Security

Actually, the Army Kind of Likes Your Blog

You’d think all the criticism from left-wing websites like the Huffington Post, Daily Kos, and Salon would royally piss off the Army. But at least one Army report finds the sites’ posts to be consistently “balanced.” Every week, the defense contractor MPRI prepares for the brass a “Blogosphere and Social Media Report,” rounding up sites’ […]

You'd think all the criticism from left-wing websites like the Huffington Post, Daily Kos, and* Salon* would royally piss off the Army. But at least one Army report finds the sites' posts to be consistently "balanced."

Every week, the defense contractor MPRI prepares for the brass a "Blogosphere and Social Media Report," rounding up sites' posts on military matters. It's meant to be a single source for top officers to catch up on what's being said online and in leading social media outlets. Items from about two dozen national security and political blogs are excerpted, and classified as "balanced," "critical," or "supportive." The vast majority of the posts are considered "balanced" -- even when they rip the Army a new one.

Here are three recent reports:

* Week of March 20th

* Week of April 3rd

* Week of April 10th

A Huffington Post item headlined "U.S. Military Still Lying About Special Forces Night Raid In Afghanistan" - that's "balanced."* Salon's *Glenn Greenwald pronouncement the "slaughter" of Iraqi civilians by U.S. troops is "not an aberration" is considered "balanced," too. So is a post from the right-of-center *This Ain't Hell *declaring, "Healthcare Bill Screws Veterans."

Only posts that directly blast a particular Army general -- or the Army's ability to perform in Afghanistan -- seem to qualify as "critical." Our pal Jason Sigger was dinged as critical twice during the week of April 3rd. In one post, he called Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey "something of an ignorant asshole." Then, in a book review, he opined that "the US Army hasn't effectively executed COIN [counterinsurgency] operations in Iraq and Afghanistan."

The reports also rank the top issues of the week in the national security blogopshere, and categorize blog posts into "strategic lines of effort." (Most fall into "other.") A few choice comments on blog posts are highlighted, as well. (So keep ranting away there, trolls!)

Last summer, *Stars & Stripes *revealed that U.S. Forces - Afghanistan relied on an outside contractor to screen the work of journalists about the embed with American troops. The idea was the gauge the "expected sentiment" of the dispatches. These social media roundups are different -- light on analysis, heavy on excerpts. The Army also assembles more analytical reports. How closely these resemble the controversial embed screens is unclear. Those analyses are labeled "for official use only," and have not been released -- or leaked -- to the public.

[Photo: U.S. Army]

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