IFJ endorses joint Russian and Georgian demand to end media restrictions

International Freedom of Expression eXchange: Media groups are calling for an end to war propaganda and concrete actions to promote dialogue and confidence between Russian and Georgian journalists.

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IFJ endorses joint Russian and Georgian demand to end media restrictions

Independent US Bloggers Beat Voice of America and Radio Liberty in Delivering Uncensored News to Russia

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, September 6, 2009, San Francisco — Neither the Voice of America nor Radio Liberty, both US government-funded international broadcasters, provided Internet users and radio listeners with a Russian translation of an article about Vladimir Putin which sparked a major controversy over censorship both in Russia and in the US. Conde Nast, the publisher of “GQ” magazine, reportedly banned the article from being printed in Russia because it is highly critical of Prime Minister Putin and suggests that Russian security services engaged in criminal activities to help him become an authoritarian ruler. The article was published only in the US edition of “GQ.”

While the two radio stations funded by US taxpayers to broadcast news for audiences abroad largely ignored the story, independent bloggers in the US volunteered to translate the article into Russian in a grass-root effort to combat press censorship. A popular New York news site Gawker posted their translations under the Russian title: “Вы можете прочитать запрещенную статью GQ про Путина здесь” (”Hey, you can read the forbidden GQ article about Putin here”)

US public broadcaster National Public Radio (NPR) reported Friday that Condé Nast prohibited republishing of the article, “Vladimir Putin’s Dark Rise to Power” by veteran war correspondent Scott Anderson, in any of its magazines outside of the US, including Russia. According to NPR reporter David Folkenflik, Condé Nast also prevented the article from being posted on the “GQ” website in the U.S. The NPR report “Why ‘GQ’ Doesn’t Want Russians To Read Its Story,” quotes from a July 23 e-mail sent by one of the company’s top lawyers.

“Condé Nast management has decided that the September issue of U.S. GQ magazine containing Scott Anderson’s article ‘Vladimir Putin’s Dark Rise to Power’ should not be distributed in Russia,” the lawyer wrote.

According to NPR, Condé Nast “ordered that the article could not be posted to the magazine’s Web site. No copies of the American edition of the magazine could be sent to Russia or shown in any country to Russian government officials, journalists or advertisers. Additionally, the piece could not be published in other Condé Nast magazines abroad, nor publicized in any way,” NPR correspondent David Folkenflik reported.

Gawker has called the actions of Condé Nast executives “an act of publishing cowardice.” In addition to protecting their business interests in Russia, Condé Nast executives may have also been concerned about the safety of their Russian employees. Journalists who had written articles critical of the Kremlin have been murdered in recent years by unknown assailants. Most journalists in Russia practice self-censorship and because of the atmosphere of fear would not dare to write articles highly critical of Prime Minister Putin. Russian and Western-owned media outlets are also concerned that cyber attacks will disable their websites if their reporting displeases the Kremlin and its security services, which are known for being able to launch such attacks.

The censored “GQ” article deals with a series of bombings at apartment buildings that killed hundreds of people in Russia in 1999. The anti-terrorist campaign that followed the attacks helped Vladimir Putin to consolidate his power. In writing his article, Scott Anderson relied on information from Mikhail Trepashkin, a former Russian intelligence officer who investigated the bombings. Trepashkin suggests a possible link between the bombings and Russian officials who were interested in increasing Mr. Putin’s powers in running the country. Russian officials have always denied these charges as a complete fabrication and blame the bombings on Chechen terrorists.

After issuing its appeal for help, Gawker was posting parts of the Russian translation of the article as soon as they received them from volunteer translators. Gawker reported that the translation was completed by Sunday afternoon.

The speed with which independent bloggers in the US responded in making the text of the censored article available to Internet users in Russia was in stark contrast to how this story was handled by the two main US-government funded broadcasters responsible for delivering news in Russian. The Russian-language websites of Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and the Voice of America (VOA) did not post any in-depth reports about the censorship controversy and neither provided any online excerpts from the article.

This has been the latest example of serious problems at the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages both VOA and RFE/RL. The BBG terminated Voice of America Russian radio broadcasts in July 2008, just 12 days before the Russian military launched an attack on Georgia over a territorial dispute. The BBG has also cut funding for the VOA Russian Service staff still assigned to maintain a news website. Largely as a result of these moves, VOA’s annual audience reach in Russia has registered a 98% decline and is now estimated to be only 0.2%.

A Russian Service journalist, who wants to remain anonymous because VOA broadcasters are not authorized to speak to outside media, told FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit, that many experienced journalists have left or have been forced out. The source said that there was nobody available Friday who would have been capable of producing an in-depth report on this story. According to the same source, none of the managers was able to write a report since they don’t speak Russian at all or not well enough to be able to post to the web. The management, according to this source, has hired some private contractors to maintain the Russian Service website and produce video clips, but they are incapable of professional reporting in Russian. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has rated the Broadcasting Board of Governors as one of the worst-managed Federal agencies. The broadcaster said that the few remaining Russian-speaking professional journalists at VOA are completely demoralized.

Radio Liberty, based in Prague, the Czech Republic, and in Moscow, has many more reporters and still receives much greater funding than the Russian Service of the Voice of America, which is based in Washington, D.C. FreeMediaOnline.org contacts familiar with RFE/RL believe that Radio Liberty reporters and managers are also practicing self-censorship because of justifiable fear that they or their family members might become targets of reprisals from the Kremlin’s secret police. Many RFE/RL reporters are Russian citizens living in Russia and those working at RFE/RL headquarters in Prague have family members in Russia and travel there frequently. The RFE/RL English-language website did carry an extensive report on the “GQ” story and issues of censorship, but the English site is not widely read in Russia and its main purpose is to help generate more Congressional support and funding for RFE/RL. What matters in Russia, FreeMediaOnline.org analysts said, is what appears on the Russian-language Radio Liberty website.

Not unlike the management’s interference with journalistic freedom at Condé Nast, both RFE/RL and VOA have been pressured by BBG strategic planners and private consultants, some of whom had business operations in Russia and links to BBG members (some of the BBG members involved in these decisions also had business interests in Russia) to make their reporting less critical of the Kremlin (the phrased used by the consultants was “anti-Russian”) in an effort to gain a wider audience among those Russians who are anti-Western and pro-Putin. A former director of Radio Liberty’s Russian Service Mario Corti, Italian journalist, management consultant for a major electronic media outlet in Russia and author of books about Russian culture, was forced out for resisting these pressures. Radio Liberty’s audience in Russia has declined significantly since his departure and the change of programming philosophy.

The non-Russian management’s editorial pressure on the Voice of America Russian Service journalistic staff to offer more popular culture programming was also evident in the web content produced over the Labor Day weekend. While the “GQ” censorship story was barely mentioned, VOA website had more than one story about Michael Jackson, a story about US Open tennis matches, and even a story about retirement reforms in the US.

Only a few years ago, it would have been highly unusual for Voice of America and Radio Liberty not to broadcast in-depth reports about such a significant case of press censorship and not to offer extensive excerpts from the banned article. Media freedom activists familiar with the BBG’s strategy and management in recent years are not surprised, however, that independent bloggers and other volunteers are now having to do the work previously done by US government-funded broadcasters who still receive millions of US taxpayers money every year.

Largely in response to the BBG-ordered program cuts and restrictions in news coverage for Russian-speaking audiences, FreeMediaOnline.org volunteers have launched a Russian-language multi-source news analysis website GovoritAmerika.us. The website, which receives no public funding, has provided links to the Russian translation of the “GQ” article banned in Russia.

Self-Censorship About Putin at Condé Nast GQ Magazine, Limited Coverage by U.S.-Taxpayer Funded Broadcasters

The popular New York blog site Gawker is reporting that “in an act of publishing cowardice, Condé Nast has gone to extraordinary lengths to prevent Russians from reading a “GQ” article criticizing Vladimir Putin.” Condé Nast publishes such widely read magazines as “Vanity Fair,” “The New Yorker,” and “Vogue.” In Russia, it publishes “GQ,” “Glamour,” “Tatler,” and “Vogue.” The Manhattan media news website is making the Russian translation of the article, which is being done by volunteers, available online. Gawker: “Hey, you can read the forbidden GQ article about Putin here” Вы можете прочитать запрещенную статью GQ про Путина здесь>>

“Vladimir Putin’s Dark Rise To Power” by veteran investigative reporter Scott Anderson appears in the current U.S. issue of “GQ.” U.S. public broadcaster National Public Radio (NPR) reported that Condé Nast prohibited republishing of the article in any of its magazines in Russia and in other countries. According to NPR, Condé Nast also prevented the article from being posted on the “GQ” website in the U.S. The article deals with a series of bombings at apartment buildings that killed hundreds of people in Russia in 1999.

Scott Anderson relied on information from Mikhail Trepashkin, a former Russian intelligence officer who investigated the bombings. Trepashkin suggests a possible link between the bombings and Russian officials who were interested in increasing Mr. Putin’s powers in running the country. Russian officials have always denied these charges as a complete fabrication.

According to media freedom advocates, Condé Nast executives may have been afraid what would hapen to their business interests and their employees in Russia if they had allowed the article to be published in Russian.

Ted Lipien, president of FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit, said that unsolved killings of many Russian journalists and a climate of fear among media professionals have resulted in self-censorship in Russia on a mass scale. “It is unfortunate but not surprising,” Lipien said, “that faced with intimidation by the secret police and killings of journalists by unknown assailants, even Western-owned and funded publications and institutions are practicing self-censorship in Mr. Putin’s Russia.” Ted Lipien was formerly acting associate director at the Voice of America (VOA). FreeMediaOnline.org publishes Russian-language news analysis website, ГоворитАмерика.us GovoritAmerika.us.

In past years, U.S.-government-funded radio stations Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) would have provided quick translations of newsworthy articles which were censored in Russia. Their funding, however, has been greatly reduced in recent years by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a Federal agency managed by a group of bipartisan political appointees, who used the savings to pay for controversial radio and television projects in the Middle East ordered by the Bush Administration.

Independent studies and surveys found these projects, such as Alhurra Television, to be both ineffective in attracting a wider audience and journalistically substandard. One such study conducted by The University of Southern California’s Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School determined that Alhurra TV has been a failure. The BBG tried to keep the Center on Public Diplomacy report secret but was eventually forced by Congressional and media criticism to make it available on its website.(http://www.bbg.gov/reports/others/uscreport.pdf)

In one of its most controversial moves, the BBG had terminated VOA radio programs to Russia in July 2008, just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia over a territorial dispute. Some of the BBG members and their consultants have been involved in private business deals in Russia.

The Voice of America Russian and VOA English websites did not report on the “GQ” censorship story as of Saturday evening, Sept. 05, Washington D.C. time. After a series of BBG-ordered budget and personnel cuts, the VOA Russian Service operates with only a skeleton staff, especially on weekends.

Another U.S. taxpayer-funded and BBG-managed international broadcasting station, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), had a comprehensive homepage article on this story on its English-language website, Controversial Decision By U.S. Publisher Sparks Debate On Free Speech, Censorship. But RFE/RL’s Радио Свобода (Radio Liberty) Russian-language website – svobodanews.ru – which attracts most of the Internet traffic for RFE/RL in Russia, did not report on the “GQ” controversy as of Saturday. Radio Liberty receives more funding from the BBG than the VOA Russian Service and keeps news bureaus in Russia with a large staff of local reporters. FreeMediaOnline.org reported that BBG-hired private consultants were putting pressure on Radio Liberty editors to make their radio and web content less politically controversial and more appealing to pro-Putin and anti-Western Russians. VOA website had stories on the 2009 US Open tennis matches and Labor Day celebrations but nothing on censorship at the Russian edition of “GQ.”

According to FreeMediaOnline.org media analysts, the BBG’s concern for the safety of their employees in Russia may have also contributed to self-censorship at Radio Liberty. Ted Lipien of FreeMediaOnline.org said that he’s encouraged by private Internet journalists trying to publicize this story but sees limited coverage by U.S.-taxpayer funded international broadcasters managed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors as an inadequate response to the serious threats to media freedom in Russia.

Read this report on TedLipien.com>>

Выбор ГоворитАмерика.us GovoritAmerika.us. Вы можете скопировать и использовать эту статью. You can copy and use this report. Подписка на рассылку ГоворитАмерика.us.

