A look into the past (BBC 1998)

[mogster]

BBC Monitoring's Peter Feuilherade reports on how the spin doctors in Moscow are waging an information war to control the media's reporting of the conflict in Chechnya.
At this month's Newsworld conference on the global news industry in Barcelona, Nato spokesman Jamie Shea said the Kosovo conflict had taught the organisation several lessons about the impact of the media.

If Nato were involved in a future campaign, he said, the most effective way of waging a media war would be to try to create "rival (news) outlets", the Internet and radio being ideal.

Moscow is applying the same tactics to try to win the information war in Chechnya.

When the previous Chechen war started in 1994, the then fledgling commercial station NTV showed graphic pictures from both sides of the conflict.

Terrorists? Government has been determined to crush Chechen opinion
Now, Russian broadcasters and press are much more restricted in how they report the fighting.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/monitoring/528620.stm

Jamie Shea was a charming Londoner, I remember him well from the Kosovo conflict.
But what did he say, and has it come true?

He is in a position to influence as the current Director or Policy, and look at the past:

* October 2000 - March 2003: Director of Information and Press

* 1993 - 2000: Spokesman of NATO and Deputy Director of Information and Press.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Shea

As it is, he says it straight out back then: We will produce propaganda by creating 'rival' news outlets, mainly internet and radio outlets.

Take a look at the links in the sidebar of this 1998 BBC article. How many 'aha moments' do you experience? ;-)

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/170679.stm

The article text is of course also interesting, describing the raid against Licio Gelli, the notorious leader of the P2 lodge in Italy. They were known participators and propagators of the Gladio network, a rightwing network which (supposedly) arranged false terror attacks in the Italian society to create the mood for a society change, described like this at Wikipedia:

When searching Licio Gelli's villa, the police found a document called the "Plan for Democratic Rebirth", which called for a consolidation of the media, suppression of trade unions, and the rewriting of the Italian Constitution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_Due

Silvio Berlusconi was a member of Propaganda Due (P2) prior to starting his political carreer. He owns nearly all influential media in Italy today.