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March 18, 2010

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The Lost City of Marjah

By Greyhawk

"For weeks, the U.S. public followed the biggest offensive of the Afghanistan War," writes Gareth Porter of the recent Marjah campaign in Afghanistan.

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That statement has some truth to it, but as far as followings go, Olympic Women's Curling probably drew a bigger crowd. And while much of the coverage of the Marjah campaign was outstanding, with many embedded reporters providing details from on-scene, much more of it (no doubt produced with TV ratings in mind) was just awful.

For Porter all that meant maybe, just maybe, he could write a story like this one, and people would believe it.

WASHINGTON, Mar 8, 2010 (IPS) - For weeks, the U.S. public followed the biggest offensive of the Afghanistan War against what it was told was a "city of 80,000 people" as well as the logistical hub of the Taliban in that part of Helmand. That idea was a central element in the overall impression built up in February that Marja was a major strategic objective, more important than other district centres in Helmand.

It turns out, however, that the picture of Marja presented by military officials and obediently reported by major news media is one of the clearest and most dramatic pieces of misinformation of the entire war, apparently aimed at hyping the offensive as a historic turning point in the conflict.

It's a great conspiracy theory - claiming that a major city was situated precisely where one obviously wasn't is even more audacious than claiming a nation had weapons of mass destruction when they really didn't. But it's riskier, too - anyone spending a minute with Google Earth could expose the "big city" claim as fraud without any room for arguments to the contrary.

"But wouldn't even the most effective propaganda campaign have collapsed," you might wonder, "when at least one of the many reporters embedded with the Marines eventually noticed that the city they were supposedly assaulting did not exist?"

Why, no - they're the obedient major news media, after all. But what happened - in Porter's story - was that one mysterious "official of the International Security Assistance Force" found the courage (or maybe Porter's tenaciousness simply wore him down) to at last admit The Truth.

"It's not urban at all," an official of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), who asked not to be identified, admitted to IPS Sunday. He called Marja a "rural community".

"It's a collection of village farms, with typical family compounds," said the official, adding that the homes are reasonably prosperous by Afghan standards.

And now we know that all those DoD and news media photos and videos showing Marjah as a rural area are, um, somehow part of the, er, um... vast military industrial, uh... We are left to imagine what fate might befall that hapless whistle blower if his name was known to those whose evil manipulations he'd exposed!

Okay, no. Actually we aren't. Because that actually is a guy who can't tolerate twisted manipulation of truth - as practiced by Gareth Porter.

Gareth's argument is supported by an ISAF official "who asked not to be identified" confirming that Marjah is a "rural community" -- which adds to the air of a secret plot revealed. Except there's no secret. The official was me, and I didn't ask to be quoted anonymously.
Damn, perfectly good tinfoil hat - ruined by ISAF spokesman Lt Col Tadd Sholtis, writing on his personal blog.
[Porter] has somehow managed to convince himself and a bunch of people repeating his post that briefings and press accounts describing the rural community of Marjah as a "town" or "city" was somehow a misinformation campaign by the evil militarists of 40-plus nations who are committed to eroding their political support by duping the public into extending an unpopular war in the hopes of killing as many brown people as possible. Or something like that. A search for clear motives tends to muddle an otherwise pristine paranoia.

Porter's motive, on the other hand, seems a bit more clear - and he doesn't need to sway rational people to achieve his goal, just enough people. So if an actual US military spokesman is the person telling you Marjah isn't a major urban area, but you still write a story about a US military fraud supported by major media, then describing that (as Sholtis does) as a case of someone jumping "off the Reason Train short of Plausible Junction" sounds just about right. Or maybe too kind.

It's absurd beyond any semblance of reason. But Google a quote from Porter and you'll find quite a crowd - not limited to blogs. Google a quote from the response (which also includes the text of an email sent to Porter) and you'll discover that if there's any such thing as a reason train, it's got plenty of empty seats.

Tasked with briefing the press in Afghanistan, Sholtis has probably seen more than a few of those.

*****

More from Gareth Porter here.

More on Marjah here. (There are plenty of valid reasons it's too bad no one was paying attention...)

