COMPARING U.S. AND INTERNATIONAL NEWS Part III.

Here is part III, in which I compare the writing styles of the United States, and various foreign countries.

After evaluating the articles written by American sources, I noticed that a trend was occuring. Even though the sources all stated that the US had indeed used white phosphorous, they all tried to defend the American forces.

The Epoch Times defended America by saying that it was hard for our troops to distinguish between civilians and enemy combatants, because the enemy fighters use guerilla warfare. Plus, it is not even entirely sure that white phosphorous can be classified as a chemical weapon.

The Washington Post made it very clear that white phosphorous was not intentionally used against the civilians of Iraq.

Reuters stated that if it happened to be that civilians had been killed due to the exposure of white phosphorous, then it was purely accidental. The women and children were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I found that the articles written from foreign sources were much more condescending of the actions of American soldiers.

For example, an article from Aljazeera made it appear that the US had lied about using WP against the people of Iraq. When reading this article, it was very evident to me that the author was angry, because the US had denied using phosphorous against civilians, but yet the burnt
bodies of many women and children were found.

The writer of the Indian article made it very clear that the US had used white phosphorous against the citizens of Fallujah. This was basically all that it talked about.

In England, the author of the article criticized America for using chemical warfare, which is exactly one of the reasons that we entered this war in the first place. We entered the war to prevent chemical weapons from being used, but yet we use them ourselves. Something here is not right.

All in all, I found that I can never trust any one article that I read, especially if the source is biased in any one direction. It is obvious that great care needs to be taken when reading a news source, because the truth can be stretched and bent in many ways.

From now on, I think that I'll attempt to find unbiased opinions as often as possible, because that is where the truth often lives.