Washington Post Duped Instead of D.U.P.E.S. (UPDATE: WaPo Purposeful Dupe)

Earlier, describing “Winter Soldier II Off To A Lying Start,” I concluded by noting that “Bloggers today see the Associated Press and Washington Post in the audience. Let’s see whether the American press has learned anything since 1971.”

Apparently not.

Unless some editor culled out all critical thought, there’s no excuse for the Washington Post’s coverage today. The bald assertions by Iraq Veterans Against the War of atrocities are parroted, without scrutiny.

The only indication of any parallel to the discredited 1971 Winter Soldier propaganda upon which this Winter Soldier II is explicitly modeled is in whomever wrote the WaPo’s headline, “War Stories Echo An Earlier Winter.”

It’s not like the Washington Post was unaware of what happens when it blithely prints scurrilous charges.

In 2004, the Washington Post publicly recognized it accepted the lies by false serviceman Micah Ian Wright, but only after he was exposed by real servicemen.

In the Style section last summer we profiled a Los Angeles writer named Micah Ian Wright, who'd just published a shrill antiwar poster book called "You Back the Attack! We'll Bomb Who We Want!" In his book, he described himself as a veteran of combat, a former Army Ranger whose experiences during the 1989 invasion of Panama turned him into a peacenik. In interviews with The Post and other media, he played up that background.

Wright, it turns out, is a liar. He never served in the military -- and confessed that last week to his publisher, Seven Stories Press, after we insisted on evidence of his service. Pursuing a tip from real Rangers who'd never heard of Wright, we filed three Freedom of Information Act requests with separate Army commands -- and last month finally confirmed that Wright never served.

The sorry record of the 1971 Winter Soldier hearings’ false and unsubstantiated “testimony” is well known, as is the negative effect on the reputations and morale of a generation of Vietnam veterans by the media accepting its lies. For example, see these documented studies which show prominently in any web search about it, here, here, and here. As well, the Washington Post's memory of the many articles during the 2004 presidential campaign delineating the false charges by John Kerry in 1971 might have rung a bell to any conscient reporter.

It’s not like the major media, including the Washington Post, weren’t warned about what to expect at Winter Soldier II, and the basics of fair scrutiny. A Reporters Guide and a backgrounder were published. It was picked up at many other blogs. The Reporters Guide was distributed by PRNewswire, and Google showed it hitting at over 250 media sites. (See here for example.)

Key to the Reporters Guide is D.U.P.E.S.

Journalists should exert due diligence to establish the truth and search for the facts that will verify or refute each allegation.

-- An acronym has been developed as a simple guide to what should reasonably be asked by journalists of those making allegations: DUPES:

D: Date(s) - When did the incident occur?

U: Unit(s) - What military units were involved?

P: Personnel - What are the names of the participants and witnesses?

E: Event(s) - What exactly happened exactly where?

S: Signature(s) - Was this reported at the time or later and were reports, affidavits or depositions signed, or will they now be signed?

Instead, today’s Washington Post just repeats the IVAWers assertions. The only demurral is from a protestor outside, a retired Colonel, demanding,

"This is too important to our nation. The credibility of our nation and the credibility of our soldiers are involved."
Riley said those making allegations against the U.S. military should have to give sworn testimony instead of speaking at an antiwar conference.

The WaPo follows that with this fox guarding the henhouse statement, and moves on to more parroting of IVAWers assertions:

Organizers said they have sought to verify the records of all soldiers speaking, including reviewing their service records and talking to other members of units. Some soldiers had videos and photographs, which were displayed yesterday on a large screen in the auditorium.

However, again, all the Washington Post had to do was see the evaluation of those same assertions and video earlier this week by the major liberal online newsmagazine Salon. “The soldiers were unable to provide Salon with any conclusive evidence of war crimes.” Their video is remote and hazy, of a building; the deaths claimed by the two IVAWers could be not substantiated by anyone, and these IVAWers admitted not seeing them either.

The Washington Post’s reporter, Steve Vogel, cannot claim being a rookie. He reported for WaPo from Iraq and Afghanistan. Either he was wrongfully edited, or he was irresponsibly duped instead of following the elementary rules of evidence in D.U.P.E.S.

I haven’t yet seen the Associated Press coverage. Can we hope its journalism is better?

UPDATE: No Mistake; WaPo Ignored Knowing Better

As far as wanting to get both sides of the story, Steve Vogel did throw in a couple of lines from retired Colonel Harry Riley. But Vogel had an opportunity to interview TSO who was live-blogging WSII and could have given a perspective from a non-IVAW point of view. Here's what TSO wrote about the encounter...

Walking back with the private goon (jk) run into Wash Post reporter (Vogel?) interviewing Vets For Peace guy. So I say hey, just wanted to let you know that the "so called hostile bloggers" are in the back row in case you want to talk to us and provide some balance.

We waves me off and says no.