Page 280 - Mass Media, Mass Propoganda Examining American News in the War on Terror

270 Chapter 10

long history of suffering under war. In Z Magazine, Mohsen Makhrnalbaf made
reference to the over 2.5 million Afghans who had died as a result of violent
conflict, famine, and a lack of social services in the last twenty-five years, as
well as to the over six million refugees in Iran and ~akistan.~~ Makhrnalbaf dis-
cussed dire conditions for "a country where 10 percent of the people have been
decimated and 30 percent have become refugees; where currently one million
are dying of hunger."84
Emphasis in mainstream reporting was largely the opposite. Newspapers
spoke of wartime objectives in which the US. would "balance traditional fire-
power" by "mounting a humanitarian offensive" through food drops.85 diffi-
culty in "trying to win the hearts and minds of people you are pounding with
high explosives" was acknowledged in papers like the Washington Post, al-
though this did not stop writers from repeating "humanitarian warfare" rhetoric
promoted through the "bread and bombs" paradigm.86 The Washington Post
labeled American food drops as an important part of "the lifeline" to the Afghan
people, as the paper spoke of the Bush administration's "moral imperative to
save innocent lives in a theater where U.S. and Western forces are operating."87
The editors at the New York Times asserted: "Mr. Bush has widely made provid-
ing humanitarian assistance to the Afghan people an integral part of American
strategy. It is important for humanitarian and practical reasons, to minimize the
suffering of innocent Afghan civilian^."^^ Reporting at the New York Times
largely followed the "humanitarian bombing" frame with headlines such as
"U.S. Plane Crews Fight Hunger from the Sky" and "Food Falls from the Sky
over Afghanistan, Strange but el come."^^
However, it was also admitted in reporting that the 37,500 food rations
dropped by the US. every day-each enough to feed only one person for one
day-were falling far short in making up for the loss of humanitarian food
shipments (from the United Nations and other humanitarian aid agencies) previ-
ously provided to millions of ~f~hans?' Overall, it was estimated in mainstream
and independent media sources that, at the time of U.S. bombing, the number of
Afghans in need of food had reached upward of 5.5 to 7.5 million people.91 De-
spite the fact that the World Food Program described the Afghan predicament as
one of "pre-famine conditions," media reports only trickled out describing those
Afghans who fled to the Pakistani and Iranian borders and were forced to eat
"grass and animal fodder"92 to survive. Regardless, American media outlets con-
tinued to repeat the erroneous claim that the US. was committed to humanitar-
ian aid during the height of the bombing.93
Those who took issue with the United States' claim to humanitarianism
countered that it was ridiculous to argue for engagement in humanitarian inter-
vention at a time when the Bush administration had moved to cut off aid to mil-
lions of people, while providing aid (ineffectively) to thousands. Mainstream
news organizations turned a deaf ear to such claims. Instead of implicating the
U.S. in creating a humanitarian crisis, the Chicago Sun Times saluted the Bush
administration and the U.S. military for coming "closer than any other nation to
warring within the confines of the Geneva ~onventions."~~