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December 01, 2004



"There is not a single surgeon in Falluja. We had one ambulance hit by US fire and a doctor wounded. There are scores of injured civilians in their homes whom we can't move. A 13-year-old child just died in my hands." (Dr. Sami al-Jumaili, main Fallujah hospital, November 9, 2004)

"Do not avoid contact with suffering or close your eyes before suffering. Do not kill. Do not let others kill. Find whatever means possible to protect life and prevent war." (Thich Nhat Than)

Introduction

This Thursday, December 2, the peace group A Call For Light is organising a peaceful vigil outside the BBC, Bush House, Aldwych, London, between 5:30pm and 7:00pm. ( http://www.acallforlight.org/)

Should you take time out to participate in this protest? Is it worth the effort and inconvenience involved?

If you are in doubt, we have selected below just a few examples indicating how the BBC has facilitated the mass killing of innocents in Iraq. We would all do well to recall the judgement of Nazi media boss, Julius Streicher, at Nuremberg:

"No government in the world... could have embarked upon and put into effect a policy of mass extermination without having a people who would back them and support them... These crimes could never have happened had it not been for him and for those like him." (Conot, Robert E, Justice At Nuremberg, Carrol & Graf, 1983, NY, pp.384-385)

The BBC, of course, is not the Nazi media, but there have been real war crimes in Iraq, a real mass slaughter, and the BBC has helped make it possible. Please read the examples below and protest on December 2 out of compassion for the suffering of the men, women and children of Iraq.

They Know They Can Trust US

In their history of the British media, Power Without Responsibility, James Curran and Jean Seaton show how the BBC has a long history of defending the establishment of which it is a part. They describe "the continuous and insidious dependence of the Corporation [the BBC] on the government". (Curran and Seaton, Power Without Responsibility, Routledge, 1991, p.144)

David Miller of Strathclyde University wrote earlier this year:

"BBC managers have fallen over themselves to grovel to the government in the aftermath of the Hutton whitewash. When will any of the BBC journalists who reported the 'Scud' attacks apologise? When will their bosses apologise for conspiring to keep the anti war movement off the screens? Not any time soon." (Miller, 'Media Apologies?', ZNet, June 15, 2004,  http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfmSectionID=21&ItemID=5713)

A Cardiff University report found that the BBC "displayed the most 'pro-war' agenda of any broadcaster". (Matt Wells, 'Study deals a blow to claims of anti-war bias in BBC news', The Guardian, July 4, 2003)

Over the three weeks of the initial conflict, 11% of the sources quoted by the BBC were of coalition government or military origin, the highest proportion of all the main television broadcasters. The BBC was less likely than Sky, ITV or Channel 4 News to use independent sources, who also tended to be the most sceptical. The BBC also placed least emphasis on Iraqi casualties, which were mentioned in 22% of its stories about the Iraqi people, and it was least likely to report on Iraqi opposition to the invasion.

Andrew Bergin, the press officer for the Stop The War Coalition, told Media Lens:

"Representatives of the coalition have been invited to appear on every TV channel except the BBC. The BBC have taken a conscious decision to actively exclude Stop the War Coalition people from their programmes, even though everyone knows we are central to organising the massive anti-war movement...". (Email to Media Lens, March 14, 2003)

The BBC's own founder, Lord Reith, noted in his diary of the establishment:

"They know they can trust us not to be really impartial." (Quoted, David Miller, 'Is the news biased?'  http://staff.stir.ac.uk/david.miller/teaching/7613bias.html)

Talking Up War - Talking Down Peace

The first BBC Newsnight programme after the massive anti-war march in London on February 15, 2003, saw political correspondent, David Grossman, asking:

"The people have spoken, or have they? What about the millions who didn't march? Was going to the DIY store or watching the football on Saturday a demonstration of support for the government?" (Newsnight, February 17, 2003)

It was the biggest protest march in British political history!

