Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book argues that in an attempt to manage public opinion, the Bush administration and the Pentagon produced a barrage of propaganda, disinformation, and outright lies that covered over the more unsavory aspects of the Gulf war and that legitimated United States (US) policies. It analyzes the role of the mainstream media, especially television (TV), in transmitting, promoting, and legitimizing US Gulf war policy and actions. The book provides an analysis and critique of how the media represented the crisis in the Gulf and then the Gulf war. It is concerned to uncover how TV presented the war by analyzing the dominant images, frames, and messages transmitted and the ways in which the TV audience bought into the Bush administration/mainstream media version of the war.