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White propaganda is fine and even necessary at times. There was plenty of it by western countries during WWII and the Cold War. It's that this propaganda conta

White propaganda is fine and even necessary at times. There was plenty of it by western countries during WWII and the Cold War. It's that this propaganda contained false information on both the source and the details that is problematic. Black propaganda is wrong. We don't need it to win, and when it is exposed it undermines our credibility, which undermines our white propaganda and efforts to contrast our values with the values of our adversaries. I take a similar stand with politicians. I'd rather vote for an honest person that I disagree with on a majority of issues than a dishonest one that shares my political party. For especially honest politicians I go out of my way to vote for them. Trust in government is paramount. The rest breeds corruption and eventual democratic decline.

hutzlibu 6y ago
"There was plenty of it by western countries during WWII and the Cold War." There were also plenty of atrocities commited by western countries during WW2 and after. Napalm, atomic bombs on civilians, ... And George Orwell based his 1984 of his experience working for the BBC in WW2, btw. In other words, no, I don't see a valid need for propaganda in democratic societies. And the role of the military should be to simply defend the societey, not influence them in a sneaky way.
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  > There were also plenty of atrocities commited by western countries during WW2 and after. Napalm, atomic bombs on civilians, ... No, Japan and Germany started war with the western allies. Blame Japan and Germany for the atrocities.
  - speeder 6y ago
    You don't want to go down that path, because will result in endless finger-pointing. Why Japan joined WW2? Because they were playing catch up with European powers and doing what they did to Japan a some time earlier, and were trying to avoid the fate of China (see Opium wars) Why Germany and Italy were heavily involved in both WW? Because they were the only European country with no colonies, in part due to their recent unification (specially Italy in this case), and the other European countries were screwing with them. But... why? And so on, you will end with a huge chain of whys and finger pointing until you blame God for creating Adam.
    - C1sc0cat 6y ago
      Japan was trying to do to China what the western powers did - but with more actual killing. For China WW2 started in the mid 30's
    - jcranmer 6y ago
      > Why Japan joined WW2? Because they were playing catch up with European powers and doing what they did to Japan a some time earlier, and were trying to avoid the fate of China (see Opium wars) That is not a very accurate take of Japanese involvement in WW2. Japan was planning several wars of naked territorial expansion during WW2, invading China twice in the 1930s, calling off an invasion of the Soviet Union after a border incident they started didn't go their way, demanding that Vichy France hand over French Indochina, and of course its very well-known invasion of US, British, and Dutch colonies to better secure needed supplies for its ongoing war with China. By WW2, Japan didn't see itself as playing "catch-up" (that period would have been the Meiji period, about 70 years prior to WW2), and instead saw itself as racially superior; nor did the European powers see Japan as an inferior power playing catch-up, but instead as a competitor and likely future adversary. > Why Germany and Italy were heavily involved in both WW? Because they were the only European country with no colonies, in part due to their recent unification (specially Italy in this case), and the other European countries were screwing with them. Italian Somaliland, Triplotania, Cyrenaica, Eritrea, German West Africa, German Southwest Africa, German East Africa, German New Guinea, German Samoa. (Germany was especially uninventive with its colony names). Italy was enticed into the war by promise of territory, but the promised territory was Sudtirol and the Dalmatian coast, which would be part of Italy proper and not any Italian colonies. Japan itself joined the war primarily to steal Germany's colonies in the Pacific, which they did.
    - redis_mlc 6y ago
      Your post is simply nonsense. You've repeated the excuses of the aggressors without acknowledging that Germany and Japan enslaved and deliberately starved civilians on the scale of tens of millions. The League of Nations told Japan to leave Manchuria long before WW2 started. There was no confusion on any side. Just so HN readers understand what happened, Japan tried to build "New Tokyo" in inhabited areas of China - in other words, ethnic cleansing long before the term became well-known in the Balkans wars. I suggest you re-study pre-WW2 and WW2 history and formulate a more solid argument.
jmnicolas 6y ago
Honest, successful. For a politician you can only pick one.
- arethuza 6y ago
  Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan are examples of politicians that I mostly disagree with their views but I've never regarded them as personally dishonest.
  - gruez 6y ago
    What about the whole war on drugs that Regan started?
    - arethuza 6y ago
      That's what I meant by "personally" honest - their governments they led had all kinds of problems but I don't think that was caused by fundamental dishonesty by those individuals.
    - symkat 6y ago
      I thought Nixon started the war on drugs?
      - justinclift 6y ago
        Yep, seems like it was Nixon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs
  - 542354234235 6y ago
    Reagan secretly sold illegal weapons to Iran to fund bloody coups and death squads in South America. I’d say secretly committing treason is a pretty big lie.
  - davidwitt415 6y ago
    Check out 'Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine' as a counter-example. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan_Speaks_Out_Against_Socialized_Medicine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan_Speaks_Out_Again... Also worth noting is the October Surprise, where Reagan foiled negotiations with Iran to bring US hostages back, in order to help his election chances. https://jacobinmag.com/2020/1/ronald-reagan-october-surprise-carter-iran-hostage-crisis-conspiracy https://jacobinmag.com/2020/1/ronald-reagan-october-surprise...
numpad0 6y ago
> White propaganda is fine and even necessary at times. That’s a remarkably low friction coefficient for a figurative slope
- TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
  We live in an information environment that is wide open. With the internet, any of our enemies can launch psyops campaigns against us at almost no cost. In such an environment, their campaigns must at least be countered, or else we would be steamrolled.
  - mistermann 6y ago
    That's a frequently broadcast message lately isn't it. :)
  - ihm 6y ago
    And you think the local military is your friend who has your best interests at heart?
RobertoG 6y ago
>>"We don't need it to win, and when it is exposed it undermines our credibility, which undermines our white propaganda and efforts to contrast our values with the values of our adversaries." Fair enough. Now, the only problem left is to determine who is "we".
- emilecantin 6y ago
  It's pretty well defined in various parts of the Canadian Armed Forces' regulations, and in this document in particular: https://www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/services/benefits-military/defence-ethics/policies-publications/code-value-ethics.html https://www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/service... > At all times and in all places, DND employees and CF members shall fulfil their commitments in a manner that best serves Canada, its people, its parliamentary democracy, DND and the CF So from the CAF's point of view, "we" is "Canada, its people, its parliamentary democracy, the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces" (sidenote: The Canadian military was recently renamed from "Canadian Forces" (CF) to "Canadian Armed Forces" (CAF), thus the differences in acronyms.)
  - RobertoG 6y ago
    I don't know. Don't take my comment too seriously, but if I was Canadian, I think these guys sending me fake administrative notes and filling the night with wolf sounds would qualify more like "them" than "we".
LinuxBender 6y ago
Propaganda never stops when a war does. If you would like a great documentary on this, look for Century of the Self [1]. It explains how Edward Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud, taught governments and companies how to control people in peace time. Apologies in advance, it is a black-and-white film. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s
- therockspush 6y ago
  Good recommendation. I would add most of the stuff by Adam Curtis to this list. Been pretty eye opening for me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Curtis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Curtis
davidwitt415 6y ago
'White propaganda is fine and even necessary at times' reads just like 'One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.'