The Kremlin’s Efforts to Rewrite Soviet History Work in Subtle Ways

The map from the secret appendix to the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact showing the new German-Soviet border. The map is signed by Joseph Stalin and German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop.

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, Media analysis by Ted Lipien, August 21, 2009, San Francisco — A title of a recent report on the Voice of America Russian Service website caught my attention: “Сговор Сталина с Гитлером – «единственное средство самообороны»?” “Stalin’s Pact with Hitler – «The Only Means of Self-Defense»?”

The story posted in Russian was the VOA Russian Service translation of the English Service report from Moscow by Jonas Bernstein. When I checked the original English-language report, the title was different: “Russia Defends Stalin’s Deal with Hitler.” It was a well-written, objective and comprehensive story how the current leadership and nationalist extremists in Russia are trying to rewrite history by defending Stalin’s secret deal with Hitler that led to the start of World War II.

In the secret documents signed in Moscow by their foreign ministers, Hitler and Stalin had agreed to divide Poland and give the Soviet Union control of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and parts of Finland and Romania. Germany attacked Poland on September 1, 1939, and the attack by the Red Army followed on September 17.

The difference between the Russian and the English title of the VOA report seemed minor but could have a significant impact on an audience in Russia and presumably was chosen with some deliberation. “Russia Defends Stalin’s Deal with Hitler” suggests a neutral perspective. “Stalin’s Pact with Hitler – «The Only Means of Self-Defense»?” — a question asked on behalf of a U.S. Government-funded broadcasting station — gives a subtle measure of legitimacy to the Kremlin’s defense of the Hitler-Stalin Pact, even if the words «The Only Means of Self-Defense» are in quotes followed by a question mark. Behind the title of the VOA story on the Russian Service website was the statement of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, issued on August 17, saying it had declassified documents showing that the 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was the Soviet Union’s “only available means of self-defense.”

While the VOA report itself does not in any way support the assertion that Stalin had no other choice but to become Hitler’s accomplice in attacking Poland and occupying other countries — in fact, it quotes extensively from those who hold the opposite view — the title used by VOA’s Russian Service shows that the Kremlin’s efforts to rewrite history are achieving at least some success, and not only among nationalists in Russia.

There may also be an additional explanation why an editor in Washington chose to use a title for the audience in Russia that is both provocative and seems to cater to the prejudices of post-communists and nationalists.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a bipartisan Federal agency which manages VOA, has been pressuring the Russian Service journalists to increase their audience ratings, while at the same time it has been cutting their budget to pay for broadcasting initiatives in the Middle East and other projects awarded to private contractors. In 2008, the BBG had terminated all on-air VOA Russian-language radio programs, just 12 days before Russia launched a major military attack on the Republic of Georgia over a territorial dispute. (Later, the BBG had also eliminated on-air VOA Russian television news programs and forced the Russian Service to rely solely on the Internet for program delivery. VOA websites were completely crippled by a cyber attack for at least two full days during President Obama’s recent official visit to Russia. One short radio rebroadcast in Moscow was reinstituted by the BBG, but only after strong protests from VOA journalists and media freedom advocates.)

Blaming the BBG for editorial mistakes in how VOA journalists describe the history of World War II may seem far-fetched, but another BBG-managed broadcaster, Alhurra Television, caused a major scandal and drew anger of many members of Congress by airing extensive statements from Holocaust deniers. It was an apparent effort to make Alhurra programs more acceptable to those in the Middle East who do not believe the Holocaust is a historical fact. With its programming philosophy set by BBG members, their private sector consultants and neoconservatives in the Bush Administration, Alhurra has not managed to attract a large number of viewers. BBG policies had an equally disastrous impact on VOA’s Russian Service. Largely as a result of the BBG-imposed program cuts, VOA’s audience reach in Russia has declined 98% and is now estimated at only about 0.2% annually.

VOA Russian Service journalists are under enormous pressure to expand their Internet audience, which may also explain why they chose this particular title for the news story about the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II. Never mind that it’s almost like asking whether Hitler’s attack on the Soviet Union or the Holocaust were also the only means of self-defense. After all, the Nazis claimed they were. Reporting about history at the VOA Russian Service has not been easy under the BBG’s “marry the mission to the market” programming philosophy.

But the Kremlin’s Foreign Intelligence Service has some reasons to cheer that their efforts to rehabilitate Stalin are having an impact. Even if it is only a title for a news story from the U.S. taxpayer-funded Voice of America, at least they managed to raise their defense of the Soviet dictator to a legitimate question.

Voice of America report from Moscow

Russia Defends Stalin’s Deal with Hitler
By Jonas Bernstein
Moscow
20 August 2009

Sunday, August 23, marks the 70th anniversary of the so-called Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact – the non-aggression treaty signed in 1939 by Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov and German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop. The pact included a secret protocol dividing Eastern and Central Europe into Nazi and Soviet spheres of influence. Days after it was signed, first German and then Soviet forces invaded Poland.

The anniversary’s approach has sparked a debate in Europe. Western governments condemn Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin as two equally murderous variants of totalitarianism. The Russian government calls that comparison a “distortion” of history.

On August 17, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service issued a statement saying it had declassified documents showing that the 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was the Soviet Union’s “only available means of self-defense.”

The spy agency’s demarche was just the latest in a series of Russian government statements that critics say appear to defend Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and justify actions he took shortly before and during World War II.

In early May, Russian Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu introduced legislation in parliament that would make it a crime to deny the Soviet victory in World War II.

Later in May, President Dmitri Medvedev issued a decree setting up a presidential commission to counter what he called attempts to “falsify history.”

At a meeting in early July, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe passed a resolution designating August 23 – the anniversary of the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact – as a day of remembrance for the victims of both Stalinism and Nazism.

Russian delegates to the European security body walked out of the meeting, in protest. Russia’s Foreign Ministry denounced the OSCE resolution as “an attempt to distort history with political goals,” while Russia’s parliament called it a “direct insult to the memory of millions” of Soviet soldiers who, in the words of the parliament, “gave their lives for the freedom of Europe from the fascist yoke.”

Former independent Russian parliament Deputy Vladimir Ryzhkov says what he calls the “official” Russian position on the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact is “extremely strange.”

Ryzhkov asks why today’s Russia, which has a democratic constitution and new democratic legitimacy, should justify the division of Europe between Hitler and Stalin.

He says that this view is now included in Russian history text books and has caused “enormous moral damage” to Russia’s reputation, particularly in the countries of Eastern Europe that were the main victims of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Ryzhkov says the only explanation for the Russian leadership’s position on the issue is what he calls “sympathy for Stalin.”

Public opinion surveys suggest many ordinary Russians share at least some of their government’s views.

A poll conducted by the state-run VTsIOM agency, following the OSCE resolution condemning Stalinism and Nazism, found that 53 percent of the respondents across Russia viewed it negatively, while 11 percent viewed it positively and 21 percent viewed it neutrally. In addition, 59 percent of those polled said the resolution was aimed at undermining Russia’s authority in the world and diminishing its contribution to the defeat of Nazi Germany.

Dmitry Furman of the Russian Academy of Science’s Institute of Europe calls the presidential commission to counter what it deems historical falsification an “idiotic undertaking” and a “very bad idea.” He also says Stalin’s government killed as many, or even more people than Hitler’s.

But, given the suffering Russians endured after Hitler turned on Stalin and invaded the Soviet Union, Furman says it is natural that many resist equating Stalinism and Nazism.

Furman says it is “very difficult psychologically” for Russians to put what they see as their “victors” in the Great Patriotic War, as they call World War II, on the same level with the vanquished Nazis.

Voice of America Report As Posted on the Russian Service Website

Сговор Сталина с Гитлером – «единственное средство самообороны»?

В воскресенье 23 августа исполняется 70 лет со дня заключения Пакта Молотова-Риббентропа. Речь идет о договоре о ненападении, подписанном в Москве народным комиссаром иностранных дел СССР Вячеславом Молотовым и министром иностранных дел Германии Иоахимом фон Риббентропом. К пакту был приложен секретный протокол о разделе Восточной и Центральной Европы на сферы влияния Советского Союза и нацистской Германии. Через неделю германский вермахт вторгся в Польшу с запада, а две недели спустя в Польшу вторглась с востока Красная армия.

Приближение годовщины пакта вызывает острые дискуссии. Западные правительства осуждают Гитлера и Сталина как вождей двух одинаково преступных форм тоталитаризма. Москва именует подобные сравнения «искажением» истории.

17 августа нынешнего года Служба внешней разведки РФ известила о рассекречивании документов 70-летней давности, призванных доказать, что заключение Пакта Молотова-Риббентропа было для СССР «единственным средством самообороны». Критики расценивают этот демарш российского разведывательного ведомства как очередной шаг Кремля, направленный на реабилитацию Сталина и оправдание его действий накануне и во время второй мировой войны.

В мае российский министр по чрезвычайным ситуациям Сергей Шойгу внес в Госдуму законопроект об уголовном наказании за отрицание победы СССР во второй мировой войне. Чуть позже президент Дмитрий Медведев учредил комиссию по борьбе с «фальсификацией истории».

В июне Организация по безопасности и сотрудничеству в Европе приняла резолюцию, объявляющую 23 августа днем памяти жертв сталинизма и нацизма. Российская делегация в знак протеста покинула заседание ОБСЕ. МИД РФ назвал резолюцию «попыткой исказить историю в политических целях», а Дума сочла ее «прямым оскорблением памяти миллионов» советских солдат, «отдавших жизнь за освобождение Европы от фашистского ига».

Существуют, однако, и другие мнения. По словам независимого российского парламентария Владимира Рыжкова «официальная» российская позиция в оценке пакта Молотова-Риббентропа звучит «крайне странно». Почему сегодняшняя Россия, имеющая демократическую конституцию, должна защищать раздел Европы между Сталиным и Гитлером, спрашивает он?

Как указывает Рыжков, подобные суждения включены в учебники, что наносит «огромный моральный ущерб» репутации России, особенно в странах Восточной Европы, ставших главными жертвами Пакта Молотова-Риббентропа. Единственным объяснением позиции российского руководства депутат Госдумы считает возможную «симпатию к Сталину».

Опросы показывают, что многие рядовые россияне разделяют, по крайней мере, некоторые оценки Кремля. Опрос, проведенный государственным агентством ВЦИОМ после принятия резолюции ОБСЕ, выявил, что 53% респондентов относятся к ней негативно, 11% – позитивно, а 21% – нейтрально. Кроме того, 59% опрошенных выразили убеждение, что резолюция нацелена на подрыв авторитета России в мире и преуменьшение ее вклада в разгром фашистской Германии.

Сотрудник Института Европы РАН Дмитрий Фурман назвал президентскую комиссию по борьбе с фальсификацией истории «идиотским мероприятием». По его словам при Сталине было убито не меньше, а, может быть, и больше людей, чем при Гитлере. Однако, учитывая страдания, перенесенные народами Советского Союза в годы гитлеровской оккупации, многим россиянам психологически трудно поставить себя – победителей в Великой Отечественной войне – на одну доску с побежденными фашистами.

US Public Diplomacy Failure to Reach Out to the Russians After Terrorist Attack in Ingushetia

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, Commentary by Ted Lipien, August 18, 2009, San Francisco — Ever since the United States Information Agency (USIA) was dismantled in a foolish post-Cold War cost-cutting move, the U.S. State Department and American diplomats abroad have not been able to present a coherent message to foreign audiences quickly and effectively. The latest example is the lame U.S. public response to the terrorist attack in Ingushetia — no phone call from President Obama to President Medvedev, just a short written statement which was not easily available. There was no statement from Secretary Clinton.

Even though the lack of a proper U.S. response was not deliberate and can be blamed on the distraction with the health care reform and just plain bureaucratic incompetence, the Russian leaders and the Russian public have a reason to wonder how badly the Obama Administration wants Russia’s support in combating terrorism and restraining Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Americans, on the other hand, should be concerned how professional and how effective is America’s public diplomacy, which aims to inform and influence public opinion abroad to make it more sympathetic to U.S. interests. The ultimate aim is to make America safer by strengthening and promoting security and democracy worldwide. Yet, few within the government bureaucracy in Washington seem to grasp that ineffective public diplomacy threatens America’s safety.

Prior to 1999, a cadre of foreign service officers assigned to USIA in Washington and abroad had been responsible for crafting and coordinating U.S. responses to major international and domestic news events. Overall, they did a good job in helping to win the Cold War.

