The PR War (and lawfare) win because our “leaders” are politicians and will do d@nm near anything to ensure their re-election. The real problem is the voters - they have such weak stomachs and flimsy morals that they can’t allow our leaders and our troops to the necessary, but unpleasant things necessary to protect us and our nation.
Of course, it doesn’t help that there are folks who stand to make fortunes promoting the PR War...
For example, we need to burn every port on the coast of Somalia harboring pirates to the ground and sink everything in them that floats. But if we do that, pictures of dead kids will be on YouTube before the shells stop falling, and on the news minutes after that. The politicians will be responding to their constituents crying about this within hours and holding “hearing” within days.
This is a whole new dimension of war, that we need to learn to manipulate. We need to remember that the media is the enemy every bit as much as the terrorists are.
Is it really new? Seems to me it went on during WWI and WWII to name just two recent wars. Recent, in the sense we had modern technology (radio and telegraph) and near instant access to propaganda on both sides.