R
>http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-022602office_wr.story
>Pentagon Will Close Embattled Office
>By MATT KELLEY
>Associated Press Writer
>
>February 26 2002, 11:26 AM PST
>
>WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon will close a new office that reportedly has
>proposed spreading false information abroad, Defense Secretary Donald H.
>Rumsfeld said today.
>
>Rumsfeld denied that the Office of Strategic Influence would have spread
>misinformation but said news reports and commentary have made it
>impossible for the agency to do its job.
>
>"While much of the thrust of the criticism and the cartoons and comment
>has been off the mark," Rumsfeld told reporters, "the office has been
>damaged so much that it could not operate effectively."
>
>The Defense Department created the office after the Sept. 11 terrorist
>attacks. Rumsfeld said the office was supposed to help get the United
>States' side of the story out to counter the views of opponents such as
>the Taliban and the al-Qaida terrorist network.
>
>Last week, reports surfaced that the office had proposed giving false
>information to foreign journalists as a means of furthering the U.S. war
>against terrorism.
>
>The New York Times reported that the office, headed by Air Force Brig.
>Gen. Simon P. Worden, had begun circulating classified proposals calling
>for using the Internet and clandestine operations to spread such
>disinformation.
>
>Rumsfeld said the Pentagon has not spread lies and would never do so in
>the future. President Bush pledged on Monday that "we'll tell the American
>people the truth."
>
>The Pentagon will continue trying to get its message across overseas, just
>not through the Office of Strategic Influence, Rumsfeld said.
>
>"The office is done. What do you want, blood?" he said at a Pentagon news
>conference.
>
>Rumsfeld said last week that the Pentagon might engage in what he called
>strategic or tactical deception, as it has in the past. For example, if
>U.S. troops were about to launch an attack from the west, they might "do
>things" that would make the enemy believe an attack was instead coming
>from the north, Rumsfeld said.
>
>Douglas Feith, the undersecretary of defense who oversaw the now-closed
>office, had said he created the bureau to oversee all of the military's
>"information operations," such as dropping leaflets and broadcasting radio
>messages in battlefield areas.
>Rumsfeld said he met with Feith this morning and Feith said he decided to
>close the office.
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