A day later, Newsnight's Jeremy Paxman asked playwright Arthur Miller:

"You live in New York City... you must vividly recall what happened on September 11. In the world in which we live now, isn't some sort of pre-emptive strike the only defensive option available to countries like the United States?" (Newsnight, February 18, 2003)

Noam Chomsky reflects on the idea that this kind of strike might have been "the only defensive option available" in dealing with, say, the conflict in Northern Ireland:

"One choice would have been to send the RAF to bomb the source of their finances, places like Boston, or to infiltrate commandos to capture those suspected of involvement in such financing and kill them or spirit them to London to face trial." (Chomsky, 9-11, Seven Stories Press, 2001)

Another, sane possibility, Chomsky comments, is "to consider realistically the background concerns and grievances, and try to remedy them, while at the same time following the rule of law to punish criminals".

Newsreader Fiona Bruce reported that the build-up of troops in the Gulf was "to deal with the continuing threat posed by Iraq". (Bruce, 18:00 News, January 7, 2003)

She meant the threat +alleged+ by Bush and Blair - not quite the same thing.

On the BBC's 6 O'Clock News, Matt Frei noted, sagely:

"There may be a case for regime change in Iran, too. But for now the Bush administration is relying on change from within." (Frei, BBC1, 18:00 News, June 16, 2003)

Frei explained in September 2003:

"The war with terror may have moved from these shores to Iraq. But for how long?" (Frei, 22:00 News, September 10, 2003)

This at a time when even the British government had abandoned its desperate attempts to conflate the war in Iraq with "the war on terror", in the absence of any evidence of links between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.

In October 2004, the BBC's Rageh Omaar noted: "I have followed, reporting the war on terror, from Afghanistan to Iraq." (Omaar, BBC1, 18:00 News, October 26, 2004)

Two years earlier, Labour MP, Glenda Jackson, had said:

"We have also seen the government, quite deliberately in my view, attempting to blur the line between the activities of al-Qaeda and the seeming threat of Saddam Hussein." (Newsnight, BBC2, November 25, 2002)

Inspectors - Were They Pulled Or Were They Pushed?

The BBC's Jane Corbin stated on Panorama that "the inspectors were thrown out... and a divided UN Security Council let Saddam get away with it." (Panorama, 'The Case Against Saddam,' BBC1, September 23, 2002)

On the BBC's Lunchtime News, James Robbins reported that inspectors were "asked to leave" after relations with Iraq broke down. (BBC1, 13:00 News, September 17, 2002)

The BBC's political editor, Andrew Marr, sent this email in response to one of our readers who challenged his claim that UN inspectors had been "kicked out" of Iraq in December 1998:

"Dear [Name Deleted].

If I am in your house, made to feel unwelcome and not allowed to wash or pee (not likely, a metaphor) and then, as a result, leave, you might be technically able to say that I had not been 'kicked out' - no leathered toe had been applied to my rear. But I might well use that phrase. Here as I understand it, is the sequence of events in 1998. I don't think my phrase increases the likelihood of war and will continue to try to report fairly on a subject where - I assure you - I don't feel or act as a mouthpiece of the Blair govt." (Forwarded to Media Lens, January 21, 2003)

Scott Ritter, former chief Unscom weapons inspector, who was an inspector in Iraq between 1991-98, said:

"If this were argued in a court of law, the weight of evidence would go the other way. Iraq has in fact demonstrated over and over a willingness to cooperate with weapons inspectors." (Ritter and William Rivers Pitt, War On Iraq, Profile, 2002, p.25)

Ritter claims that Iraq was "fundamentally disarmed" of 90-95% of its WMDs by December 1998. He also claims that inspections were deliberately sabotaged by US officials in 1998 precisely +because+ the Iraqis were rapidly approaching 100% compliance - so removing justification for continued sanctions and control of Iraq. In December 1998, Ritter said:

"What [head of Unscom] Richard Butler did last week with the inspections was a set-up. This was designed to generate a conflict that would justify a bombing." (Quoted, New York Post, December 17, 1998)

Last year, Richard Sambrook, then BBC's director of news, told us that Ritter had been interviewed just twice: on September 29th, 2002, for Breakfast With Frost, and on March 1, 2003 for BBC News 24. Newsnight editor Peter Barron told us that Newsnight had interviewed Scott Ritter twice on the WMD issue before the war: on August 3, 2000 and August 21, 2002.

