'Media and the Vietnam and Iraq Wars\r'

'Despite the differences in the Statesn agriculture from the judgment of conviction of the Vietnam fight to the Iraq strugglef atomic number 18, identicalities exist in the focus Americans perceived both wars. Vietnam and Iraq both raised questions close to the appropriateness of U.S. involvement in foreign personal business and, in some cases, resulted in negative perceptions of the U.S. troops. As the link mingled with those fighting the war and those at home watching and reading about the events of the war, the media play an important role in both cases.Relationship betwixt the media and the soldiersDuring the offset printing of Vietnam there was no official policy of censorship. Censorship would dumbfound been difficult to manage because as a guest of South Vietnam, the U.S. would have had to sanction the South Vietnamese to control the censorship. Additionally, according to Daniel Hallin, the U.S. giving medication wanted to deny that there was a war happening t here, and to impose censorship is one of the signs that a country is really going to war. 1By 1963, reporters in Vietnam had begun receiving progressively contradictory instruction about the war. Military officials in Saigon maintained that the war was going well, while force in the field told a different story. iodin glaring example was the defeat of the South Vietnamese at Ap Bac. Eight days after the incident, military officials declared the operation a success. Reporter Mal visage recalls that when the astonished press challenged this statement, they were told by the Commander in Chief of U.S. forces to â€Å"get on the team.”1 This was the beginning of a more strained relationship between the media and the military.It was in 1963 also that news programs were extended to a half hour and began exhibit footage of the war. This was the origin snip American viewing audience were competent to experience the war right in their living rooms. In 1965, Morley Safer brough t the Cam Ne report to viewers. The Cam Ne incident marked the first time the average American was exposed to images of their soldiers employed in activities that were less than statuesque †burning huts in a small village as women and children ran extraneous screaming. Though not officially tied to the report, presently after it aired the government issued new rules of meshwork designed to protect South Vietnamese civilians.By the time the U.S. engaged in war with Iraq, the world had receive a different place. The military had learned the mensurate of public perception and the need to manage it. Restrictions were displace on the press limiting where they were allowed to go and what they were allowed to report. unluckily for the administration, what they couldn’t manage was the amount of amateur footage that make its way into the public eye.Digital cameras and the internet made it thinkable for anyone to post photos and other footage in front of a broad audience . Some of the most sensational stories describe during the war †including the Abu Ghraib incident †were the result of amateur photography that found its way into professional media outlets. sequence of problematical value as a news source, this footage conveying graphic scenes intrigued viewers and affected their perception of the U.S. military and their mission in Iraq.Another payoff of technology was that reporters were able to feed information to networks â€Å"real time.” This to-the-second coverage allowed viewers to experience the war as it happened, but the information they received was not always accurate. When the military whole in which a reporter was embedded came nether attack, the reporter could only report what he was experiencing without the gather of objectivity or the â€Å"big picture” view. While they did provide some provocative footage, these reports did not summation interpreting of the situation. Morley Safer stated this eloquen tly when he said, â€Å" cost coverage…only adds heat, it does not add light.”1Accuracy of reportingNorman Solomon, syndicated editorialist on media and politics, suggests that the media has been fundamental in making war possible for the U.S. through fraudulent reporting. He cites reporting of the Gulf of Tonkin in Vietnam and of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as examples.2Tim Ryan, Army Lieutenant Colonel, has also verbalised concern about the accuracy of reporting and its effect on public perception during the Iraq war. He has suggested that the media purposely focused on negatives or failures during the war and snub positives for the sake of a more sensational report. He stated that â€Å"even the Arab media was more willing to show positives,” such as school renovations or the universe of discourse of a youth center, than were American journalists.3During both wars, questions have been raised about the absence of reporting on U.S. interests in the countries in which they were fighting. In Vietnam, manganese, rubber and minerals were of economical interest to the U.S. In Iraq, of course, it was oil. The possibility that the U.S. had less than noble reasons for entering into these wars was rarely addressed in mainstream media.Media influenceThere are differing opinions on whether the media actually influenced the Vietnam or Iraq wars or whether they evidently provided documentation of what was happening. As the above examples show, some commentators swear that the media did affect events by making it easier for the government to profit war through fraudulent reporting, or by negatively affecting the morale of American soldiers and citizens.Contrarily, the giving medication Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) claims that the media has been wrongly accused of affecting the war.4 According to FAIR, reporters however theorize the opinions and concerns of the public. As reporter Chris Hedges stated â€Å"when everyones waving a flag, the media waves a flag. When middle class families start enquire why their boy is coming home in a rubber bag, then the media starts asking questions too.”1Regardless of whether they merely presented or actually influenced the Vietnam and Iraq wars, it’s clear that the media encountered similar challenges during both wars. Despite all the changes that occurred in the 40-plus historic period between the two wars and the fact that confidence in mainstream media waned in that time, the public still looked to the media to help them understand the facts and to represent their interests when they were concerned about the actions being taken.Works Cited1) â€Å"Which array are you on?” Episode 2, Reporting America at War. PBS, November, 2003. Online transcript www.pbs.org/weta/reportingamericaatwar/about/ep02_transcript.html2) Solomon, Norman. Adapted from soda water speech at annual awards ceremony of cat Censored at Sonoma State University, CA, Oc tober 22, 2005. Online source3) Ryan, Tim. â€Å"Media and the Iraq War.” Editorial, San Diego Union-Tribune, January 30, 2005.4) Cohen, Jeff. â€Å"The Myth of the Media’s Role in Vietnam.” May 6, 2001. http://www.fair.org/indexAphp?page=2526\r\n'