You're In The Army Now: Message Force Multipliers

Want to multiply your message?

Try some army-issue ‘message force multipliers’. 

In 2008 the New York Times again returned to the issue of hidden public relations agendas with a series of stories in which Barstow showed how the Pentagon was using retired military officers to deliver the miltary’s message on the war in Iraq and its counterterrorism efforts.  

 

Barstow described how the officers were presented on the news programs and independent consultants offering unvarnished opinions.
After being stonewalled by the Pentagon for two years, the Times eventually sued to obtain records about the Defense Department’s use of retired military officers.

 

Barstow found evidence that the officers’ appearances on television were not happenstance, but a carefully coordinated effort of what the Pentagon called ‘message force multipliers’.
Sullivan, J (May/June 2011), ‘True Enough: The Second Age of PR’, Columbia Journalism Review.

Horribly unethical? Makes you think who you are really listening to on the news doesn’t it?

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