German intelligence, the Iraq War and exporting American media dysfunction

This is a story that makes me wonder how much the off-the-tracks dysfunction of the American mainstream press is leaking into European news. Obviously, Britain has a major Murdoch presence with the Times of London, which has been FOXified to the point where it has seriously damaged its general credibility. It has became almost a joke that they repeatedly report that Israel is on the verge of launching a nuclear strike against Iran.

The story has to do with report in Der Spiegel, which quotes reitred US Gen. James Marks as saying that German intelligence from Baghdad was very helpful to US forces during the invastion in 2003: US-Militärs nennen BND-Beiträge aus Bagdad "extrem wichtig" und "hilfreich" Der Spiegel Online 13.12.2008. In fact, he says it was even better than anything they were getting from US intelligence!

(A Yahoo! search didn't turn up any English-language versions of this story. )

This set off inquiries in which the current Social Democratic Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and the previous Green Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer have been called to Parliament to answer questions on the matter. Because both of them have previously denied any significant assistance to the US during the invasion in response to earlier stories that suggested a less intense level of German intelligence collaboration. Steinmeier was also head of the Chancellor's Office during the time of the alleged events.

I try to avoid this when I'm writing about foreign stories. But comparison is painfully hard to avoid in this case. That news report is dated this past Saturday. By Monday, Parliament was scheduling a current and a former Foreign Minister to answer questions about it which is slated for this coming Thursday. With far, far more serious crimes to address, our Congress for a good seven years has disgraced itself - on a bipartisan basis - by not exercising any kind of reasonable oversight. The contrast is stunning to me.

And, as strange at it may seem to Americans, at least in comparison to the Democrats' behavior these last seven years, German members of Parliament really take a dim view of senior officials lying to them. They even have the idea that they should legitimately be held accountable!

The criticism from the other parties is across the board. The SPD and Greens, from what I've seen, are being reserved in their statements involving their own partisans. Things tend to work that way in parliamentary systems; it's hard to imagine a German version of Joe Lieberman whose personal brand is built on echoing the other party's attacks on his own party.

But the other three parties in Parliament - the Left, the conservatives, and the liberals (who may be more conservative in American terms than the conservatives) - are all demanding answers. Because in German politics, any kind of involvement in the Americans' Iraq War at that time is still politically radioactive.

Now, unlike our sad American excuse for a press corps, reporters don't there don't tend to jump on something like this and engage in endless speculation about how certain figures may be "tainted" if "something comes out" that they have no evidence even exists. Or demand that "Steinmeier come clean" right now today, without really knowing if he has anything to "come clean" about, and then tomorrow wring their hands and furrow their brows and opine about the significance of his not have "gotten everything out there" instantly.

Spiegel is a very legitimate news source. And there doesn't seem to be any question that Gen. Marks is making the claims which Spiegel reported.

But here's where the corrupt American journalistic practices could well be affecting the German reporting on this matter.

Because James Marks isn't the most credible of sources. Marks was one of the Pentagon's pet analysts in the propaganda program they ran for years during the Iraq war to manipulate (a polite term for it) supposedly "independent" military analysts being used by TV news organizations. David Barstow reported on it Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand New York Times 04/20/08:

The group was heavily represented by men involved in the business of helping companies win military contracts. Several held senior positions with contractors that gave them direct responsibility for winning new Pentagon business. James Marks, a retired Army general and analyst for CNN from 2004 to 2007, pursued military and intelligence contracts as a senior executive with McNeil Technologies. Still others held board positions with military firms that gave them responsibility for government business. General McInerney, the Fox analyst, for example, sits on the boards of several military contractors, including Nortel Government Solutions, a supplier of communication networks. [my emphasis]

Just within the last three weeks, Glenn Greenwald was reporting in his Salon blog on the continuing reluctance of the TV networks to report on this story about the Pentagon's sock-puppet pundits, even months after it broke - a story which goes to the hear of their own news operations' credibility: The ongoing disgrace of NBC News and Brian Williams 11/30/08; NBC and McCaffrey's coordinated responses to the NYT story 12/01/08.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I'd like to know the real story either way. Did the German government provide greater intelligence support than they previously claimed? Or is James Marks doctoring the story? And, if so, why would a Pentagon propaganda flack who masqueraded on TV for years as a responsible military commentator want to burn the current German Foreign Minister?

See also:

US-General: BND »extrem wichtig« von René Heilig Neues Deutschland 15.12.2008

Druck auf Steinmeier wegen BND-Einsatzes im Irak wächst Yahoo! Deutschland Nachrichten 15.12.2008

Tags: frank-walter steinmeier, joschka fischer, james marks