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As I understand it, the propaganda operation must be "covert" to be illegal. According to Barstow's article, the Pentagon took affirmative steps to assure that the fundamental nature of the relationship with the analysts would not be disclosed.
Participants were instructed not to quote their briefers directly or otherwise describe their contacts with the Pentagon.
In addition, the Pentagon's briefings of the Generals were kept separate from the Pentagon's press briefings. This is obviously evidence that the operation was intended to be covert.
Ultimately the legal issue is likely to come down to whether the Pentagon merely asked the Generals not to volunteer the nature of their Pentagon contacts or whether the Pentagon and the Generals took affirmative actions to conceal them. However, this issue is complicated by the media's stunning abrogation of any duty to ascertain and disclose to viewers and readers the nature of any potential conflicts of interest. In effect, the Pentagon and the Generals appear to have relied upon the media's unwillingness to make these basic inquiries of the Generals. If, in response to such inquiries, the Generals had mislead the media, or if the Pentagon terminated the participation of any General who truthfully responded to such inquiries by disclosing their Pentagon contacts, we'd have an open and shut case of a covert propaganda operation.
If, at the end of the day, the media was content to faithfully peddle Pentagon propaganda and ignore troubling signs that the Generals were coordinating with the Pentagon in a propaganda operation, the Pentagon and our government can argue that they could not have reasonably expected to have concealed the contacts from a media professionally obliged to reveal conflicts of interest and restrict the analysts they employed to truly independent analysts. But the media did not apply to the analysts the same requirements applied to reporters and correspondents for disclosing potential conflicts of interest, and the Pentagon, it appears, in effect relied upon the media's negligence and unprofessionalism and was willing to exploit it.
As troubling as the Pentagon's propaganda operation is, it is even more troubling to consider the possibility that the media was a willing and eager conduit, if not a knowing participant in the operation. Governments will, by their nature, attempt to propagandize, even in the face of laws prohibiting covert propaganda operations. We rely upon the media to reveal and report such illegalities, and to assure that they are indeed presenting independent analysis rather than propaganda. As Glenn has so amply demonstrated, the media completely failed to do this, and the failure appears to have been more a product of conscious disregard by the media for its duty rather than mere inadvertence or negligence.