During that period USIA operated separately of the State Department but was integrated into the foreign policy establishment in Washington and at U.S. embassies abroad. USIA officers knew their foreign audiences, specialized in working with local media, and made sure that whatever message the U.S. was trying to send was presented quickly and credibly using the most modern and efficient channels of communication available at the time.

Many of these skills have now been lost. The case in point is the U.S. reaction to the latest terrorist attack in Russia that killed and wounded many innocent civilians. While the White House did issue a short statement of condolences from President Obama, the statement was not posted immediately on the White House or the State Department websites, where it would have been accessible to Russian media and individual web users. There was no official photograph or video to accompany the statement. It was not translated into Russian except in a brief news item posted with some delay on the Voice of America (VOA) Russian Service website. But after recent program cuts by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages U.S. international broadcasting, VOA’s estimated annual reach in Russia through the Internet is only about 0.2%.

VOA website is better designed and more frequently updated than the State Department websites but is still far from perfect. Another U.S.-funded broadcaster, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) has a superior Russian news website — more in terms of design than content — but it does not specialize in American news and faces other problems, such as American management’s discrimination against foreign-born journalists and intimidation of its reporters in Russia by the Kremlin’s secret police.

There was no mention Monday of the terrorist attack or the U.S. reaction to it on the official State Department Blog, the U.S. Embassy Moscow website or the Open America website created by the Embassy in Moscow to communicate with the Russian public. There was also nothing posted about this tragic incident on the Russian-language America.gov website edited in Washington by the State Department’s public diplomacy team. This website is notoriously late in posting news-related U.S. government statements and articles. Not that the web team at the White House has done a much better job as far as Russia is concerned. It took the White House 10 days to post a video from President Obama’s trip to Russia.

The video, produced in the style of early Cold War propaganda newsreels, was already overtaken by other events when it was posted ten days after President Obama’s visit, and there was no Russian translation to accompany the images. It was not posted on the U.S. Embassy Moscow website.

Evgeny Morozov, originally from Belarus, who is a fellow at the Open Society Institute in New York, has some very interesting insights about new media and public diplomacy. He wrote in Foreign Policy that “watching American diplomats embrace new media for the purposes of public diplomacy has been a very awkward experience (not as painful as watching my 82-year-old grandpa learn how to use Skype, but at times it has come pretty close). By shifting their outreach campaigns to Facebook, Twitter, and blogs, the government may be trying to do the impossible, i.e. to plant carefully worded and controlled messages on platforms that sprang up precisely to avoid the kind of influence that the State Department seeks to exert via them.”

His last point is certainly worth pondering. The U.S. Ambassador to Russia, John Beyrle, a career diplomat who speaks fluent Russian, has made good attempts to communicate directly with the Russian people through radio and television interviews, but the Kremlin controls access to those television and radio networks which enjoy the highest ratings because of their nation-wide coverage. Ambassador Beyrle also has his own blog, in which he makes use of video and his Russian-language skills. Compared to the official State Department Blog, which has little useful information and even less analysis, in addition to relying heavily on AP images — which are not in public domain — his blog is far more informative and focused.

Whether or not Evgeny Morozov is right that the benefits of the Internet for official public diplomacy are to some degree utopian, U.S. taxpayers deserve that their money used for their government’s efforts of communicating with foreign audiences be wisely spent. Even if U.S. diplomats are ill-equipped to take advantage of the new social media, they can still use the Internet to present and explain foreign policy questions.

But U.S. Embassy and State Department websites and blogs are not only poorly designed, they are also infrequently updated and rarely offer public domain photographs and other useful materials. Foreign journalists cannot rely on them for timely and objective information, in-depth analysis, and free resources, such as ready-for-posting photo images and broadcast quality video and audio.

They can also no longer rely for the same on the Voice of America. The Broadcasting Board of Governors, which was created when USIA was dismantled, eliminated VOA Russian-language radio broadcasts just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia last summer. The BBG denied VOA resources to serve as a multimedia source of comprehensive information about U.S-Russian relations and American society and did not protect the VOA website from cyber attacks. During President Obama’s official visit to Moscow, the VOA website was out of commission for at least two full days.

Instead of demanding that the Russian security services stop threatening radio and TV stations using VOA news programs and that the Russian authorities should treat VOA the same way the Russian state broadcasters Radio Russia and Russia Today TV are treated in the U.S., where they are free to place their programs on cable and individual stations, the BBG responded to the secret police intimidation by eliminating on-air VOA radio and TV broadcasts. An NGO website, GovoritAmerika.us, launched in 2008, edited by volunteers and not connected with the U.S. government, offers now the only one-source access with direct links to both U.S. government and non-government U.S.-Russia-related news materials, but the website receives no public funding, which prevents it from expanding its coverage.

Even with currently available resources, the Obama Administration could have done a much better job in communicating its sympathy and support for the Russian people in the aftermath of the latest deadly terrorist attack if it had mobilized its public diplomacy team. If the Obama White House and the State Department had decided on their public diplomacy message and given a proper briefing for Vice President Biden, it might have helped him avoid making comments in the Wall Street Journal interview suggesting that Russia is a second-rate country — comments that the Russians found highly insulting, and rightly so — while at the same time the Russian leadership has taken a number of highly provocative steps, vis-a-vis the U.S. and Russia’s nearest neighbors, which suggest that their interest in President Obama’s call for a “reset” in U.S.-Russian relations is not nearly as strong as his. (Vice President Biden’s staff has been much better in updating White House website stories and posting photographs on his trips abroad than President Obama’s public affairs team, which shows the importance of foreign policy and public diplomacy experience some of them acquired while working in the U.S. Senate.)

Not all of Vice President Biden’s comments were ill-advised from the public diplomacy perspective. Robert Amsterdam, an international lawyer who represents Russian businessman Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an imprisoned political foe of Prime Minister Putin, wrote in a recent article in the Huffington Post that by “creating manageable confrontations, especially with Europe, the United States, and the former Soviet states, the Kremlin is attempting to govern outwardly, diminishing pressures for greater accountability in their domestic shortcomings, and helping to stir up nationalism and support for the regime.” Under these circumstances, communicating with the Kremlin and the Russian public requires a great deal of sophistication.

All of this calls for a quick overhaul of U.S. public diplomacy. The State Department has a new public diplomacy chief, Under Secretary Judith McHale — her predecessor, James K. Glassman, appointed by the Bush White House, terminated VOA Russian radio and TV in his previous position as the BBG chairman — but there still is no Obama Administration plan and no structure to that would help the U.S. to respond with a coherent and well-delivered message to such developments as the recent terrorist attack in Russia, the Kremlin’s threats against Georgia and Ukraine, or the Russian media’s reaction to Vice President Biden’s Wall Street Journal interview.

Concerned by these shortcomings, several members of Congress, including Senator Richard Lugar (R-Indiana), are trying to revive support and funding for professionally conducted U.S. public diplomacy. Senator Lugar introduced S. Res. 49 on February 13, 2009, expressing the sense of the Senate regarding the importance of public diplomacy. He also wrote an oped for ForeignPolicy.com on this topic. Another U.S. Senator, Sam Brownback (R-Kansas), has called for abolishing the Broadcasting Board of Governors. He introduced legislation that would establish the National Center for Strategic Communications, an agency similar to the now defunct U.S. Information Agency. Senator Patrick Leahy (D -Vermont) has tried to stop the BBG from eliminating U.S. broadcasts in foreign languages but his efforts have been ignored by most of the Board members and their executive staff. Only one BBG member, Blanquita Walsh Cullum — the only journalist serving on the Board — opposed cuts in U.S.-funded broadcasting to Russia and other media-at-risk countries.

Whether these and other calls for reforming U.S. public diplomacy and international broadcasting will be answered and result in meaningful legislative changes will depend on the cooperation from the Obama White House. New media, international broadcasting, and public diplomacy cannot solve all the problems the U.S. is facing abroad, but a little bit of expertise in these areas and good management can be very helpful. Otherwise, pro-democracy activists and authoritarian regimes will continue to wonder what the Obama Administration wants and what it can do. It would help if the Administration could agree on what that message should be and how it should be delivered.

The Russians may conveniently assume that Vice President Biden’s unfortunate comments about their country’s second-rate status were deliberate, and may think the same about the non-response in Washington to the terrorist attack in Ingushetia. But as someone who has observed the U.S. foreign policy establishment first-hand, I can say that most of it can be blamed on carelessness, incompetence, and the simple fact that most of the State Department and U.S. diplomats based abroad are on vacation in August. But in addition to that, the structural problems of U.S. public diplomacy are real and demand immediate attention from the Obama Administration and the U.S. Congress.

Voice of America Report Shows Confusion and Divisions Over Obama’s Policy Toward Russia

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, August 13, 2009, San Francisco — A report by a senior Voice of America (VOA) correspondent, posted online today, shows a high level of confusion over the Obama Administration’s new policy of “resetting” relations with Russia. While the report by VOA’s Andre de Nesnera focuses on statements by Vice President Biden, which have “angered” Russian officials, and on apparent divisions within the Administration over Russia policy, it does not address a number of recent Russian actions and statements, which other analysts saw as a clear challenge to President Obama after his recent visit to Moscow. They included a stern videotaped warning to Ukraine’s pro-Western president, Victor Yushchenko, delivered earlier this week by President Medvedev.

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The content and the harsh tone of President Medvedev’s video message to Ukraine was in sharp contrast with a number of friendly and hopeful statements from President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton, offering a “reset” in U.S.-Russian relations.

VOA report quoted a number of American analysts, including Stephen Jones, a Russia expert from Mount Holyoke College, and Robert Legvold at Columbia University, who are critical of Vice President Biden’s statements made in a recent interview with the Wall Street Journal. In that interview, the U.S. Vice President suggested that Russia’s economic and social weakness would force the Kremlin to make concessions to the West on key national security issues. VOA’s Andre de Nesnera did not cite any comments in defense of Vice President Biden’s statements, which he had made after his visit to Ukraine and Georgia.

The VOA correspondent asserted in his report that after Vice President Biden’s interview with the Wall Street Journal, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had tried to “head off a dispute with Moscow” during an appearance on (NBC’s) television program Meet the Press. She told the American TV network that “We want what the president called for during his recent Moscow summit. We want a strong, peaceful and prosperous Russia. Now there is an enormous amount of work to be done between the United States and Russia,” said Clinton.

VOA’s de Nesnera also quotes Ronald Suny, at the University of Chicago, as saying that “the Russians have a point.” According to Ronald Suny “The Russians are extremely sensitive. They are looking for signals. They don’t know what to expect from this new government in Washington. And so they were very well pleased, it seemed, by Obama’s visit. And then the [vice president's] trip comes and these statements are made – and the Russians are now upset again. And they are asking, in a way, what are the signals? Which signals are we to take to be the real signals? And I’m as much at a loss as they are,” he said.

Other American experts, however, see the Kremlin’s recent actions as highly provocative and designed to regain Russia’s former imperial control over now independent countries like Ukraine and Georgia. They also point out that nationalistic and anti-American rhetoric serves the power interests of the current Russian leadership and will continue regardless of the Obama Administration’s wish for a “reset” in the bilateral relationship.

The Voice of America is a taxpayer-funded U.S. international broadcaster managed by the bipartisan Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). De Nesnera’s report was translated into Russian and posted on the VOA Russian-language website. VOA no longer broadcasts, however, on-air radio and television newscasts in Russian. They were terminated by the BBG in July 2008, just 12 days before Russian troops attacked the Republic of Georgia in a territorial dispute.

Voice of America Report Biden Remarks Anger Russian Officials
By Andre de Nesnera
Washington
13 August 2009

Recent statements by Vice President Joe Biden have angered Russian officials.

Vice President Biden recently told the Wall Street Journal that – in his words – the Russians “have a shrinking population base, have a withering economy, have a banking sector and structure that is not likely to be able to withstand the next 15 years.” He then suggested that all these trends would force Russia to make concessions to the West on key national security issues.

Mr. Biden made those statements following a trip to Ukraine and Georgia. Several weeks earlier, President Barack Obama held a Moscow summit with his Russian counterpart, Dmitri Medvedev – a meeting whose main goal was to reset U.S.-Russian relations on a positive footing.

Most analysts agree that was achieved. But they also say Mr. Biden’s statements represented a different kind of tone from the one that was taken by Mr. Obama in Moscow.

