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Sheldon Rampton

John C. Stauber

The Best War Ever: Lies, Damned Lies, and the Mess in Iraq Paperback – September 14, 2006

by Sheldon Rampton (Author), John Stauber (Author)

4.1 13 ratings

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The war in Iraq may be remembered as the point at which the propaganda model perfected in the twentieth century stopped working: the world is too complex, information is too plentiful, and-as events in Iraq reveal- propaganda makes bad policy.

The Best War Ever is about a war that was devised in fantasy and lost in delusion. It highlights the futility of lying to oneself and others in matters of life and death. And it offers lessons to the current generation so that, at least in our time, this never happens again.

As the team of Rampton and Stauber show in their first new book since President Bush's reelection, the White House seems to have fooled no one as much as itself in the march toward a needless (from a security perspective) war in Iraq. As the authors argue, one of the most tragic consequences of the Bush administration's reliance on propaganda is its disdain for realistic planning in matters of war. Repeatedly, when faced with predictions of problems, U.S. policymakers dismissed the warnings of Iraq experts, choosing instead to promulgate its version of the war through conservative media outlets and PR campaigns. The result has been too few troops on the ground to maintain security; failure to anticipate the insurgency; and oblivious disregard, even contempt, for critics in either party who attempted to assess the human and economic costs of the war.

Even now that withdrawal seems imminent, however, the administration and its allies continue their cover-ups: downplaying civilian deaths and military injuries; employing marketing buzzwords like "victory" repeatedly to shore up public opinion; and botched attempts, through third-party PR firms, at creating phony news.

The Bush administration entered Iraq believing that its moral, technological, and military superiority would ensure victory abroad, and that its mastery of the politics would win support at home. Instead, it found a morass of problems that do not lend themselves to moralistic, technological, or propaganda-based solutions.

Print length

272 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Tarcher
Publication date

September 14, 2006
Reading age

18 years and up
Dimensions

5.54 x 0.71 x 8.18 inches
ISBN-10

1585425095
ISBN-13

978-1585425099
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Having dissected the events and reporting that led to the invasion of Iraq in 2003's Weapons of Mass Deception, Rampton and Stauber now unravel the Bush administration's "web of disinformation" around its handling of the war. In the tradition of Austrian journalist Karl Wiegand, who observed after WWI that "Politicians lie to journalists and then believe those lies when they see them in print," the authors detail the work of Bush's PR apparatus and the media's uncritical response. They provide elegant, effective analysis of examples including the media's approach to Colin Powell's now infamous UN speech affirming the existence of Saddam Hussein's WMDs, the politics behind the outing of Valerie Plame Wilson as a CIA agent, the Pentagon's use of Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmed Chalabi as an inside source, and the complicated relationships New York Times reporter Judith Miller (who also reported on Iraq's possession of WMDs) had with the high ranking people in the administration. Rampton and Stauber make their argument with verve while carefully documenting their claims; this is muckraking without mudslinging.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber are the bestselling authors of Weapons of Mass Deception, Toxic Sludge Is Good for You!, Banana Republicans, and Trust Us, We're Experts! Stauber is the founder and director of the Center for Media & Democracy. He and Rampton write and edit the quarterly PR Watch.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Tarcher; First Edition (September 14, 2006)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 272 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1585425095
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1585425099
Reading age ‏ : ‎ 18 years and up
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9.6 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.54 x 0.71 x 8.18 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #5,256,967 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2,805 in Censorship & Politics
- #51,760 in International & World Politics (Books)
- #556,639 in History (Books)

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4.1 13 ratings

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Folantin

"The issue is just how much are we going to pay before we limit the damage."

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2006

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As the promise of a quick victory in Iraq fades on the horizon, and the reality of a long, messy and costly occupation emerges, authors Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber's timely book "The Best War Ever: Lies Damned Lies, and the Mess in Iraq" examines the details behind the propaganda and the headlines that led to the war in Iraq. The authors' main point is that the wave of propaganda and lies continues, and while this is a multi million business that successfully 'sold' the war to Americans, the campaign isn't reality. Those who created the war, coveted the war, profit from it, and sold it are immersed in an incredible, dangerous fantasy of 'victory' 'liberty' and the spread of 'democracy.' Meanwhile those who chose to read this book are likely to be those who haven't drunk the cool-aid and are probably already opposed to the war for a variety of reasons. While I'd like to imagine that the book would help change the pro-war opinion, it probably won't happen. Nonetheless, the facts presented here will stun and sicken those already opposed to the war, and by the time the last page is turned, the anti-Iraq war reader will feel their opinions solidified.