hutzlibu 6y ago

"There was plenty of it by western countries during WWII and the Cold War." There were also plenty of atrocities commited by western countries during WW2 and after. Napalm, atomic bombs on civilians, ... And George Orwell based his 1984 of his experience working for the BBC in WW2, btw. In other words, no, I don't see a valid need for propaganda in democratic societies. And the role of the military should be to simply defend the societey, not influence them in a sneaky way.

redis_mlc 6y ago
> There were also plenty of atrocities commited by western countries during WW2 and after. Napalm, atomic bombs on civilians, ... No, Japan and Germany started war with the western allies. Blame Japan and Germany for the atrocities.
- speeder 6y ago
  You don't want to go down that path, because will result in endless finger-pointing. Why Japan joined WW2? Because they were playing catch up with European powers and doing what they did to Japan a some time earlier, and were trying to avoid the fate of China (see Opium wars) Why Germany and Italy were heavily involved in both WW? Because they were the only European country with no colonies, in part due to their recent unification (specially Italy in this case), and the other European countries were screwing with them. But... why? And so on, you will end with a huge chain of whys and finger pointing until you blame God for creating Adam.
  - C1sc0cat 6y ago
    Japan was trying to do to China what the western powers did - but with more actual killing. For China WW2 started in the mid 30's
  - jcranmer 6y ago
    > Why Japan joined WW2? Because they were playing catch up with European powers and doing what they did to Japan a some time earlier, and were trying to avoid the fate of China (see Opium wars) That is not a very accurate take of Japanese involvement in WW2. Japan was planning several wars of naked territorial expansion during WW2, invading China twice in the 1930s, calling off an invasion of the Soviet Union after a border incident they started didn't go their way, demanding that Vichy France hand over French Indochina, and of course its very well-known invasion of US, British, and Dutch colonies to better secure needed supplies for its ongoing war with China. By WW2, Japan didn't see itself as playing "catch-up" (that period would have been the Meiji period, about 70 years prior to WW2), and instead saw itself as racially superior; nor did the European powers see Japan as an inferior power playing catch-up, but instead as a competitor and likely future adversary. > Why Germany and Italy were heavily involved in both WW? Because they were the only European country with no colonies, in part due to their recent unification (specially Italy in this case), and the other European countries were screwing with them. Italian Somaliland, Triplotania, Cyrenaica, Eritrea, German West Africa, German Southwest Africa, German East Africa, German New Guinea, German Samoa. (Germany was especially uninventive with its colony names). Italy was enticed into the war by promise of territory, but the promised territory was Sudtirol and the Dalmatian coast, which would be part of Italy proper and not any Italian colonies. Japan itself joined the war primarily to steal Germany's colonies in the Pacific, which they did.
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    Your post is simply nonsense. You've repeated the excuses of the aggressors without acknowledging that Germany and Japan enslaved and deliberately starved civilians on the scale of tens of millions. The League of Nations told Japan to leave Manchuria long before WW2 started. There was no confusion on any side. Just so HN readers understand what happened, Japan tried to build "New Tokyo" in inhabited areas of China - in other words, ethnic cleansing long before the term became well-known in the Balkans wars. I suggest you re-study pre-WW2 and WW2 history and formulate a more solid argument.