Stephen Jones, a Russia expert from Mount Holyoke College (in Hadley, Massachusetts), says the vice president was in a sense writing off Russia as a significant power.

“Russia, of course, is going through a very serious economic situation. Its prospects are not good in terms of the demographic situation, and the energy situation too because Gazprom is very inefficient and oil production is declining. But Russia is still enormously powerful in the region. And when Russia has its back to the wall, it can certainly pursue some very strong, even aggressive policies at times. So that sort of statement, I think, is rather exaggerated and rather naïve in many ways,” he said.

Vice President Biden’s remarks hit a raw nerve with Russian officials. Sergei Prikhodko, a senior Kremlin foreign policy adviser, said “it raised the question who is shaping U.S. foreign policy -the president or members of his team?”

Robert Legvold at Columbia University, agrees. “It has raised a lot of questions both in the Russian media and even in the western media about whether the administration is singing from the same page. And if the page they are singing from is the same, and it is the Biden message – then are we hearing from Biden what they really think and from Obama what the diplomatic gloss is that he means to put on the relationship. That, I think, has created – at least for the moment – something of a problem,” he said.

Ronald Suny, at the University of Chicago, says the Russians have a point. “The Russians are extremely sensitive. They are looking for signals. They don’t know what to expect from this new government in Washington. And so they were very well pleased, it seemed, by Obama’s visit. And then the [vice president's] trip comes and these statements are made – and the Russians are now upset again. And they are asking, in a way, what are the signals? Which signals are we to take to be the real signals? And I’m as much at a loss as they are,” he said.

Shortly after the interview was published, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tried to head off a dispute with Moscow during an appearance on (NBC’s) Meet the Press. “We want what the president called for during his recent Moscow summit. We want a strong, peaceful and prosperous Russia. Now there is an enormous amount of work to be done between the United States and Russia,” he said.

Secretary Clinton said Moscow and Washington are working to reduce their nuclear arsenals – and are collaborating on the key issues of North Korea and Iran. “And so there is an enormous amount of hard work being done. And we view Russia as a great power,” he said.

Some analysts say Mrs. Clinton’s remarks were an attempt at damage control at a time when relations between Washington and Moscow are at a sensitive stage given the new U.S. administration and the issues facing both countries.

Cyber attack makes anti-Russia blogger a star – The Los Angeles Times reports

‘I am not happy . . . but it is good that I get famous,’ Georgian Cyxymu says of the onslaught that brought down Twitter and crippled Facebook and other online services.

The Los Angeles Times and other American newspapers reported that the massive cyber attack last week, seen by security experts as aimed at silencing a single blogger in the country of Georgia, instead made him a global celebrity.

LAT reporter David Colker wrote that “Cyxymu, as he is known on his mostly anti-Russia blog, has been the subject of news reports worldwide ever since he was identified as the target of the attack that took down Twitter for hours and crippled other popular online services.” more from LAT

A comment from Ted Lipien, president of FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom NGO:

This LAT report sheds a new light on the decision made by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to end all on-air Voice of America (VOA) Russian radio and television broadcasts and its planned termination of VOA Georgian radio broadcasts. Despite protests from members of Congress and human rights and media freedom organizations, the BBG in fact terminated Russian-language VOA radio broadcasts at the end of July 2008, only 12 days before Russian troops attacked Georgia. (BBG officials did not have enough time before the outbreak of the Russian-Georgian war to end VOA radio to Georgia, but they still stopped on-air VOA television broadcasts to Russia shortly after the war started.)

Internal BBG documents described the Internet as the optimium program delivery platform for Russia. During President Obama’s historic trip to Russia earlier this summer, the entire Voice of America website was completely crippled for at least two full days by another cyber attack. Instead of using new media and Web 2.0 applications to enhance a sensible and cost-effective multimedia program delivery strategy, the BBG granted the Russian security services full victory in their efforts to limit the access of Western broadcasters to a mass media audience in Russia. In the meantime, Russian state broadcasters, such as Russia Today TV, continued to expand their presence in the American media market without any restrictions.

After Barack Obama’s electoral victory, the Voice of America Russian Service no longer had the necessary technical and human resources to try to reclaim its role as a major on-air radio and television broadcaster capable of conducting interactive live discussion programs with state or independent broadcasters in Russia. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), also managed by the BBG, was allowed to keep its Russian-language radio broadcasts, but RFE/RL does not specialize in American news and most of its Russian staff is based in Russia within easy reach of the secret police operatives assigned to keep an eye on, and if necessary, to intimidate independent journalists.

The current annual audience reach for VOA in Russia is estimated at only 0.2%, which represents a recent 98% decline, largely as a result of the BBG’s actions. The Broadcasting Board of Governors is a bipartisan body which manages U.S. international broadcasting. According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, only one BBG member voted against ending on-air VOA radio and television programs to Russia.

VOA Director Testifies Before Congress About Strategy in Russia and Cyber Attack on VOA Website But Serious Mistakes Go Unreported

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, July 23, 2009, San Francisco — Voice of America director Dan Austin had a hard job explaining before Congress the broadcasting and program delivery strategy for Russia and the cyber attack that shut down the VOA website, including its Russian-language site, for at least two full days during President Obama’s visit to Russia earlier this month. His testimony was most revealing in how damaging information was being obscured from members of Congress and American taxpayers.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages VOA, stopped all on-air Voice of America radio and television broadcasts in Russian just 12 days prior to the Russian military attack on Georgia last summer. Largely as a result of this action, VOA’s annual audience reach in Russia dropped by 98% to an estimated level of just 0.2%, which was the prior reach of VOA in Russia on the Internet.

VOA Capital Hill correspondent Dan Robinson reported that “Lawmakers are concerned about obstacles in places like China, Iran and Russia to the free flow of information and independent reporting. The role U.S. government-funded broadcasters play in overcoming these barriers was the main focus of a Europe subcommittee hearing.

Members of Congress have condemned Iranian government restrictions on the Internet, and criticized steps by the Chinese government to tighten surveillance of Internet traffic, and government pressure on radio, television and print outlets in Russia.

Referring to the impact of technology amid post-election turmoil in Iran, the panel chairman Democrat Robert Wexler said VOA and RFE/RL play a crucial role as ’smart power tools’ as the U.S. faces foreign policy challenges, anti-Americanism, and efforts by governments to suppress media.” more

Voice of America director Danford Austin:

“In Russia, we are now a multi-media web-based service produced for a country where Internet usage is growing rapidly,” said Danforth Austin. “At a very critical juncture in U.S.-Russia relations, this strategy allows audiences to increase their understanding of American policies, politics and culture and American views of Russia. It also frankly galvanizes conversation among its audience through utilization of these so-called Web 2.0 tools.” more

The anecdotal and largely meaningless statistics for Russia, which the VOA director selected for presentation to Congress, were designed to draw attention away from the real issues: how many Russians have access to the VOA website in Russia (about 0.2% annually); the lack of any significant interaction by the small number of VOA site visitors; the departure of talented TV and radio journalists; inability to take advantage of TV and radio broadcasting in response to changes in U.S.-Russian relations; the lack of any significant impact on the political discussion and media scene in Russia. VOA Capitol Hill correspondent Dan Robinson:

“Critics say the decision by the non-partisan Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) which oversees U.S. international broadcasting to end Russian-language radio and television broadcasts in favor of an Internet-focused approach damaged efforts to maintain the flow of news to people in the country.”

VOA director offered a rather lengthy and somewhat confusing explanation of the shutdown of the VOA website during President Obama’s visit to Russia:

“The Denial of Service (DoS) cyber-attack against the VOA web site on July 5 was part of a wide scale attack that targeted Korean and US government sites, financial sites, and some news sites. VOA’s core computer systems were never affected and there was no loss of any agency information technology asset. The voanews.com web site is hosted off-site, and all public traffic to it was affected, most severely from the Asia-North America axis, with local access problems elsewhere, such as within Russia. The attack prevented many users from reaching the site (and all the other targeted sites) for several hours until Korea, the suspected source of the attacks, was cut-off by many of the Internet Service Providers (ISP). As the suspect machines were quarantined by Korean ISPs and others, the attacks slowed and Korea access was re-established. VOA traffic from Asia since has reached near normal levels and non-Asian traffic is completely back to normal levels. Our production systems are behind firewalls and intrusion detection systems, which functioned well, and both servers and desktop machines are updated with security patches at least once per day. Working with our web distribution contractors, we now have predictive systems in place that can isolate the source of DoS attacks much more promptly.”

In simple words, the testimony can be reduced to a few facts: despite warnings from VOA journalists, members of Congress, and media freedom organizations like FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG ended all VOA radio and TV Russian-language broadcasts to Russia last summer opting for the Internet-only program delivery strategy. Shortly after VOA radio in Russian went of the air, Russian troops attacked Georgia. The BBG refused urgent appeals from VOA journalists to resume these broadcasts. Within a relatively short period, VOA’s annual audience reach in Russia dropped by about 98%, and is now well below 1%. The BBG failed to provide security for the VOA website. The VOA website was unavailable in Russia during President Obama’s visit not just on June 05 but for at least two full days.

The Russian media largely ignored President Obama’s major speech to the graduates of the New Economic School in Moscow, in which he defended democratic institutions and media freedom while calling for bringing an end to the Cold War mentality in US-Russian relations. VOA was both silent and invisible in Russia during the speech. And even if its website had not been blocked, the lead U.S. international broadcaster no longer has the capability to engage with the Russian media in serious interactive TV and radio broadcast journalism. The Obama White House, which still lacks a public diplomacy team and direction, did not do much better. It released a video promoting the speech 10 days after it was delivered. The video had not been translated into Russian.

White House Video From Russia Released 10 Days Late, Without Russian Translation, And A Message Overtaken By Events

AS RELEASED BY THE WHITE HOUSE, FRI, JULY 17, 12:51 PM EST

Highlights from the President’s Trip to Russia

Posted by Katherine Brandon

Get a behind-the-scenes look at the highlights of the President’s trip to Moscow earlier this month. See images of his trip, and listen to the President speak at the New Economic School. You can read the whole speech here.

END OF WHITE HOUSE MATERIAL

White House Video From Russia Released 10 Days Late, Without Russian Translation, And A Message Overtaken By Events

Pro-democracy intellectuals in Russia and political leaders from the former Soviet block countries, who had lived under communism and were exposed to communist propaganda, would probably see the White House video as dangerously naive.

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, Commentary by Ted Lipien, July 17, 2009, San Francisco — The White House posted on its website today carefully produced video highlights from the President’s visit to Russia, exactly ten days after Barack Obama delivered a major speech on the future of U.S.-Russian relations. The address to the graduates of the New Economic School, which Natalia Bubnova, a public affairs specialist at the Carnegie Center in Moscow, described as a “silent speech,” was not carried live by the Kremlin-controlled national television networks and received relatively little media coverage in Russia, where journalists are increasingly threatened by the Kremlin’s secret police and the local mafia of business and government leaders. Many Russian journalists have been murdered by unknown assailants, and the few remaining semi-independent media outlets practice self-censorship to protect themselves from official reprisals.

But if the White House video was designed to inform and inspire the Russian public about the President’s commitment to a new start in U.S.-Russian relations, it was not only released ten days too late to be of any news value to journalists and media consumers. It also came without a Russian translation, and its overly optimistic message presented in the style of old Soviet era propaganda films would have been inappropriate for the skeptical Russian audience. Barack Obama would have done much better in communicating his message of change to the Russian people if the White House handlers had arranged during his visit for a series of extensive live interviews with audience participation on national TV networks in Russia and had insisted that his speech also be carried live on the same television channels, which are controlled by the Kremlin. When it comes to overcoming media control in Russia, some of the Cold War diplomatic tactics are still needed.

The limited media outreach during the Moscow visit was in sharp contrast with the White House public relations effort to publicize the President’s earlier speech in Cairo, Egypt, in which Barack Obama called for a new beginning in America’s relationship with Muslim communities around the world. The Cairo speech was released by the White House in Arabic and other foreign languages, both in text and in video, as soon as it was delivered. The media blitz after the Cairo speech seems to have been, however, a one-time effort, which the Obama Administration seems not capable of sustaining due to a severe shortage of experienced public diplomacy and media specialists.

