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French Catholic Newspaper fires reporter for book on Iraq
PARIS Alain Hertoghe believes that in covering the Iraq conflict, French newspapers recreated "the war they would have liked to have seen." That meant concentration on the Vietnams and Stalingrads that didnât take place, he said, and so many more accounts of U.S. difficulties rather than advances that it was "impossible to understand how the Americans won." In the book, Hertoghe explains what he considers the pressâs unanimity not as the result of some kind of explicit understanding but coming from a combination of factors. He regards the single most cohesive element as French anti-Americanism. Nice to see him admit it The two other central motors, in Hertogheâs view, were Franceâs nostalgia for its lost status as a great power and what he described as "the Arabophilia that reigns among Franceâs deciders and in particular among the journalists specializing in this part of the world." So they really are afraid! As an example, he compares headlines involving Saddam Hussein, President George W. Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain during the period. He said there were 29 clearly negative ones concerning Saddam, and 135 for Bush and Blair. The coalition leaders were routinely described, he says, as violent, imperialist, fundamentalist and unreasonable. Four-to-one? Thatâs balanced! "Le Monde went the furthest," he added. "I wrote that Le Monde became âSaddamâs Gazette.â It gave a picture from Baghdad of Saddamâs units perfectly controlling the situation. The difference between Le Monde and Le Figaro was that Le Figaro insisted that American tanks would operate easily on Baghdadâs wide streets. Then when the Americans made their move, we read how they were massacring the Iraqis. The explanation for the collapse was that Saddamâs fedayeen had so much compassion for the population that they stopped fighting." I donât get the French Newspapers (or the English versions) but I suspected that they and others in Europe were in FULL ATTACK mode towards the U.S. Now that someone calls them on their lies he gets fired. This guy should go work for Fox News or the Washington Post. Posted by: Cyber Sarge (VRWC CA Chapter) 2003-12-29 |
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