"Zarqawi PSYOP program is the most successful information campaign to date

[sabra]

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002314713

A U.S. 'Propaganda' Program, al-Zarqawi, and 'The New York Times'

NEW YORK Midway in Thomas Ricks’ well-publicized Washington Post scoop on Monday detailing a U.S. military “propaganda program” aimed at convincing Iraqis that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has a very prominent role in directing violence in that country, there is one specific tip on how the plan may have also targeted American reporters and audiences.

Ricks found that one “selective leak”--about a recently discovered letter written by Zarqawi--was handed by the military to Dexter Filkins, the longtime New York Times reporter in Baghdad. Filkins's resulting article, about the Zarqawi letter boasting of foreigners' role in suicide attacks in Iraq, ran on the front page of the Times on Feb. 9, 2004.

“Leaks to reporters from U.S. officials in Iraq are common, but official evidence of a propaganda operation using an American reporter is rare,” Ricks observed. He quoted Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the U.S. military's chief spokesman when the propaganda campaign began in 2004: "We trusted Dexter to write an accurate story, and we gave him a good scoop."

...

He also quoted one internal briefing, produced by the U.S. military headquarters in Iraq, which revealed that Kimmitt had concluded that, "The Zarqawi PSYOP program is the most successful information campaign to date."

meanwhile * quotes from the letter in today's "terra" speech:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/04/20060410-1.html

President Bush Discusses Global War on Terror
The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies
The Johns Hopkins University
Washington, D.C.

<snip>

The terrorists know that the greatest threat to their aspirations is Iraqi self-government. And we know this from the terrorists' own words. In 2004, we intercepted a letter from Zarqawi to Osama bin Laden. In it, Zarqawi expressed his concern about "the gap that will emerge between us and the people of the land." He declared "democracy is coming." He went on to say, this will mean "suffocation" for the terrorists. Zarqawi laid out his strategy to stop democracy from taking root in Iraq. He wrote, "If we succeed in dragging the Shia into the arena of sectarian war, it will become possible to awaken the inattentive Sunnis as they feel imminent danger ... the only solution for us is to strike the religious, military, and other cadres among the Shia with blow after blow."

[NNN0LHI]

1. Oh yes. We had DUers telling us how dangerous Zarqawi was

I remember who they were too.

Bush and Cheney were constantly quoting this guy too.

Don

[sabra]

2. * quoted from Zarqawi today,

[Neil Lisst]

3. In California, everything is El Nino's fault. In Iraq, Zarqawi's.

This guy was made an emblem by the US, a rallying cry.

Another bullshit operation.

[frylock]

4. kick..

I don't believe for a GD minute that this guy actually exists. He's just a modern-day Emmanuel Goldstein.

[blogslut]

5. Didn't Sy Hersch say

...that Zarqawi was an amalgam, a compilation of characters, a made-up guy...something like that?