Thread: CNN and the NYT Are Deliberately Obscuring Who Perpetrated the Afghan Hospital Attack

CNN and the NYT Are Deliberately Obscuring Who Perpetrated the Afghan Hospital Attack

Glenn Greenwald

2015-10-05T11:41:39+00:00

Much of the world spent the last 48 hours expressing revulsion at the U.S. airstrike on a hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan. It was quite clear early on that the perpetrator of the attack was the U.S., and many media outlets and other organizations around the world have been stating this without any difficulties.
“U.S. Airstrike Kills 19 at Doctors Without Borders Hospital in Afghanistan,” states the straightforward Wall Street Journal headline, under which appears this equally clear lede: “A U.S. airstrike in the Afghan city of Kunduz killed at least 19 people at a hospital run by international medical-aid organization Doctors Without Borders early Saturday, prompting condemnation from humanitarian groups and the United Nations.”

Human Rights Watch chose this as its headline: “US Airstrike Hits Kunduz Hospital.” And so on. Even the media outlets that early on took a more cautious approach nonetheless prominently identified right from the start — in their headline and/or lede — the key fact: namely, who was the likely perpetrator. This Vice headline states: “19 Dead After Apparent US Airstrike Hits MSF Hospital in Afghanistan”; USA Today’s headline read: “19 killed after Afghan hospital hit in suspected U.S. airstrike”; while NPR in its first sentence definitively stated that the hospital was hit by “an aerial attack carried out by U.S. forces.”
But not CNN and the New York Times. For the last 36 hours, and up through this moment, this is the extraordinary opening paragraph in the featured article on the attack from the cable news network:

We’re bravely here to report that these two incidents perhaps coincidentally occurred at “about” the same time: There was a hospital that blew up, and then there was this other event where the U.S. carried out an airstrike. As the blogger Billmon wrote: “London 1940: Civilians throughout the city were killed at about the same time as a German air strike, CNN reports.”
The entire article is designed to obfuscate who carried out this atrocity. The headline states: “Air attacks kill at least 19 at Afghanistan hospital; U.S. investigating.” What’s the U.S. role in this incident? They’re the investigators: like Sherlock Holmes after an unsolved crime.

The article itself repeatedly suggests the same: “The United States said it was investigating what struck the hospital during the night.” It’s a fascinating whodunit and the U.S. is determined to get to the bottom of it. Offering a tantalizing clue, CNN notes that “the circumstances weren’t immediately clear, but the U.S. military was conducting an airstrike in Kunduz at the time the hospital was hit, U.S. Army Col. Brian Tibus said.” So the U.S. commits a repugnant atrocity that, at the very best, was reckless, and CNN can’t bring itself to state clearly who did it.
In its own special way, the New York Times has been even more craven. Its original article on the attack opted for this bizarrelyagent-less formulation:

Some airstrike, traveling around on its own like a lost tourist, ran into a hospital in Afghanistan (admittedly, for sheer propagandistic obfuscation, nothing will ever top the repellent missile-tourism headline chosen by the NYT when Israel bombed a Gaza cafe in 2014 and killed 8 people: “Missile at Beachside Gaza Cafe Finds Patrons Poised for World Cup”).
The article in the NYT’s Sunday print edition illustrated the pains the paper was suffering to avoid framing the story as what it was: a U.S. airstrike on a hospital. This is what readers of that paper saw on Sunday morning:

In fairness, this is a modest improvement from the day before, as it at least constitutes an acknowledgment that there are some people in the world who are blaming the U.S. for what happened — but none who are at the New York Times of course! That led Kade Crockford, in exasperation, to offer this obvious editorial suggestion:

Even as of this morning, more than 48 hours later, the NYT continues to obscure who perpetrated this attack. In a long article about the effects on the region’s residents from the destruction of their only hospital capable of advanced care, one reads and reads some more without any mention of who actually did this:

