CNN & the Anschluss

There is a disturbing similarity between historical and current media depictions on the cable that just unnerves me. CNN recently (most likely in the week of 4/1/03) reported the obvious role of propaganda in Gulf War II. The Iraqi public clamoring for humanitarian aid, as well as the reports in print and televised media of enthusiastic welcomes, when contrasted with the potential illegalities of supporting the reconstruction of Iraq in light of the Food for AId program remind me of a potential economic Anschluss.

What brings this to mind are some principles Baudrillard put forth in his book, Illusion of the End. First is the idea of the war never happening except as a representational field. I don't think anyone can argue that in reality that it isn't happening, but rhetorically there is a real disconnect between the AMerican people and the realities of that war. THis can be substantiated by 100-1000:1 kill ratios; for the American and British forces, the level of loss is certainly near nonexistent, therefore supporting the idea of War as a Video Game.

Which brings me to my second point of representational issues. In the case of the war, US television has been reticent to show war dead, but even more so to show US war casualties. War is constructed now as a morally just cause with no risk, regardless of the mission (ideally), and regardless of the actual motivations, as long as it is done in the cause of American 'decency'

The way that I consider this as a form of Anschluss is multifaceted. I have discussed the representational issues; it looks like the old Nazi prop films after a fashion. Of course, the political landscape is different, but the issues of globalist and idological colonization still remain. The fact that the US is trying to excludet he UN from any reconstruction efforts (assuming that all contracts would go to American & UK contractors), as well as considering a potentially illegal cooptation of oil funds from the second largest global oil field for reconstruction represents a form of globalist imperialism, both from the ideas of capitalist (note that I do not call this Jeffersonian) democracy and 'democratic' conquest, which is in itself a key irony.

The capping point that drove me into the similarity between the Nazis and the Bush regime was 4/6 Rumsfeld attribution that stated that if Iran and Syria didn't shape up, they would recieve the same treatment.

And lastly, the motivations for the invasions are wearing quite thin, as to 4/7, no caches of WMD have been found yet, making the stated mission of the incursion relatively groundless. ANd the fact that this point is all but absent in the media is baffling unless you adopt an extremely jaundiced eye towards the matter.

Patrick Lichty
Director of the Bureau for the Dissemination of Metastructures and Media Metaphors
US Dept. of Art and Technology