What Imaginary Incubators Can Teach Us About Ukraine
Reminder: War propaganda is always hiding in plain sight
(my book from 2004)
When I write or post about the blatant propaganda swirling around the situation in Ukraine, some people get angry… at me. They don’t want to accept the truth so they take my highly-researched analysis personally. In turn, some will even attack me personally. I’ve been doing this a long time so I’m used to it and it will not deter me. With such programming in mind, I’ll once again offer one of the many, many examples of what passes for “normal” in the Home of the Brave™.
After being invaded by Iraq on Aug. 2, 1990, the government of Kuwait funded as many as 20 public relations, law, and lobby firms to marshal world opinion in its favor. One such firm was NYC-based Hill & Knowlton (H&K), which was paid at least $12 million to conspire with the Kuwaiti government.
As part of this effort, H&K conducted a study to discern the most effective method for garnering widespread U.S. support in the defense of Kuwait. Put more bluntly: They were hired to find the quickest-acting propaganda. In no time, the answer was clear: emphasize the atrocities (real or imagined) committed by Iraqi soldiers. Enter “Nurse Nayirah” from Kuwait (see above photo).
On Oct. 10, 1990 — without her background ever being vetted — Nayirah gave testimony to the Congressional Human Rights Caucus of the U.S. Congress. She tearfully described witnessing Iraqi troops stealing incubators from a hospital, leaving 312 babies “on the cold floor to die.” (watch below video)
In reality, “Nurse Nayirah” was the 15-year-old daughter of Saud Al-Sabah, the Kuwaiti ambassador to the United States. She was an aspiring actress and the story was an elaborate hoax. Nayirah’s false testimony was part of H&K’s well-funded conspiracy of deception.
All this came out too late to prevent mass slaughter — with no complaint from U.S. government officials, of course. For example, Brent Scowcroft, President Bush’s national security adviser at the time, claimed ignorance about the plot but admitted: “It was useful in mobilizing public opinion.”
President George H.W. Bush repeated Nayirah’s fabrication multiple times as he rounded up Congressional support for his war plans in the months following her testimony. By way of justifying their “aye” votes, 7 U.S. senators also quoted Nayirah in their own speeches. The resolution passed on Jan. 14, 1991. Two days later (after months of deadly sanctions), the coalition bombing commenced.
To accurately document the human cost in Iraq since Nayirah’s performance would require another full article. For now, I’ll leave you with findings from the London School of Economics in 2006: Between 1991 and 1998, there were an estimated 380,000 and 480,000 excess child deaths in Iraq due to the U.S.-led military actions and economic sanctions.
The cruel irony is that deceitful testimony about murdered Kuwaiti children — as part of a well-orchestrated conspiracy — directly led to innumerable Iraqi children losing their lives over the next three decades.
When attempting to unravel the behaviors of today’s ruling class, it helps to understand their actions in the past. Rather than getting angry at those who dash your red, white, and blue delusions about the US of A, do a little homework, educate yourself, and accept reality. It’s the only way anything will ever change.
Every time I'm reminded of such history I drop in again on the concepts of agency and collective action vs mindlessness and groupthink. Nationalism/patriotism is always an amalgam along a continuum between these two poles; it's only ever a matter of which component is called forth or emphasized at any given point in time. I would posit that a healthy patriotism *is* possible insofar as the citizens of a nation are sovereign individuals, empowered at each step to chose educated participation OR dissent. Cooerced or manipulated participation/consent, esp that which is fostered behind a scrim of morality, is of course the opposite: a top-down effort to birth the Mindless Mob to do the will of those in power. They might call it "patriotism" but mindful people must call it something else. This might be thought of as the macrocosim to the microcosm that is happening with the manipulated "mental health" of individuals these days: rather than supporting integrity (i.e.wholeness from personal sovereignty) from the inside out, the broad effort has become to map all the power onto environments and amorphous outside forces, such that the suffering are necessarily herded into identifying only *as* their trauma -- and then experiencing/participating in a diminished shadow life, and only via groupthink. On either level, those who foster such states of being in others may even fool themselves that they are being expedient or are doing "good." But -in or out of religious thinking- they are committing a sin against life. It is my feeling that THIS is the primary evil one must seek to address, one person at a time.
It is powerful irony that in certain circumstances the most patriotic thing one might do as a citizen of the USA is burn the flag. Such tangible proof that full-throated dissent is not only possible, but necessary to the health of the ongoing *practice* of self-governance was once subject to regular discussion. That is (was?!?) the power of the ideals which provided the foundation to this experiment known as the USA. But in the internet age...?? That is why I fear the partnership between corporate and government interests far more than any "terrorist" or "virus." The manipulation of information and the censorship necessary to stifle dissent and manufacturer consent is something long practiced by the psychologist trained in marketing and sales, long since honed to a deadly edge. That this tool is in the hands of "our elected government" should frighten us enough to wake us from this nightmare - but will it??