[infowar.de] CT 13.11.05: Firm helps U.S. mold news abroad

[Georg Schoefbaenker <schoefbaenker -! - aon - at>]

chicagotribune.com >> Business

Firm helps U.S. mold news abroad
Pentagon also wages war of images, words

By Stephen J. Hedges
Washington Bureau
Published November 13, 2005

WASHINGTON -- In an effort to fight what it sees as an insidious propaganda 
war waged by terrorists, from incendiary Web sites to one-sided television 
images of the Iraq war, the Pentagon has been quietly waging its own 
information battle throughout the Middle East and Central Asia.

One of its primary weapons is a controversial, secretive firm that has been 
criticized as ineffective and too expensive.

The Rendon Group, directed by former Democratic Party political operative 
John Rendon, has garnered more than $56 million in Pentagon work since the 
Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Those contracts list such activities as tracking foreign reporters; 
"pushing" news favorable to U.S. forces; planting television news segments 
that promote U.S. positions; and creating a grass-roots voting effort in 
Puerto Rico on behalf of the Navy, Pentagon records show.

The contracts, some of which were obtained by the watchdog group Judicial 
Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request, reveal that the Bush 
administration is engaged in a war of images and words with Al Qaeda and 
other radical groups.

Civilian and military leaders say the contracts are necessary to fight the 
media wars waged by Islamic fundamentalists who control images on 
television, radio and the Internet in some Arab countries.

But proponents of open government question the role of firms like The 
Rendon Group, suggesting their work blurs the line between legitimate news 
and propaganda. And Americans have long been nervous about the notion of 
the government managing information.

To the extent that the Pentagon is attentively studying media publications, 
there is nothing wrong with that, said Steven Aftergood, a secrecy expert 
at the Federation of American Scientists.

"Where it gets questionable is when they start engaging in media-based 
operations," Aftergood said, meaning actually distributing news items. "And 
that's something that needs to be carefully circumscribed and defined in 
policy, because there is no clear line between the foreign media and U.S. 
media."

The Rendon Group is perhaps best-known for its part in the controversy that 
surrounded the Pentagon's short-lived Office of Strategic Influence nearly 
four years ago. A February 2002 New York Times article disclosed the 
office's existence and reported that the company was part of the effort, 
which possibly included attempts to plant false news stories abroad.

`That was never us'

After public and congressional outcry, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld 
shut down the office. But John Rendon, who until now had declined to 
discuss the episode, said in an interview last week that the news stories 
were wrong and that his company never worked for the office.

"That wasn't us," Rendon said. "The whole notion of putting false news 
stories abroad, that was never us."

Retired Air Force Brig. Gen. S. Pete Worden, who directed the Office of 
Strategic Influence during its short life, confirmed by e-mail that The 
Rendon Group did not work for him.

"He [Rendon] is correct that he didn't work directly for my office," Worden 
wrote. "Most of the actual work we did was through SAIC," or Science 
Applications International Corp., a large defense contractor.

Rendon has, however, played a substantial role in the Pentagon's efforts to 
track and shape media coverage of the Iraq and Afghan conflicts and the war 
on terrorism.

Rendon has at least five current contracts with the Defense Department, 
according to the newly obtained records. A full list of the contracts, 
provided to Judicial Watch, totals about $45million. The work began in 2000 
and continues, the contracts show. They include work, supervised by the 
Joint Chiefs of Staff, for the Air Force, Army, Navy and Defense Advanced 
Research Projects Agency.

Most recently, Rendon was awarded a $6.4 million contract in September to 
track media coverage in Iraq. Rendon also won a $1.4 million contract in 
2004 to advise the staff of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and a $3.9 
million contract to work on a counternarcotics campaign in the Afghan 
Interior Ministry.

The Rendon Group's costs were an issue among CIA staff members during the 
group's earlier work with the CIA and Pentagon. Rendon once received a CIA 
contract of $20 million to $40 million, according to former employees, to 
advise the then-London-based Iraqi National Congress and its leader, Ahmad 
Chalabi.

