Wikileaks - CIA paper reveals plans to use propaganda to manipulate opinion on Afghanistan

[NNN0LHI]

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0326/cia-paper-reveals-strategies-manipulate-european-opinion-afghanistan/

CIA paper reveals plans to manipulate European opinion on Afghanistan

By Daniel Tencer
Friday, March 26th, 2010 -- 3:41 pm

'Out-of-the-box' CIA think tank proposes concerns over women's rights, fear of terrorism as ways to boost support for Afghan war

Evidently spooked by the collapse of the Dutch government over the country's involvement in Afghanistan, the CIA has put together a strategy proposal to prevent what it fears could be a "precipitous" collapse of support for the war in Afghanistan among European allies.

A document marked "confidential / not for foreign eyes," posted to the Wikileaks Web site, suggests strategies to manipulate European public opinion on the war, particularly in France and Germany.

The document doesn't propose any direct methods by which the CIA could achieve this -- there are no references to planting propaganda in the press, for example -- but it does lay out what it sees as the key talking points to changing hearts and minds on the war. Among its proposals, the policy paper suggests playing up the plight of Afghan women to French audiences, as the French public has shown concern for women's rights in Afghanistan.

[sabrina 1]

1. All this does is show that there is no legitimate reason to

stay in Afghanistan. If the cause was just, they would not need to manipulate public opinion.

However, it does prove what most intelligent people have always suspected, that they DO try to manipulate people's thinking and many of us are smart enough to recognize it when we see it.

Eg, the Bush administration was using Afghan women to justify being there. I remember once pointing out to a few people online when they posted a photo of Laura talking to some women in Afghanistan, that they ought to read what was actually happening to women there since the occupation. They would not accept anything that didn't push how much we were doing for those women, no matter how legitimate the source was.

I wish there were a thousand Wikileaks keeping tabs on the deceivers, all over the world. It is the lack of a real independent media that has made it possible for them to continue these wars.

[polly7]

2. Whoops .........they forgot to include a few links in their rush to claim

concern over women's rights.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/25/AR2008122500931.html
Little Blue Pills Among the Ways CIA Wins Friends in Afghanistan

http://www.rawa.org/women9.htm
Afghan women under the tyranny of the brutal fundamentalists

http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1079316.html
Afghanistan: Marriage Practice Victimizes Young Girls, Society

[jberryhill]

3. This is the really dastardly part....

"The CIA Red Cell points out that President Obama continues to enjoy popular support in Europe at levels he has not seen in the US in months. The report suggests getting the president involved in selling the Afghanistan war to Europeans."

OMG, they suggest that President Obama's popularity could be used to persuade others to support his policy in Afghanistan!

"'Out-of-the-box' CIA think tank proposes..."

You mean that the CIA commissioned someone to come up with off-the-wall brainstorming ideas, and they came up with some? That's insidious!