‘Decoding The Language of War’ – Introduction Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Modern wars and language.
Every American or British-led military operation, especially after World War I, has had a
productive effect over the English language. This contribution has been larger in recent
times, especially after Vietnam. The war on terror, or war against terrorism, from
September 11
th
to the end of Operation Iraqi Freedom (although the war on terror is still
not over), has created a new dictionary of terms and expressions that have - once again -
enriched the English language. There are many ways to explain this vast lexical
contribution and many reasons to suppose that the process of word-creation is only at its
beginning.
The main cause that has led to the knowledge of this sub-division of language is the
development of the news mass media in rapidly providing world coverage - CNN effect is
the term chosen to describe the fascination and disruption created by extensive, live
television presence in combat zones. Every word pronounced by a military or a political
leader is broadcast all around the world just one minute after it is uttered, and since war is
still not over and the media keep evolving, new terms and expressions will be inevitably
coined and then widespread and accepted by world citizens.
The aim of the thesis is to analyze this trend and decode every new term of this part of
language in order to make it clear for every type of reader. In order to do that, the work
includes many subjects: journalistic language, social sciences, social psychology,
contemporary history and, above all, linguistics.
‘Decoding The Language of War’ – Introduction Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Being a field that does change frequently, it has to be circumscribed, at least in time.
Two dates are set to delimit the period of war operations, between March 20
th
- day of the
beginning of war operations in Iraq - and April 9
th
- day of the troops’ first entrance into
Baghdad. Inevitably, there are many references to other events, especially to the days
immediately before and after the substantial conflict and the period between the terror
attack against the New York World Trade Center (September 11
th
, 2001) and the end of
Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan against the Talebans (December 2001).
Structure.
The thesis is divided into four Chapters. Each focuses on a different feature of the
language of war. In Chapter 1 the subject is the media. In the first section some changes in
the news media structure are analyzed in order to explain the media choices in covering the
war on terror. In this part both the last definitions of the language of war are taken into
consideration. The second section of Chapter 1 is a specific analysis of International
newspaper structures because the newspapers are the media chosen as the main point of
reference for the thesis.
Chapter 2 is about a pair of important historical and literary British figures: Winston
Churchill and George Orwell. The former is quite significant for his strong relationship
with the English language and for the well-known use he made of it, especially during
World War II (second meaning of language of war). George W. Bush has been inspired by
this strong use of language exerted by the famous British Prime Minister and has
demonstrated it in his speeches. Orwell on the contrary is analyzed for his contribution to
the English language made famous in his novel NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR. Actually many
words of Orwell’s invented language – Newspeak – have much in common with the
contemporary language of war (third definition).
‘Decoding The Language of War’ – Introduction Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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The third Chapter is about the main sources of the language of war. Military and
political contributions are herein discussed together with some of the most common
language features: metaphors, euphemisms, misinformation, propaganda and lies, which
are generally included in the category of the weapons of mass deception. Then the process
of language decoding takes place but, before entering the last step of the thesis, a brief
chronology of military events during Operation Iraqi Freedom is provided.
Chapter 4 has a particular structure and therefore quite a strange layout. About two
hundred terms are analyzed, compared and quoted from newspaper articles and other
sources. The large amount of words has led to a practical division in thematic paragraphs
although many of these terms could be undoubtedly associated to more than one group.
After having decoded the language of war, some considerations about its future are
discussed in the conclusions.
Considerations.
The hub of the thesis is Chapter 4. It is the longest, the most elaborated and probably the
most interesting of all sections, but the importance of the other Chapters should not be
underestimated. The thesis is structured to be an easy-access instrument for every scholar
or reader who wants to understand this sector of the English language. Therefore, Chapter
1 with its continuous reference to the power of the media provides some hints of the war
report mechanism and specific knowledge of the structures of international and electronic
newspapers. They are the most reliable physical means that have been bringing the
language of war into everyone’s home. Many scholars and experts have said that the
knowledge of history is necessary to understand how mankind will behave. This is the
reason why Churchill and Orwell have found relevant space in the work.
