U.S., bin Laden broadcasts little more than propaganda

  Doug Lief Lief is a fourth-year English
student who watches way too much TV. Contact him at [email protected]. Click
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Sunday, the United States displayed its first visual strike
against the Taliban across all major media. It included speeches
from President Bush and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, while
statements from Osama bin Laden and his right-hand man were
broadcast across Afghani television (or in the Afghans’ case,
the television, singular). These actions speak to an important
element of the conflict ““ propaganda and media
manipulation.

Given Americans’ notoriously poor attention span, it is
essential that the Bush administration give the public some visual
evidence that their military is handling the situation with
precision. After learning of the strikes, I found my roommates and
myself glued to the TV watching a grainy, green twinkling
light.

It could have been a NASA quicktime movie of the pulsar in the
Crab Nebula, but the CNN crawler at the bottom of the screen
indicated that it was in fact a live image of a target exploding in
Afghanistan. Many of us remember similar images of Baghdad during
the Gulf War.

Thanks to this visual gambit, Americans can now feel satisfied
that we have begun to retaliate against our enemies. It is likely
that covert operations have been under way ever since Sept. 11, but
one of the curiosities of war is that we cannot be accurately
apprised of our own military activity for fear of tipping our hand
to the opposition. Effective or not, a completely covert war cannot
boost the morale of the United States, given our
“I’ll-believe-it-when-I-see-it” culture.

From a media relations standpoint, the United States’
smartest strategic move was to send aid to the Afghani people as
part of the mission. We can oust the Taliban while providing the
food and medicine the people deserve. If they have read their
history, the Afghanis should cooperate against the Taliban. I
believe when this is over the U.S. will institute a version of the
Marshall plan, helping to rebuild our fallen enemy. Afghanistan
would do well to learn the lessons of Germany and Japan.

Our current aid effort not only helps in this respect, but in
another. Bin Laden’s primary beef against the United States
is that our trade policy has kept people in Islamic countries poor.
By offering humanitarian help to the Afghanis, the United States
can undermine bin Laden’s case.

On the other side of the spectrum was the address by bin Laden
himself. Both he and the Taliban have invoked the Islamic concept
of jihad in their defense. Although the speech was delivered to
Americans, making use of the pronoun “you” several
times, I believe the speech was intended more as a call to arms for
Muslims worldwide. While Bush’s address to a joint session of
Congress a few weeks ago called upon an “us vs. them”
mentality, bin Laden’s version defined “us” and
“them” along religious grounds, while Bush’s
criterion were political.

It is bin Laden’s desire that the Islamic world perceive
what he does as the beginning of a fifth Crusade, and like Saladin
before, they had better prepare for a fight. The ploy could work,
but more likely than not this media maneuver will only reinforce
the image of bin Laden as the troublemaker that cost the class
their pizza party.

Ultimately, because terrorism is a campaign based around
emotion, it all comes down to flashy publicity stunts ““ in
other words, propaganda and media manipulation. The attack on the
World Trade Center was about image, not about military victory. Bin
Laden greatly underestimated his audience. We watch a lot of
television and ingest deadly levels of baloney from all sources on
a daily basis. We react heavily to images.

But Mr. bin Laden, we can still recognize the transparency of an
image, and we can see right through you.