How the 'Washington Post' Promoted a War -- Part II

By: Greg Mitchell Why keep returning to the question of press complicity in the Iraq war? After all, nothing we now say or do or write can halt the invasion, breathe life into the dead or re-attach thousands of missing limbs. It's a good question, but as one who has written hundreds of thousands of words on the use of atomic weapons in 1945 without saving a life or a soul, it's not likely to stop me.

Putting aside any political or moral questions, a reason to keep returning to the issue is this: It provides a Journalism 101 textbook example of what happens when reporters and editors attach too much credibility to statements by officials with an agenda or axe to grind.

It could be any officials on any issue. The case of Iraq is just deadlier and more tragic than most. It also involves the nation's most respected newspapers, making it an even better (or more shameful) example.

As much of the media world knows, Howard Kurtz, at his own initiative, wrote a front-page article in The Washington Post on Aug. 12, detailing how, in retrospect, some of the newspaper's editors now acknowledge that they provided one-sided (i.e., pro-administration) coverage during the run-up to the attack on Iraq. Last week, I complained that editors quoted by Kurtz offered as many excuses as admissions, but let's look at a different question now, for posterity.

According to the Kurtz article, the Post's news coverage should be judged apart from the paper's thoroughly hawkish editorial views on the war. Further, the pro-war opinion page had absolutely no influence on the paper's news coverage.

Can a news department remain completely untainted by hardline positions held down the hall and expressed on their editorial page almost every day? The Wall Street Journal, for example, functions well despite its bipolar condition. The Post certainly has provided tougher coverage during the postwar period (oft-praised by E&P), although that has been easier to do with the Iraq adventure gone sour.

To look at it a different way: if the Post editorial page was reading much of the paper's own news coverage before the war this could have only hardened its hawkish views.

In any event, to capture a snapshot of the Post's opinion pages before the war, I decided to do an archival search of articles in a single edition, Feb. 6, 2003, the day after the turning point of the prewar period: Secretary of State Colin Powell's speech and slide show at the United Nations, proving the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Analysts have since concluded that the vast majority of evidence that Powell put forward was faulty or just plain bogus, and most of his assertions have turned out wrong. Powell, himself, has almost (but not quite) apologized for it. Nevertheless, the overwhelmingly positive, even rapturous, reaction to his speech, from the media and political figures, set the U.S. even more firmly on the path to war.

The Post's primary news stories on the Powell speech were painfully credulous, although a couple of articles inside the paper cast some doubt on certain aspects of his address. But the editorial commentary from the Post that single, crucial, day deserves a special place in that Journalism 101 textbook.

The New York Times, at least, has admitted that its editorials in the prewar period were too soft on the administration.

So, from the Washington Post, Feb. 6, 2003:

Editorial (title: "Irrefutable"):

"After Secretary of State Colin L. Powell's presentation to the United Nations Security Council yesterday, it is hard to imagine how anyone could doubt that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction. ... Mr. Powell's evidence, including satellite photographs, audio recordings and reports from detainees and other informants, was overwhelming."

Column by Richard Cohen (Title: "A Winning Hand for Powell"):

"The evidence he presented to the United Nations -- some of it circumstantial, some of it absolutely bone-chilling in its detail -- had to prove to anyone that Iraq not only hasn't accounted for its weapons of mass destruction but without a doubt still retains them. Only a fool, or possibly a Frenchman, could conclude otherwise. ... It was the totality of the material and the fact that Powell himself had presented it. In this case, the messenger may have been more important than the message. This time, for instance, when the by-now hoary charge was made that a link existed between al Qaeda and Baghdad, it was Powell who made it -- and it hit with force."

Column by Jim Hoagland (Title: "An Old Trooper's Smoking Gun"):

"Colin Powell did more than present the world with a convincing and detailed X-ray of Iraq's secret weapons and terrorism programs yesterday. He also exposed the enduring bad faith of several key members of the U.N. Security Council when it comes to Iraq and its 'web of lies,' in Powell's phrase. ... Speaking as 'an old trooper,' the ex-general showed, through technical detail, the illogic of Iraq's protestations that it has been importing aluminum tubing for short-range rockets and not for nuclear weapons. Nobody uses this kind of tubing for rockets, Powell said convincingly. ... To continue to say that the Bush administration has not made its case, you must now believe that Colin Powell lied in the most serious statement he will ever make, or was taken in by manufactured evidence. I don't believe that. Today, neither should you."

Column by George Will (title: "Disregarding the Deniers")

"In estimating the impact of Colin Powell's U.N. presentation on persons who believe that there is no justification for a military response to Iraq's behavior, remember the human capacity for willful suspension of disbelief. ... But Powell's presentation, its power enhanced by his avoidance of histrionics, will change all minds open to evidence."

Column by Mary McGrory (title: "I'm Persuaded"):

"I can only say that he persuaded me, and I was as tough as France to convince. He talked of the mobile factories concealed in trains and trucks that move along roads and rails while manufacturing biological agents. I was struck by their ingenuity and the insistence on manufacturing agents that cause diseases such as gangrene, plague, cholera, camelpox, and hemorrhagic fever. ... I'm not ready for war yet. But Colin Powell has convinced me that it might be the only way to stop a fiend, and that if we do go, there is reason."