The book details the PR campaign ($300 million over a 5 year period) launched before the war. It takes a particularly cynical mind to conduct surveys with a focus on "casualty aversion" in order to analyze how a war can be 'sold' to the people, but those surveys were conducted with the conclusion that Americans would swallow the Iraq war without too much squawking if they believed the war would "ultimately succeed." Experts on the pre-war Future of Iraq Project urged the administration to consider back up plans in case it didn't go smoothly and even predicted looting and the emergence of insurgency. This team was replaced, and the invasion of Iraq sailed ahead with Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz predicting that Iraq could "finance its own reconstruction." Fat chance of that happening. By late 2003, the occupation was costing America 1 billion a week, and by the end of 2005, 5.9 billion a month!

The book also examines specific linguistic choices made by the speechmakers and the media spokespeople in order to present a united, positive front on the subject of Iraq, and hand-in-hand with the word choices is the "bloodless" approach to the war--the suppression of photos, the lack of coverage of the horrendous wounds some of our soldiers are coming home with--plus the lack of coverage of the deaths of Iraqis.

There's a lot of 'old' material here--the Valerie Plame outing, the smear campaign against Wilson, the forged documents detailing the purchase of uranium oxide, etc. But in spite of the fact some of this is old news, the authors plug the material into the book to illustrate an overall pattern of the media burying stories and retractions while hyping rumours of supposed weapons findings in Iraq. The Iraq Survey Group (ISG) for example, with their "big impact" project and a generous budget of 300 million hunted for WMD in Iraq but couldn't discover anything. But no matter--because the lack of weapons led to a U.S. intelligence theory that Saddam deliberately acted suspicious to 'dupe' America. The twists and turns of the propaganda used for this war would be hilarious if it were fictional--but it's not--it's real--and people are dying because of it.

One of the best sections of the book covers the arguments that led to the war, and includes quotes from those who predicted invading Iraq would be a piece of cake ("I really do believe we will be greeted as liberators"- Cheney). New arguments have been created for remaining in Iraq, and once again by putting this all in print, the authors illustrate an insidious pattern of shifting propaganda. The authors successfully debunk all the arguments for the war--including the flypaper theory, and instead argue that it's time for damage control. The book includes scrupulous footnotes and an index--displacedhuman

20 people found this helpful

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Mr D.

Another Iraqi War Book - The Best War Ever,

Reviewed in the United States on February 3, 2007

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The Best War Ever is actually the second book on the Iraq War by these authors. The First Book, entitled Weapons of Mass Deception was released in July of 2003, a mere four months after the beginning of hostilities and while truck loads of personnel were still canvassing Iraq in a futile search for non-existent WMD.

That fact almost makes them look prescient but the fact remains that the was plenty of evidence around contradicting the White House line for those willing to listen to it.

As this book, The Best War Ever, points out the Iraq war was a product of several failures. The failure of the Media, the Congress, the Administration and the Intelligence community. It was also a product of purposeful disinformation and inertia.

By now we have all heard how ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq were fabricated and reports of WMD were exaggerated and cherry picked to make the best case for war. Well, this book delves into that and more. According to T.B.W.E. the Administration may have been fooled by their own disinformation. Apparently in the late nineties some shadowy department of the Defense or State Departments hired an advertising agency to disseminate disinformation.

Not being versed in subterfuge and underhanded dealings, they hired a man named Chalabi to form a government in exile and thus the Iraqi National Congress was born. Of course we had all heard of the INC and it was thought by many to be a movement of disaffected Iraqi patriots. In fact it became a movement of cash from the US into Chalabi's coffers. At first Chalabi seemed to be the real thing and was the darling of the CIA but as more and more of his statements proved untrue and the information given by defectors he provided was discredited he fell from their favor. Yet, he remained a favorite of the Administration, not because of the truthfulness of what he said but because it helped to move along their agenda.

T.B.W.E. also points to the failure of the media to scrutinize the rational for going to war. In fact they cite The Administrations self proclaimed enemy, the liberal New York Times for being their biggest ally for laying out the case for going to war. The includes Judith Miller the NY times reporter who was getting almost all of her scoops from the aforementioned Chalabi.

Lastly the Administration virtually shamed the congress into allowing them to have their way with Iraq by intimating and insinuating that it was unpatriotic to question the Commander in Chief in a time of war and in fact they still are trying that tactic but with less and less success.

