[PEN-L:36299] Campbell orders media shake up

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

From the anti-war Independent (UK):-

[other papers allege that Campbell is furious with the bias of the BBC.]


Campbell orders media shake-up

By Jo Dillon, Deputy Political Editor

30 March 2003

Alastair Campbell has ordered the Whitehall press machine to get a grip of 
the war coverage, fearing that dramatic footage from the front line is 
overshadowing the overall successes of the military campaign.

Tony Blair's powerful director of communications and strategy went 
"ballistic" last week as criticism of the war began to spiral. The idea 
that the war plan had been changed to cope with unexpected Iraqi resistance 
began to circulate, and there was criticism that what people had expected 
to be a short war would become a more protracted campaign.

According to Whitehall sources, Mr Campbell ordered the MoD to "get the big 
picture out there".

On Thursday, the MoD dutifully attempted to give London-based journalists a 
sense of the "wider context". But Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon's appeal was 
quickly drowned out by a series of gaffes by Government ministers. First, 
Mr Hoon was embarrassingly forced to retract claims that the discovery of 
more than 100 biochemical protection suits was proof that Saddam Hussein 
was preparing to use weapons of mass destruction.

Then, more damagingly, the Prime Minister used a Washington press 
conference to erroneously claim that two British servicemen were "executed" 
by the Iraqi regime.

Questions surfaced about the veracity of other claims made by the coalition 
­ the injury or death of Saddam Hussein in the opening stages of the 
campaign, the scale of humanitarian aid getting into Iraq and the confused 
situation in Basra.

The following day, General Sir Michael Jackson issued a stern warning to 
the press. He told journalists to think about the effects of what they 
wrote and broadcast on the bereaved families. "It's not about propaganda or 
spin, it is about human decency," he said. Turning to the reporting of the 
war, General Jackson urged people to set in context the significance of 
events shown on television. "They are no more than snapshots of a 
particular time and a particular place," he said. "They tell you very 
little if anything at all of the progress of the campaign at a strategic 
level."

Downing Street admitted there were a "lot of challenges" associated with 
the demands of 24-hour news and competition between journalists, papers and 
broadcasters. Mr Campbell was fulfilling his role as head of strategic 
communications in handling the way the war was presented as in everything 
else.