‘Decoding The Language of War’ – Introduction Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Actually what is written after Chapter 2 is more difficult and less clear to understand if one
does not pay attention to these historical figures. Chapter 3 is a kind of guide to discover
what is hidden behind the words and how the mechanism of term-creation works. Chapter
4 therefore stands inside a well-outlined background and every term can be discussed
without contextualizing it every time.
Experts’ contributions.
Some information was collected with the help of Internationally renowned experts. They
have been helpful in clarifying doubts about the subjects and in finding reliable sources.
They are Justin Huggler, Francis Beer, Phillip Knightley and Robert Fisk. Most of their
contributions were given by answering questions about different topics.
Justin Huggler is the Jerusalem correspondent for the British newspaper ‘The
Independent’. He has been living for years in a country where war and violence are the
main news subjects. His help is about the comprehension of journalistic language and war
reporting reliability.
Francis Beer is a professor of political science at the University of Colorado, Boulder
(CO, U.S.A). He has just published a book entitled MEANING OF WAR AND PEACE. He is
also interested in the subject and has given useful contributions, especially about media
coverage during the war on terror and political use of language in Chapters 1 and 3.
Phillip Knightley is the author of ten books, including THE FIRST CASUALTY and is one
of the world's most distinguished investigative journalists. He is one of only two journalists
to have been twice named ‘Journalist of the Year’ in the British Press Awards. His
contribution is more general; he answered questions about the language of war, war
reporting, and politics and gave important reference as how reliable sources can be found.
‘Decoding The Language of War’ – Introduction Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Robert Fisk is Middle East correspondent for ‘The Independent’. He was in Baghdad
during Operation Iraqi Freedom and normally lives in Beirut (Lebanon). He is Britain's
most awarded foreign correspondent, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the United Nations
Press Award, and has seven times been named ‘British International Journalist of the
Year’. He is the author of many authoritative books including PITY THE NATION: THE
ABDUCTION OF LEBANON. His contribution is about all the topics analysed in the thesis.
Questions and answers and other pieces of the interviews are noted along the work where
the reference is necessary while the entire interviews are posted in the appendix at the end
of the thesis.
Research methodology.
Since most of the bibliography of the thesis consists of online documentation, the
researching phase was quite delicate. Online versions of International newspapers were
taken as the main sources.
A selection of American and British newspapers was made including tabloids and
broadsheets (see Chapter 1.2). This specific decision was taken in order to cover the largest
area of English language varieties. Excluding the solid newspaper-made basis, there were
other difficulties in looking for reliable sources in a jungle of self-made information. In the
beginning the subject of the thesis was still vague and every search attempt gave too many
results to be considered. It was quite hard to detangle this mess (just remember that anyone
can insert their own material online). Many efforts were made to overcome this obstacle
and much time spent in differing between bad and reliable sources.
‘Decoding The Language of War’ – Introduction Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Great help came from F. Beer and P. Knightley, who addressed the research in a useful
direction, providing URLs, books titles and ghost links to interesting reliable essays about
the language of war. Finally, when the body of the thesis text was almost ready, a second,
more accurate and direct step was made in the research of material to fill every actual gap
of the work. The aim of this further stage was to include the widest possible network. The
‘Google’ search engine – web site: www.google.com - was selected (searching
3,307,998,701 web pages). The advanced search queries were:
ξ Iraq AND (language of war) OR (war of words) OR (military language) OR (war
reporting) OR (collateral language) OR (doublespeak)
About 99,400 pages were found while organizing the results according to their relevance
with the query, it was interesting to see how the first 50 pages had already been taken into
consideration. Excluding all the sites where the relevance percentage was under 20%, only
a few documents were still interesting and complementary to the work. Knightley, Huggler
and Fisk’s answers solved any last doubt.
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Chapter 1
Media Choices
1.1 Media Coverage
On September 11
th
, 2001 in the precise instant when the second hijacked plane hit the
South Tower of the World Trade Centre in New York, there was a sudden, unexpected
change in the standard of living for mankind. This was valid also for news mass media.
