Disinformation Follies

ack in the ’80s, the Reagan administration established an elaborate and illegal domestic propaganda apparatus known as the Office of Public Diplomacy for Latin America and the Caribbean. Its covert mission: Sell Congress, the media and the American people on the administration’s war against leftists in Central America. The stated objective: Convince Americans that the Contras are “fighters for freedom in the American tradition” and that the “FSLN [Sandinistas] are evil.”


When the Iran-Contra scandal broke, the Office of Public Diplomacy was dismantled and its unit of Psychological Operations (Psyops) agents sent home to their U.S. Army base at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.


Three administrations—and several enemies—later, Army Psyops agents were again deployed in Washington, again fighting “evil,” but this time from the Pentagon’s new Office of Strategic Influence (OSI). The covert mission: Target foreign media organizations in the Middle East, Asia and Western Europe with disinformation campaigns. The objective: Convince foreign leaders and citizens to support U.S. policy.


The difference this time around is that conscientious Pentagon officials leaked OSI’s plans to the New York Times. A senior Pentagon official put it this way, “Everybody understands using information operations to go after non-friendlies. When people get uncomfortable is when people use the same tools and tactics on friendlies.”