In the past years, and certainly in the future, media has proved to be the essential teacher when it comes to the history of certain events. Other than word of mouth, the media has been the most influential tool in our daily lives. From morning newspapers, to the radio on the drive to work, to the new Time magazine in the mail, to the 6 o'clock news, media is everywhere. Like it or not, media influences people's ideals on an everyday basis. Since media constitutes as the most influential teacher, you'd expect to hear all sides of the story, but this is rarely ever the case. Take 1991 for example.

On August 2nd, 1990, Iraqi president Saddam Hussein sent troops into and occupied the neighboring country of Kuwait. Kuwait, though very small, had one of the largest oil reserves in the world, and that was exactly what Saddam Hussein was after. The invasion was viewed as a shock and the United Nations Security Council soon passed twelve resolutions which condemned the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Iraq had just come off of a successful victory against neighboring Iran that spanned ei

In the same session, Peter Jennings praised the "brilliance of laser-guided bombs" and scolded the Scud as "a horrifying killer" on a January 21, 1991 broadcast. Five days earlier, a CNN reporter sweetly recounted the sight of bombers taking off from Audi Arabia as a "sweet beautiful sight". ABC's Judith Kipper said she was impressed by the bombings on Iraq, but was appalled by Iraqi missile attacks on Israel a day later. Journalists would tell the world Saddam just launched another scud, but failed to say President Bush just ordered a round of bombings over Baghdad. In the media, "to support the war was to be objective, and to be anti-war was to carry a bias" stated Meg Greenfield in a Washington Post editorial. A survey was conducted of ABC, CBS, and NBC news during the first two weeks of war which showed that out of 878 on-air sources, only one of them showed any sign of pacifism. Oddly enough, NFL players were asked by networks to share their thoughts on the war.

The media's news was soon turning into propaganda in the eyes of many. Behind all of this propaganda was the issue of civilian targets. On January 17, 1991 Nightline, Ted Koppel assured that "great effort is taken, sometimes at great personal cost to American pilots, that civilian targets are not hit". Likewise, Tom Brokaw stated twelve days later that "the U.S. has fought this war at arm's length with long-range missiles, high-tech weapons... to keep casualties down." Much was said despite the Pentagons claim that targets included civilian roads, bridges, and places necessary for the life of the inhabitants. Many journalists shunned when Iraq publicly showed the world their Geneva protocol violation of parading prisoners of war, but did not say a word when the U.S. broadcasted the destruction of a hydroelectric dam with the use of laser-guided bombs, which is indeed a violation against the Geneva protocol as well. Sometimes, U.S. offenses wouldn't even be shown on T.V. After a day when 2,000 bombing operations were launched over Baghdad, Koppel smoothly stated, "Aside from the Scud missile that landed in Tel Aviv earlier, it's been a quiet night in the Middle East." But wait, days later Brokaw states, "we must point out again and again that it is Saddam Hussein who put these innocents in harm's way."

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Approximate Word count = 1571
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)