Baghdad photos are propaganda

A tale of two photos

You have probably seen the photos of the statue of Saddam Hussein being toppled, and TV footage of jubilant Iraqis rolling the bronze head around, bringing back memories of so many previous popular uprisings – 1989, 1956, 1953...

If there is one thing this war has taught us all, it's that we can't believe what we're told. For Donald Rumsfeld these were "breathtaking". For the British Army they were "historic". For BBC Radio they were "amazing".

Here's the truth.

First there is a photo from the BBC website showing the statue toppling. Below that is a long-shot in which you can see the whole of Fardus Square (conveniently located just opposite the Palestine Hotel where the international media are based), and the presence of at most around 200 people – most of them US troops (note the tanks and armoured vehicles) and assembled journalists.

The BBC website had the honesty to say that "dozens" of Iraqis were involved, but this grain of truth was swamped by the overwhelming impression of mass joy. The radio and TV were even worse.

The masses are no doubt glad to see the back of Saddam Hussein, but this was a US Army propaganda coup, staged for the benefit of the same journalists it had bombed the day previously, and which the British media have swallowed hook line and sinker. Shame on them.

Whats the difference between Iraq today and Yesterday. The US has taken the Univesity of Baghdad and toppled one statue and gotten a positive response Christian and Shiite parts of Baghdad (and even there the media has at most shown several dozen people cheering in a city of millions)

But this one image of the statue will make every paper in the world present the downfall of Hussein and perhaps the result will be self fullfilling (which is the military point of symbolic actions). If Hussein is dead or desides to go into exhile and not appear on TV anymore the war will be over in the eyes of the media. But for Iraqis the war has only begun. There is no clue who will be running the country and the Red Cross has only today proclaimed Baghdad too dangerous for them to operate in...

It's nice to realize, that for whatever reasons, this was a small crowd, and for all we know, a paid crowd.

It's been such an awful day, this is one thing that made me smile. I'd wondered why the media shots were oriented in such bizarre ways and from such distances at the time when I saw it this morning (aside from the fact that they may be scared shitless of being murdered by 'our troops').