Note the lovely claim in the first paragraph that things have become so very “precarious for residents caught between government troops and Taliban militants after the withdrawal Sunday of an aid group that was one of the last providers of medical services there.” In addition to “government troops and Taliban militants,” they’ve also sort of been “caught between” massive American firepower that destroyed the hospital in question, though this unpleasant fact has been vanished from the NYT’s narrative of this event.
It’s not as though these media outlets have any doubt about who did this. Both the NYT and CNN eventually get around to acknowledging that it was the U.S. who did it. In today’s NYT article, for instance, the paper generously acknowledges in the third paragraph that “the Pentagon … has said it may have inadvertently struck the hospital during a military operation”; grants anonymity to a “senior U.S. military official” in the fourth paragraph to justify why “American forces on the ground then called for air support”; and then, all the way down in the 10th paragraph, finally gets around to acknowledging that “the attack … appeared to have been carried out by American aircraft.”
The U.S. and its allies — in both the Afghan government and its own media — have now switched course from the “it was a collateral damage mistake” cliché to the proud “yes we did it and it was justified” boast (indeed, a large bulk of today’s NYT article, ostensibly about the effects of the hospital’s destruction, is actually devoted to giving voice to those who are justifying why the hospital was attacked, even as the framing of the article is designed to suppress the identity of the perpetrator). But from the start, not even the U.S. military had the audacity to try to obscure that they did this. They left that dirty work to their leading media outlets, which, as usual, are more than eager and happy to comply.
* * * * *
See also from today: The Radically Changing Story of the U.S. Airstrike on Afghan Hospital: From Mistake to Justification



https://theintercept.com/2015/10/05/...spital-attack/

***PROPAGANDA ALERT***
US: Afghans Requested Airstrike on Kunduz Hospital

Doctors Without Borders Accuses US of Attempting to Pass Responsibility

by Jason Ditz, October 05, 2015

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Saturday’s US airstrike against a Doctors Without Borders hospital on the outskirts of Kunduz has become a major controversy for US officials in the days that followed, with US commander Gen. John Campbell admitting Monday that previous claims that US troops had come under attack were false.
Rather, Campbell says that the Afghan military had requested the airstrike against the hospital, an attack which killed 22 people, including 12 members of the Doctors Without Borders staff. Campbell did not address previous claims the stirke was “an accident.”
Doctors Without Borders lashed the latest comments, saying they were an attempt by the US to pass responsibility for the attack, saying that the US dropped the bombs and thus remains responsible for the targets it hits, no matter who asked them to hit them.
The Afghan government has been defending the attack, with the Kunduz governor claiming the hospital was “a Taliban base” and the Defense Ministry labeling the slain hospital workers and patients as “armed terrorists.”
The Taliban captured Kunduz itself a week ago, and fighting is ongoing in the area to try to reclaim the city. Yet the focus on attacking a hospital, and ultimately forcing Doctors Without Borders to close the facility, suggests the Afghan government may believe the battle is a losing one, and is simply trying to reduce the value of the area by damaging key infrastructure.


http://news.antiwar.com/2015/10/05/u...nduz-hospital/

N.Y. TIMES

Obama Apologizes for Bombing of Doctors Without Borders Hospital in Afghanistan

By MICHAEL D. SHEAR OCT. 7, 2015


Video Obama Reaches Out After Hospital Bombing

Josh Earnest, the White House spokesman, said President Obama offered his condolences to Dr. Joanne Liu, chief of Doctors Without Borders, for the United States’ bombing of a hospital in Afghanistan.

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS on Publish DateOctober 7, 2015. Photo by Zach Gibson/The New York Times.Watch in Times Video »



Dr. Joanne Liu, the president of Doctors without Borders, spoke on Wednesday in Geneva.CreditDenis Balibouse/Reuters

WASHINGTON — President Obama called the chief of Doctors Without Borders on Wednesday to apologize for the bombing of a hospital in Afghanistan that killed doctors and patients, a White House spokesman said Wednesday.

“When the United States makes a mistake, we own up to it, we apologize,” Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, told reporters.

Mr. Earnest had declined on Tuesday to apologize to the doctors group despite calling the strike in Kunduz a terrible tragedy, saying the administration was not prepared to make further comments while three separate investigations were continuing.

But on Wednesday, Mr. Earnest said the president had decided to issue the formal apology in the wake of testimony from the top general in Afghanistan before a congressional committee.

Mr. Earnest said that by Wednesday morning, when the president made the call from the Oval Office to Dr. Joanne Liu, Mr. Obama had concluded “that he had learned enough about this matter to conclude that it was appropriate for him to offer an apology.”