Other than the lack of proper structures and resources, the public diplomacy experts at the White House and the State Department also seem to have some difficulty realizing that their focus should be on providing timely and objective information in foreign languages to local media outlets and media consumers rather than taking full ten days to produce a short upbeat video, as the one released today, that looks and sounds much more like a government-generated propaganda film of World War II and Cold War vintage. Had the video been released immediately after the speech, Russian journalists may have been able at least to take advantage of its outstanding visual composition and provide an appropriate text and translation. Ten days later, in its English-language version, it is largely unusable. Its release now is also counterproductive, as its core message has been overtaken by recent events in Russia and the region.

Normally, the Voice of America (VOA), the U.S. government-funded international broadcaster, would have carried live a major presidential speech in Moscow and provided a Russian translation. VOA would have also offered live commentaries by independent U.S. experts. These would be broadcast on satellite radio and television from VOA studios in Washington, D.C. Some of the programs might have also been replayed live or broadcast later on those stations in Russia that would still be willing to defy the Russian secret police and maintain an affiliate relationship with VOA. The VOA Russian broadcast would have also been transmitted on short-wave radio frequencies, which cover great distances and are not as easy to jam as a single website, although they attract a very limited number of listeners unless there is a major crisis and a government blockade or heavy censorship of all other media.

Unfortunately, the Federal agency in charge of the Voice of America, the bipartisan Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), terminated in 2008 all live VOA Russian-language radio and television programs, both high-tech satellite and low-tech short-wave, just 12 days before Russia’s sudden military attack on the Republic of Georgia over a territorial dispute. Since then, the BBG has refused urgent pleas from VOA journalists to resume these broadcasts as a response to the last summer’s Russian-Georgian war and the still deteriorating human rights and media situation in Russia.

The Voice of America Russian Service was left only with a poorly-designed and unprotected website and a 30 minute Monday through Friday pre-recorded radio segment on a weak AM station in Moscow, which was restored only after protests from media freedom advocates over a period of many months. To make things much worse, during Barack Obama’s historic first presidential visit to Russia, the Voice of America website went blank for at least two full days as a result of a suspected North Korean cyber attack. The website was back online after President Obama left Russia, but even then the audio program on the web was not updated for over a week. The BBG/VOA web team was not aware of the problem for several days. Instead of a recording of President Obama’s speech with a Russian translation, visitors to the VOA website were offered a week-old audio newscast. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), another U.S. taxpayer-funded international broadcaster also managed by the BBG, did cover the Obama visit, but RFE/RL is based in Prague, the Czech Republic, and in Moscow, and its Russian speaking reporters do not specialize in analyzing U.S. foreign policy from an American perspective. RFE/RL reporters based in Russia are also vulnerable to threats from the Russian secret police.

Even if the Voice of America website were available during President Obama’s visit to Russia, it would not have included full texts in Russian, video, and audio of all the presidential speeches delivered in Moscow. BBG officials responsible for terminating live VOA Russian radio and TV programs had also directed the Russian Service to focus their energies on producing short and entertaining news stories for the web in order to drive more visitors to the VOA website.

English and Russian texts of most of President Obama’s speeches in Moscow — but not audio or video files — were posted rather quickly on the State Department’s news and information website, America.gov, and on the website of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow. Summaries of President Obama’s speeches and links to full texts were also available on GovoritAmerika.us, a Russian-language news analysis website created by volunteers associated with the San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit FreeMediaOnline.org. Some of them are former VOA journalists who are concerned about media censorship in Russia and the restrictions imposed by the BBG on the Voice of America Russian broadcasts.

One of the drawbacks of waiting ten days to produce a video from a presidential trip is that new events can quickly overtake the video’s message. The same is true for producing a video that is much more oriented toward promoting a particular propaganda theme rather than offering factual information in a timely manner.

The White House video was heavily focused on hailing a new beginning in the bilateral relationship between Washington and Moscow and making a clean break with the Cold War models. Unfortunately for the public relations specialists who produced it, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev directly challenged their theme and President Obama when he visited South Ossetia earlier this week and said that Moscow would continue to back the breakaway Georgian region, which Russia recognized as independent despite strong objections from the United States and most other nations. Then, as a further sign that the situation in Russia was not moving in the direction desired by the Obama Administration, a respected human rights activist, Natalya Estemirova, was abducted and brutally murdered in Chechnya. Both the U.S. State Department spokesman and the U.S. Ambassador to Russia, John Beyrle, have condemned the murder. The White House has also condemned the killing, calling it “especially shocking” that it happened a week after President Barack Obama met with activists, including those from the human rights group Memorial, of which Ms. Estemirova was a member.

Because of these events in Russia, this may have not been the best time to release the already much outdated video. Also, a group of pro-American intellectuals and political leaders from former Central and East European countries, including former Polish president Lech Walesa and former Czech president Waclav Havel, has just published an open letter to the Obama Administration, warning President Obama of Russia’s return to what they call a “revisionist power pursuing a 19th century agenda with 21st century tactics.” The letter refers to “nervousness in our capitals” over energy blockades, media manipulation and other methods Russia has used to undermine the region’s ties with Western Europe and the United States.

The White House media team may deserve some credit for much more timely postings of official photographs, texts of presidential speeches and at least some videos during President Obama’s first visit to Moscow. After his initial meeting in London with President Medvedev in April 2009, the official photograph of the two presidents was not made available on the White House website for several days. The website was only infrequently updated during the entire U.S. presidential trip to Europe last April.

President Obama has a highly talented team of photographers and web designers lead by Pete Souza, but his public affairs and public diplomacy advisors seem to be lacking critical journalistic skills and are suffering from what could only be described as too much of a hero worship to be able to produce timely and credible materials for the media and news consumers. (They even put “hero” as part of the name for web images with President Obama, which anybody visiting the White House website can see by right-clicking on these photos in order to download and save them.)

These White House advisors, if they are indeed advising the president, clearly lack the journalistic, public diplomacy and foreign policy experience to find the right balance in describing and presenting his message to Russia and the rest of the world. They are, unfortunately, repeating the mistakes of the Bush White House by confusing U.S. domestic political campaign advertising with public diplomacy abroad. Pro-democracy intellectuals in Russia and political leaders from the former Soviet block countries, who had lived under communism and were exposed to communist propaganda, would probably see the White House video as dangerously naive.

Perhaps then, it’s not so bad after all that the video with the highlights of President Obama’s trip to Russia was released several days too late and without foreign language captions. Hopefully for the Obama Administration, it will not receive much publicity in the region formerly dominated by the Soviet Union and still feeling threatened by Russia’s autocratic leaders. If it does, it will only contribute to the nervousness about the U.S. policy and intentions.

About Ted Lipien

Ted Lipien is a former Voice of America acting associate director. He was also a regional BBG media marketing manager responsible for placement of U.S. government-funded radio and TV programs on stations in Russia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries in Eurasia. In the 1980’s he was in charge of VOA radio broadcasts to Poland during the communist regime’s crackdown on the Solidarity labor union and oversaw the development of VOA television news programs to Ukraine and Russia.

He is also author of “Wojtyla’s Women: How They Shaped the Life of Pope John Paul II and Changed the Catholic Church” (O-Books – June 2008). The book, which describes Pope John Paul II’s views on feminism, also includes evidence of the importance of Western radio broadcasts during Karol Wojtyla’s life in communist-ruled Poland and in the first ten years of his papacy. The book also has references to the efforts of the KGB and other communist intelligence services to place spies in the Vatican and to influence reporting by journalists covering the Polish pope.

About FreeMediaOnline.org

FreeMediaOnline.org is a San Francisco-based nonprofit which supports media freedom worldwide.

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us — which includes summaries of some of the more serious news and commentaries from multiple U.S. government and nongovernment sources. According to Ted Lipien, the web site is designed to compensate for the loss of information from the United States for Russian-speaking audiences due to program and budget cuts implemented by the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The web site, which includes links to VOA Russian Service news reports, is also designed to counter the BBG marketing strategy that has forced broadcasting entities to focus on entertainment programming and to avoid hard-hitting political reporting that might prevent local rebroadcasting or offend local officials. GovoritAmerika.us web site was developed without any public funding and is managed by volunteers. It is also hosted on LiveJournal.com.

BBG officials initially had told the VOA Russian Service that their requests to resume radio broadcasts were a “non-starter” even after Russia invaded Georgia. Only after weeks of protests, including reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG finally allowed VOA to produce a short audio program for the Internet, updated only Monday through Friday. This program is rather difficult to find on the VOA website. We made it available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us website managed by FreeMediaOnline.org.

Прочитайте речь на русском языке.

ГоворитАмерика.us Всесторонний Анализ Новостей из США – Link to GovoritAmerika.us Home

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Выбор ГоворитАмерика.us GovoritAmerika.us. Вы можете скопировать и использовать эту статью. You can copy and use this report. Подписка на рассылку ГоворитАмерика.us.

With Obama in Moscow, Voice of America Russian Reporters Saw Their Work Vanish

The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) has put all the eggs of broadcasts to Russia from the U.S. in one basket.

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, Commentary by Ted Lipien, July 10, 2009, San Francisco — Established in 1942 in response to wartime emergency, the Voice of America (VOA) has been the official U.S. broadcaster, funded by American taxpayers and guaranteed journalistic independence by the U.S. Congress. VOA journalists produce radio and TV programs and maintain Internet websites in multiple languages. VOA helped the United States win the Cold War and continues to provide uncensored news to countries with limited or no free media.

But when President Obama went to Moscow this week and met with President Medvedev, Prime Minister Putin, as well as with opposition and civil society leaders, a VOA Russian Service correspondent who was reporting on these meetings vainly tried to see his own work on the VOA website. The VOA site suffered a catastrophic failure and was out of commission for at least two full days due to a suspected North Korean cyber attack. The Russians could not learn from the Voice of America about President Obama’s speeches in which he talked about human rights and media freedom issues in Russia. These speeches were not carried live by the Kremlin-controled national TV and radio networks and did not receive wide coverage from independent media outlets, few of which still remain.

Agency set up to guarantee America’s ability to communicate with the world could not protect its own website

Other U.S. government websites were also targeted by the latest cyber attack, but only the Voice of America website was made inaccessible for a number of days. This failure is extremely disturbing, since the Voice of America, created during World War II with a mission to provide accurate and objective news to the rest of the world, is still considered by the U.S. Congress and the White House as an important national security asset, especially in times of national and international emergencies.

Until the summer of 2008, the Voice of America Russian Service still had on-air radio and TV programs. Some of the radio programs were transmitted on short-wave, which hostile governments cannot easily block, while other radio and TV programs were rebroadcast by local stations and networks in Russia, even as the Russian security services were trying to force them to stop from carrying such foreign broadcasts.

BBG lacks strategic vision and fails to plan for emergencies

This is when the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) — the bipartisan body which manages U.S. international broadcasting entities, including the Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio and TV Marti, Alhurra Television and others — decided that from now on the Voice of America will only use the Internet for delivering its programs to Russia. In July 2008, the BBG took all VOA Russian-language radio programs off the air. 12 days later, the Russian army attacked the Republic of Georgia over a territorial dispute, creating a major crisis in Moscow’s relations with Washington and other Western nations. Despite of the political and news emergency resulting from the Russian military attack, the BBG refused to resume VOA radio broadcasts to the war zone.

Before the Russian-Georgian war, members of Congress and representatives of human rights and media freedom organizations had warned the Bush Administration that the BBG’s Internet-only strategy for the Voice of America in Russia represented a serious national security risk and a further threat to what little remained of the Russian independent media. The BBG ignored these warnings.

The BBG not only did not anticipate the possibility of a Russian attack on Georgia, BBG members also did not consider the possibility that Barack Obama would be elected president, or that in the resulting improvement in U.S.-Russian relations, VOA might again be able to expand placement of its programs on national and local media in Russia. Such program placement represents the best option for gaining a large audience, assuming that it does not compromise journalistic freedom and objectivity of the programs being produced for local rebroadcasts — something that the BBG’s “marrying the mission to the market” strategy was not able to guarantee. In fact, it encouraged biased, unbalanced and soft journalism, as in Alhurra TV network’s coverage of the Holocaust deniers conference in Tehran, hosted by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and in some of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s (RFE/RL) programs. Both Alhurra and RFE/RL are managed by the BBG.

