When the press amplified false claims about Iraq, it failed its highest duty - and fueled a war - Poynter

"The president of the United States of America climbs out of the cockpit of a Navy fixed-wing airplane that just dramatically landed on an aircraft carrier, tucks his helmet jauntily under one arm and swaggers off across the deck, saluting the troops along the way. He has the bow-legged gait of a "Top Gun" pilot, thanks to his harness and flight suit, as he proudly walks beneath a larger-than-life banner proclaiming "Mission Accomplished.""

"It was May 1, 2003, and President George W. Bush, whose own military record was the subject of long-standing questions, was the main character in a staged media event falsely proclaiming the end of the Iraq War. The mainstream American press fell for it hook, line and sinker. The photo of the triumphant president beneath that banner covered newspapers around the country, as did almost stenographic repetitions of his speech from the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln."

""With the liberation of Iraq and Afghanistan, we have removed allies of al Qaeda, cut off sources of terrorist funding and made certain that no terrorist network will gain weapons of mass destruction from Saddam Hussein's regime," he boldly proclaimed in a line the media repeated. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. But consumers of American news media wouldn't have known that because, for months, major U.S. newsrooms had repeatedly reported that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein possessed such weapons."

On May 1, 2003, President George W. Bush landed on an aircraft carrier and posed beneath a large "Mission Accomplished" banner, projecting an end to the Iraq War. Major U.S. news organizations widely published the imagery and near-verbatim excerpts of the accompanying speech. The administration's assertions about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were repeated broadly by the press despite lacking verification. For months, leading newsrooms reported that Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs, creating widespread public belief. The sequence revealed systemic failures in journalistic skepticism, sourcing, and courage amid a post-9/11 climate driven by fear and patriotism.

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