People had seen something similar to what had happened only in some disaster-movies,
and still have difficulty in accepting those dramatic images as true. The evolution of the
mass media and the improvements in technical skills, as well as the strong will of terrorists
to show their power to the whole world, have given the population new fears and new
doubts. Nothing will be the same after September 11
th
and the media are being asked to
report every step of what is to be known as the war against terrorism or war on terror.
A hijacked airplane in front of millions of viewers hits Tower South of World Trade Centre;
a new era begins
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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In a few lines Professor Francis A. Beer of University of Colorado explains this change in
the behaviour of the media:
‘The change in speed of communication over the past fifty years has produced a
revolution. For the first time in human history the shot was heard around the world. [...] It
begins with technology. The time required to communicate from anywhere is now
measured in seconds. Global communication has always been possible – if you were
willing to wait. But waiting only seconds brings new meaning to “global communication”
and creates a new human reality’
1
Terrorism has always existed, but now it is a public affair. The media deal with public
opinion and try to obtain agreement from it. This is a crucial point; public opinion has to be
won whatever it costs. American National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, after Bin
Laden’s first videotape was broadcast around the world, asked the presidents of all
American networks to interrupt the flow of information. She justified this unusual request
saying that the Talebans’ broadcast might contain messages for Al Quaeda sleeper
associates in America. The reaction of CNN was quiet; it accepted the request, probably
because it felt the responsibility of being the first international news channel in the world.
Therefore, on one hand this request by the Bush administration is an almost unacceptable
but necessary act of protection for the population; on the other hand, American citizens had
and still have the right to hear the voice of the enemy and see his face. If the enemy was
invisible, he could spread the fear he has already generated. Walter Cronkite, a famous
American anchorman said that the media have to inform with all the news they hold in
order to give the people the opportunity of judging the government’s activity. This role
does not change, in times of war or peace.
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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The situation remains quite confusing. With all these fears, doubts, rules and criticism,
there was a sudden change in the most important media structures and a thick fog started
covering the borders of good and reliable journalism and rendering them indefinite.
Although every journalist says that the media should provide correct news in the correct
way, and everyone agrees with the idea of the sovereignty of free information, which has
to resist every outer pressure, many networks now depend on their governments. Justin
Huggler answered a question about newspapers reliability, and about the differences
between tabloids and broadsheet papers (for a further explanation of these terms see
Chapter 1.2).
QUESTION. ‘[…] There are many differences (between tabloids and broadsheets). One is
about focusing. Tabloids (‘The Mirror’ above all) deal with human and social stories giving
them an exaggerated dramatic turn. The most of ‘real’ news seems to come from the
briefings released by the agencies. How reliable are tabloids in dealing with military
reports? How much difference between a broadsheet and a tabloid? In better words is it
possible that some newspapers are more fact oriented than others?’
ANSWER. ‘In the end, wars are human stories. Wars are all about people getting killed --
often innocent civilians. So the focus of the tabloids on this is by no means a bad thing.
That is the reality of war, and not the policy decisions made by men in comfortable offices
thousands of miles from the action. I wouldn't accept that the agency briefings constitute the
‘real’ news. They contain what governments are saying, which is often not true. A tabloid
reporter wading through mud with bullets whizzing past him to interview a family on the
front line can find out more about what is really going on than any number of broadsheet
newspaper reporters going to a press conference.
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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The problem with the tabloids is that sometimes, in some papers, they are guilty of
exaggerating to make the story more dramatic, as you say. But some broadsheets reporters
have been know to do this too. In the end, you would hope the broadsheets are more
reliable. But I would usually be inclined to trust a report from the frontline more than a
government press briefing, whichever paper they're in.
2
’
The best choice seemed to follow the war in the most traditional way: through international
newspapers, without differing between tabloids and broadsheets but paying more attention
to the reports that came from the frontline. Government press briefings are indeed useful
because - being the voice of the political and military power - they are full of relevant
expressions and terms for the linguistic part of the thesis. Clearly no statement about the
reliability of some newspapers and the consequent untrustworthiness of other sources can
be taken as universal.
There are different points of view and the only behaviour to observe is reporting each
opinion given about the argument. For Phillip Knightley, another noted expert in the field
of war reporting, the difference between governmental and frontline-based reports does not
exist. Asked about the topic, he answered: ‘neither is reliable. Both are full of propaganda.
