Must-read: It's WMD all over again. Why don't you see it? by Peter Hitchens:
"Actually knowing something, remembering history and having experience of the world is becoming a disadvantage. How much easier it would be to join in with the flow of opinion about Syria, to listen happily to, and read contentedly, media reports on the subject.
"As it is, I feel something close to physical pain as I do this.
"Today's frenzy over illegal use of poison gas in Syria is the 2017 version of Anthony Blair's WMD in Iraq. Why can you not see it? Did you think they would do it in exactly the same way again? You are being assailed through your emotions, to act first and think long after, and far too late.
"How can trained journalists (and experienced diplomats) be so lacking in the desire or ability to question what they are told. How come that they accept without hesitation reports which have not come from their own staff, but instead come from within terrifying war zones where gangs of fanatical murderers are the only law? One or two at least have the decency to refer to the new reports as 'suspected' or alleged, but most present them as established fact. 'All the hallmarks' mean in such cases what? Though millions believe this has been proven, past accusations of gas use by Damascus have never been independently shown to be true." (hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk, 8/4/17)
Worth reading in full.
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2 comments:
And in the Daily Mail too! This is an amazing exchange of roles between the Guardian and the Daily Mail!
No need to go back to Blair's WMD propaganda, though. Consider the Ghouta attack:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/v36/n08/seymour-m-hersh/the-red-line-and-the-rat-line
Any halfway intelligent observer would realise that there is no rationale for Assad to use chemical weapons at this stage.
The Daily Mail on Wikipedia:
"On international affairs, the Mail broke with the establishment media consensus over the 2008 South Ossetia war between Russia and Georgia. The Mail accused the British government of dragging Britain into an unnecessary confrontation with Russia and of hypocrisy regarding its protests over Russian recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia's independence, citing the British government's own recognition of Kosovo's independence from Russia's ally Serbia."
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