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A Failure of Skepticism in Powell
Coverage
MEDIA ADVISORY: Disproof of
previous claims underlines need for scrutiny
In reporting on Secretary of State Colin
Powell's February 5 presentation to the United Nations Security
Council, many journalists treated allegations made by Powell as
though they were facts. Reporters at several major
outlets neglected to observe the journalistic rule of prefacing
unverified assertions with words like "claimed" or
"alleged."
This is of particular concern given that
over the last several months, many Bush administration claims
about alleged Iraqi weapons facilities have failed to hold up
to inspection. In many cases, the failed claims--like
Powell's claims at the U.N.-- have cited U.S. and British
intelligence sources and have included satellite photos as
evidence.
In its report on Powell's presentation,
the New York Daily News (2/6/03) accepted his evidence at face
value: "To buttress his arguments, Powell showed satellite
photos of Iraqi weapons sites and played several audiotapes
intercepted by U.S. electronic eavesdroppers. The most
dramatic featured an Iraqi Army colonel in the 2nd Republican
Guards Corps ordering a captain to sanitize
communications." The Daily News gave no indication
that it had independent confirmation that the photos were
indeed of weapons sites, or that individuals on the tapes were
in fact who Powell said they were.
In Andrea Mitchell's report on NBC
Nightly News (2/5/03), Powell's allegations became actual
capabilities of the Iraqi military: "Powell played a tape
of a Mirage jet retrofitted to spray simulated anthrax, and a
model of Iraq's unmanned drones, capable of spraying chemical
or germ weapons within a radius of at least 550
miles."
Dan Rather, introducing an interview with
Powell (60 Minutes II, 2/5/03), shifted from reporting
allegations to describing allegations as facts: "Holding a
vial of anthrax-like powder, Powell said Saddam might have tens
of thousands of liters of anthrax. He showed how Iraqi
jets could spray that anthrax and how mobile laboratories are
being used to concoct new weapons." The anthrax
supply is appropriately attributed as a claim by Powell, but
the mobile laboratories were something that Powell
"showed" to be actually operating.
Commentator William Schneider on CNN Live
Today (2/6/03) dismissed the possibility that Powell could be
doubted: "No one disputes the findings Powell presented at
the U.N. that Iraq is essentially guilty of failing to
disarm." When CNN's Paula Zahn (2/5/03) interviewed
Jamie Rubin, former State Department spokesperson, she prefaced
a discussion of Iraq's response to Powell's speech thusly:
"You've got to understand that most Americans watching
this were either probably laughing out loud or got sick to
their stomach. Which was it for you?"
Journalists should always be wary of
implying unquestioning faith in official assertions; recent
history is full of official claims based on satellite and other
intelligence data that later turned out to be false or dubious.
After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, the first Bush
administration rallied support for sending troops to Saudi
Arabia by asserting that classified satellite photos showed the
Iraqi army mobilizing on the Saudi border. This claim was
later discredited when the St. Petersburg Times obtained
commercial satellite photos showing no such build-up (Second
Front, John R. MacArthur). The Clinton administration
justified a cruise missile attack on the Sudan by saying that
intelligence showed that the target was a chemical weapons
factory; later investigation showed it to be a pharmaceutical
factory (London Independent, 5/4/99).
In the present instance, journalists have
a responsibility to put U.S. intelligence claims in context by
pointing out that a number of allegations recently made by the
current administration have already been debunked. Among
them:
* Following a CIA warning in October that
commercial satellite photos showed Iraq was
"reconstituting" its clandestine nuclear weapons
program at Al Tuwaitha, a former nuclear weapons complex,
George W. Bush told a Cincinnati audience on October 7 (New
York Times, 10/8/02): "Satellite photographs reveal that
Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of
his nuclear program in the past." When inspectors returned
to Iraq, however, they visited the Al Tuwaitha site and found
no evidence to support Bush's claim. "Since December
4 inspectors from [Mohamed] ElBaradei's International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA) have scrutinized that vast complex almost
a dozen times, and reported no violations," according to
an Associated Press report (1/18/03).
* In September and October U.S. officials
charged that conclusive evidence existed that Iraq was
preparing to resume manufacturing banned ballistic missiles at
several sites. In one such report the CIA said "the
only plausible explanation" for a new structure at the Al
Rafah missile test site was that Iraqis were developing banned
long-range missiles (Associated Press, 1/18/03). But CIA
suggestions that facilities at Al Rafah, in addition to sites
at Al Mutasim and Al Mamoun, were being used to build
prohibited missile systems were found to be baseless when U.N.
inspectors repeatedly visited each site (Los Angeles Times,
1/26/03).
* British and U.S. intelligence officials
said new building at Al-Qaim, a former uranium refinery in
Iraq's western desert, suggested renewed Iraqi development of
nuclear weapons. But an extensive survey by U.N.
inspectors in December reported no violations (Associated
Press, 1/18/03).
* Last fall the CIA warned that "key
aspects of Iraq's offensive [biological weapons] program are
active and most elements are more advanced and larger"
than they were pre-1990, citing as evidence renewed building at
several facilities such as the Al Dawrah Vaccine Facility, the
Amiriyah Serum and Vaccine Institute, and the Fallujah III
Castor Oil Production Plant. By mid-January, inspectors
had visited all the sites many times over. No evidence was
found that the facilities were being used to manufacture banned
weapons (Los Angeles Times, 1/26/03).
The Associated Press concluded in its
January 18 analysis: "In almost two months of surprise
visits across Iraq, U.N. arms monitors have inspected 13 sites
identified by U.S. and British intelligence agencies as major
'facilities of concern,' and reported no signs of revived
weapons building."
Regarding the number of allegations made
by the Bush and Blair governments that have washed out on
inspection, former U.N. weapons inspector Hans von Sponeck told
the British newspaper The Mirror (2/6/03) following
Powell’s U.N. presentation:
"The inspectors have found nothing
which was in the Bush and Blair dossiers of last September.
What happened to them? They are totally embarrassed
by them. I have seen facilities in pieces in Iraq which
U.S. intelligence reports say are dangerous.
"The Institute of Strategic Studies
referred to the Al Fallujah Three castor oil production unit
and the Al Dora foot and mouth center as 'facilities of
concern.' In 2002 I saw them and they were destroyed,
there was nothing. All that was left were shells of
buildings. This is a classic example of manipulating
allegations, allegations being converted into facts."
Responsible journalists should avoid
playing a part in such a conversion by making a clear
distinction between what has been alleged by the U.S.
government and what has been independently verified.
Fairness & Accuracy In
Reporting
Media analysis, critiques and activism
Media analysis, critiques and activism
February 10, 2003