A BBC news online search for 1 January, 2002 - 31 December 2002 recorded the following mentions:

George Bush Iraq, 1,022 Tony Blair Iraq, 651 Donald Rumsfeld Iraq, 164 Dick Cheney Iraq, 102 Richard Perle Iraq, 6 George Galloway Iraq, 42 Tony Benn Iraq, 14 Noam Chomsky Iraq, 1 Denis Halliday, 0

The Fall Of Baghdad

In April 2003, the BBC's Nicholas Witchell declared of the US drive into central Baghdad:

"It is absolutely, without a doubt, a vindication of the strategy." (Witchell, BBC1, 18:00 News, April 9, 2003)

The BBC's breakfast news presenter, Natasha Kaplinsky, beamed as she described how Blair "has become, again, Teflon Tony". The BBC's Mark Mardell agreed with her: "It +has+ been a vindication for him." (BBC1, Breakfast News, April 10, 2003)

Retired general William Odom, former head of the US National Security Agency, sees it differently:

"Bush hasn't found the WMD. Al-Qaida, it's worse, he's lost on that front. That he's going to achieve a democracy there? That goal is lost, too. It's lost. Right now, the course we're on, we're achieving Bin Laden's ends." (Quoted, Sidney Blumenthal, 'Far graver than Vietnam', The Guardian, September 16, 2004)

BBC journalist Rageh Omaar reported his emotions as Baghdad fell:

"In my mind's eye, I often asked myself: what would it be like when I saw the first British or American soldiers, after six years of reporting Iraq? And nothing, nothing, came close to the actual, staggering reaction to seeing American soldiers - young men from Nevada and California - just rolling down in tanks. And they're here with us now in the hotel, in the lifts and the lobbies. It was a moment I'd never, ever prepared myself for." (Omaar, BBC1, 18:00 News, April 9, 2003)

Ex-Marine Staff Sergeant Jimmy Massey was one of these same "young men from Nevada and California" in the main invasion force all the way to Baghdad. In May 2004, Massey said:

"It sickened me so that I had actually brought it up to my lieutenant, and I told him, I said, you know, sir, we're not going to have to worry about the Iraq [people] - you know, we're basically committing genocide over here, mass extermination of thousands of Iraqis." ('Ex-US Marine: I killed civilians in Iraq', Democracy Now, May 24, 2004, ( http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/24/148212)

Infamously, on the day Baghdad fell, Andrew Marr declared:

"Well, I think this does one thing - it draws a line under what, before the war, had been a period of... well, a faint air of pointlessness, almost, was hanging over Downing Street. There were all these slightly tawdry arguments and scandals. That is now history. Mr Blair is well aware that all his critics out there in the party and beyond aren't going to thank him, because they're only human, for being right when they've been wrong. And he knows that there might be trouble ahead, as I said. But I think this is very, very important for him. It gives him a new freedom and a new self-confidence. He confronted many critics.

"I don't think anybody after this is going to be able to say of Tony Blair that he's somebody who is driven by the drift of public opinion, or focus groups, or opinion polls. He took all of those on. He said that they would be able to take Baghdad without a bloodbath, and that in the end the Iraqis would be celebrating. And on both of those points he has been proved conclusively right. And it would be entirely ungracious, even for his critics, not to acknowledge that tonight he stands as a larger man and a stronger prime minister as a result." (Marr, BBC1, 22:00 News, April 9, 2003)

By contrast, on November 20, 2004, journalist Dahr Jamail quoted an Iraqi, Abu Talat. Talat, we are told, was crying and distraught as he spoke:

"'I am in a very sad position. I do not see any freedom or any democracy. If this could lead into a freedom, it is a freedom with blood. It is a freedom of emotions of sadness. It is a freedom of killing. You cannot gain democracy through blood or killing. You do not find the freedom that way. People are going to pray to God and they were killed and wounded. There were 1,500 people praying to God and they went on a holiday were people go every Friday for prayers. And they were shot and killed. There were so many women and kids lying on the ground. This is not democracy, neither freedom.'" (Jamail, 'Terrorizing Those Who Are Praying...,' November 20, 2004)