While the Russian government continued to expand placement in the United States for its international TV program, “Russia Today,” the BBG granted victory to the Russian security services in their intimidation campaign designed to drive the Voice of America off the airways in Russia shortly before President Obama was elected and promised to work to improve U.S.-Russian relations. If they are serious about U.S. international broadcasting, the Obama Administration officials should now point out to their counterparts in Moscow that, unlike harsh treatment of foreign and local media in Russia by the Russian secret police, the FBI and the CIA have not been trying to force “Russia Today” off American stations and cable channels.

Had it been allowed to maintain its multimedia program delivery strategy, the Voice of America could now be in a good position to quickly regain its TV and radio audience in Russia. But BBG officials killed both radio and TV, ignoring their own audience research, which showed that VOA was only reaching about 0.2% of the Russian audience through the Internet. Most importantly, however, they ignored clear evidence that, unlike radio and satellite TV, the Internet can be easily sabottaged and blocked not only by the Russian FSB, the KGB’s successor, but even by security services of other countries, and possibly also by ordinary hackers. The BBG has put all the eggs of broadcasts to Russia from the U.S. in one basket.

BBG officials failed to anticipate what might happen to the Internet-only strategy if U.S.-Russian relations should take a sudden turn for the worse. If the North Koreans could launch a successful attack on the VOA website — assuming that North Korea was indeed behind the latest attack — so can the Russian security services if ordered by the Kremlin. They demonstrated this ability during the Russian-Georgian war by blocking the Georgian government websites.

Another BBG-managed broadcaster, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, still has radio programs to Russia. But RFE/RL staff is based in Prague, the Czech Republic, and in Moscow. Its broadcasts do not focus on the United States or provide an American perspective on world events. In any case, RFE/RL reporters working in Russia are vulnerable to intimidation by the Russian security services. These foreign-born, locally-based journalists are discriminated against and denied basic legal protections by the BBG. They would be especially threatened if a serious crisis developed in U.S.-Russian relations.

The U.S. Congress and American taxpayers should be concerned that a VOA Russian Service correspondent traveling with Barack Obama to Moscow could not see for a number of days any of his reports on the President’s comments about human rights and media restrictions in Russia. They should be concerned that a few North Korean agents were apparently able to shut down the Voice of America website serving the entire world, including Russia, China, and Iran. They should also be concerned that members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors and their executive staff terminated VOA programs to Russia a few days before the Republic of Georgia was invaded, and that they have failed to protect the VOA website from cyber attacks. (The BBG also ended VOA Hindi radio broadcasts to India shortly before the terrorist attacks in Mumbai and VOA radio broadcasts to Ukraine one day before Russia shut of the delivery of natural gas supplies to Ukraine and Western Europe in the middle of winter. They even tried to limit broadcasts to Tibet.)

Americans should not be surprised, however, by the BBG’s dismal record. The Broadcasting Board of Governors has been consistently rated by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management as the worst managed Federal agency.

There have been many calls for abolishing the current board in charge of U.S. international broadcasting. Some have suggested taking away the BBG’s powers to conduct day-to-day journalistic and programming operations. Others have called for selecting competent journalists, human rights, and media freedom professionals to fill the vacant BBG positions.

Journalists working at the Voice of America Russian Service hope that something will be done to make their programs once again heard and seen in Russia. As a result of the BBG’s termination of on-air radio and TV Russian broadcasts, their audience in Russia shrunk by an estimated 98%, an unprecedented audience loss in the history of international broadcasting. The same BBG officials who suggested that the Internet-only strategy for VOA in Russia would work also failed to protect the VOA website from a relatively minor cyber attack.

Frustrated current and former VOA journalists seeks private Russian-American broadcasting ventures to overcome restrictions imposed by the BBG

Some VOA Russian Service journalists, frustrated by the inability of the BBG and VOA management to grasp the opportunities presented by President Obama’s call for a “reset” in U.S.-Russian relations, have started to explore with Russian networks the possibility of launching live TV discussion programs between Washington and Moscow, which would be conducted outside of VOA, privately funded, and would focus on serious political, social, economic, and cultural topics of the day. BBG and VOA officials eliminated such programs last summer and ordered production of short videos with a focus on popular American culture.

The morale of journalists working for VOA’s Russian Service is at all time low. One of its most experienced journalists and managers has left. VOA executives refused to fill the position of the service director, appointing instead a number of non-Russian managers, some of whom do not even speak Russian. They also refused to send a Russian Service reporter when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had her first meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Geneva, during which she called for a new start in U.S.-Russian relations.

In response to the dismal state of VOA’s Russian Service, some former VOA journalists have launched an independent private website, GovoritAmerika.us, which serves as an aggregator of U.S.-Russia-related news and analyses from multiple American government and non-government sources. GovoritAmerika.us website was available online and included extensive summaries of Voice of America reports when the VOA website suffered a two-day meltdown.

With the latest blow of seeing even their current limited work vanish during the critical news window of President Obama’s visit to Russia, VOA journalists are understandably frustrated. Let’s hope that the Obama White House will take notice of this latest example of the BBG’s numerous failures. The latest one is the BBG’s failure to protect America’s lead website for communicating with the rest of the world.

About Ted Lipien

Ted Lipien is a former Voice of America acting associate director. He was also a regional BBG media marketing manager responsible for placement of U.S. government-funded radio and TV programs on stations in Russia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries in Eurasia. In the 1980’s he was in charge of VOA radio broadcasts to Poland during the communist regime’s crackdown on the Solidarity labor union and oversaw the development of VOA television news programs to Ukraine and Russia. He is also author of “Wojtyla’s Women: How They Shaped the Life of Pope John Paul II and Changed the Catholic Church” (O-Books – June 2008). The book, which describes Pope John Paul II’s views on feminism, also includes evidence of the importance of Western radio broadcasts during his life in communist-ruled Poland and in the first ten years of his papacy. The book also has extensive references to the efforts of the KGB and other communist intelligence services to place spies in the Vatican and to influence reporting by journalists covering the Polish pope.

About FreeMediaOnline.org

FreeMediaOnline.org is a San Francisco-based nonprofit which supports media freedom worldwide.

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us — which includes summaries of some of the more serious news and commentaries from multiple U.S. government and nongovernment sources. According to Ted Lipien, the web site is designed to compensate for the loss of information from the United States for Russian-speaking audiences due to program and budget cuts implemented by the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The web site, which includes links to VOA Russian Service news reports, is also designed to counter the BBG marketing strategy that has forced broadcasting entities to focus on entertainment programming and to avoid hard-hitting political reporting that might prevent local rebroadcasting or offend local officials. GovoritAmerika.us web site was developed without any public funding and is managed by volunteers. It is also hosted on LiveJournal.com.

BBG officials initially had told the VOA Russian Service that their requests to resume radio broadcasts were a “non-starter” even after Russia invaded Georgia. Only after weeks of protests, including reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG finally allowed VOA to produce a short audio program for the Internet, updated only Monday through Friday. This program is rather difficult to find on the VOA website. We made it available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us website managed by FreeMediaOnline.org.

Voice of America International News Website Blocked by Suspected Cyber Attack

FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, July 08, 2009, San Francisco –The Voice of America (VOA) multi-language international news website has been down most of the time during the final day of Barack Obama’s first presidential visit to Moscow as a result of a suspected North Korean cyber attack. Other U.S. government websites were also affected by the same cyber attack, but while many were back in normal operation on Wednesday, July 8, the VOA website was still not working through late Wednesday afternoon, exposing a major flaw in U.S. public diplomacy abroad.

VOA is a U.S. government- funded radio and TV broadcaster with programs in multiple languages, but in recent years it has moved to rely increasingly on the Internet to reach audiences in countries like Russia and China. In 2008, the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a bipartisan body which manages U.S. international broadcasts, eliminated all on-air Voice of America Russian-language radio programs and opted for an Internet-only strategy in Russia. The Federal Human Capital Surveys (FHCS) conducted by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) have consistently rated the BBG as one of the worst-managed Federal agencies.

In 2008, human rights and media freedom organizations, including FreeMediaOnline.org — a San Francisco-based independent journalism NGO, had warned the BBG that when it comes to providing information to countries with limited free media, putting all eggs in one basket by relying only on the Internet program delivery was inappropriate for a major U.S. government international broadcaster. Ignoring such warnings, the BBG stopped all on-air VOA radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian army invaded parts of the Republic of Georgia.

While shutting down live VOA radio and television in Russia last summer, BBG officials argued that the expanded use of the Internet would allow them to counter the Kremlin’s efforts designed to reduce the ability of the Russian public to listen to American news broadcasts through programs placed on local radio and TV stations. But an independent survey showed that after the programs went off the air due to BBG’s decision to rely only on the Internet, VOA audience in Russia shrunk by more than 90%. VOA’s annual reach in Russia through the Internet is now estimated at 0.2%. A BBG memo justifyng the termination of VOA Russian radio did not address the issue of cyber security.

According to inside sources, only one Republican member of the BBG, Blanquita Walsh Cullum — the only working journalist sitting on the bipartisan broadcasting board — protested against adopting Internet-only program delivery strategy for VOA in Russia. Other BBG members, both Republicans and Democrats, including Edward E. Kaufman, Vice President Biden’s former aide who is now a U.S. Senator from Delaware, voted to end VOA radio presence in Russia.

The BBG official website, bbg.gov, has not been affected by the cyber attack, but links from it to the VOA website did not work. According to inside sources, neither BBG nor VOA are prepared for a cyber attack of this magnitude. The International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) Internet specialists and contractors, who are employed by the BBG to help VOA run its website, were not able to quickly work around the problem. The BBG website provided no information about the cyber attack on the Voice of America. Radio Free Asia (RFA) — another broadcaster managed by the BBG, which also broadcasts radio programs in Korean and has a Korean-language website — may have been targeted by the latest cyber attack but managed to keep its website working.

Commenting on the latest cyber attack against the Voice of America website, Ted Lipien, president and founder of FreeMediaOnline.org, said that the Internet plays a critical role in bringing information to countries under government censorship, but he added that the BBG made a serious mistake when it ended on-air VOA radio programs in Russian. “If North Korean hackers can shut down the VOA website, security services of other countries can easily do the same, especially in time of a major international crisis. It may be coincidence that the suspected North Korean cyber attack happened during President Obama’s historic visit to Moscow, but Internet users in Russia were effectively prevented from learning from the Voice of America about the U.S. president’s meeting with Russian opposition leaders. The democratic opposition in Russia criticizes President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin, a former KGB spy, of stifling independent media,” Lipien said.

Ted Lipien is a journalist, media marketing expert and a former acting associate director of the Voice of America. He was in charge of VOA broadcasts to Poland during the Solidarity pro-democracy movement and is the author of a book about Pope John Paul II’s views on feminism, Wojtyla’s Women, which has several references to the importance of Western radio broadcasts as well as to KGB’s attempts to manipulate media reports about the Polish pope.

In response to restrictions imposed on the Voice of America in Russia by the BBG members and their executive staff, FreeMediaOnline.org launched an independent Russian-language news aggregator website, GovoritAmerica.us, which provides news analysis from both U.S. government and non-government sources for Russian-speaking Internet users. GovoritAmerika.us was not affected by the latest cyber attack.

The volunteer-run GovoritAmerika.us website had summaries of many of the news stories related to President Obama’s visit to Russia, including Voice of America reports which could not be seen on the official VOA website due to the suspected North Korean cyber attack.

The Humpty Dumpty Strategic Plan for U.S. International Broadcasting

FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog The Federalist Commentary, July 8, 2009, San Francisco — This commentary is by The Federalist, one of our regular contributors with inside knowledge of US government bureaucracy.

The Humpty Dumpty Strategic Plan at the Broadcasting Board of Governors

by The Federalist

Let us refresh our memories…

Last year, the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) made the decision to eliminate all Voice of America (VOA) radio broadcasts to Russia. Not long afterward, Russia invaded the Georgian Republic in a dispute over border provinces. To this day, there are no direct VOA on-air radio broadcasts to all of Russia.

Not long after the initial uproar over this decision, senior VOA officials stopped by the VOA Russian Service to pompously declare that all of VOA would be like the Russian Service in five years…meaning that VOA would be reduced to a collection of Internet websites as part of the Broadcasting Board of Governors/the International Broadcasting Bureau’s glorious “strategic plan.”

Arrogant, pompous and stupid to a fault.

