Posted on 10/16/2001 5:34:25 PM PDT by aculeus
What is an embassy for? Surely one purpose is to represent its country's point of view abroad. There are at least two aspects to this. Embassy officials ought to represent that viewpoint privately, to local politicians, and other leading figures in the host country. A second aspect is representing that viewpoint in public.
Both of these tasks have rarely been more important for U.S. embassy officials than now.
I cannot comment on what the U.S. embassy in Dublin is doing behind the scenes in meetings with local politicians, but would someone explain to me why it is, that in the propaganda battle being waged ever since September 11, it is doing absolutely nothing?
Let me explain what I mean by that. With one major exception, all media outlets in Ireland are either openly anti-American, or else do not have a coherent, worked out position on the current international situation. The exception is The Sunday Independent, Ireland's biggest selling Sunday paper. That is only one paper among many.
The national broadcaster, RTE, is probably the worst offender. Since the bombing began, its news coverage has been dominated by footage of desperate Afghan refugees, rioting Pakistani protesters, and Taliban casualty reports.
Its current-affairs discussion programs are all about how the U.S.-built coalition is bound to collapse soon, how almost anything the U.S. does will be in breach of international law, and how whatever else is left to it is bound to fail. American foreign policy has been dissected piece by piece and almost every aspect of it blamed for the ills of the world.
When RTE, or one of the main newspapers here, carries an anti-Israeli item, the Israeli embassy is quick off the mark. The Israeli ambassador will go on air or into print himself. If not him, then someone based in Israel will be lined up.
From the U.S. embassy, there has been a deafening silence.
I'll offer a partial explanation for this state of affairs. There has recently been an almost complete turnover of senior personnel at the embassy in Dublin. The public-affairs officer, the deputy chief of mission, and the ambassador himself have all arrived in Ireland only within the last few weeks.
But it is only a partial explanation, because even before the change of staff and ambassador, the embassy did not respond to the routine anti-Americanism found in the Irish media. Under Jean Kennedy Smith, for example, no matter what the level of provocation, there was no response.
Back in the 1970s, when a Soviet embassy was established here, it launched a charm offensive by wining and dining everyone of influence. The May Day bash was eagerly looked forward to by politicians, journalists, etc. The U.S. embassy launched no counteroffensive. Its social events remained fairly low-key.
Only briefly, at the time of the Gulf War, had we a public-affairs Officer willing to take on the Irish media. Back then, RTE, etc., were preaching the doctrine of moral equivalence between the U.S. and Iraq. John Tracey, the PAO, challenged the Irish media at every turn. The result was that they could no longer preach their anti-American message with total impunity.
Once Kennedy-Smith took over, she put a halt to Tracey's activities. Keeping the peace at any price became the order of the day. To be fair, those were the years when the Northern Ireland Peace Process was only just getting off the ground, and it was the top priority.
This led the embassy to seek strange alliances however. Journalists with good Sinn Fein/IRA contacts were cultivated. It didn't matter that they were almost invariably anti-American. One of them all but justified the September 11 massacres on one of our most-watched shows just three days after the attacks.
In all those years, no attempt whatever was made to cultivate pro-American journalists. It wouldn't be hard, there are only three or four of us, but it is a fact that none of us has ever been contacted by an embassy official.
Is this happening only in Ireland? Are embassies in other countries similarly complacent? Are they also letting anti-Americanism go unchallenged?
If so, then it is a serious matter because it means that America is allowing its enemies a clear field in the battle for hearts and minds. The United States may be a mighty country, but it does need friends, and if public opinion in friendly countries starts to turn against it post-September 11, then there will be a very high price to be paid.
Is anyone at the State Department monitoring properly what is going on? If not there, then is someone at the Bush administration doing it? These are important questions, and they need to be answered.
Our embassy tolerated anti-American propaganda because the anti-Americans were also pro-IRA!
Treasonous!
So9
This is by far the biggest selling newspaper in Ireland and is pro-American. The author of the piece is also Irish. The other best selling paper in the country, The Irish times, has written some of the best pro American pieces on this issue - read any Kevin Myers article. There are anti-American sentiment but that has been challenged but must be challenged harder. It is the same anti-American sentiment we get in America. Some of the postings here have been daft.
Mr. Aculeus ought to get a life and stop trying to demonize Ireland every time it gets the chance.
There are reports in the media today that Bin Laden has been funding terrorists in Ireland who are linked with the Omagh bombing.
Charles Haughey, the former premier and well known sleaze-bag, lobbied for passports for the Bin Laden family.
Mercy International Relief Agency, which was associated with the attacks on US embassies in Africa a few years ago, had its headquarters in Dublin.
Hamid Aich worked for MIRA in Dublin. The Canadian and US authorities asked Dublin to question Aich when some of his associates were arrested on the way from Vancouver to Seatttle with a bomb in December 1999. Dublin found Aich and a huge amount of evidence linking him to terrorism.
Guess what Dublin did. They let Aich go and then they passed the evidence to their US and Canadian colleagues.
The line from Washington to Dublin must have been red hot!!
They've even been accused of being pro-Unionist and pro-British by the American-Irish apologists for terror.
I don't know what people like you and Mr. Arculeus hope to achieve by posting such anti-Irish propaganda. You are clearly using the events of 9/11 to shamefully further your own anti republican agenda. Ireland is relatively peaceful apart from the current loyalist pogroms in the north. Ireland is also behind America in this new war. GWD is not so stupid as to listen to such ridiculous assertions from blatantly anti-Irish people like yourself. It is incredibly insulting to Irish people reading your previous diatribes. Why don't you go back to being a cheerleader and making excuses for those who blast bomb little schoolgirls.
Oh, and by the way NornIron, 6000+ lives lost on 9/11 equals 6000+ lives. Saying it is equivalent to 600,000 killed in NI over 30 years is irrelevant nonsense. 3500 were killed in NI, 6000+ in America on 9/11 - GET IT! What a gib!
Right you are. And I'll continue to do so in order to offset the impression given by the pro-IRA scum that most Irish Americans support those killers.
As for 'getting a life' just look at the variety of subjects I post. Unlike the IRA-loving slobs I am not a monomaniac.
BTW isn't it surprising that that so many of the pro-IRA crowd haven't been heard from on FR since 9/11?
Because I have respect for Ireland, you assume I am pro-IRA. I merely point out the inconsistencies of yours and Norn Irons posts. You consistently rant about IRA terrorists but curiously, you are silent about the current murders and violence perpetrated by loyalists. But I wouldn't assume you support those who choose to blast bomb little girls, unlike others on this thread.
The morons who harrass those little girls are despicable.
Colosis, do you read the Irish Times? For a start it is not 'the other best selling paper in the country', the Irish Independent is (the sister paper to the Sunday Indo). And have you read most of Patrick Smyth's drivel? He's their US correspondent for crissakes!
Normally when I do read it I get so irked by their opinions that...3^&**()&*"*&"£*)&&%()"£!!! (does that explain it? *L*)
BTW...isn't `The Star' the second biggest national daily? (I know it's a tabloid, but Tony O'Reilly gets around! *L*)
Those illegal Irish that have returned during the last few years of prosperity are reworking the country into a clone of America and keeping the socialist tendencies of the Irish at bay.
I've deprogrammed my mother-in-law and some other relatives there. They only get CNN and NBC as far as American TV goes.
Let the Tony O'Rielly (who's made a bundle swindling Americans in both glassware and ketchup) and his Irish newspapers say what they want. It's only so much prattle.
Your right though, the star would be the second biggest selling newspaper. It's a tabloid but no more so than the times. BTW, I can't understand the second paragraph in your last post.
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