jmnicolas 6y ago

Honest, successful. For a politician you can only pick one.

arethuza 6y ago
Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan are examples of politicians that I mostly disagree with their views but I've never regarded them as personally dishonest.
- gruez 6y ago
  What about the whole war on drugs that Regan started?
  - arethuza 6y ago
    That's what I meant by "personally" honest - their governments they led had all kinds of problems but I don't think that was caused by fundamental dishonesty by those individuals.
  - symkat 6y ago
    I thought Nixon started the war on drugs?
    - justinclift 6y ago
      Yep, seems like it was Nixon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs
- 542354234235 6y ago
  Reagan secretly sold illegal weapons to Iran to fund bloody coups and death squads in South America. I’d say secretly committing treason is a pretty big lie.
- davidwitt415 6y ago
  Check out 'Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine' as a counter-example. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan_Speaks_Out_Against_Socialized_Medicine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan_Speaks_Out_Again... Also worth noting is the October Surprise, where Reagan foiled negotiations with Iran to bring US hostages back, in order to help his election chances. https://jacobinmag.com/2020/1/ronald-reagan-october-surprise-carter-iran-hostage-crisis-conspiracy https://jacobinmag.com/2020/1/ronald-reagan-october-surprise...

numpad0 6y ago

> White propaganda is fine and even necessary at times. That’s a remarkably low friction coefficient for a figurative slope

TheAdamAndChe 6y ago
We live in an information environment that is wide open. With the internet, any of our enemies can launch psyops campaigns against us at almost no cost. In such an environment, their campaigns must at least be countered, or else we would be steamrolled.
- mistermann 6y ago
  That's a frequently broadcast message lately isn't it. :)
- ihm 6y ago
  And you think the local military is your friend who has your best interests at heart?

RobertoG 6y ago

>>"We don't need it to win, and when it is exposed it undermines our credibility, which undermines our white propaganda and efforts to contrast our values with the values of our adversaries." Fair enough. Now, the only problem left is to determine who is "we".

emilecantin 6y ago
It's pretty well defined in various parts of the Canadian Armed Forces' regulations, and in this document in particular: https://www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/services/benefits-military/defence-ethics/policies-publications/code-value-ethics.html https://www.canada.ca/en/department-national-defence/service... > At all times and in all places, DND employees and CF members shall fulfil their commitments in a manner that best serves Canada, its people, its parliamentary democracy, DND and the CF So from the CAF's point of view, "we" is "Canada, its people, its parliamentary democracy, the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces" (sidenote: The Canadian military was recently renamed from "Canadian Forces" (CF) to "Canadian Armed Forces" (CAF), thus the differences in acronyms.)
- RobertoG 6y ago
  I don't know. Don't take my comment too seriously, but if I was Canadian, I think these guys sending me fake administrative notes and filling the night with wolf sounds would qualify more like "them" than "we".

LinuxBender 6y ago

Propaganda never stops when a war does. If you would like a great documentary on this, look for Century of the Self [1]. It explains how Edward Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud, taught governments and companies how to control people in peace time. Apologies in advance, it is a black-and-white film. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJ3RzGoQC4s

therockspush 6y ago
Good recommendation. I would add most of the stuff by Adam Curtis to this list. Been pretty eye opening for me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Curtis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Curtis

davidwitt415 6y ago

'White propaganda is fine and even necessary at times' reads just like 'One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter.'