We have been discussing access to accurate information during times of
conflict, the determination of bias, motivation for the use of
misinformation and how we might be able to distinquish truth from
misdirection, particularly from 'official' information sources.
There is clearly an established need to provide misinformation to mislead or
misdirect the 'enemy' in any conflict. However, when we are considering the
nature and function of information in times of conflict - and explaining
this to students - we should also recognise that often misinformation (or
propaganda) is also directed at the citizens of a country by it's own
government and that 'official' accounts are not always full or accurate
accounts. We expect this of opponent counties. Perhaps we do not so readily
accept that this could be the case of our own.
To provide a recent case study to illustrate this:
On Monday afternoon this week. Prime Minister Blair addressed the House of
Commons. During his speech he told MPs that the pumps on the Iraqi oil
fields had been mined and that by talking control of them before they could
been denotated, we had saved both the oil fields and averted an ecological
disaster. That same evening, there was a live news report on British
television's Channel 4 from southern Iraq during which the reporter on the
ground was asked if he could confirm what Mr Blair had said to Parliament
that day. The reporter said that he and a group of other reporters had been
taken to the largest oil field in southern Iraq that day and been given a
detailed inspection tour by the commanding officer of the British troops now
controlling them. He went on to state that the commander of the British
troops had been at pains to stress to the assembled reporters that the oil
fields had not been mined, that as fart as they could determine they never
had been mined and that they (the troops) had found no evidence that the
Iraqis had been in the process of mining them. The reporter went on to state
that he did not know who was briefing the Prime Minister but that, in this
instance, they had clearly not given him accurate information
This raises very interesting issues about the nature and accuracy of
'official' reporting. In this case, either Prime Minister Blair had been
giving incorrect information, or he had deliberately given Parliament
incorrect information. If the first, this raises the issue of the accuracy
of intelligence reporting (how much of it is accurate ? if accurate how much
is being reported to political leaders ? if inaccurate, is it known to be
inaccurate when passed on, and if so, for what purpose ?). If the second,
then this raises serious questions about how much of the information
presented to elected representives is 'information' and how much is actually
misinformation ?
In this particular instance, it also has serious implications for the
workings of the UK Parliament because of Parliamentary working practices. In
the UK, 'misleading' Parliament is a very serious political (as opposed to
criminal) offence. Ministers have been forced to resign as a result of not
being completely truthful to Parliament in their answers. For Mr Blair to
consider doing this himself - if that was in fact the case - means that his
motive for doing so must have been very strong, because of the potential
implications and consequences he would have to face if it was discovered he
had not been telling the truth.
In order to try to understand possible motives, we need to understand
something of the domestic political background in which this has been
happening. I am not sure how much of this has been reported by the US press,
so apologies if this is known already. Before the defeat of the second UN
resolution, 81% of the UK population were opposed to direct military action
without a formal sanction from the UN. Once military action started, this
dropped to 49% - still a significantly high percentage. In the vote in
Parliament on taking independent action, 142 members of Parliament
(including almost a third of Tony Blair's own party) voted against military
action. Consequently, Mr Blair has been very much aware of the fact that he
has strong opposition to the war at home to contend with, and much of the
content of his and his Minister's speeches since the conflict started has
included statements in justifcation of the action and examples of the
benefits to be gained from the action. If he DID deliberately mislead the
House on Monday and did not simply relay inaccurate information that had
been passed to him, this could be another example of a 'justification'
speech, the main intention of which is to win support from those both inside
and outside of Parliament still uncovinced for the need for military action,
and not simply a briefing statement to Parliament.
This example is taken from the UK, but it could just as readily have been
taken from the US - or from Iraq, for that matter. It illustrates how very
difficult it can be to find out what is actually happening, to separate fact
from opinion, and to determining what is 'information' and what is
misinformation. This, of course, is something that happens all the time -
only in times of crisis and of conflict the need to apply critical skills to
all sources of information ('official' and unofficial) becomes even more
important if we are to seperate fact from fiction.
Without diminishing tragedy of war, in some ways, the present conflict
provides an excellent if not unique opportuntity for students to critically
and intelligently evaluate information from a range of different sources,
and to assess them for bias and inaccuracy in a very immediate and direct
way.
Graham Stanley Small
Partner
CSP - The Carter-Small Partnership
Tel/Fax: 020 8879 0884
E-mail: g.small@cspgroup.co.uk
Website: www.cspgroup.co.uk
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