War 2.0: perception of war by a media saturated society

Electronic mass media changed the way we perceive world events including mili¬tary conflicts. In the 60–70¬s television conveyed the horrors of Vietnam war to an ordinary American living¬room. Army was quick to learn a lesson so, for the time being, military conflicts began to be or¬chestrated as a television show where good defeats evil in a bloodless fight. The advent of the age of Web 2.0 and diffusion of digital technologies have made it impossible to control media coverage.

Since Vietnam War Public Relations have directly influenced military out­comes and whatever soldiers have done, their commanders should take into consid­eration the way army’s actions will be reflected on television or computer screens.

Until quite recently media coverage was an accelerated, instantaneous infor­mation flow of TV images delivered by a few large companies. It used to be a one­way street, where the audiences were left with few opportunities to find either an alterna­tive point of view or an independent comment. After learning Vietnam’s lessons American military have understood the importance of controlling the media cover­age. Taking into account the overwhelming US fire power, it was relatively easy to turn any war into a kind of television show where real violence and suffering were thoroughly overwritten by the electronic narrative.

1. Baudrillard J. The Gulf War Did Not Take Place. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.