IT'S EVEN WORSE THAN THAT
By Cori Dauber - Ranting Profs
Ralph Peters argues that the debacle of Fallujah proves that military doctrine has to adapt, now, that our troops have to begin to fight even faster -- within the "media cycle" so that they can win before the lies of propagandistic media outlets convince National Command Authorities that we have no choice but to pause, negotiate, to give our enemies, in essence, the wins on the battlefield they could never have won on their own.
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But you know and I know that it's even worse than he suggests. It isn't only that al Jazeera and the European press report untrue atrocities to their audiences, worrying our authorities about how we will be seen to those audiences. It's also that those stories are picked up by the American media, cracking support at home -- partially because Americans who don't believe the stories begin to believe the cost in support abroad will be too high and partially because some Americans will believe the stories. But the hesitancy that results in American military operations then creates a further feedback loop, when it begins to look as if success may not be possible, and the costs, therefore, not worth it.
What Peters does not suggest, however, is that since there is nothing that can be done about the way we will be represented in those media outlets, we might as well just fight through and win. If you factor out the pauses we may well win with the speed he's looking for. We'd take less of a hit in public support and no less of a hit in the media if we did. |
