Portrayal of Wars through the Ages: The Power of Media and Information Access in War time

With the advent of radio, television and ultimately the Internet in the later half of the 20th century, there's no denying that increased access to information has significantly changed that way society views wars and conflicts.  From Homer's the Iliad to the correspondents of both World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, and ultimately both Gulf Region conflicts. the power of information access has fundamentally changed how I and may people view the pursuit of conflicts.

A Little History from a Geeks POV

Communication development throughout the ages can be portrayed in terms of logarithmic and exponential growth. Just think, going from weeks months and years of waiting for information of a war during ancient times through the late 1800's to instantaneous updates in our most recent conflicts. Things have certainly changed both for the better and for worse. Increased capability in communication has given society a powerful resource to convey ideas to a mass audience. But as Peter Parker's Uncle Ben told Peter (aka, Spiderman),"With great power comes great responsibility". The responsibility in this context is the use of information, disinformation, reporting propaganda and marketing during wartime.

Information Access During War and the Shaping of History

The Sun Tzu quote,"Every battle is won or lost before it is ever fought." has be countlessly applied to the control of information in examples of wartime. Control of information has become  challenging in recent years with the availability of so much information and although ancient wars suffered primarily for the technology limitations of the era in terms of the overall time information is conveyed and received, the control of the content of information has been constantly applied throughout history to shape outcomes.

Examples can easily be applied recent history with propaganda and news reels of the middle at latter 20th century. It interesting to note the tone of the information presented as time progressed during this period:


Typical 1940 News Reel


1960 Vietnam War Video Compilation (Image Entertainment)

Gulf War Era Propaganda (Rt.com)

The Soapbox: Media Introduction of the Human Factor in the Portrayal of War

It is human nature to always portray an unpleasant subject such as war in the best light. Allegation of governments and politicians of manipulating situation an facts to justify positions on war is not limited to the Iraqi and Gulf War. Such allegations have extended throughout the modern era, most notably the conspiracy of  available intelligence prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Pentagon Papers for Vietnam and the activities leading up to 9/11.

Since the advent of radio TV and the Internet , people's desire and sense of entitlement for information conflicted with established needs for secrecy during wartime. The increasing availability of information is a challenge for institutions that wish to control and manipulate a political, diplomatic, or sociological  reality or outcome.  Often times, punditry, disinformation and legislation become the tools to control the flow and access to information. However in exercising these tactics, society may respond in open criticism of such action to the point where such institutional action is ultimately ineffective.

It may be argued  that a natural response of criticism to institutional practice of platitude promotion, hypocrisy, secrecy, disinformation in the modern age is the media introduction of movies, TV shows,  opinion editorials, comedy shows and blogs as a modern soapbox  that presents an individualistic impact of subjects such as war so as to balance out the intangible idealism of a cause that is undertaken which may difficult to support by society given the availability of information.

Each major conflict of the modern era has been represented through first person account dramatic movies in response to the high level intangible ideals promoted in the name a conflict. Movies such as "Saving Private Ryan" and "Band of Brothers" for World War II, "Apocalypse Now" and "The Deer Hunter" for Vietnam, to "Jarhead", "Stop-Loss" and "Traitor" for the Gulf War and the War-On-Terror, have given a balancing perspective to the patriotic fervor often espoused by the political establishment.

Information is ultimately a resource that can be clearly used to effect historical and sociological change. Its use in conducting and criticizing war is ultimately dependent upon the intended use of the information by institutions such as the government, corporations, the main stream media, and general members of society.