Marr said of joining the BBC:

"When I joined the BBC, my Organs of Opinion were formally removed." ('Andrew Marr, the BBC's political editor', The Independent, January 13, 2000)

This was fortunate indeed. Prior to joining the BBC, Marr had written articles with titles such as:

'Brave, bold, visionary. Whatever became of Blair the ultra-cautious cynic?' (The Observer, April 4, 1999)

and:

'Hail to the chief. Sorry, Bill, but this time we're talking about Tony.' (The Observer, May 16, 1999)

Marr declared himself in awe of Blair's "moral courage", writing: "I am constantly impressed, but also mildly alarmed, by his utter lack of cynicism."

Part 2 will follow shortly...

SUGGESTED ACTION

The goal of Media Lens is to promote rationality, compassion and respect for others. We urge you to peacefully protest the BBC on December 2.

In writing letters to journalists, we strongly urge readers to maintain a polite, non-aggressive and non-abusive tone.

Write to Helen Boaden, director of BBC News Email:  helen.boaden@bbc.co.uk

You can contact any of the BBC journalists named above by following the same pattern. For example, Matt Frei's email address is: Email:  matt.frei@bbc.co.uk

Please copy all emails to us at Media Lens: Email:  editor@medialens.org

Media Lens readers may also wish to consider contacting the BBC's programme complaints unit at:

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/info/contactus/serious_form.shtml




Introduction

Tomorrow, December 2, the peace group A Call For Light is organising a peaceful vigil outside the BBC, Bush House, Aldwych, London, between 5:30pm and 7:00pm. ( http://www.acallforlight.org/)

Like the rest of the mainstream media, the BBC did next to nothing to expose the devastating effects of US-UK war and sanctions on the civilian population of Iraq from 1990 onwards. Ahead of last year's war, the BBC endlessly echoed and channelled UK government propaganda claims, almost never subjecting those claims to serious challenge.

Post-invasion and post-Hutton, the BBC has presented the occupation of Iraq as a flawed but well-intentioned act of 'liberation' and 'rebuilding'. Yesterday, the UN's Integrated Regional Information Network reported of Fallujah:

"Approximately 70 percent of the houses and shops were destroyed in the city and those still standing are riddled with bullets." ('Fallujah still needs more supplies despite aid arrival',  http://www.irinnews.org, November 30, 2004)

You would not know from BBC coverage that a vast war crime has taken place in Fallujah. If Saddam Hussein had demolished 70% of Kuwait in 1990, it would surely have been declared one of the great atrocities of the twentieth century.

Legitimising The Illegitimate

The US-UK "coalition" would soon "hand over power to the Iraqis" on June 30, Laura Trevelyan declared on BBC1 in May. (16:45 News, May 23, 2004) Thus "soon the occupation will end", Orla Guerin observed. (BBC1, 19:00 News, June 16, 2004)

The death of a British soldier in Basra was particularly tragic, Guerin noted on the day of the "handover" (June 28), because he was "the last soldier to die under the occupation". (BBC1, 13:00 News, June 28, 2004) On the same programme, Matt Frei declared Iraq "sovereign and free" on "an enormously significant day for Iraq". It was an "historic day", anchor Anna Ford agreed.

Guerin described how Iraqi troops participating in an official ceremony "have waited all their lives for freedom", and so "feel satisfaction that power will be back in Iraqi hands". (Guerin, BBC1, 18:00 News, June 28, 2004)

Back in the real world, Paul Krugman wrote in the New York Times:

"The formal occupation of Iraq came to an ignominious end yesterday... In reality, the occupation will continue under another name, most likely until a hostile Iraqi populace demands that we leave." (Krugman, 'Who lost Iraq?', New York Times, June 29, 2004)

Robert Fisk wrote in the Independent:

"Alice in Wonderland could not have improved on this. The looking-glass reflects all the way from Baghdad to Washington... Those of us who put quotation marks around 'liberation' in 2003 should now put quotation marks around 'sovereignty'." (Fisk, 'The handover: Restoration of Iraqi sovereignty - or Alice in Wonderland?' The Independent, June 29, 2004)

In November, Anna Ford continued with the BBC's preferred version of events:

"Iraq's prime minister, Iyad Allawi, has said he has given American and Iraqi forces the authority to clear Fallujah of terrorists." (Ford, BBC1, 13:00 News, November 8, 2004)

Caroline Hawley noted in July that the interim Iraqi government would need to ensure the security of the Iraqi people "if it's to keep their support". (Hawley, BBC1, 18:00 News, July 28, 2004)

We await credible evidence of this support for the US puppet regime.

