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Intro to Politics Communication (5th edn)-p.qxp 9/2/11 10:55 Page 186

COMMUNICATING POLITICS
had in fact been no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, there was wide-
spread criticism of the Blair government, and a marked drop in its popu-
larity. At the UK general election of 2005 Labour’s majority in parliament
was substantially reduced.
Both the Spanish and Italian governments which had supported the US in
Iraq lost general elections in 2004 and 2006 respectively. While there is no
proof that their pro-war stance was the only or main factor in bringing down
the governments of Jose Maria Aznar and Silvio Berlusconi, few observers
doubted that this was a factor in determining electoral outcomes. Only in
Australia, where John Howard’s Liberals won re-election in 2004 (before
losing to the Australian Labour Party in 2007), did involvement in the
Coalition not appear to harm the governing party’s standing. In this case the
revulsion provoked by the Bali bombing of Australian tourists may have
affected the public’s mood.
In short, then, modern wars are as much about communication as armed
aggression. In a liberal democracy, where government must submit itself to
periodic electoral judgment, wars, to a greater extent than any other aspect
of policy, must be legitimised in the eyes of the people. In recognition of this
fact defence ministers, generals and others responsible for the planning and
execution of warfare have been joined by public relations professionals,
whose job it is to ensure that the media’s image of a conflict is such as to
maximise the degree of popular support for it. Military public relations has
become an important sector of the opinion management industry, without an
understanding of which no analysis of modern warfare would be complete.
In the rest of this chapter we examine the pursuit of military public relations in
four conflicts, chosen because of their importance in establishing the rules of
‘the game’, as it were, and because they have been extensively researched and
written about. We deal, firstly, with the Vietnam War, often viewed as the
‘first media war’. We then examine the media management tactics of the
British government during the Falklands conflict. Third, we consider the
experience of the Gulf War of 1991, in which many of the public relations
lessons of previous conflicts were applied with considerable success by the
US, Britain and their allies. And finally, we examine military public relations
in the invasion and occupation of Iraq which began in March 2003.

Vietnam

By the 1960s newsgathering technologies had advanced to the point that
relatively ‘live’ coverage of military conflict was possible. There was still
likely to be a gap of a day or two between scenes being shot and the film
flown back to the news organisation’s headquarters, but by comparison with
the Second World War and before, military events could be reported more
or less as they happened. The availability of such technology meant that the
conflict in Vietnam between communist and anti-communist forces, the

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