A Muslim Mao Calls for Wiping Israel Off the Map:  A Classic Example of Covert Disinformation?

by Dr. Robert Dickson Crane


  Once upon a time, Mao Tse Dung ordered all Chinese to wear distinctive proletarian clothes.  Now we are told about a modern Muslim Mao by the name of Ahmedinajad, the president of Iran.  This story is part of a larger pattern.  It is possible that the American people are being systematically re-educated to support an attack on Iran.  The pattern is clear.  Hitler’s propaganda minister, Goebbels, gave the secret strategy of the Nazis, “If you tell a really big lie long enough, anyone will believe it.”  In other words, the bigger the lie the better, and a big lie can led to acceptance of an even bigger one.

  Chris Wattie’s recent article in the Ottowa Post spread the story about all Iranians having to wear standard clothes and Jews in Iran having to wear colored insignia so that Muslims would not have to risk being contaminated by their inherent najaz or impurity.  This played off other absurd lies invented by MEMRI (an Israeli controlled translation center for the U.S. government), according to which Ahmadinejad called the holocaust a myth and called for wiping Israel off the map.  I had thought that this nonsense had been adequately revealed as fake, but here it is again, this time as support for an even more grotesque lie.

  Probably most educated people who follow U.S. foreign policy are familiar with MEMRI’s collections of weird statements by a few pathological Muslims and equally weird translations of sane statements by non-pathological Muslims.  I have received queries from government officials asking about such things, such as one collection of statements that MEMRI distributed at the highest levels of the U.S. government allegedly to prove that the world’s leading Muslim imams believe that suicide bombers will go to heaven where they can have their choice of huries for an eternal sex orgy. 

  It amazes me how easily MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute) can reach everyone at the top levels of the U.S government whenever it wants.  It is owned by two extremist Israeli Neo-Cons, namely, Meyrav Wurmser, the wife of David Wurmser (one of Dick Cheney’s aides and ex-special assistant to John Bolton), and former Israeli military intelligence officer, Colonel Yigal Carmon.  MEMRI’s collection of wierdo translations of alleged statements by Ahmadinejad are in the same category as sex orgies in heaven. 

  Ahmadinejad never said that the holocaust is a myth, but only that it had been exploited for political purposes.  And he never said that Israel should be wiped off the map.  His only statement was that the government of Israel (and also the Bush Administration) needed to be changed.  The phrase “wiped off the map” was sheer invention.  Although he firmly believes, as do most people in the world, that Israel should never have been created, he never called for its elimination as a state now that it exists.  He may be angry, but he is not mad.

  There are gray areas, where statements in the press are not deliberate lies, but merely reflect legitimate differences of opinion.  Ahmadinejad has supported the right of Palestinians to resist occupation, which is a right and even a duty recognized in Article 51 of the U.N. Charter.  How one should do this is a matter of tactics and strategy.  Ahmadinejad has never supported suicide bombing, but he has called for humanitarian financial support of families of suicide bombers, as do the Saudis and other favored friends of America.  Indeed, it is difficult to separate such humanitarian aid from political support of suicide bombing, but there is such a thing as accuracy in media. 

  Deliberate distortion of the truth, of which we are seeing more and more these days, is another matter.  There are two basic motivations.  One is merely to hide the truth, which was my official job during the Korean War whenever visiting congressmen wanted to follow up on disturbing rumors.  One was the massacre of the entire Ranger Batallion, which constituted the entire U.S. special forces in 1951, when the totally deranged commander attacked three Chinese armies one night behind enemy lines.  This story has never been told. 

  Another was the systematic practice of torture.  I was warned that I would never make it home if I told anyone about our policy of rendition to South Korean professionals.  I was head of Russian interrogation for the U.S. Army in Korea (Eighth Army in Seoul) from 1951 to 1953.  I was initially shocked because the interrogators would call me in the middle of the night and say, “We have a live wire.  Give us another thirty minutes.”  And then they would call and apologize, saying “Sorry. The subject is dead.”  We were instructed never to kill the POWs, because we might thereby lose valuable intelligence.  This, of course, occurs in all wars, always has and always will, which is one reason why war should always be only a last resort.

  The second reason for deliberate lies by governments is not to hide the truth but to invent it.  While in the State Department thirty-five or so years ago, I was invited to analyze the threat posed by an amazing statement by Khrushchev covertly obtained from a Politburo meeting.  It was a real block-buster and, as I recall, would have supported basing U. S. missiles in Europe.  At the last minute I was quietly informed that this was internally generated to promote U.S. bargaining with our allies and should be ignored.  Too bad, because it made a great story. 

  The latest Muslim Mao story may make the history books on official disinformation because it is so absurd and could so easily be refuted.  But the same was true of some of the raw intelligence that led up to the Third Gulf War (the first being the U.S. support of Saddam Hussein in his eight year war against Iran during the 1980s), which the mainline American media naively accepted as gospel truth. 

  Governments in democratic countries always work through like-minded media moguls.  The National Post, which scooped the story of the Muslim Mao, is owned by CanWest Global.  This multi-billion dollar media monster, owns the metropolitan daily newspapers in nearly every large city across Canada, 50% of the National Post, and media conglomerates in Australia, New Zealand, and Ireland.  The Asper family, which controls CanWest, is NeoCon to the core and is a perfect and powerful outlet to manipulate English speaking electorates. 

  All governments try to manipulate the media, but the problem arises when policymakers believe their own propaganda.  The first thing that every senior official does every morning is to scan the in-group newspapers so he knows what everyone else “knows.”  This produces a vicious circle as a self-fulfilling prophecy, which is difficult to overcome. 

  Furthermore, disclaimers, if there ever are any, don’t get the same coverage as the original story.  It is like a prosecutor in a jury trial who says something he knows the judge will have to overrule as totally out of order.  No matter, the jury has already absorbed it psychologically.  The emotional jolt has accomplished its purpose. 

  The practice of disinformation by the molders of public opinion should be exposed, not merely because it is a moral obligation and essential to maintain freedom of the press, but because the good name of America and the security of Americans depend upon it.