[Peace-discuss] MIA/POW Issue

[David Green]

ExcerptFrom Edward Herman: "Lessons of Vietnam: Back
to the Stone Age"

http://www.nnn.se/levande/lessons1.htm

Following the official line, and in accord with
classic principles of atrocities management, the
mainstream media found that only the enemy committed
atrocities and had evil plans. The murderous acts of
the United States were invariably portrayed as
responses to somebody else's acts or threats, and
occasionally as "errors."

The Vietnamese enemy was quickly labeled ”terrorist”
and aggressor-- allegedly committing "internal
aggression"-- and was effectively demonized. The media
averted their eyes from all but a minuscule fraction
of the enormous U.S. violence, focusing instead on the
relatively minor and more selective acts of the
"terrorists." This helped make the almost unlimited
use of force and high-tech warfare against the distant
peasant society acceptable.

After the war, the media's apologetics never flagged.
The Vietnamese were villainized for an alleged failure
to co-operate in the matter of the MIAs, which the
media interpreted as a "humanitarian issue." But the
obligation of the aggressor country to clear millions
of land mines and pay reparations to the victimized
people of Indochina has never been seen as a
humanitarian issue for the U.S. establishment or
media, and therefore has never gripped the
international community.