Cross-Atlantic flights offer lots of time to skim a wide range of newspapers and magazines. On my way back to the Republic of Fear, I began sensing a growing gap between what the war planners and information managers in Washington want the media to report and what it is reporting. To be sure, the coverage of the conflict remains dominant, but its tone has shifted with more questioning of military strategies and their political framework increasingly evident.

President Bush’s decision to step up the propaganda war, at home and abroad, suggests that he and his policy makers are aware that their message is loosing ground and adherents. Perhaps that’s why we keep hearing official calls for patience along with reminders that wars can’t be run like fast food restaurants. Fair enough, but it seems to be the NATURE of the response to terrorism that is coming under growing question, not the need for a response. Bush will give another prime time speech on Thursday to try to reassure a still unsettled nation, or should I say, homeland. Too see how the government is seeking to fashion a coherent “message,” see the “Talking Points” document from Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld obtained by the GLOBALVISION NEWS NETWORK a available exclusively on mediachannel.org. Go back to the home page.

“GIVE WAR A CHANCE”

While columnists like Thomas Friedman of The New York Times offer unsolicited advice to Pentagon spinners with phrases like “GIVE WAR A CHANCE,” other opinion makers are tsk tsking their weighty fingers at the power brokers. And, increasingly, buried in the news reports, andechoed in the stand-ups are pessimistic reports that suggest that the war is not working. And perhaps is even unworkable.

The lead column in this weekend’s International Herald Tribune features veteran foreign affairs analyst William Pfaff who complains that “what set out to be an American War on terrorism has become a war against Afghanistan. The substitution of Afghanistan for terrorism, or the identification of the one with the other, is not only unjust but diverts US policy from where it is intended to go.” He notes that because of various setbacks, the US is abandoning hope of a political solution and instead is going for a military campaign that it can’t win because the terrorist threat needs a focus on police and intelligence work, not a bombs away focus. “The utility of the bombings is hard to defend,”he writes.

“BATHMAT BOMBING”

Andrew Brookes of the International Institute for Strategic Studies dismisses the idea of carpet bombing calling it “bathmat bombing instead’ In this weekend’s Financial Times. He says there is actually less bombing than in earlier conflicts like Iraq and Kosovo questioned its overall effectivenss, At issue also is the use of cluster bombs which function as anti-personelly weapons, destroying people not bunkers or military bases. The US government has now agreedto change the color of the humanitarian food packets from yellow to blue, because these bombs which are very lethal were also yellow and could be confused for food. Human Rights Watch has called for an end to the use of the cluster bombs all together. Donald Rumsfeld is quite upfront in defending their use. “They are being used on frontline Al-Quaeda and Taliban troops to try to kill them; that is why we are using them to be perfectly blunt.” Unfortunately, some of these bomblets have also killed civilians. CNN’s Nick Robertson, inside Taliban territory reported that the bombing is turning ordinary people towards the Taliban, and not in the other direction.

Over in the Financial Times news columns, there is also coverage from the front. Robert Korokh’s report from the North of Afghanistan casts doubt that the Northern Alliance has the capacity to take Kabul, even with help from the US Airforce. The New Republic carried a similarly dark view of the Alliance’s chances of ousting the Taliban. They are dependent on donkeys and horses for their mobility. Their morale is lousy, and their equiptment not up to the tasl. The winter rains are making a hard in every season environment even more unbearable. Like many other journalists, Karokh calls the army “rag-tag” whose weapons “hang from hooks like coats.” No wonder they have not gained ground against the better armed and motivated Taliban for FIVE years! Also bear in mind that this force does not represent the country’s principal ethnic groups. Washington’s prime ally President Musharraf of Pakistan says their victory will return the country to a new wave of “anarchy, atrocities and criminal killings.” And yet they have become, by default, the only indigenous military force we are banking on. Now with a few billion dollars in aid, and help from Putin, new es Soviet military bases in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan are suddenly available for US use. This is the best coalition money can buy. Is anyone in the media adding up all these costs?

“LIKE THE STARS IN THE SKY”

USA TODAY sent a reporter to hang out with another unit in this internally divided “Alliance,” driven along by a $100 day interpreter and driver. (That’s a big, big salary in that part of the world.) Tim Friend’s piece describes a casual attitude in the ranks and soliders firing off rockets which rarely hit their intended targets. He pictures General Abdul Samad as a “movie character” who offered to shoot a Taliban combatant for the visiting journalist. The most sobering line in the story was the last. a report on an encounter with one soldier.”I asked Fauz how many graves there are in Afghanistan after so many years of fighting. ‘They are uncountable,’ he said.”Like the stars in the sky.”