In addition to the apology, White House officials said Mr. Obama had promised a “transparent, thorough and objective accounting” of the incident, and told Dr. Liu that he would make any changes necessary to ensure that such incidents were less likely in the future.

That may not be enough for Doctors Without Borders,which has pressed for an independent investigation into the attack on the hospital. Currently, there are three investigations — one by the Defense Department, one by NATO and another by a joint United States-Afghan group.

Mr. Earnest said the president had confidence in the existing investigations and declined to say whether the United States would agree with calls for an independent investigation.

“The president has made quite clear that, over the course of these three investigations, particularly the one that’s being conducted by the Department of Defense, that it will be transparent, it will be thorough, and it will be objective, and it will provide the full accounting that the president has insisted on from the beginning,” Mr. Earnest said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/08/wo...T.nav=top-news

Is U.S. bombing of Afghan hospital a war crime?

By Mairi Mackay, CNN
Updated 10:17 AM ET, Wed October 7, 2015

Story highlights

• After U.S. bombing of Afghan Doctors without Borders hospital, aid group demands war crimes investigation
• Lawyer: Hospitals have special protection in conflicts, but they lose it if they are used for military purposes
• Armed forces forbidden from indiscriminate attacks, but laws recognize that mistakes are made in the "fog of war"

(CNN)The bombing by U.S. forces of a Doctors without Borders hospital in the Afghan city of Kunduz, which left at least 22 people dead, has caused outrage and raised questions around the world.

The United States says it is conducting a "full investigation," but the medical aid group, also known as Medecins Sans Frontieres, or MSF -- which lost 12 staff members in the attack -- has called for an independent inquiry "under the clear presumption that a war crime has been committed."

Doctors without Borders is asking for an investigation to be carried out by a never-before-used commission: the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission.

It's an open question as to whether an inquiry could be initiated, as the commission's website says it requires the consent of the parties involved, and neither the United States, Afghanistan, nor France recognizes the commission.

CNN asked Steven Kay, who defended Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta against charges of crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court, and Anthony Dworkin, co-editor of "Crimes of War: What the Public Should Know," about the case.

READ MORE: MSF calls Kunduz bombing an 'attack on the Geneva conventions'

What constitutes a war crime?



Doctors Without Borders hospital attacked in Afghanistan

In general terms, a war crime may be committed when there is an attack on a civilian population during an armed conflict, Kay says.

There is an extensive body of law that regulates military action during conflict.

The aim, says Dworkin, is to draw a balance between what armed forces are justified to do out of military necessity -- which includes causing collateral damage to civilians -- and the principles of humanity.

"Hospitals enjoy a special protected status under international humanitarian law. So, to attack a hospital or medical facility, whether it is a civilian or military installation, is a crime," says Kay.

However, if the hospital is used to support military operations for nonmedical purposes, then it loses its special protection status and it can be attacked by the opposition forces.

But the law requires that the attack be proportionate to the threat and risk involved.

Can the hospital bombing be considered a war crime?

Doctors Without Borders: Hospital attack 'a war crime' 02:03


Doctors without Borders says the hospital was bombed for more than half an hour after it notified NATO and U.S. officials that the facility was under attack.

In this case, according to Kay, the hospital bombing would be justified, and not considered a war crime, only if there was a clear, imminent or ongoing attack at the hospital.

Kay notes that there have been instances of medical installations being used as cover for forces to launch attacks.

Kay cites examples including allegations that during the last three decades of the Sri Lankan civil war, the separatist Tamil Tigers based fighters and used force at protected sites like civil hospitals. A U.N. panel found credible allegations of war crimes committed by both sides during the final stages of the country's civil war.

Dworkin makes the point that hospitals can be attacked by mistake.
In comments Monday, Gen. John Campbell, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, described the hospital deaths as an error, saying "several innocent civilians were accidentally struck" in an operation targeting Taliban fighters.

Dworkin says he believes that in this case, the United States would not be found guilty of committing a war crime because although armies are forbidden from conducting indiscriminate attacks, "the laws do recognize that mistakes happen in the fog of war."