Since then, it has been determined, through BBG’s own research conducted by an independent contractor, that the audience in Russia for VOA programs has been drastically reduced as a result of taking radio and TV programs off the air.

On Wednesday, July 08, 2009 US Government officials announced that a major cyber attack was directed against Federal government websites and others, including those of major financial institutions and multimedia organizations like The Washington Post.

Lo and behold, sources have indicated that many – perhaps – all VOA websites were put out of commission for a substantial period of time. While other Federal agencies and news organizations were quickly able to fend off these cyber attacks, the Voice of America website was out of commission for hours and was still not working late Wednesday afternoon EST.

It is unclear who orchestrated these attacks, although speculation appears to be focused on North Korea.

Let’s speak plainly:

The people in charge of BBG, IBB and VOA represent for American public and taxpayers a dangerous combination of arrogance and incompetence. Those responsible for creating and embracing this porous strategic plan should be fired. Period. It is well known to the agency’s workforce just how inept and incompetent these people are. The seriousness of the problem can be seen in the results of the US Office of Personnel Management’s (OPM) Federal Human Capital Survey. The agency (BBG) is dead last among comparable Federal agencies and has been hovering around the bottom for the past five years…seemingly content to be populated by a group of senior managers, protecting their big salaries and completely corrosive in their handling of critical government resources. Because the mission of US international broadcasting is all important at the time of terrorist threats and growing anti-Americanism in countries like Russia, this is a very serious lapse for US national security.

The shortcomings of the BBG strategic plan are painfully obvious. The officials running the agency choose to ignore the threat.

This threat itself is no mystery. The ability to disrupt strategic communications was aptly demonstrated by the Russian security services during the Kremlin’s conflict with the Georgian Republic.

This threat is so significant that both the outgoing Bush Administration and the incoming Obama Administration were both briefed on the subject and its possible consequences to communications systems as well as computer systems. These systems are integrated with various parts of US domestic infrastructure, including power plants, power grids, air traffic control systems and nearly anything that his heavily reliant upon computers.

Be assured that the executive staff of the BBG do not want the public to know just how badly they have mangled this aspect of the US international broadcasting operations. Their primary concern seems to be to protect their bloated salaries. It has been commonly said that the Voice of America and other BBG-managed broadcasting entities run in spite of the bungled decisionmaking of the senior management, but VOA journalists and IBB broadcasting engineers can only so much to limit the damage of the BBG’s Humpty Dumpty strategic plan.

It is reckless and irresponsible for a Federal agency to leave itself extremely vulnerable to these cyber attacks and not have a real strategic plan built on the redundancies found in the right combination of radio, television and the Internet.

To be certain, the self-aggrandizers of the BBG/IBB/VOA will try to make the argument that they are saving enormous sums of money by going all-Internet, all the time. On the other hand, since the decisions of these officials have caused substantial reductions in the audiences for these programs, to the extent that VOA no longer has a substantial audience penetration in places like Russia, the argument can then be turned around and the case made to close the agency altogether.

These cyber attacks seems to be beyond the comprehension of the less-than-competent self-promoters of the BBG/IBB. The hackers probe for weakness and vulnerabilities and they found them in the VOA website. They are precursors of worse things to come. And all the while, the senior IBB/VOA management appears to be sitting back hoping that no one will notice.

Well, we did.

And now that you know, it is incumbent upon the Obama administration to do some serious housecleaning of the BBG/IBB/VOA management structure.

Nothing less will do.

The Federalist
July 2009

Cautious to a Fault: Solidarity with Reformers in Poland and Iran – Reagan’s Response in 1981 Markedly Different from Obama’s in 2009

FreeMediaOnline.org,  Free Media Online Blog,  GovoritAmerika.us, Commentary by Ted Lipien, June 26, 2009, San Francisco – Ronald Reagan’s strong response to the imposition of martial law  against the independent Solidarity trade union in Poland in 1981 was distinctly different from President Barack Obama’s nuanced comments about the crackdown on demonstrators in Iran in the aftermath of the disputed Iranian presidential elections. While President Obama may have wanted to show his appreciation of the subtleties of Iranian politics, his public statements projected around the world a sense of confusion and weakness instead of showing firm American support for human rights and democracy.   

Intellectually, President Obama is right that the current situation in Iran is not the same as the communist crackdown on Solidarity in Poland in the 1980’s and may require a different policy response from the way President Reagan dealt with communist regimes. But the right course of improving communications with the Muslim world, set by President Obama’s speech in Cairo, was undermined by his initial refusal to speak out strongly against violations of human rights in Iran. He may have lost some of the earlier respect among supporters of democracy in the Middle East and weakened his position vis-a-vis America’s most determined enemies.

President Obama is right that President George W. Bush had made monumental mistakes by his unsophisticated and interventionist approach to the Muslim world while appeasing other authoritarian rulers, including Russia’s Vladimir Putin. Public diplomacy mistakes by the Bush Administration are too numerous to list, but U.S. international broadcasting initiatives during the last eight years serve as a good example. The Bush-appointed Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) eliminated all Voice of America (VOA) highly-respected Arabic news programs and created Radio Sawa and Alhurra TV, which are viewed in the Middle East and by independent experts in the U.S. as propaganda stations that lack journalistic standards, credibility and audience. Alhurra had broadcast unchallenged statements by Holocaust deniers at a conference in Tehran organized by no other than President Ahmadinejad. The BBG  had also eliminated Voice of America Russian radio programs just 12 days before the Russian army invaded the disputed parts of the Republic of Georgia. Democrats serving as members of the bipartisan BBG, including former BBG member Edward E. Kaufman, who has replaced Vice President Joe Biden as a U.S. Senator from Delaware, had been instrumental in helping the Bush Administration to make and implement many of the misguided decisions that have replaced objective journalism by the Voice of America with crude propaganda that damages America’s reputation and interests abroad.

President Obama is right in offering a new style of public diplomacy in the Middle East and throughout the world. He did not go to Alhurra to give his first interview targeted for the Middle East but chose an Arab TV network instead. Unfortunately, he still does not have around him enough good advisors who could help shape all of his public statements on human rights and freedom of expression issues, especially in times of crisis, so that he and his Administration do not appear at times as being intimidated by dictators of Mr. Ahmadinejad’s kind or appear naive and impulsive like President Bush.

As someone who was in charge of Voice of America (VOA) radio broadcasts to Poland during the Solidarity period, I agree that the two situations — the imposition of the martial law in Poland in December 1981 and the crackdown on demonstrations in Iran in June 2009 – are not identical. They both required, however, from the President of the United States a quick and decisive public response that would not be misinterpreted by foreign leaders and public opinion. Unfortunately, President Obama did not pass this latest test with flying colors.

Undoubtedly, he is a highly intelligent leader and hopefully capable of making right assessments and decisions. His reading of the situation in Iran may be in some ways correct, but his initial public response to this latest crisis was insufficient and quite wrong. He may have been told that workers and intellectuals in Iran are not as united against the religious regime as the Poles were against the communists in the 1980s. America was never seen by the vast majority of the Polish people as a threatening imperial power; Russia was. On the contrary,  most Poles saw America as an only major ally that could help them free themselves from communism and Soviet domination. And unlike the religious authorities in Iran, the Catholic Church and Pope John Paul II were on the side of striking workers, protesting intellectuals and students.

But while the situation in Iran in 2009 is in some ways different from Solidarity’s struggles in Poland in the 1980s, the need for moral support for pro-democracy Iranian reformers is now just as urgent as support for Lech Walesa was for the Reagan White House.  To achieve their goals,  the reform-minded, largely urban Iranians who are behind the street protests could learn from Solidarity’s success in Poland by sticking to their non-violent posture. They could also follow the example of Solidarity’s intellectual advisers, who had shaped the alliance with the Polish industrial workers, by making a similar effort in reaching out to the poor, highly religious, and anti-Western rural voters who tend to support President Ahmadinejad and the clerical regime.

Even in Poland, where conditions were more favorable to creating a democratic society, the solidarity-building process between intellectuals and workers was long and arduous. It took several decades before the Polish society finally united to a sufficient degree against the communist rule. Strong but not overly aggressive statements from President Reagan, and radio broadcasts by the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe, had helped the Poles in their struggle for freedom.

President Obama’s speech in Cairo, offering a new approach in dealing with the Muslim world, was a great public diplomacy success and was  seen in the region as a new beginning. Unfortunately, public diplomacy experts at the White House and the State Department were not able to show a similar sophistication when a sudden crisis developed in Iran. President Obama’s overwhelming public concern how his comments in support for the protesting Iranians might be perceived by anti-Western, anti-democratic, and pro-clerical forces was clearly not the right response and opened him to criticism from his Republican opponents.

The White House could have taken a lesson or two from President Reagan on how to articulate a strong public diplomacy message that strikes the right balance between legitimate policy concerns and the impact of presidential statements on public opinion.  It’s good for the president of the United States to be aware of all the subtleties of foreign policy, but in some situations speaking publicly about them sends a wrong message to both supporters and enemies of democracy. Reagan knew how to use public comments to project a strong and confident image abroad while still being able to practice diplomacy when it served America’s interests and the cause of freedom.

In responding to the crackdown on Solidarity In 1981, President Reagan expressed America’s unqualified support for freedom without any concern that he would be criticized in Moscow and Warsaw for interfering in Poland’s domestic politics or trying to undermine the Polish communist regime’s close links with the Soviet Union. He was still able to engage later in successful negotiations with Soviet and Polish communist leaders when they were already critically weakened by America’s resolve to support freedom. Reagan was decisive but not intellectually inflexible like President George W. Bush. His was the right approach, and history has proved him right.

President Reagan’s Address to the Nation About Christmas and the Situation in Poland, December 23, 1981

I urge the Polish Government and its allies to consider the consequences of their actions. How can they possibly justify using naked force to crush a people who ask for nothing more than the right to lead their own lives in freedom and dignity? Brute force may intimidate, but it cannot form the basis of an enduring society, and the ailing Polish economy cannot be rebuilt with terror tactics.

Poland needs cooperation between its government and its people, not military oppression. If the Polish Government will honor the commitments it has made to human rights in documents like the Gdansk agreement, we in America will gladly do our share to help the shattered Polish economy, just as we helped the countries of Europe after both World Wars.

President Obama’s reaction to street demonstrations in Iran was markedly different in an interview with Harry Smith of CBS News, June 19, 2009.

CBS News Harry Smith: Let’s move on to the news of the day.  The Ayatollah Khamenei gave his speech today, gave his sermon.  He said that the election in Iran was, in fact, legitimate.  He said, “The street demonstrations are unacceptable.”  Do you have a message for those people in the street?

President Obama:  I absolutely do.  First of all, let’s understand that this notion that somehow these hundreds of thousands of people who are pouring into the streets in Iran are somehow responding to the West or the United States, that’s an old distraction that I think has been trotted out periodically.  And that’s just not going to fly.

CBS News Harry Smith: People in this country say you haven’t said enough, that you haven’t been forceful enough in your support for those people in the street, and which you say? 

President Obama: To which I say the last thing that I want to do is to have the United States be a foil for those forces inside Iran who would love nothing better than to make this an argument about the United States. That’s what they do. That’s what we’ve already seen. We shouldn’t be playing into that. There should be no distractions from the fact that the Iranian people are seeking to let their voices be heard.

Now, what we can do is bear witness and say to the world that the, you know, incredible demonstrations that we’ve seen is a testimony to, I think what Dr. King called the the arc of the moral universe. It’s long but it bends towards justice.

President Obama is right that the United States should not be seen as directly interfering in domestic Iranian politics, as this may hurt pro-democratic forces. But there is a big difference between actual interference and strong public statements in support of human rights abroad, especially in a crisis situation. Regardless of what President Obama says or does not say, Ahmadinejad’s supporters will still claim — as they have – that the United States is creating unrest in Iran. But if President Obama had taken a more Reagan-like approach in his public statements, while still maintaining diplomatic flexibility – supporters of human rights around the world would not be discouraged and enemies of freedom would not see him and the United States as confused by the events in Iran and weak against dictators. If the president’s public diplomacy advisers knew what they were doing, this would not have become an issue for the new administration. It is possible to have a sophisticated public diplomacy strategy in the Middle East without appearing too cautious in support of democracy and freedom of expression.