The Pentagon offices that work with Rendon--the Joint Chiefs of Staff and 
the Office of Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict--declined to 
comment.

Rendon's previous experience positioned him well for the Pentagon's new war 
needs. Rendon worked in the political world until 1989, when he took a job 
advising the Panamanian opposition on how to handle the media during the 
U.S. invasion to oust dictator Manuel Noriega. He took similar jobs after 
that, including advising the Kuwaiti government after Iraqi troops invaded 
in August 1990.

When the Sept. 11 attacks occurred, Rendon already had an active Pentagon 
contract.

"This is really probably the 10th or 9th time we've done this kind of work, 
going all the way back to Panama," Rendon said. "Nobody else has done this."

Though Rendon declined to discuss some of his Pentagon work because it is 
classified, he compared his Pentagon contracts to menus. They contain a 
variety of potential tasks, he said, but the Pentagon does not necessarily 
ask for all of them to be performed.

An Oct. 3, 2001, contract for $16.7 million describes Rendon's initial work 
as testing public opinion and "media mapping"--tracking and analyzing news 
reports in such places as Cairo; Istanbul; Tashkent, Uzbekistan; Islamabad, 
Pakistan; and Jakarta, Indonesia.

Monitoring Al Jazeera

The contract called for Rendon to track "the location and use of Al Jazeera 
news bureaus, reporters and stringers, both regionally and globally. The . 
. . effort will provide a detailed content analysis of the station's daily 
broadcast. TRG [The Rendon Group] will also chart event-related regional 
media coverage to identify the biases of specific journalists and 
potentially obtain an understanding of their allegiances."

In the interview, Rendon was wary of saying his group tracked reporters' 
biases.

"Bias is a tough term," he said. "I know that we don't look at U.S. 
journalists. I know that in conducting operational media analysis, we track 
the nature of stories."

The contracts also raised the possibility of Rendon establishing a radio 
program in Peshawar, Pakistan, to broadcast "timely, truthful and accurate 
information to the people of Afghanistan." That work, Rendon said, was not 
done.

While tracking media coverage is Rendon's self-described specialty--the 
firm is under government contract to do it in 34 countries--The Rendon 
Group also is paid by the Pentagon to advise foreign governments on 
handling the media.

Rendon said his firm has not "pushed" news favorable to the U.S. The main 
advisory work, he said, "has been helping foreign governments to correct 
things that are bad or wrong in the news cycle, and amplify those things 
that are not bad."

Mission on Puerto Rico

Rendon became involved in shaping the relationship between the U.S. 
military and local communities in 2001, when it was given a $1.6 million 
Navy contract to help win over residents of Puerto Rico's Vieques island.

The Navy had used the island for aerial bombing practice for 60 years, and 
residents objected to the danger and noise. When the Navy's continued use 
of Vieques was scheduled for a vote in 2001, the Navy turned to Rendon to 
"conduct public outreach and build grass-roots support" for the Navy's 
position.

Questions were raised about the role of the Navy in trying to influence 
residents, and Judicial Watch noted that political activity by the Navy may 
violate U.S. law.

Rear Adm. T.L. McCreary, the Navy's chief spokesman, said senior Navy 
officers noticed the contract language in August 2001 and ordered the 
activities halted. The contract was formally corrected, McCreary said, in 
October 2001.

A senior Defense Department official who asked not to be named said the 
Navy amended its contract when it learned that Rendon personnel were 
promising Vieques residents that backing the Navy's position would mean 
future U.S. development dollars. The Navy, the official said, did not have 
authority to make such pledges.

Rendon denied that his staff promised anything like that. Instead, he said, 
the contract changed when the Navy decided that an island referendum on the 
issue was not a good idea.

The Navy, he said, was trying to "open a dialogue . . . into the community 
so that people would know what was going on from the Navy, and not 
necessarily have to depend on outside parties to characterize the Navy's 
intentions."

Under a 2001 decision by President Bush, the Navy quit using Vieques as a 
bombing range in 2003.



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