Sorry, forgot to put a link to the original article into the post. It's a few lines down now. 

 Not only are they given carefully constructed tours, and information, their financial dealings in military-industrial complex means they get more money the more they please the  Bush administration.

Damn it.  I could feel this in my guts every time I listened to them. 

The paper notes that the public is seldom told of the analysts' ties to making money on war and even the stations they appear on often do not know. 

Excerpt NY Times report "Behind Military Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand " (link insertion constitutes the 6th update.  Other updates are at the bottom):

Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks.

... 

...members of this group have echoed administration talking points, sometimes even when they suspected the information was false or inflated. Some analysts acknowledge they suppressed doubts because they feared jeopardizing their access.

A few expressed regret for participating in what they regarded as an effort to dupe the American public with propaganda dressed as independent military analysis.

“It was them saying, ‘We need to stick our hands up your back and move your mouth for you,’ ” Robert S. Bevelacqua, a retired Green Beret and former Fox News analyst, said.

Kenneth Allard, a former NBC military analyst who has taught information warfare at the National Defense University, said the campaign amounted to a sophisticated information operation. “This was a coherent, active policy,” he said.

As conditions in Iraq deteriorated, Mr. Allard recalled, he saw a yawning gap between what analysts were told in private briefings and what subsequent inquiries and books later revealed.

“Night and day,” Mr. Allard said, “I felt we’d been hosed.”

This is a long report which I will read all of today, but I suspect most of it are just disclaimers from the people who have been made to look bad by the above (unless the Times is going to admit that similar types manufactured news makes it way into print and maybe even the Gray lady even after little Miss Runamok left the paper).  If something else interesting comes up in the rest of the 10 page report I'll post more.

Update 1: 

The New York Times sued the Pentagon for the information they are revealing here. 

Another excerpt: 

Internal Pentagon documents repeatedly refer to the military analysts as “message force multipliers” or “surrogates” who could be counted on to deliver administration “themes and messages” to millions of Americans “in the form of their own opinions.”

Though many analysts are paid network consultants, making $500 to $1,000 per appearance, in Pentagon meetings they sometimes spoke as if they were operating behind enemy lines, interviews and transcripts show. Some offered the Pentagon tips on how to outmaneuver the networks, or as one analyst put it to Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense secretary, “the Chris Matthewses and the Wolf Blitzers of the world.” Some warned of planned stories or sent the Pentagon copies of their correspondence with network news executives. Many — although certainly not all — faithfully echoed talking points intended to counter critics.

 Remember this.  Everytime you are given the 'opinion' of a military analyst, remember how most of them are total sellouts. 

Update 2:

Excerpt:

Again and again, records show, the administration has enlisted analysts as a rapid reaction force to rebut what it viewed as critical news coverage, some of it by the networks’ own Pentagon correspondents. For example, when news articles revealed that troops in Iraq were dying because of inadequate body armor, a senior Pentagon official wrote to his colleagues: “I think our analysts — properly armed — can push back in that arena.”

Soldiers dying for lack of body armor?  No problem.  Just get your propaganda people distributed to quell the outrage. 

Update 3:

Excerpts: 

the administration has demonstrated that there is a price for sustained criticism, many analysts said. “You’ll lose all access,” Dr. McCausland said.

and

With a majority of Americans calling the war a mistake despite all administration attempts to sway public opinion, the Pentagon has focused in the last couple of years on cultivating in particular military analysts frequently seen and heard in conservative news outlets, records and interviews show.

Update 4:

The entire Iraq War was pushed this way.  We were Hermann Goeringed.

Excerpt HG quote found at thinkexist.com :

Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”

 Excerpt New York Times report linked at top of this post:

By early 2002, detailed planning for a possible Iraq invasion was under way, yet an obstacle loomed. Many Americans, polls showed, were uneasy about invading a country with no clear connection to the Sept. 11 attacks. Pentagon and White House officials believed the military analysts could play a crucial role in helping overcome this resistance.

Torie Clarke, the former public relations executive who oversaw the Pentagon’s dealings with the analysts as assistant secretary of defense for public affairs, had come to her job with distinct ideas about achieving what she called “information dominance.” In a spin-saturated news culture, she argued, opinion is swayed most by voices perceived as authoritative and utterly independent.

And so even before Sept. 11, she built a system within the Pentagon to recruit “key influentials” — movers and shakers from all walks who with the proper ministrations might be counted on to generate support for Mr. Rumsfeld’s priorities.

Update 5:

The Pentagon’s regular press office would be kept separate from the military analysts. The analysts would instead be catered to by a small group of political appointees, with the point person being Brent T. Krueger, another senior aide to Ms. Clarke. The decision recalled other administration tactics that subverted traditional journalism. Federal agencies, for example, have paid columnists to write favorably about the administration. They have distributed to local TV stations hundreds of fake news segments with fawning accounts of administration accomplishments. The Pentagon itself has made covert payments to Iraqi newspapers to publish coalition propaganda.

Rather than complain about the “media filter,” each of these techniques simply converted the filter into an amplifier. This time, Mr. Krueger said, the military analysts would in effect be “writing the op-ed” for the war.

Okay, I'll have to admit that I'm sorry I thought the rest of the article would be just about handling  blowback from the people impuned by this report.

I recommend reading the entire article.  As you can see there is plenty of damage done to the lies and posturing of the Bush administration and mainstream TV news.

If you refuse to register at the New York Times and they refuse to let you read the report if you don't you might be able to get a pass from Google News by typing "New York Times: Behind Military Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand"

Or you can read a usenet copy of the report I found at  More Things On Heaven and Earth: (NYT) Behind Military Analysts, the Pentagon’s Hidden Hand

tags: iraq  war  military analysts  propaganda  mainstream news media  

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