But it would come down to a matter of evidence and establishing exactly what happened.

Collateral damage: A brief history of mistakes at war
What proof is required to prosecute a war crime?

'Doctors without Borders' airstrike a war crime? 04:08


"Beyond reasonable doubt -- the criminal standard of proof," says Kay.

He adds that cases like this are generally quite easy because state military operation are often well documented.

"Satellite photographs, drones ... all this is recorded in live time," he says. "Military operations don't happen in a garden shed. Hundreds of people (are) involved in planning an operation and monitoring, because they are monitoring a plane flying in the sky that is worth $100 million."

What happens next?

Armed forces have a duty to investigate the conduct of their own members because if there has been breach of humanitarian law, they have the first responsibility to punish those responsible, says Kay.

It doesn't automatically escalate to the international level, but there is a duty on the state involved to investigate and discipline, he says. Failure to investigate and discipline adequately would then bring scrutiny at a higher level, he adds.

Can the U.S. be prosecuted at the ICC for war crimes?

Why is Kunduz important to the Taliban's resurgence? 03:22


The International Criminal Court is the first permanent court established to bring to justice to those who commit the most serious crimes of concern to the international community.

The ICC prosecutes individuals, not countries, and in theory the person who gives the command can be held responsible for the crime, just as the subordinate who executed the order can be, says Dworkin.

However, the jurisdiction of the ICC extends only to states that have ratified the treaty that created the court. The United States is not a state party to the ICC treaty, or so-called Rome Statute, its citizens cannot be tried at the International Criminal Court.

In this particular case, says Dworkin, Afghanistan is a signatory to the ICC, so the court would have jurisdiction over any crimes committed on its territory.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/05/asia/k...ing-war-crime/

Scoop! Dose it again! lol I think the only thing you have proved with your posts is THAT YOU(Consciously or Unconsciously) CARRY WATER FOR THIS SHAM OF A GOVERNMENT WE HAVE ALLOWED. I hope you, at least, get something' for it. I am sure there are more productive places your WATER CARRYING would fit in, but its your screen name. Bless your heart.

YOU("Scoop" aka Jondope2) posted CNN and NY Times articles on MY page(which you have quoted "ALIPAC Rules" in the past) TRYING(a compliment) to do something(not clear exactly what). If you do your research you would know these Dinosaur Media Sources are about as reliable as Wikipedia now. PROVEN LIARS. I am happy to help educate you, as it only took 5 seconds to SEARCH for Information that may help you. This was 3rd down of 100s on my search of "NY Times and CNN Operation Mockingbird". Enjoy:
Propaganda 101: Operation Mockingbird Continues



Most Americans are under the influence of TV and radio sources for the daily dose of propaganda. Not understanding they are being lied to and made to believe a lie, it becomes a formidable task to get folks to see the light. They want to see, it's just the lie is so big, so pervasive at this point it is hard for people to grasp the size of the depth and breadth the lie has reached. For me (and you may disagree), propaganda is nothing more than a lie that has been presented as truth and is intended to influence how people live and think. As you read you will see that I use the words "lie" and "propaganda" interchangeably–they are the same thing for the purposes of this article and my life.
While researching another article I came across an article that came straight out of minds of the CIA and Operation Mockingbird. If you are unaware of Operation Mockingbird or question whether the mainstream media–think CNN, Fox, CBS, NBC, ABC, and "newspapers" like The Tribune, LA Times, NY Times, Reuters, and so many others, are manipulated by the CIA and Operation Mockingbird please explain this,

Former Washington Post publisher Philip Graham "believing that the function of the press was more often than not to mobilize consent for the policies of the government, was one of the architects of what became a widespread practice: the use and manipulation of journalists by the CIA" (*81). This scandal was known by its code name Operation MOCKINGBIRD. Former Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein cites a former CIA deputy director as saying, "It was widely known that Phil Graham was someone you could get help from" (*82). More recently the Post provided cover for CIA personality Joseph Fernandez by "refusing to print his name for over a year up until the day his indictment was announced …for crimes committed in his official capacity as CIA station chief in Costa Rica" (*83). [Source]

That one paragraph should be enough to terrify most people, unfortunately, most people will not be reading this article, as much as I would like for this information to be in every home across the country.
If that doesn't do it, how about this jewel

