A Taste of their Own “Culture and Wisdom”

The French military is discovering just how much the French media loves to kick people when they’re down. They’ve made so much of a recent ambush that killed 10 French troops in Afghanistan, that they might as well be the Taliban’s press agents. Paris Match even did everything they could to make the failure into a glorious “Life Magazine” photo-essay moment.

J.C. Durbant cites Max Gallo’s article in Le Figaro:

The French army gets a taste of its own media's disloyalty

We know now that the Taliban can win the war in Afghanistan. Not because they have killed ten of our soldiers, or they will win a decisive victory on the ground. But because their military successes will be relayed by the media as a triumph.

(…) Contemporary wars are won not only by standing still.

Max Gallo

Durbant adds:

And it is being provided by this "parade" offered by the enemy.

Geared to excite withdrawal in the manner that al Queda got Zapatero voted in, the attack has proved a rousing success among the thoughtless, preaching press whose intellects are so great that they can only run in one direction.

In fact it’s a portrait of America in 1969 which has come 40 years late to them: the press are doing anything they can to get troops killed for the sake of the journalists’ egos.