It almost caused a massive war with NATO.
The Associated Press defends the story of the Russian bombing of Poland after it became clear that it was a lie
The rockets fell in Poland, killing two people.
Reuters
The Ukrainian president said: "I have no doubt that the missiles that hit Poland came from Russia."
Reuters
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Last Tuesday, the American Associated Press reported that “an American intelligence official says that Russian missiles bombed Poland, which is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), killing two.”
And the rules of this agency say that its correspondents can give any source the status of “anonymous” if this source is “reliable”, but if it is not, it should not be granted this status.
MSNBC presented the worst form of reporting that the Associated Press could publish, showing thousands of tweets about World War III becoming a trend on Twitter.
Article four
By the afternoon of the same day, Reuters news agency published a story saying: "Poland is likely to activate Article 4 of the NATO Charter."
For its part, the American newspaper “The Hill” reported that “(US President Joe) Biden is holding an emergency meeting with his allies from the Group of Seven rich countries, after Russian missiles killed two from Poland.”
By Tuesday evening, the Washington Post used the frenzy to line up advocates for NATO, writing: “Poland is a member of NATO, and of course an attack on a member of the alliance triggers Article 5 which states that any attack Armed against one of the NATO member states in Europe or North America, it will be considered an attack on all member states, and then force must be used against the aggressor.
For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said: "I have no doubt that the missiles that hit Poland came from Russia."
Russia did not launch the missiles
And while the Associated Press was publishing its false story on Tuesday, others were pointing to evidence that Russia had not fired these missiles at Poland, and others had raised good information, and others thought that the Associated Press should not publish this news. Because it could trigger a third world war.
On the second day, details of some of what happened appeared, especially how local players were trying to falsify the story or try to benefit from it.
On Wednesday morning, I called the Associated Press and asked them a few questions, focusing on whether the agency should mention the name of the source. Nicole Meir of the agency eventually answered on Wednesday evening with a curt answer, as she asked me to look at the correction they had published regarding With "the story of the war in Ukraine", but there is a detailed question that remains unanswered: Why is the Associated Press still defending a source it says provided it with false information?
False sources must be exposed
In an article I wrote in 2017, I said: “Should the media reveal the source that is lying to them?”
And I said, “Not exposing the sources of false news is like a loaded gun lying around everywhere, and when any crisis occurs and any government source wants to smear any foreign government or even help the outbreak of any war.
Can this mechanism be replicated without fear of consequences or accountability?
The source can hide behind statements (the identity of the source is unknown), just as its media outlets hide behind anonymous sources, thus evading accountability.
The solution is to expose the false sources so that we can have a responsible discourse.
Part of the anonymity deal is honesty, and why would serious media protect their anonymous sources who might have been given fake news?
For them to do it again?
catastrophic end
As I was writing my article, there was an example of this that ended disastrously. Journalist Judith Miller of The New York Times reported in 2002 an anonymous source of an official from the administration of President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, who claimed that a government scientist thought The aluminum tubes that Iraq was trying to obtain were for their nuclear weapons programme.
This was a false statement and was used to justify the war on Iraq.
When I confronted her about this in 2005 and asked her who was that source, she did not tell me the truth.
What is the world we want?
On the other hand, in 1996, the Wall Street Journal served as a source to carry out a smear campaign in favor of a cigarette manufacturing company, and then target a government secret security man. What we want, is a world where false sources pass through their lies without accountability, which results in catastrophic wars, or do we want a world where false sources do not survive the lies they fabricate, where we put some procedures to hold accountable for big mistakes?
Last Thursday, The Washington Post published an article titled, “How Anonymous Sources Raise False Warnings of Russia Attacking Poland?” by Ilah Izday and Paul Farhi, but as with the previous examples, the Post was not invited to name Associated Press source.
It is possible for the agency to put forward the existence of a strong reason for not disclosing the name of the source, and it must clarify this very seriously, and we do not know what the source’s motives are for publishing such information, but it appears, as many believe, that it appears to be part of a coordinated attempt to activate Articles Four and Five of the Pact Charter NATO, which will lead to a major war, perhaps to a nuclear war, or perhaps it is an extreme form of saber rattling against Russia.
The Associated Press must mention the name of the source in order for it to be held accountable.
Sam Hosseini is a freelance journalist
At the time the Associated Press was publishing its false story, others were pointing out that there was evidence that Russia had not fired these missiles at Poland, and others had raised good information, and others thought that the agency should not publish this news.
It is possible for the agency to put forward that there is a strong reason not to disclose the name of the source, and it should explain this very seriously.
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