You could get a journalist cheaper than a good call girl, for a couple hundred dollars a month." – CIA operative discussing with Philip Graham, editor Washington Post, on the availability and prices of journalists willing to peddle CIA propaganda and cover stories. "Katherine The Great," by Deborah Davis (New York: Sheridan Square Press, 1991)

Let's take a closer look at how the mainstream media and Operation Mockingbird set policy, distract people and use word-play to create rainbow spewing unicorns in a world that is falling apart and on the brink of economic collapse.
Starting with social media. This article was shared on FB over 1,700 times and tweeted over 100 times. It was also shared through other social media networks over 330 times. This is a new key element in spreading lies and making lies into truth. If you have several social networks spreading lies as truth it is going to be extremely difficult to break the cycle; due to the fact that all of their "friends" believe the same lie. This lie is now growing and will continue to grow for some time—it will never go away on these networks and there is always an opportunity for it begin spreading again even after it has gone through its first cycle.
The examples that follow were all taken from the same article, as it presents a classic example of CIA propaganda.
Here is an example of how the lie begins: start with an emotional charge, sprinkle in what appears to be a reputable source, and throw in a survey to tie it all together.

"There's a gross misconception, and extreme environmentalist groups have been able to get ahold of people's emotions and twist facts and present false evidence. That's what it's all about."
A recent study by researchers at Oregon State, George Mason, and Yale universities revealed that more than half of the 1,000-plus people surveyed across the nation had no idea what fracking was, and almost 60 percent had no opinion on it.

This portion of the article begins with the emotional charge "extreme environmentalist." Unless you are an environmentalist, this is going to evoke a reaction, conscientiously or sub conscientiously. Notice there are three fairly well known colleges/universities along with stats from the survey. Note the survey is only 1,000 people and provides no links or source material for the survey. Why? There are over 310 MILLION people in this country. 1,000 people doesn't even register as a percentage. A grain of sand on the beach. Ok, two grains.

Drilling stops initially below the water table so the well can be encased in cement to prevent anything from the well leaking into the water table.

Sounds perfectly normal and natural. Drill a hole, fill it with cement. If you drill a hole through something that contains a fluid, doesn't the fluid typically flow out of the drill hole? But it's encased in cement, right? Is this why faucets catch fire in the areas where fracking is allowed?

Throughout the drilling process, drilling mud is pumped in to cool the drill bit and act as a means for the resulting debris to leave the well.

Once again, sounds perfectly natural and normal. Unless you happen to be concerned about what "drilling mud" is made of; or where it is being pumped. Very vague, happy talk. Let's not focus on those pesky details. No source material is provided, no links to explain any of the details.
Now we come to the portion of this article that moved me to the point of writing this article.

The actual fracking process uses a lot of machinery capable of driving the fluid down more than a mile, and a lot of science to calculate the exact mixtures of everything from chemicals and water and sand to the pressure it takes to crack tiny little fissures into rocks, more than a mile beneath the surface.
Sand, water and chemical additives are pumped into the well at high pressures, so as to crack the rock in different stages in the horizontal (parallel to the surface) portion of the well.

Don't you just love when professionals use "a lot of science to calculate"? Pretty special, must be important and way above my understanding. Well, they are discussing "science." Once again, no source material, very vague language that is being used as a weapon. Using the word science in this context makes it appear more important than it is. It is merely a calculation that most any middle or high school student could figure out on their cell phone calculator.
This is how it's done folks. This is what it actually looks like, sounds like and is running rampant throughout the land. This is a very, very small example of how the media is used to perpetuate a lie and set policy against the citizens. It seems a shame that our society has been dumb-down to the point where the above few passages are acceptable as investigative reporting.
One last question. If you pump a high pressure chemical slurry into the ground and it is designed to crack rocks, wouldn't it crack a cement encasement as well that is located in the same bed rock? For the last time, vague information, no source materials, links or any references provided. Operation Mockingbird is alive and well, just tune into Anderson Cooper tonight to see just how well it is working.
Source
http://freedomoutpost.com/2015/01/pr...ird-continues/

Scoop, I guess you didnt read those Chatroom Tourettes links I sent you either. I tried.