Nicholas Witchell said in September:

"Dr. Allawi may say, 'we're winning', and there may be a time soon when that claim is more obviously justifiable. If that time arrives, there is no doubt that the overwhelming majority of Iraqis will be delighted." (Witchell, BBC1, 22:00 News, September 23, 2004)

On October 20, Ben Brown said:

"The people of southern Iraq know they have their freedom." (Brown, BBC1, 22:00 News, October 20, 2004)

Imagine our reaction if a Russian journalist had said the same of Afghanistan in the 1980s.

On October 21, Caroline Hawley observed:

"It's hard to imagine that there can be free and fair elections across this country without a dramatic improvement in security." (Hawley, BBC1, 22:00 News, October 21, 2004)

With the United States having so far lost 1,100 troops killed in action in Iraq, with ten times that number wounded, at a cost of $200 billion, some find it hard to imagine that Bush and Rumsfeld would allow free and fair elections +regardless+ of the 'security' situation.

Dr. Wamidh Omar Nadhmi, a senior political scientist at Baghdad University, and an outspoken critic of Saddam Hussein's government, is official spokesman for the Iraqi National Foundation Congress. Nadhmi says:

"We suggested to the occupation forces and Iraqi government four requirements for an Iraqi election: an international committee of oversight; an immediate ceasefire because we cannot have elections under bombardment and rockets; [the] withdrawal of American troops from the major cities one month before the election." (Quoted, Dahr Jamail, 'Iraqi Critics Speak Out on Occupation, Elections,' The New Standard, November 22, 2004)

Ignoring these suggestions, which Nadhmi describes as prerequisites for a free and democratic election, the interim government declared martial law. Nadhmi asks:

"How can we have a free election under martial law?... Martial law is one of the nails in the coffin of this regime. The last pretext for democracy here is now buried. Their declaration of martial law is a declaration of political bankruptcy."

From An Establishment Perspective

In a 2003 Panorama special, Matt Frei said:

"There's no doubt that the desire to bring good, to bring American values to the rest of the world, and especially now to the Middle East... is now increasingly tied up with military power." (Frei, BBC1, Panorama, April 13, 2003)

New York Times commentator Thomas Friedman allows us to decode the propaganda:

"The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist. McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas, the designer of the F-15. And the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley's technologies is called the US Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps." (Quoted, John Pilger, 'The New Rulers of the World', Verso, 2001, p.114)

US presidential candidate and congressman, Dennis Kucinich, wrote in March, 2003:

"Is President Bush's war in Iraq about oil? Of course it is. Sometimes, the obvious answer is the right one: Oil is a major factor in the President's march to war, just as oil is a major factor in every aspect of US policy in the Persian Gulf." (Kucinich, 'Obviously Oil', AlterNet, March 11, 2003)

The BBC's John Humphrys said:

"So maybe it's not being too naive to think America really does want to use its position as the world's only superpower to spread freedom and democracy. The truth is, it's a question of where. Only last week James Woolsey - who once ran the CIA and has been appointed to run the new information ministry in Iraq - claimed America had been actively promoting democracy for most of the past century." (Humphrys, 'Bush turns a blind eye to the wars he doesn't want to fight', Sunday Times, April 13, 2003)

Mel Goodman, senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and former CIA analyst, takes a different view:

