Iraq War: who really pays the price for war spin?

Following the September 11th attacks, the Bush administration began building its case for the necessity of war with Iraq. The public was constantly bombarded with the tremendously popular catch phrase: ‘weapons of mass destruction’, which was seemingly used as an answer for everything- a reason for war, a bid to protect the US and proof that Bush could pronounce 3 syllable words.

Six years on, with more than 4,000 US military casualties, a war bill estimated at US$3 trillion and still no discovery of any so-called WMDs, the former government is being accused of utilizing propaganda to gain public support for the war.

According to Garth Jowett and Victoria O’Donnell, authors of Propaganda and Persuasion, ‘a government should not lie to those who have elected it, [as] in the long run, it does so at its own peril’. (Jowett and O’Donnell, 2006, p. 319). Bush suffered from the lowest approval ratings of any president and significantly contributed to the country’s general disillusionment with the Republican Party. In the UK, Tony Blair, who was responsible for dragging his country into the conflict, attracted growing media cynicism and was the subject of the Hutton Inquiry, which questioned the government’s motives for entering the war.

But ultimately, it is not the propagandists and peddlers of the Iraq war who suffer. It is the thousands of families who have lost love ones in battle that pay the price for a conflict built on lies; weakened economies struggling in the midst of a global financial crisis and yet still having to fund an unpopular war; emotionally and physically wounded soldiers who will never fully recover from their participation in the conflict and Iraqis engulfed in a war-torn region with no sight of an end to the violence.

And what happens to those who so staunchly defended their action to invade Iraq? As outgoing president, Bush has retreated to his multi-million dollar lifestyle on his Texan ranch while former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was exonerated by the Hutton Inquiry and recently awarded the Dan David prize for his exceptional leadership.

A truly powerful message to further fuel future manipulators and liars.

References

BBC (2007). How Blair put the media in a spin. [online] Available from: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6638231.stm> [Accessed 20 February 2009]

CNN (2003) Is lying about the reason for a war an impeachable offense? [online]
<http://edition.cnn.com/2003/LAW/06/06/findlaw.analysis.dean.wmd/> [Accessed 20 February 2009]

Jowett, G. And O’Donnell, V. (2006). Propaganda and Persuasion. 4th Edition. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, Inc.

Washington Post (2008). The Iraq War will cost us $3 trillion, and much more . [online] Available from:

<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-yn/content/article/2008/03/07/AR200830702846.html>

[Accessed 20 February 2009]