Manufacturing Consent: The US Has a Formula for Selling War
The US really wants you to support this war, no matter what it takes
“The first casualty of war is the truth” — Aeschylus
Those words once again ring in my head on the eve of the 13th day of our war of choice with Iran.
Today, I woke up to ABC News’ reporting that the FBI has warned police departments in California that Iran wants to retaliate for American attacks by launching offensive drones against the West Coast. Naturally I was skeptical of this news, but before I could even think about the notion of Iran having even the remotest possibility of being able to attack from 8,000 miles away, my feed started blowing up with hundreds of reposts. Outlandish TikToks of how it was something that was about to happen. Even Gavin Newsom was out there making videos about how they are ready.
Of course, this was all but a few hours before CBS News reported that there was no credible intelligence underpinning the bulletin distributed on the unverified possibility that Iran could retaliate for American attacks by launching drones at the West Coast.
But of course as is the case with most things, the news spreads wider than the correction.
The answer to why the news was out there in the first place was more than clear to me. It’s the same thing that happened with the anthrax scare during the Iraq war.
The Anthrax Scare
In October 2001, just weeks after the 9/11 attacks, letters containing anthrax spores were mailed to several news offices and two U.S. senators. The incidents killed five people and infected 17 others. Almost immediately, the Bush administration and its media allies seized on the attacks as proof of the existential threat posed by Iraq, despite the fact that Iraq had nothing to do with the anthrax mailings. The narrative was simple: the enemy is everywhere, they can reach into our homes, and we must act now.
The fear was amplified across every major network. Senators appeared on cable news to warn of “mushroom clouds.” Reporters repeated talking points about Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction without skepticism. The anthrax attacks — which remain unsolved to this day, with the FBI’s primary suspect apparently dying by suicide in 2008 — served as the perfect cultural lever to pry open public support for an invasion that would ultimately kill hundreds of thousands of people based on fabrications.
The playbook hasn’t changed. Replace anthrax with drones. Replace “saddam has WMDs” with “Iran is rebuilding its nuclear program.” The script is identical. What has changed is that we’ve seen this movie before, and more people are waking up to it.
The Unpopularity Problem
This matters now more than ever because this war is deeply unpopular. According to polling from New York Times, support for the Iran strikes ranges from just 27 percent in a Reuters/Ipsos poll to 50 percent in a Fox News poll. Even the highest level of support falls far below what we’ve seen at the beginnings of previous conflicts. When George W. Bush put troops on the ground in Afghanistan, 92 percent of Americans supported the move. As unpopular as the Iraq War ultimately became, 76 percent of Americans approved of the decision to go to war in a poll taken the day after the conflict began. We are nowhere near those numbers, and the administration knows it.
When at war, the job of the country is to manufacture consent among the population. This is especially important for America as their military actions around the world often do not lead to consequences to its own people. So the onus becomes on the government to create enough support to continue its endeavors. But this time, it’s not working the way it used to.
Why It’s Failing (For Now)
More than ever it has become obvious for two main reasons.
One, this administration’s incompetence. Because of the chaotic nature of the Trump regime, we see into what happens behind the curtains a lot more. Very clearly, they are trying to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. The news from this morning is just the latest example. We’ve seen senators and congressmen spreading rumors of so-called sleeper cells with no proof or evidence, fear-mongering about Iran having nukes, and other unsubstantiated news.
Second, due to both the admin and Israel’s unpopularity, people in the country have become especially skeptical of these kinds of propaganda efforts. The American people have seen over the past two years many narrative propaganda attempts both in Gaza, and even at home when it comes to things like Epstein and ICE protests.
Why Attrition Wins
Ultimately, despite the government’s current best efforts not working, it seems that time and time again agitprop and repetitive attempts always win out in the end. Create enough restlessness and worry, and people will soon come to accept it. As we drag into our third week in this war, it starts to slowly become a fact of life.
But what I fear most, and what seems to be the thing the Iranian diaspora fail to comprehend, is that even these obvious attempts at fear-mongering slowly but surely create resentment and fear towards ordinary Iranian Americans here. As the US gets more desperate and weaker both in its global hegemonic power and its domestic, expect to see even more attempts to convince people and bring Americans on board with this war, with potentially even higher stakes. Every day, the stakes and conflict seems to be expanding and growing, and I fear the worst is yet to come. The war machine runs on fear. The question is whether we’re still willing to feed it, or if it will win once again.