Pentagon May Have Mixed Propaganda With PR

[sabra]

Source: WP

The Pentagon's inspector general said yesterday that the Defense Department's public affairs office may have "inappropriately" merged public affairs and propaganda operations in 2007 and 2008 when it contracted out $1 million in work for a strategic communications plan for use by the military in collaboration with the State Department.

"Without clearly defined strategic communications responsibilities, DoD may appear to merge inappropriately the public affairs and information operations functions," the inspector general said in a report released yesterday. Strategic communications programs, which have become a major part of the Pentagon's information operations carried out in the "war of ideas" in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East, should be under the oversight of the undersecretary of defense for policy, the report added.

The Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs "should only perform strategic communications responsibilities related to its public affairs mission," the report said. It called attention to a May 2005 Defense Department publication titled "Public Affairs," which stated that public affairs and information operations "differ with respect to the audience, scope and intent and must remain separate."

Robert T. Hastings, the acting assistant secretary for public affairs, has responded to the report by saying he agrees there should be an evaluation of the functions of the office with a new definition of its missions.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/11/AR2008121103319.html

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. "inappropriately" = "illegally."

[MadMaddie]

18. exactly

This was no accident, this was an intentional action.

[babylonsister]

2. May have? I thought this was a known fact. It is around here. nt

[awoke_in_2003]

6. Is this what is meant

by "catapulting the propaganda"?

[Dover]

16. "....as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know.

We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don’t know we don’t know."

-- Rummy

[FreakinDJ]

3. Ya Think ???

[jpak]

4. May?

Did

[arcadian]

5. Public affairs are psycological operations.

The U.S. Army even puts them under the same command.

[mwb970]

7. The final paragraph is interesting too.

The inspector general also raised questions about the Office of Public Affairs' use of funds and personnel from the Armed Forces Information Service to carry out its functions without specific authority. AFIS, which was recently renamed Defense Media Activity, runs Pentagon internal communications including Stars and Stripes as well as the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service. With a budget of more than $160 million and about 1,200 staff members, it nonetheless comes under the authority, direction and control of the assistant secretary for public affairs, whose authorized staff is only 89, according to the report.

[LynnTheDem]

8. water may be wet.

[Piewhacket]

9. Inappropriate? You meant to say illegal.

How about arresting the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs.
That would be a nice start.
Then work your way up.

[Sydnie]

10. WP = Captain Obvious

And we wonder why newspapers don't have the circulation that they used to?

[Doctor_J]

11. What's the difference?

:shrug:

[antimatter98]

12. DOD is a huge business, they have to protect their interests. n/t

[pattmarty]

13. FUCKING, MAY HAVE????????

[sakabatou]

17. My first thoughts exactly

[acmavm]

14. Okay, we're supposed to be surprised?

[cosmicone]

15. "may" ???????? wtf n/t