More Women's Curling here.



Posted by Greyhawk / March 18, 2010 8:41 AM | Permalink

1 TrackBack

From the Front: 03/18/2010 from Argghhh! The Home Of Two Of Jonah's Military Guys.. on March 18, 2010 11:06 AM

News and Personal dispatches from the front and the home front.

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4 Comments

That Porter guy is an interesting cookie. So is Gordon Duffy. He deletes any comments contrary to his strange beliefs.

I think you mean Gordon Duff, yes?

Oops, Yes. I suppose I try to forget. :)

I guess he missed (from one of your earlier reports) "The U.S.-led force said Tuesday that fewer than 200 families -- around 1,200 people -- had left the town of Marjah and the surrounding area, which have a population of about 80,000.".

The area has a population of 80,000.

That's completely consistent with a rural area. Because outside of the West with giant factory farms, rural areas tend to be smallholders, which makes for much greater density than, say, farmland, Kansas.

A look at the satellite maps of the area suggests a population of 80,000 in the district is perfectly plausible. (Lashkar Gah is a "city" and is only 10 miles or so away!)

Stupid Military bastards, lying to us by telling the truth!

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November 26, 2010


America@war
[Greyhawk]
I think anyone who's ever pondered the "comment" option - once only available on blogs and bulletin boards, now ubiquitous on almost any web site - will appreciate this:
The so-called faculty of writing is not so much a faculty of writing as it is a faculty of thinking. When a man says, "I have an idea but I can't express it"; that man hasn't an idea but merely a vague feeling. If a man has a feeling of that kind, and will sit down for a half an hour and persistently try to put into writing what he feels, the probabilities are at least 90 percent that he will either be able to record it, or else realize that he has no idea at all. In either case, he will do himself a benefit.

That's wisdom from the past, captured for posterity at the US Naval Institute, shared via the web on the institute's 137th anniversary.

From their about page:

The Naval Institute shall remain

INDEPENDENT - A non-profit member association, with no government support, that does not lobby for special interests;

NON-PARTISAN - An independent, professional military association with a mission, goals and objectives that transcend political affiliations; and shall encourage

IDEAS - Through its respected journals Proceedings and Naval History, its conferences, its books and its online content, in support of those who serve.

"The Naval Institute has three core activities," among them, History and Preservation:

The Naval Institute also has recently introduced Americans at War, a living history of Americans at war in their own words and from their own experiences. These 90-second vignettes convey powerful stories of inspiration, pride, and patriotism.

Take a look at the collection, and you'll see it's not limited to accounts from those who served on ships at sea, members of the other branches are well-represented.

I'm fortunate to have met USNI's Mary Ripley, she's responsible for the institute's oral history program (and she's the daughter of the late John Ripley, whose story is told here). She also deserves much credit for their blog. ("We're not the Navy nor any government agency. Blog and comment freely.") We met at a milblog conference - Mary knew (and I would come to realize) that milbloggers are the 21st-century version of exactly what the US Naval Institute is all about. Once that light bulb came on in my head, I mentioned a vague idea for a project to her - milblogs as the 21st century oral history that they are.

"Put that in writing," she said (of course - see first paragraph above!) - and here's part of the result.

Shortly after the first tent was pitched by the American military in Iraq a wire was connected to a computer therein, and the internet was available to a generation of Americans at war - many of whom had grown up online. From that point on, at any given moment, somewhere in Iraq a Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine was at a keyboard sharing the events of his or her day with the folks back home. While most would simply fire off an email, others took advantage of the (then) relatively new online blogging platforms to post their thoughts and experiences for the entire world to see. The milblog was born - and from that moment to this stories detailing everything from the most mundane aspects of camp life to intense combat action (often described within hours of the event) have been available on the web...

And et cetera - but since you're reading this on a milblog, you probably knew that. And you know that milblogs aren't just blogs written by troops at war, that many friends, family members, and supporters likewise documented their story of America at war online in near-real time, as those stories developed.

