blogging, his regular "Good News" reports concerning Afghanistan and Iraq might be missed. However, this gap is being filled by a new site, GoodNewsFromTheFront.com, which will carry on Chrenkoff's work. This site is being supported by a variety of blogs (including Iraq the Model) and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

The site is covering the "good news" in both Iraq and Afghanistan, as a means of partially countering the "police blotter" style of reporting that usually dominates coverage of the war in both countries. This is comprehensive, covering the society, the economy, reconstruction, humanitarian aid, security, and the coalition forces. This has included, among other projects, a radio network in Afghanistan, updates on opinion polls from Iraq, and the start of construction work for eight new bridges in Iraq. This is a site that will receive some wide play on the internet, often from people who will want to know the rest of the story - a side of the story that is obscured. Other bloggers, like Michael Yon, have been providing coverage not seen in the media. Some of the military commands are also reaching out to the blogosphere as well, bypassing the legacy media.

[pissant]

Suprised they didn't mention you and Gucho and SandRat in the article!

[68skylark]

I don't think the military knows what to do about blogs. Some of them only see the downside risk to OPSEC.

But there's a huge potential upside to bypassing the MSM. I don't think the military knows or cares much about the benefits.

[Trampled by Lambs]

Whenever I show Iraq blogs like Iraq The Model to the liberals I know, they instantly dismiss them as being fake, often without even bothering to read them.

/shrug

[Wiz]

Well, Free Republic has similar functions of blogs, but said to be different from blogs. Meanwhile, posted articles related to Iraq are only part of the Free Republic and not the dominated subject, which may be the reason why it is not mentioned. I have only written my own (oppinion) twice, one of them which was the strange flip flop of a leftist Italian journalist captured in Iraq, full of lies about the incident claiming about the US soldiers shooting at her car. Another oppinion that I think I have written was about Al Jazeera not airing the beheading of a women while airing a soldier shooting a terrorists in a mosque of Fallujah. I was glad that these have caught attention on other blogs as well, but I think just posting articles most of the time is not worth being credited. I would also give Gucho, TexKat, and Straight Vermonter more credit.