Coincides with strongly growing European doubts in alledged role of Bin Laden (e.g warnings by German chief of EUROPOL of premature conclusions)
andreas
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WASHINGTON, D.C., Sept. 12 (EIRNS)-ARMY WAR COLLEGE PROFESSOR WARNS: WATCH OUT FOR LINES PUT OUT BY THE MEDIA. Stephen Pelletiere, a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Army War College, warned, this afternoon, that the media, led by such conservative commentators as George Will, Charles Krauthammer and Thomas Friedman, put out lines which then become the news and then influence policy. Pelletiere was appearing at the Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine, to speak on how the news media steered the campaign against Iraq in 1988-89, and how they do the same with respect to the current conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
When questioned by EIR, he had much to say about the media lines around the twin attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, last Tuesday. He especially warned against two of them. The first one he warned against is the line that "America will never be the same as it was...." In spite of what happened on Tuesday, "we're still going to be on the brink of a recession...," and we have a President "who has yet to win the confidence of the American people." He said that all of this reality "will reassert itself." "Obviously," he concluded, "they have something in mind around that line."
The second line that Pelletiere, who's a veteran specialist on the Middle East, warned against, is that Osama bin Laden is responsible for the suicide attacks. "It's hard for me to conceive that it is bin Laden, simply because I don't think he has those kinds of resources." He said that no evidence has been presented that bin Laden had any involvement in Tuesday's attacks. He said the news media is "going to put their finger on him. He's going to be a patsy." Thirdly, Pelletiere warned that another line that's being put out is that there's going to be some sort of an attack on Afghanistan. He stated that putting troops in Afghanistan would be the worst thing that the U.S. could do.