Fed by their masters, Western media toe the line

BUZZ NOTE:  I wish to make it absolutely clear that right from the beginning I did not and have NEVER taken sides in the Ukraine conflict.  I have both Russian and Ukrainian blood in my veins - My father was born in White Russia and my mother was born in Kiev (as it was then spelled), Ukraine, and they did not meet until both had immigrated to Canada.  Ever since I was a law student I have known that there are bound to be at least two sides to a story - our very first lecture was by the law school dean who told us that if we were not capable of knowing and understanding the argument of the other side of a dispute we might just as well walk out that door and never come back.  I choose neither side but I believe that the "other side of the story" (and where is Paul Harvey with "the rest of the story"?) is ignored by most, and so how can an intelligent decision be based on only knowing one side of a story?  

S E E D E D   C O N T E N T

Fed by their masters, Western media toe the line

Pipes at the landfall facilities of the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline are pictured in Lubmin, Germany, March 8, 2022. [Photo/Agencies]

The incredulity of the Western media seemingly knows no ends. Increasingly, having itself swallowed 'hook, line and sinker' the propaganda fed to it by Western politicians, it simply parrots their untruths.

Of the Russia-Ukraine conflict everything must be viewed through a black and white duality. There is unanimous agreement that Russia represents 'pure evil,' having launched an unprovoked attack on an 'innocent' Ukraine, while NATO is viewed as entirely virtuous, riding to the rescue of a beleaguered people. All seem to sing from a same song sheet, in the same key.

No mention of context is ever made, NATO's ever moving further eastward in violation of promises made to the then Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, that the bloc would not advance even an inch eastward. There is silence regarding the West's role in the violent overthrow, through the 2014 'color revolution,' of the democratically elected government of Viktor Yanukovych, so to install a government more compliant to Western demands.

The bias in reporting is most clearly seen in analysis of two recent events.

The first of these is the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines. First, the docile Western media spun the concocted story, fed to them by their political masters, that it was Russia who had destroyed the pipelines, so to starve western Europe of energy. When it was pointed out that any such action taken by Russia would be entirely illogical, given that Russia had total control of the energy flow and could have simply turned it off at any time without destroying the expensive infrastructure they had just put in place, that game was up and another yarn had to be spun.

The next story had a group of Ukrainians, unbeknown of course to their government, who would never condone such illegal actions in international waters, hiring a yacht then sending some frogmen down 85 metres, to attach sufficient explosive to destroy the pipelines with their thick surrounding concrete protection.

When this again was called out as being farcical, with no more stories to be had, Western media turned to silence on the topic, consigning it to being a historical curiosity.

Of course the famous, or infamous to many, veteran journalist Seymour Hersh, having received information, let the real story be known. The US with Norwegian cooperation, he charged, under the cover of the Baltops Naval exercise had set the explosives to the pipelines, later to be remotely detonated, when they were no longer present in the region.

Hersh was predictably lambasted for his reliance on 'an anonymous source,' as though anyone with inside knowledge of the operation would reveal themselves, having seen the fate of Assange, Manning and Snowden! Despite being one of the giants of 20th century journalism, Hersh was largely ignored, or belittled by his profession's current minnows. Attacking him, they remained silent as to what he charged.

Now in another act of environmental vandalism the Nova Kakovka has been destroyed. Western media spent little time in pointing their finger of accusation at Russia, who supposedly carried out the destruction to stop, the much vaunted, but little seen, Ukrainian spring offensive.

The real beneficiaries of the dam's collapse have been not however been Russia but rather Ukraine.

Politically the terrorist act has provided another opportunity to paint Russia darkly, while militarily the act has again favoured Ukraine. First, it released massive amounts of water stored behind the dam which presented a hindrance to Ukraine forces launching any attack in that zone. Second, by flooding downstream it destroyed Russian armoured front lines; fortified trenches, concrete spikes and minefields, meant to repel any Ukrainian attack.

Further, the explosion again runs counter to Russia's interests in that it threatens water supplies to the arid Crimean peninsula, in Russian hands since 2014.

Finally, it threatens Russia's ability to manage the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, raising the possibility of a meltdown due to lack of water needed for cooling the reactors.

Ukraine had even threatened to blow up the dam, something ironically reported in the Washington Post, but now ignored. Tests were even carried out by US supplied HIMARS missiles recklessly fired into the dam's floodgates. https://archive.md/hMkJC 'The test was a success,' boasted Ukrainian Maj Gen Andriy Kovalchuk.

Ukraine carried out such actions as the dam was under Russian control, which begs the question, if the dam was under Russian control, and the idea was to use the volume of water to thwart a proposed Ukrainian advance, why blow the dam, rather than just open the floodgates?

Falling in lockstep the Western media, raising none of these questions, instead just amplify the information fed them by their political leaders. Little wonder that in the West trust in the media, along with that of politicians, has plummeted to unprecedented depths.

It has well been said that, 'the first casualty in war is truth.'

John Queripel is a Newcastle, Australia, based writer, historian and social commentator.

The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of China Daily and China Daily website.