"None of this smells right at this point....and points to the politicization of the reconstruction process. Too many contracts have already gone to Cheney's old firm (Halliburton) and Shultz's old firm (Bechtel). The possible appointment of Jim Woolsey is total farce. Woolsey was a disaster as CIA director in the 90s and is now running around this country calling for a World War IV to deal with the Islamic problem. This is a dangerous individual who should not be part of any reconstruction process." ('War in Iraq With Mel Goodman, Senior Fellow, Center for International Policy', April 15, 2003,  http://discuss.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/zforum/03/sp_iraq_goodman041503.htm )

On the BBC's Newsnight programme, Gavin Esler noted that US crimes at Abu Ghraib prison had produced: "Images that shamed America's mission in Iraq." (Esler, Newsnight, August 24, 2004)

Much as crimes in Kabul "shamed" the Soviet Union's mission in Afghanistan in the 1980s, perhaps.

In March 2003, Newsnight's Kirsty Wark's observed that the declining humanitarian situation in Iraq threatened to "take the shine off" the "Shock and Awe" bombing campaign. (Wark, Newsnight, March 21, 2003)

Much as the humanitarian situation threatened to "take the shine off" Saddam's invasion of Kuwait.

In July 2004, Newsnight described how Iraqi insurgents were "blighting US attempts to bring peace and stability to Iraq". (Newsnight, July 5, 2004)

Resistance to an illegal superpower invasion by a quarter of a million troops is the real obstacle to peace, according to the BBC. Imagine the BBC declaring (not merely reporting) that the US-UK occupation was blighting international attempts to bring peace and stability to Iraq.

On October 1, Nicholas Witchell reported that a series of insurgent car bombs in Baghdad were "intended to undermine the future". (Witchell, BBC1, 18:00 News, October 1, 2004)

As opposed to the +Americans'+ version of "the future".

On the BBC's Politics Show, Jeremy Vine suggested that the failure to discover any WMDs in Iraq would be "toe-curlingly embarrassing for the politicians". (Vine, The Politics Show, BBC1, May 4, 2003)

Imagine launching an illegal invasion, occupation and devastation of a defenceless Third World country, killing tens of thousands of civilians on a completely concocted pretext. What could be more "embarrassing"? Or indeed a more compelling case for a war crimes tribunal?

Earlier this year, Nicholas Witchell was happy to confuse the issue of the Daily Mirror's pictures of alleged abuse of Iraqis with the wider issue of British abuse:

"After the appalling +reality+ of what the Americans have been doing, the Mirror's pictures threatened to compromise the work of every British soldier." (Witchell, BBC1 22:00 News, May 14, 2004, original emphasis)

But British abuses +were+ real. For example, according to the Red Cross, married father of two, Baha Mousa, was among nine men seized at a hotel in Basra by British troops in September 2003:

"'Following their arrest, the nine men were made to kneel, face and hands against the ground, as if in a prayer position,' the report said. 'The soldiers stamped on the back of the neck of those raising their head.'" (Agencies, 'Red Cross report details alleged Iraq abuses', The Guardian, May 10, 2004)

Amnesty International launched "a scathing attack on the British military in Iraq", the Guardian reported. Amnesty produced evidence of eight cases in which Iraqi civilians, including a girl aged eight, were shot dead by British soldiers in southern Iraq.

Naming The Bad Guys

Discussing the war against the insurgency, Newsnight's Kirsty Wark asked a US military expert: "Can you choke off terrorism in Iraq?" (Newsnight, September 23, 2004)

James Robbins reported that the interim government was faced by: "Saddam loyalists joined by al Qaeda elements." (Robbins, BBC1, 13:00 News, June 28, 2004)

Most experts reject the claim that al Qaeda and other foreign fighters are at the heart of the insurgency. Toby Dodge, a British-based analyst, told the Al Jazeera website:

"[The] Insurgency is a national phenomenon fuelled by alienation. I don't think this war is winnable because they have alienated the base of support across Iraqi society." (Quoted, James Cogan, 'Iraqi elections announced amid mass repression,' November 22, 2004)  http://www.globalecho.org/view_article.php?aid=2299)

On November 16, the Los Angeles Times reported that US-UK forces are fighting "a homegrown uprising dominated by Iraqis, not foreign fighters." According to the paper:

"Of the more than 1,000 men between the ages of 15 and 55 who were captured in intense fighting in the center of the insurgency over the last week, just 15 are confirmed foreign fighters, Gen. George W. Casey, the top US ground commander in Iraq, said Monday."