The point of embedding is to make the war correspondent identify psychologically with the
soldiers he is embedded with. He will tell the soldiers' story. The government will tell the
government's story. Who is left to tell the victims' story? Yet the victim is at the heart of
the war. One hundred years ago ninety per cent of all war casualties were soldiers. Today
ninety per cent of all war casualties are civilians. Yet war reporting continues to
concentrate on the soldiers
3
’.
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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So the decision was hardly made. Newspapers are the basis of the research in both
directions; government press briefings are generally considered as a good source for war
terms. Frontline sourced reports, indeed are commonly studied to follow military
operations and to show how new terms entered the common language. Sometimes the two
fields are interchangeable. The better work made by newspapers in war coverage is not
enough to explain this delicate choice. A question is still bound to be asked: why
newspapers of all media? A first note is about the nature of newspapers. It is not totally
correct to say that the research is based on newspapers, because for many reasons the
material analysed comes from the electronic versions of international broadsheets and
tabloids. The online version of ‘The Independent’
4
is the first, main source while ‘The
Times’, ‘The New York Times’, ‘The Daily Mirror’, ‘The Sun’, ‘The New York Post’,
‘The Washington Post’ and ‘USA Today’
5
electronic versions (from now, under the
definition of e-newspapers) have been of great help in confirming and enriching the
material collected (for the differences between online and paper-based newspapers see
Chapter 1.2). Many other web sites have had a role in the creation of this path but their
presence is less massive and their contributions are noted along the text. In the end the
best answer for the choice of newspapers could be this one: newspapers are more fact
oriented than all the other media.
The thesis research includes many references to the first stage of the war on terror.
Since the new behaviour of the media is a subject that is still being discussed by many
authoritative men of social sciences and linguistics as well as by journalists and experts in
international journalism, the only way to find paper-based discussions and complete data
relative to the subject is to go back to September 11
th
and its aftermath.
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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In the numerous documents about September 11
th
, one essay entitled ‘Return to
Normalcy?’ confirms the theory about newspapers fact orientation. It is a profound and
detailed analysis of how media have covered the war on terror in the period that goes from
September 11
th
, to the end of the military operation in Afghanistan. The essay is provided
by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, an initiative by journalists concerned about the
standards of the news media. It begins saying:
‘ The news media reacted to the terrorist attacks of September 11 with great care about not
getting ahead of the facts. [...] In the beginning, solid sourcing and factualness dominated
the coverage of bombings and their aftermath, according to the study conducted by the
Project for Excellence in Journalism with Princeton Survey Research Associates. [...] As
the story moved to the war in Afghanistan, however, analysis and opinion swelled – so
much that the level of factualness declined to levels lower than those seen in the middle of
the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal.’
6
With this low attention to facts, the choice is even more delicate and difficult. But after a
long analysis of the data the essay reports its conclusion: ‘ newspapers stuck to the facts
more than television. In September 85% of what appeared in the papers was strictly
factual. On television, it was 20 points lower – 64%. Over time, newspapers saw this level
of strictly factual accounts decline, but even at its lowest it was higher than broadcast’
7
.
Chapter I – Media Choices Pietro de Perini 450153/LL
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Therefore newspapers remained the most factual, balanced and widely sourced of any
news outlet studied and they also changed their covering less as the crisis shifted in topic
over time. Reading this article other doubts come to surface; Justin Huggler solved them.
QUESTION. ‘(Reading the article by the project for excellence in journalism) it was
interesting to see how Newspapers remained the most factual, balanced and widely sourced
of any news media studied. Why newspapers of all media? Is it a matter of freedom, of
language, of audiences?’
ANSWER. ‘One major advantage is time. Television and radio reporting these days is all
about speed. The main onus for reporters is to get the story on screen/air as fast as possible.
This means there is less time to stand back and consider what you are saying. Newspaper
reporters and editors have more time to think about what they're going to say. Also there is
a huge advantage of space to go into detail. Most TV & radio reports are just a few minutes
long: that is only 200 or 300 words at the very most. A newspaper can devote 1,200 words
to the same subject.
8
’
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