I was trying to figure out what on earth Peter "Baghdad Rose" Arnett was thinking when he said what he said to Iraqi TV. Now I know. He was angling for employment with the newspaper that employs John Pilger. And he's not the least bit apologetic for what he said.
That overnight my successful NBC reporting career was turned to ashes. And why?Yes, Peter. It's the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. It wasn't because you explained to the Iraqi government that all they had to do was cause civilian casualties to get the U.S. to abandon the war.Because I stated the obvious to Iraqi television; that the US war timetable has fallen by the wayside.
I have made those comments to television stations around the world and now I'm making them again in the Daily Mirror.
I'm not angry. I'm not crying. But I'm also awed by this media phenomenon.
The right-wing media and politicians are looking for any opportunity to be critical of the reporters who are here, whatever their nationality. I made the misjudgment which gave them the opportunity to do so.
Comments (1)
One thing that amused me about Arnett's "THIS WAR IS NOT WORKING " piece in the Mirror was this line:
The Ba'ath party, currently led by Saddam Hussein, has been in power for 34 years. Tariq Aziz told me the US will have to brainwash 25 million Iraqis because these people think exactly the same as Saddam does.
Maybe he is wrong, maybe not.
According to the CIA factbook, however, there were only 24 million people in Iraq as of July 2002. So Tariq Aziz is basically saying we'll have to brainwash all the Iraqis in Iraq, including the ones who recently fled before the war, and including the 15-20% who are Kurds and support us already, and an additional 1 million people who didn't live there to begin with.
Maybe he's wrong, maybe he's right.
Posted by Dave S | April 1, 2003 8:31 AM
Posted on April 1, 2003 08:31