The diversity in membership of that group is broad, the one thing we all have in common is the impulse to make sense of the seemingly senseless, and communicate the tale - for each of us that impulse was strong enough to overcome whatever barriers prevent the vast majority of people from doing the same. Everyone at some point has some vague idea they believe should be shared - we were the people who, from some combination of internal and external urging, found and spent those many half hours persistently trying to write it down.

*****

But where will all that be in another 137 years? Or five or ten, for that matter. That's something I've asked myself since at least 2004 - when I wrote this:

Closing Blogs is nothing new. So many site's owners just give up on their own. They come and go, you know, these MilBloggers do. Like any other sort of blogger. Many post in the lonely down hours far from home, spill their guts for the world, then abandon their spots when the tour of duty is up. They have lives again somewhere in the world, and no need to share the details. So it goes.

Many are truly gone - no site left at all. "The page cannot be found." Other blogs remain, like abandoned defensive positions in shifting desert sands.

Membership in the ghost battalion has grown in the years since, and an ever growing majority of those abandoned-but-still-standing sites are vanishing. Have you checked out Lt Smash's site lately? How about Sgt Hook's? If you're a long-time milblog reader you know the first widely-read milblog from Operation Iraq Freedom and the first widely-read milblog from Afghanistan are both gone from the web. If you're a relative newcomer to this world you may never even have heard of them - or the dozens upon dozens of others who carried forth the standard they set down.

If you have a vague notion that something should be done about that, (a notion I've heard expressed more than once...) then you and I and the good folks at the US Naval Institute are in agreement. Preserving the history documented by the milbloggers is just one of the goals of the milblog project, the once-vague idea that we're now making real.

And it's a big idea, if I say so myself - too big to explain in one simple blog post, so stand by for more. Likewise, it's too big a task to be accomplished by just one person. So if you're a milblogger (and exactly what is a milblogger? is a topic for much further discussion on its own) I'm asking for your help. All I'll really need is just a little bit (maybe just one or two of those half hours...) of your time, and your willingness to tell the tale.

We've already made history, it's time to save it.

(More to follow...)




Posted 4:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) |

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The Mudville Gazette is the on-line voice of an American warrior and his wife who stands by him. They prefer to see peaceful change render force of arms unnecessary. Until that day they stand fast with those who struggle for freedom, strike for reason, and pray for a better tomorrow.
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  • Sigivald: I guess he missed (from one of your earlier reports) read more
  • C. Minkler: Oops, Yes. I suppose I try to forget. :) read more
  • Greyhawk: I think you mean Gordon Duff, yes? read more
  • C. Minkler: That Porter guy is an interesting cookie. So is Gordon read more

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The Mudville Gazette is written and produced by Greyhawk, who recently retired from 24 years of active duty in the US military, but will maintain this disclaimer: Unless otherwise credited, the opinions expressed are those of the author, and nothing here is to be taken as representing the official position of or endorsement by the United States Department of Defense or any of its subordinate components.

Furthermore, I will occasionally use satire or parody herein. The bottom line: it's my house.

I like having visitors to my house. I hope you are entertained. I fight for your right to free speech, and am thrilled when you exercise said rights here. Comments and e-mails are welcome, but all such communication is to be assumed to be 1)the original work of any who initiate said communication and 2)the property of the Mudville Gazette, with free use granted thereto for publication in electronic or written form. If you do NOT wish to have your message posted, write "CONFIDENTIAL" in the subject line of your email.

Original content copyright © 2003 - 2011 by Greyhawk. Fair, not-for-profit use of said material by others is encouraged, as long as acknowledgement and credit is given, to include the url of the original source post. Other arrangements can be made as needed.

Contact: greyhawk at mudvillegazette dot com

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*****

Tending Distant
Fires


Far from hearth and home, watching
Cold alone but not alone
On distant shore and only wanting
Safe return and little more

What tales we'll tell
When that time comes
When tales can be told

When things grim
Seem far away
When other fires go cold

Some distant sunset, vision fading
Memories remain
And tired eyes gaze 'pon folded flags
While distant drums beat their refrain

Saluting fallen friends whose names
And youth will never fade
Here's to those on other shores,
for them live well, the price is paid

- Greyhawk,
Baghdad,
December 2004