Information at War. Philip Seib

as well as by information they have acquired over time about wars of the past and international affairs generally. Whether their perspective on the conflict primarily reflects sadness or anger or jubilation or nonchalance, whether they decide to turn away or desire to learn more, their response might depend on the vividness, thoroughness, and eloquence with which the information that they receive is presented.

      Once individuals have digested information and developed a position on the war (varying in firmness from person to person), they might want to do something about what they have learned. If they choose to act, they must decide what that should entail. The information might stir passionate support or opposition, which could lead citizens into the streets to demonstrate their feelings. Or it could shape how they will vote in the next election. The range of options is wide. Once received, information does not simply vanish; it lingers in the mind, with effects of variable significance over time.¹

Sources of information are diverse. The news media and governments shape messages according to their own interests and standards. Additional contributors might include family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, and others who populate one’s social milieu.² Conversations at the dinner table, over the backyard fence, or at the workplace water cooler are building blocks of opinion, as are an individual’s religious and ethical beliefs and life experiences. Depending on its quality and source, information can make war real even to those physically distant from the fighting. It can perhaps motivate them to learn more and decide about taking particular action.

      A nation’s collective experience of war can affect receptivity to information about conflict. For many Americans, more than the citizens of any other major power, war is something of an abstraction, a remote phenomenon that has rarely touched the homeland. With a few exceptions – such as the 9/11 attacks in 2001 – the last time a foreign adversary brought combat to the American mainland was during the War of 1812. In terms of casualties, the most devastating conflict for Americans was their own civil war, which ended in 1865.

      Many other countries have not been as fortunate in escaping war and the suffering that accompanies it. The following events took place less than a century ago, all within a short span of time: the rape of Nanking, the London Blitz, the battle of Stalingrad, the Holocaust, and the obliteration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They are among the countless examples of humankind’s capacity to destroy. Beyond the “big” wars that have occupied the world’s stage, episodes of intrastate conflict, genocide, ethnic cleansing, and terrorism have taken place with such frequency that they sometimes escape the world’s attention. That should not happen. When governments and publics fail to acknowledge and respond to any such bloodletting, the moral fabric of humanity is damaged. News media, civil society institutions, and even individuals have responsibilities as sentinels of conscience.³ Disseminating information, whether by a global television network or in an individual’s tweet, can be effective in stirring consideration of the moral and practical implications of conflict.

      War is a sad, inescapable reality. Its persistence as a societal phenomenon underscores the need to devise better ways to prevent conflict or bring it to a quick end. Such responsiveness depends in part on information flowing sufficiently swiftly and broadly for it to stir the scruples of states and their citizens. In 1938, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain abandoned Czechoslovakia to Nazi Germany rather than intervene in what he called “a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing.”⁴ Today, more than at any previous time, the technology-enabled availability of information ensures that there should be no people “of whom we know nothing” and whom we abandon. Even if people are living in remote villages of Sudan or Myanmar, information about them – perhaps even appeals coming online directly from them – can promptly reach much of the world.

The way information is delivered to its audience is crucial. Eloquent words always have power, but perhaps not as much as when they are accompanied by sound or images. The impact of information also depends in part on the context in which the information is received. What makes information memorable? What aspects of it stir people? What elements of information open pathways to taking action and influencing policy?

      This book will take us up to the present day … and then look beyond. But to begin, it is important to consider several past cases of the relationship between information and war.

Murrow in London

      “This is London.” With those words, CBS correspondent Edward R. Murrow began his reports from the British capital in 1940 and 1941. London was under the aerial siege, known simply as “the Blitz.” Determined to batter England’s defenses prior to launching a cross-Channel invasion, Adolf Hitler’s Luftwaffe massed as many as 1,000 aircraft on a single raid over London and other cities. The Blitz resulted in approximately 43,000 British civilians killed and another 139,000 wounded.

      Beginning in September 1940, the relentlessness of the Blitz accentuated its impact – attacks night after night for two months. Afterward, there was more bombing, less predictable in its timing but no less ferocious, that continued until May 1941. Later in the war, there would be still more attacks on London, including by the Germans’ devastating V-1 flying bombs and V-2 rockets in 1944 and early 1945.

      But the Blitz during the early years of the war was the real test of Britain’s ability to survive. The breadth of the devastation was stunning. During the first six weeks of the Blitz, 16,000 London houses were destroyed, 60,000 were seriously damaged, and 300,000 people needed temporary housing. One Londoner in six was homeless at some point during the nine months of the Blitz.⁵ The world had never seen anything like this massive use of air power against civilians.

      For many Americans, “It has nothing to do with us” was a prevailing sentiment as the Blitz began. The United States had bailed out European allies during the Great War less than 30 years earlier and most Americans had little interest in again sending their soldiers across the ocean. Let the Europeans clean up their own mess. Many Americans were merely spectators, intent on keeping their distance.

Radio, however, narrowed that distance. Murrow was determined that his countrymen must not ignore battered Britain, because if Britain fell, the United States would inevitably have to face Hitler on its own. He brought the war into their living-rooms with vivid and sometimes poetic descriptions of what was going on around him. He reflected Londoners’ scorn for the enemy; the bombing, he said, “makes headlines, kills people, and smashes property, but it doesn’t win wars … . Things will have to get much worse before anyone here is likely to consider it too much to bear.”⁶ Londoners’ toughness was a theme that ran through many of Murrow’s broadcasts. He said: “I’ve seen some horrible sights in this city during these days and nights, but not once have I heard man, woman, or child suggest that Britain should throw in her hand. These people are angry.”⁷

      Virtually all of Murrow’s reports gave his listeners a sense of what it was like to be in the midst of the Blitz. In one broadcast, he spoke of what he had seen during “several hours of observation from a rooftop” while the bombing was under way, and in another he said: “The air raid is still on. I shall speak rather softly, because three or four people are sleeping on mattresses on the floor of this studio.” He told of the resolve of firefighters, police officers, railroad workers, and others who combed rubble for the dead and the still-living, and dealt with unexploded bombs. “Military medals,” said Murrow, “are getting rather meaningless in this war. So many acts of heroism are being performed by men who were just doing their daily job.”⁸

      He also noted little things. He described the “rainbow bending over the battered and smoking East End just when the ‘all-clear’ sounded.” He told of standing in front of a smashed grocery store and hearing a dripping inside. He investigated and found that “two cans of peaches had been drilled clean through by flying glass and the juice was dripping down onto the floor.” And in the background, there were symbols of resilience and continuity: “The tolling of Big Ben can be heard in the intervals of the gunfire.” He was trying, he said, to give a sense of “the life in London these days – the courage of the people; the flash and roar of the guns rolling