The LA Times added: "American commanders said their best estimates of the proportion of foreigners among their enemies is [sic] about 5 percent." (Quoted, Norman Solomon, 'Will the Real "Iraqi Forces" Please Stand Up?', November 19, 2004 by  http://antiwar.com/solomon/?articleid=4008)

In October, the BBC's Paul Wood referred to the "so-called 'resistance fighters'". (Wood, BBC1, 13:00 News, October 22, 2004)

Ben Brown described Fallujah as "a haven for Sunni extremists". (Brown, BBC1, 18:30 News, October 27, 2004)

In September 2004, Witchell said:

"As is so often the case in this conflict it's the Iraqi civilian population which suffers the greatest loss of life - either as a result of mistakes by the Americans, or, far more frequently, of course, as a result of the bombs and the bullets of the insurgents." (Witchell, BBC1, 18:00 News, September 30, 2004)

A research study published in The Lancet in October made a conservative estimate of 98,000 civilian deaths since the invasion:

"The researchers found that the majority of deaths were attributed to violence, which were primarily the result of military actions by Coalition forces. Most of those killed by Coalition forces were women and children... Eighty-four percent of the deaths were reported to be caused by the actions of Coalition forces and 95 percent of those deaths were due to air strikes and artillery." ('Iraqi Civilian Deaths Increase Dramatically After Invasion', October 28, 2004  http://www.jhsph.edu/PublicHealthNews/Press_Releases/PR_2004/Burnham_Iraq.ht ml)

Blair's Passion

Tony Blair "passionately believes" that Saddam Hussein had to be confronted to avoid future regrets, the BBC's Laura Trevelyan insisted. (Trevelyan, BBC1, 13:00 News, January 14, 2003)

By contrast, former cabinet minister, Clare Short, insists that Tony Blair used "various ruses" and "a series of half-truths, exaggerations, reassurances that were not the case to get us into conflict by the spring". (Patrick Wintour, 'Short: I was briefed on Blair's secret war pact', The Guardian, June 18, 2003)

Paul O'Neill, former US Treasury secretary, explained how the Bush administration came to office determined to topple Saddam Hussein, using the September 11 attacks as a pretext: "It was all about finding a way to do it. The president saying 'Go find me a way to do this.'" (O'Neill, quoted, Julian Borger, 'Bush decided to remove Saddam "on day one"', The Guardian, January 12, 2004)

O'Neill reports seeing one memorandum, long before September 11, 2001, preparing for war dating from the first days of the administration. Another, marked "secret" said, "Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq". O'Neill also saw a Pentagon document entitled "Foreign Suitors For Iraqi Oilfield Contracts", which discussed dividing Iraq's fuel reserves up between the world's oil companies. So much for Blair's passionate beliefs!

Matt Frei had this to say:

"If you remember, Paul O'Neill was sacked mainly because he was incompetent, and he was more infamous for his gaffes than his insights on economic theory. He once famously said that the collapse of the energy giant Enron was an example of the genius of capitalism, and perhaps more accurately that the tax code in America was 9,500 words of complete gibberish." (Frei, Newsnight, BBC2, January 12, 2004)

The 1991 Gulf War And The Effects Of Sanctions

A Guardian report cited by historian Mark Curtis found that the issue of oil featured in 4% of BBC1 reports and in 3% of BBC2 reports - a remarkable achievement, given the obvious central concern. The BBC told its reporters to be "circumspect" about pictures of death and injury. ('"Circumspect" BBC', The Guardian, January 15, 1991)

David Dimbleby asked on live BBC TV:

"Isn't it in fact true that America, by dint of the very accuracy of the weapons we've seen, is the only potential world policeman?" (Quoted, John Pilger, Hidden Agendas, Vintage, 1998, p.45)

