Framing the Iraqi War

1)

All of our articles we were given had to do with the war in Iraq; more specifically, most had to do with the alleged brutality of U.S. Military troops on Iraqi civilians, in which case, almost all of them contradicted one another in the number of deaths, why the firing in the first place, and who called for the orders.

2)

Several of the articles I read had to do with the media and the Wiki Leaks incident that all pointed fingers of blame at different people for the Ishaqi and Haditha raids. But there were several different accounts, skewering what really happened, the “truth” of the events.

Some articles said that the troops were out of control due to drugs, alcohol, and possible post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); others proclaimed that the Iraqi civilians fired first on the U.S. soldiers; and the number of deaths was contradicted in more than three-fourths of the articles.              

            Each article claimed the truth of the matter from the above reasons. It’s still unclear what really happened during the raids. The frames I found were:

-       - Terrorism

-       - War/Rules of War

-       - Haditha Raid

-       - Ishaqi Raid

-       - U.S. Military

-       - The U.S. Media

-       - The U.K. Media

-       - Drug/Alcohol Abuse

-       - Death

-       - Force

-       - Investigation

-       - PTSD

-       - Anti-War

-       - Pro-War

3)

These frames have negative and positive reflections, each painting different pictures in the minds of the people who read the stories or simply read the list of above frames. Within each article, using the above frames, the writers/journalists make very different narratives out of the raids.

In two articles, “Marine’s Wife Paints Portraits of US Troops Out of Control in Haditha,” (The Guardian, UK) and “Troops Cleared in Iraqi Deaths in Ishaqi,” the writers tell the story as though it wasn’t the marines’ fault when they executed their orders to raid a home in Haditha. It goes on to state that the marines were under the heavy influence of drugs and alcohol, and some may have been suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder from extended periods of time on duty in the warzone. It paints the picture that the marines weren’t at fault, didn’t know what they were doing, couldn’t think clearly, and should be excused. They also list a fewer death toll among the Iraqi civilians involved. These two articles stated a roundabout of six to eight civilians were killed. But these accounts were contradicted by many other articles, which stated higher numbers executed by the U.S. military. These articles blame the U.S. Government for the orders of the raids of Haditha and Ishaqi.

Another article, “Wiki Leaks Iraq: U.S. Troops May Have Executed Civilians,” says that over thirteen civilians were killed in the raids. There was no listing that the marines were under the influence of any drugs, alcohol, or suffering from a psychological disorder.  The writer says that it was the Iraqi citizens who fired first at the U.S. troops, who responded with open fire in their own defense. To protect themselves, they had no choice but to return fire. They blame those who were killed in the attack and others who fired at the battalion as the cause to this horrific event.

These opposing views of the raids of Haditha and Ishaqi—when read separately—show two very different frames, Anti-war and Pro-war. These two frames can make sense to different readers, depending upon race, social status, political affiliation, et cetera. The first view, weighing on the side of the U.S. government and the U.S. military, fit the narrative of patriotism, war heroes, and protection of the homeland. The second view, a more anti-war view, blames the government and the marines involved, playing on the narrative of victimization of people in an impoverished, torn country. Two very different narratives, two very different views… And sadly, it cuts many of our fellow Americans in half.

4)

The U.S. government and military show power in the first narrative, and that the troops and commanders and Congress can do no wrong; it’s positive power. But the second narrative, power is shown in a negative way: the government has too much power, the troops are too trigger-happy, and that no innocent civilians should die because of those trigger-happy fingers. One article that blamed the troops and government even had a quote from a commander saying, “If you see anyone with a cell phone in their hand, blow their fucking heads off.”

            Sad that someone said this in reality, and not in a Tom Cruise or Van Damme action movie.

After thinking about framing, and having two and a half years of psychological study under my belt, it is hard to take a frame off any object, person, or ideal. The human brain will always associate one word with another, which builds scenarios and scenes in their minds. Psychologists consider those who can’t associate a relationship of one object with another means that there is a problem, a disassociation, which leads to other psychological and social disorders. Most of these are negative. Don’t think of an elephant? Most will, and then immediately think of the opposite or a scene that involves an elephant. If a child, while being psychologically evaluated, did not come up with anything like the above, they would be diagnosed with disassociation. It seems theoretical that we can’t control our brains, and that what we associate with other things, we will continue to associate, tying those relationships to other objects, continuing the ties that link together our languages and cultures.