Special report: fixing intelligence on Syria?
If there is anything to learn from the Syrian conflict, it is that in the fog of war, truth really is the first casualty. Narratives and counter-narratives of the conflict have plagued media accounts and the blogosphere ever since it erupted in the form of angry street protests over two years ago. From the White House dossier to the United Nations report, from Syrian nuns to revelations from former and active intelligence officials, the propaganda war between pro and anti-interventionists to control the paradigm through which we understand the conflict — manifesting in Bashir al-Assad’s latest call for a ceasefire — may be feeding into little-known strategic imperatives that see the Syrian people as mere pawns in a wider gambit.