Only 7% of the 88,500 tons of bombs dropped in the 1991 war employed 'smart' technology. The accuracy of these weapons was indicated by the performance of the much-vaunted Patriot missile system, declared 98% successful in intercepting and destroying Iraqi Scud missiles during the 1991 war. Professor Ted Postol of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was asked by Congress to investigate the 98% claim. Much to his surprise, Postol found that the Patriot's success rate was rather less impressive than claimed:

"It became clear that it wasn't even close to intercepting +any+ targets, let alone some targets." (Postol, Great Military Blunders, Channel 4, March 2, 2000, original emphasis)

In a 2002 documentary, the BBC's John Simpson reported of the 1991 Gulf War:

"The big attack didn't bring the terrible loss of life that Saddam had feared." (Simpson, 'Saddam: A Warning from History', BBC1, November 3, 2002)

In late 1991, the Medical Educational Trust in London estimated that up to a quarter of a million men, women and children had died in the assault. On his return from Iraq in the immediate aftermath of the war, UN diplomat Marrti Ahtisaari wrote:

"Nothing that we had seen or read had prepared us for the particular form of devastation which has now befallen the country. The recent conflict has wrought near-apocalyptic results..." (Quoted, Milan Rai, War On Iraq, Verso, 2002, p.135)

The BBC's Ben Brown said of the effects of UN sanctions:

"He [Saddam Hussein] claims UN sanctions have reduced many of his citizens to near starvation - pictures like these [of a malnourished baby and despairing mother] have been a powerful propaganda weapon for Saddam, which he'll now have to give up." (Brown, BBC News, June 20, 1996)

In the Observer of June 23, 2002, John Sweeney reviewed arguments made in his BBC documentary on the same day:

"The Iraqi dictator says his country's children are dying in their thousands because of the West's embargoes. John Sweeney, in a TV documentary to be shown tonight, says the figures are bogus." (Sweeney, 'How Saddam 'staged' fake baby funerals', The Observer, June 23, 2002)

In his Observer article, Sweeney wrote:

"In 1999 Unicef, in co-operation with the Iraqi government, made a retrospective projection of 500,000 excess child deaths in the 1990s. The projection is open to question. It was based on data from within a regime that tortures children with impunity. All but one of the researchers used by Unicef were employees of the Ministry of Health, according to the Lancet."

We asked Hans von Sponeck, who ran the UN's 'oil for food' programme in Iraq, to respond. Von Sponeck described Sweeney's article as "exactly the kind of journalism that is Orwellian, double-speak. No doubt, the Iraq Government has manipulated data to suit its own purposes, everyone of the protagonists unfortunately does this. A journalist should not. UNICEF has used large numbers of international researchers and applied sophisticated methods to get these important figures.

"Yes, the Ministry of Health personnel cooperated with UNICEF but ultimately it was UNICEF and UNICEF alone which carried out the data analysis exactly because they did not want to politicise their work... This article is a very serious misrepresentation." (Email to Media Lens, June 24, 2002)

Former UN Assistant Secretary-General, Denis Halliday, who set up and ran the UN's 'oil for food' programme, has said:

"Washington, and to a lesser extent London, have deliberately played games through the Sanctions Committee with this programme for years - it's a deliberate ploy... That's why I've been using the word 'genocide', because this is a deliberate policy to destroy the people of Iraq. I'm afraid I have no other view at this late stage." (Interview with Media Lens, May 2000, www.medialens.org)

SUGGESTED ACTION

The goal of Media Lens is to promote rationality, compassion and respect for others. We urge you to peacefully protest the BBC on December 2.

In writing letters to journalists, we strongly urge readers to maintain a polite, non-aggressive and non-abusive tone.

Write to Helen Boaden, director of BBC News Email:  helen.boaden@bbc.co.uk

You can contact any of the BBC journalists named above by following the same pattern. For example, Matt Frei's email address is: Email:  matt.frei@bbc.co.uk

Please copy all emails to us at Media Lens: Email:  editor@medialens.org

Media Lens readers may also wish to consider contacting the BBC's programme complaints unit at:

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/info/contactus/serious_form.shtml

Send your views to us Email:  editor@medialens.org

Visit the Media Lens website:  http://www.medialens.org


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Latest CCNWON Headlines:

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1 December 2004
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