T.B.W.E. is a well written, easily read book on the Iraq fiasco. True there are many of these books out now each of which has the ability to make you mad at the the malfeasance that has transpired. Having read at least a half dozen of these books, each has its own little niche of information, which the others didn't cover and so did T.B.W.E.

I had no idea that Chalabi and Miller has been so instrumental in fomenting the war or that ninety percent of the news articles and opinions leading up to the war were pro-war.

These and many other circumstances covered in this book and others, converged to make the war seem necessary, when in fact the evidence was all around that it wasn't.

2 people found this helpful

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Chelsea

Decent read.

Reviewed in the United States on November 5, 2013

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I purchased this book for a class I took and it was okay. The illustrations certainly make it a quick read and it is informative. Decent read.

Reviewed in the United States on August 21, 2016

Verified Purchase

Boring.

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J. J. Bradshaw

Balanced, informative and well written, a superb book

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 5, 2015

Verified Purchase

This is the sort of book that makes you angry, it is an almost forensic dissection of the media manipulation, misrepresentation and deception of the US government in relation to the war and subsequent occupation of Iraq. Scrupulously researched and refreshingly free of emotive language the book is actually much more powerful as a result of the even tone. The book picks up where the book "Weapons of Mass Deception" leaves off, although it does follow on logically from the earlier book I do not think it necessary to have read that one to appreciate this one and it stands up well on its own. In a way the authors are kind of like a thinking mans Al Franken as whereas he is very funny and goes for the jugular he is not the most balanced writer and at times is guilty of the same partisan approach as those he criticises (albeit with a lot more wit and style), Rampton and Stauber let the logic of their arguments and analysis make their points for them without recourse to polemics or diatribes. At times the impression of the Bush regime veers between the merely incompetent to the deeply sinister and in particular the Plame Wilson affair is truly shocking. Whilst Scooter Libby took the fall for that episode it is hard to believe he was some loose canon acting on his own. The Iraqi National Congress come out of the book very badly but perhaps not as badly as those in the Administration who seemed to end up believing their own web of propaganda. The medias role is also put under the microscope, what is interesting is that most accounts focus on the less than subtle input of right wing media channels such as Fox News yet this book draws attention to the less than glorious role of the respected New York Times. Overall a first class book, balance, well written, informative and engaging, 5*.

One person found this helpful

S Wood

Big Lies: Bush, The Media And Iraq

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 4, 2010

With the war in Afghanistan-Pakistan becoming the new foreign policy fiasco, the War in Iraq has, along with it's chief "planner" Bush and his wide-eyed assistant Blair, largely retired from public view. This book by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber of the Centre for Media and Democracy is a useful reminder of the level of mendacity that was a feature of the lead up to war as well as the war itself.

The opening section of the book picks up from the point their earlier work Weapons of Mass Deception concluded. It covers the activity at the UN including Colin Powell's "give war a chance" spiel. Powell's presentation only seemed to be accepted in the media because, well you know, Powell's a nice guy, he's not Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld: he doesn't tell lies. In effect his PR persona triumphed over the reality of his claims, which were, to quote Powell's initial reaction to the script: "Bulls--t!".

Also covered are the Plame affair in which senior administration figures destroyed Valerie Plame's career in order to punish her husband for debunking the nonsense spoken about Iraqi attempts to purchase Niger Uranium. The case of the "journalist" Judith Miller, who was involved in the administrations outing of Plame's as a C.I.A. agent, is also brought to light. Her links to Ahmed Chalabi and her dissemination of his propaganda in The New York Times both before and after the war with regard to Weapons of Mass Destruction are breathtaking. There is an interesting section where the authors (partially) list the amount of times that Fox News and others reported the finding of WMD with certainty, when in fact nothing was ever found. Shortly after the fall of Baghdad surveys found that 34% of Americans believed that WMD had been found, and a preposterous 22% believed they had been used (though not so preposterous in the unlikely event that they meant depleted uranium). The later efforts of the Bush administration and their media supporters to re-write the history of the conflict are also examined and filed under fantasy.

Despite the cartoons that grace the front of all of Stauber and Rampton's books they are serious, comprehensively sourced works of debunking. In the case of the Bush Administration, the war in Iraq as well as the mainstream media's failings and collusions in the covering of the later stages of the lead up to that war and the war itself. It is disappointing that this book, unlike their other works, never had a British edition when it was published in 2006 and I had to buy it second hand from the U.S. Definitely a work of enlightenment, and well worth getting your hands on if you prefer reality to myths.

One person found this helpful

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The Best War Ever: Lies, Damned Lies, and the Mess in Iraq Paperback – September 14, 2006

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