The US supply effort to these forces has also been slow in coming. Ismael Kahn, a leader of Shia forces in the North, has been bitching to reporters about this shortfall in supplies and moolah. It seems that he can’t pay his bills. He is so short of funds, he says, that he fears his satellite telephone will be cut off. There appears be a fight over funding within the Northern Alliance as well, now that the CIA spigot is open for some units but not for others.

OUR TROOPS FINALLY GET TO PARTY

I found it a case of ironic counter-positioning to find that just below a troubling account of the travails of the Northern Alliance, there is a story from the deck of the appropriately named USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT, which has been at sea for 43 days and at war for two weeks. The troops there took a break day off for a party and picnic which included some karaoke, USA TODAY offered this detail on the provisions, which apparently did not contravene Pentagon media management policy: 4000 burgers, 9000 hot dogs, 1,645 pounds of steak and l0,200 cans of soda.” Somehow, these statistics offered as color reporting, underscores the great gulf between the two sides in this conflict.

While the soldiers got a day off, the ground troops that the military experts say are need can’t seem to get off the ground. There have been delays in getting these forces on the ground. Rear Admiral John Stufflebeam, a name that seems to belong in a Gilbert and Sullivan production, has blamed the freezing rain which is hazardous for helicopters. )One crashed on Friday) Other difficulties have also been admitted, including the revelation that the few troops that did carry out a behind the lines hit and run attack ran into heavy fire from Taliban warriors. The New Yorker wlll carry another insider report on what happened during that raid on Monday, suggesting that Delta Force took significant but unreported casualties.

POLITICAL BACK-SLIDING

Mistakes and mismanagement on the battlefield seems to be compounded by a larger political failure as various Afghan factions squabble among themselves while the State Department seeks to shape a new government to support or impose, depending on your scenario du jure.

Meanwhile, Osama Bin Laden sent out a new non-electronic communique which sounds to echo the position taken by his nemesis George W. Bush who he brands as the leader of the Infidels as if this was a jidad v jihad World Series contest between two teams. He says the world is divided into two camps, just like Bush wants it to be. Only he defines the conflict in medievil terms as a fight between the Christian crusaders and the his holy warriors of Islam. This either-or, us vs them frame troubled many of the Europeans I spoke who resented being asked to choose between Mr. Evil and Dubya. “What gives him the right to tell us that those are the only choices there are,” I was asked repeatedly.”Don’t we have a say?”

On Saturday night, BIN LADEN released a new video, not shown on MSNBC but aired in is entirety in Arabic on Al Jazzeera TV. This time, he blasts Islamic states in the UN and the UN itself, adding that he believes the western war on Islam has been underway since WW l.

MURDOCH APOLOGIZES: CNN JOURNALIST NOT A “WAR SLUT”

Christine Amanpour of CNN was pissed off when NY Post columnist Andrea Peyser called her a “War slut.” She demanded an apology from Andrea’s boss, Rupert Murdoch. She dropped him an indignant line. And, poof, he was alls sweetness and light. The lesson: writing to media moguls can produce results. At least if you are CNN’s biggest star.

Feeding back to the media was part of my message here in Boston where I spoke today to the Alliance for Democracy confab at the Boston Public Library. I called on the assembled minions to stop bashing “THE MEDIA,” as if it is one seemless monolith, and start seeking out more diverse sources. I also called on them to support independent media with their wallets as well as their mouths and reaching out to the media and through the media rather just talking to themselves. It was a bit heretical on an anti-war panel, where I also felt the need to remind those present that American has been killed in sneak attacks. I will be back on Sunday at l to talk about the new film I am making about the 2000 election in Florida. More on that in future columns.

TREKS OF THE WEEK

This is all I can do from the road this weekend. I will back at my desk on Monday and speaking at the White Dog Café in Philadelphia on Monday night with a trip planned later that week to Washington DC. I am due to talk at the Barnes & Noble in Georgetown Thursday night.

Enough about me. Let me hear from you. Write Dissector@mediachannel.org