|
|
|
|
Research
assistance by Petra Bartosiewicz. Read James Carey's June
16 Nation editorial for more on problems at the
New York Times. |
robably the most instructive exercise in assessing
Miller's reporting is to compare her with the
Post's Barton
Gellman. You would think the two were in different countries, if not
on different planets. After Miller's "baseball cap" piece appeared,
Gellman wrote an article that politely dismissed her scoop: "Without
further details of the find, experts said, its significance cannot
be assessed." Here are typical Miller headlines from May:
May 21: "U.S. Analysts Link Iraq Labs to Germ Arms"
May 12: "Radioactive Material Found at a Test Site Near
Baghdad"
May 11: "Trailer Is a Mobile Lab Capable of
Turning Out Bioweapons, a Team Says"
May 9: "G.I.'s
Search, Not Alone, In the Cellar of Secrets"
May 8: "U.S.
Aides Say Iraqi Truck Could Be a Germ-War Lab"
Now Gellman:
May 18: "Odyssey of Frustration; In Search for
Weapons, Army Team Finds Vacuum Cleaners"
May 11:
"Frustrated, U.S. Arms Team to Leave Iraq; Task Force Unable to
Find Any Weapons"
May 10: "Seven Nuclear Sites Looted;
Iraqi Scientific Files, Some Containers Missing"
May 4:
"Iraqi Nuclear Site Is Found Looted; U.S. Team Unable to Determine
Whether Deadly Materials Are Missing"
To be sure, Gellman's record isn't without blemishes, but he
seems to have realized early on that tying his fortunes to the
military's not-always-reliable sources wasn't wise. The thrust of
Gellman's reporting in recent months, and his central theme, has
been that no one has confirmed that Iraq actually manufactured or
retained biological or chemical weapons after the last ones
accounted for by UN inspectors in 1998. Miller, by contrast, either
downplays this point or doesn't highlight it sufficiently.
Miller's reporting on WMD follows a pattern established with her
articles on the anthrax attacks of October 2001 [see Michael
Massing, "Where Germs Rule," December 17, 2001]. The Bush
Administration quickly labeled the attacks "terrorism," without
being more explicit, but Miller weighed in with a co-bylined
front-pager, labeled "news analysis," that implied Al Qaeda might be
responsible. She wrote that according to one scientist, the
discovery of expertly processed anthrax "casts serious doubt" on the
theory that the attacks were the work of a lone amateur. "'I do
think in one form or another, a state was involved,' one former
American scientist said.... Nor is it clear whether Al Qaeda,
Osama bin Laden's network, was involved in any way. American
intelligence officials say Mr. bin Laden has tried to acquire
nuclear, chemical and biological weapons." [Emphasis added.]
After the Post reported that it seemed to be the work of a
"lone amateur" after all, Miller simply dropped the matter. On the
same day that the Post was excising the foreign connection,
Miller was back with more Osama in a co-bylined story headlined "Al
Qaeda Sites Point to Tests of Chemicals," with the subhead "U.S.
Suspects Bin Laden of Producing Mass Poison; U.S. Intelligence
Pointed Out Two Afghan Locations Where Chemical Warfare May Be in
the Making." The article itself contained numerous disclaimers about
the suspected connection: "Collecting intelligence about facilities
of this sort is an inexact science at best; intelligence officials
and policy makers have learned from past mistakes to be wary when
using such information."
In September 2002, a year after the World Trade Center and
Pentagon attacks, Miller had yet another Osama scoop provided by the
authorities. Headlined "Lab Suggests Qaeda Planned to Build Arms,
Officials Say," the article begins: "Pentagon officials disclosed
new details today about equipment found in a laboratory near
Kandahar, Afghanistan, that they contend Al Qaeda intended to use to
make biological and chemical weapons."
Is this a real story? The headline and lead are powerful. But
here's the second paragraph: "The officials said the equipment--a
centrifuge for separating liquids and an oven in which slurried
agents could be dried--supported the assessment that Al Qaeda might
have acquired what it needed to make 'a very limited production of
biological and chemical agents,' one official said."
Each time Miller produces an article that could induce panic, she
almost always mentions, some paragraphs down, that Al Qaeda's
capability to deploy or develop these types of weapons has been
judged by the Bush Administration to be crude at best. But the
effect remains the same. Miller gets a story with a whopper of a
headline, the story gets picked up and it connects with the American
zeitgeist in support of extreme measures by the Administration
domestically (Patriot Act) and internationally (invade Iraq), with
few reading down to where Miller deflates the balloon and thereby
preserves her credibility, in the same way that politicians leak and
spin while preserving their deniability.