About Ted Lipien

Ted Lipien is a former Voice of America acting associate director. He was also a regional BBG media marketing manager responsible for placement of U.S. government-funded radio and TV programs on stations in Russia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries in Eurasia. In the 1980’s he was in charge of VOA radio broadcasts to Poland during the communist regime’s crackdown on the Solidarity labor union and oversaw the development of VOA television news programs to Ukraine and Russia. He is also author of “Wojtyla’s Women: How They Shaped the Life of Pope John Paul II and Changed the Catholic Church” (O-Books – June 2008). In his book he describes the efforts of the KGB and other communist intelligence services to place spies in the Vatican and to influence reporting by Western journalists.

Wojtyla's Women by Ted Lipien

About FreeMediaOnline.org

FreeMediaOnline.org is a San Francisco-based nonprofit which supports media freedom worldwide. 

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us  – which includes summaries of some of the more serious news and commentaries from multiple U.S. government and nongovernment sources. According to Ted Lipien, the web site is designed to compensate for the loss of information from the United States for Russian-speaking audiences due to program and budget cuts implemented by the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The web site, which includes links to VOA Russian Service news reports, is also designed to counter the BBG marketing strategy that has forced broadcasting entities to focus on entertainment programming and to avoid hard-hitting political reporting that might prevent local rebroadcasting or offend local officials. GovoritAmerika.us web site was developed without any public funding and is managed by volunteers. It is also hosted on LiveJournal.com.

BBG officials initially had told the VOA Russian Service that their requests to resume radio broadcasts were a “non-starter” even after Russia invaded Georgia. Only after weeks of protests, including reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG finally allowed VOA to produce a short audio program for the Internet, updated only Monday through Friday. This program is rather difficult to find on the VOA website. We made it available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us website managed by FreeMediaOnline.org.

In Search of A Smarter, More Cultured Approach to U.S. Public Diplomacy and Broadcasting in the Middle East

FreeMediaOnline.org,  Free Media Online Blog,  GovoritAmerika.us, Commentary by Ted Lipien, June 04, 2009, San Francisco – President Obama’s recent announcement of a new Global Engagement Directorate that will combine ”diplomacy, communications, international development and assistance” was short on specifics how this new structure might change the focus of U.S. public diplomacy and broadcasting initiatives. That’s hardly surprising, considering that the White House has to deal with many other seemingly more pressing problems. But when the Administration finally starts making hard decisions on global engagement, a greater appreciation of history and foreign cultures could help return some sanity and accountability to these programs. The President and the Senate also have to make better choices in selecting key officials responsible for international communications and avoid the temptation to use propaganda rather than dialogue and journalism in communicating with the Muslim world.  Such officials should be appointed and confirmed based on their qualifications as foreign policy analysts and international media experts rather than selected because of political loyalty or the size of their political contributions. Finally, there is no reason why American taxpayers should continue to fund many of the programs created during the Bush Administration that at best don’t work and often damage America’s image abroad. 

Propaganda Is Out, Journalism and Culture Is In – We Hope

If the White House is serious about avoiding past mistakes,  what’s clearly needed in communicating with the rest of the world is a more sophisticated approach that draws on what is best in American diplomacy, culture and objective journalism. Much will depend on what kind of people are put in charge of representing America to the world. They should appreciate what’s best in American culture.  The Administration should look for people who would be in the same league as Edward R. Murrow, who was President Kennedy’s choice to head the now defunct United States Information Agency (USIA), or John Chancellor, President Johnson’s choice to head the Voice of America (VOA) in the days when the White House appreciated the experience of professional journalists. 

The last thing America needs is leaving public diplomacy in the hands of obscure political loyalists who make private business deals on taxpayer-paid trips abroad and help their  business associates get hired as government consultants at the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which manages, or more accurately mismanages, U.S. international broadcasts. It’s hard to imagine that the late Armand Hammer, a U.S. business tycoon who made profitable trade deals with Lenin and Stalin, would have been put in charge of U.S. broadcasting during the Cold War, or that the late Edward E. Murrow would be discussing  private business deals with President Putin’s associates on a trip to Moscow if he were now in charge of these broadcasts. But such  apparent conflicts of interest and other abuses were common at the Broadcasting Board of Governors during the Bush Administration. The BBG has been consistently rated in government surveys as one of the worst managed Federal agencies. Read The Washington Post column by Joe Davidson: Employee Poll Makes VOA’s Parent the Worst Place to Work.

Under President Bush, political appointees selected to run State Department’s public diplomacy programs and U.S. international broadcasting were political operatives, advertising executives and mirror entrepreneurs who proved their value to the White House and the Democratic leadership in Congress with political contributions and loyal support. (The BBG is by law bipartisan and must include members of both parties, thus both the Bush White House and the Democratic leadership in Congress share the blame for selecting these individuals.) They were rewarded with jobs for which they were completely unsuited and unprepared.

It is not surprising, therefore, that during the past ten years, Under Secretaries of State for Public Diplomacy and members of the BBG have brought once sophisticated cultural and broadcasting programs to a new low level of simplistic and counterproductive propaganda. They promoted advertising and marketing campaigns that admittedly may sometimes produce desired results in a U.S. domestic business setting but turned out to be ineffective and outright offensive when applied to public diplomacy and international broadcasting. And that’s exactly what these political appointees who lacked any substantive experience in foreign policy, human rights and journalism, have done in trying to communicate America’s message to foreign audiences, especially in the Middle East.

Bring “American” Brand Back

BBG consultants declared “America” as a brand name not to be used in the Middle East and came up with a GM-like collection of new names and new private broadcasting initiatives, each one costing U.S. taxpayers millions of dollars. Since their creators lacked an even basic understanding of Arab culture and refused to listen to advice from area experts, there was no chance that they could be successful. And by all accounts, they were not. They should have asked themselves why the British, who after all perfected serious radio journalism for audiences abroad, did not feel the need to dilute the BBC World Service brand with new stations under many different names. 

Returning to a more sophisticated approach, using high-level cultural diplomacy and serious news broadcasts, may not be easy, as much of the knowledge and experience of previous decades has been destroyed and will take time to  rebuild. The only thing left of sophisticated news analysis and cultural programs once available on the Voice of America are old audio and text files of interviews with important cultural figures in the Arab world. They have been archived by the U.S. Embassy in Egypt, where some U.S. diplomats and local Egyptian employees still understand their value. It’s this kind of understanding and cultural sensitivity that needs to be brought back. Link to Egyptian Treasures from VOA on the U.S. Embassy Cairo website.

The BBG eliminated all VOA Arabic language programs to create privately-run Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television. The programming philosophy of these stations, developed by former BBG member Norman Pattiz, a Democrat  – who despite being then Senator Joe Biden’s protege worked closely with neoconservatives in the Bush Administration – specifically rejected anything cultural in U.S. international broadcasting above the level of Brittney Spears. BBG members claimed that their market research supported programming derived from Hollywood and popular culture. Their professional background, however, made it impossible for them to conduct a sophisticated analysis that would take into consideration Middle Eastern history, cultural sensitivities, and political implications of their programming choices.

The Obama Administration would do well by quickly reversing many of the BBG’s decisions of the past decade. Correcting these mistakes would greatly improve America’s image abroad and save U.S. taxpayers’ money. “American” brand  should be brought back by making the Voice of America again a primary U.S. international broadcaster. VOA broadcasts and Internet site in Arabic should be restored as soon as possible.

Sources of Failure

How did U.S. international broadcasting go from a series of great successes during the Cold War to disastrous results in the Middle East in the last decade? While the simplistic worldview adopted by the Bush Administration bears some of the blame, the BBG and its members have made a bad situation far worse than it had to be.  These well meaning but completely miscast individuals, most of them with backgrounds in small domestic U.S. businesses, took a Cold War concept of surrogate broadcasting — which in any case was totally unsuitable for the Middle East – and compounded their error by removing from it one element that had made the original surrogate broadcaster – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty –  vastly successful in broadcasting to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. That element was a high level intellectual and cultural program content developed by local journalists, writers, artists, and intellectuals — not  U.S. advertising experts and political loyalists based in Washington, D.C.

Not satisfied with silencing Voice of America broadcasts in Arabic, the BBG members and their private consultants destroyed cultural uniqueness and effectiveness of RFE/RL Russian broadcasts and terminated VOA radio to Russia just a few days before the Russian army invaded Georgia. FreeMediaOnline.org reported that only one BBG member, Blanquita Walsh Cullum — the only working journalist on the Board – had the courage to to oppose these cuts and spoke out against other abuses, including an ultimately unsuccessful effort by a former BBG chairman James K. Glassman to hire Paula Zahn as the Board’s high profile spokesperson while VOA broadcasts to critical countries were being eliminated. Paula Zahn declined the job offer as a private contractor that would have cost U.S. taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars. James K. Glassman, who ended up as President Bush’s last Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, refused to resume VOA Russian radio broadcasts during the Russian-Georgian conflict.

In the process of expanding their power, BBG members deprived  foreign journalists working for their surrogate broadcasters of any measure of independence and authority, which was one of the key elements of success of U.S. broadcasts during the Cold War. At the same time, they failed to provide clear editorial and policy guidelines — another key element that previous American management teams were usually able to put in place successfully by working in partnership with foreign journalists. Those who dared to oppose BBG’s misguided ideas were fired or found their programs eliminated. To cover up their mistakes, the BBG forced foreign employees to sign secrecy agreements and refused to make public independent studies showing the failure of their projects in the Middle East. Read  Report Calls Alhurra A Failure on ProPublica.org.

By all accounts, the broadcasting  Board has been an unmitigated disaster. Some of the abuses are only now beginning to come to light. BBG-approved personnel policies at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which discriminate against foreign-born journalists,  may soon come before the European Court of Human Rights. Close links between the BBG Democrats and neoconservatives in the Bush Administration have proven that the Board does not protect U.S. international broadcasters from political interference with program philosophy and program content.  

The Obama Administration has a choice of abolishing the Broadcasting Board of Governors and closing down Alhurra Television and other private broadcasting entities created during Bush years. Democrats and Republicans in Congress have a common interest in saving taxpayers money, which are now being wasted on ineffective and duplicate programs.

Alhurra Television and the BBG, however, has some powerful supporters, mostly among Democrats who helped to create Alhurra, including former BBG member Senator Edward E. Kaufman, D-DE, a protege of Vice President Biden.  Read ProPublica.org: Alhurra Bleeding Viewers, Poll Finds, But Spending is Up.

One of the key members of the Obama Administration who may have a say in what happens to the BBG and Alhurra is Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She is an ex officio member of the BBG, although she does not attend its meetings. She is usually represented at these meetings by a senior State Department official. While President Obama wisely avoided giving interviews to Alhurra, Secretary Clinton was recently interviewed by the network. Secretary Clinton is a friend of BBG member D. Jeffrey Hirschberg. He was one of the Democrats who worked closely with the Bush White House to create Radio Sawa and Alhurra. Hirschberg, a director of the U.S.-Russia Business Council, was also said to be responsible for terminating VOA radio broadcasts to Russia shortly before the Russian invasion of Georgia.

Other than Senator Kaufman and perhaps also Secretary Clinton, Alhurra, which means “The Free One,” seems to have now far fewer supporters, especially among members of Congress. ProPublica.org reported that outraged members of Congress threatened to withhold funding after the network aired a report on a Holocaust deniers conference in Tehran. According to ProPulica.org, “the reporter who covered the conference told viewers that Jews had provided no scientific evidence of the Holocaust.”

As a former acting associate director of the Voice of America (VOA),  I am certain that VOA, the only American-brand broadcaster and a target of numerous BBG program cuts, is capable of providing news and representing America in a credible and responsible manner that will not embarrass the United States. It’s unlikely that VOA would give airtime to Holocaust deniers, as did Alhurra editors and anchors, who apparently felt they had no choice but to follow the BBG dictum of giving the audience what it wants based on market research. Although VOA has had various problems with its broadcasts over the years, it follows much more strict editorial and fiscal standards than the BBG’s favored private broadcasting entities and their contractors.

In some cases, private broadcasting entities and surrogate broadcasters can be effective if they have the right programming philosophy,  proper management and  sufficient autonomy combined with sufficient oversight.  Ultimately, much will depend on the quality and experience of the people the Obama Administration puts in charge of these programs. Their understanding how we can communicate with other nations by presenting what’s best in our culture and intellectual tradition will determine whether these programs will be successful in the future.

About Ted Lipien

Ted Lipien is a former Voice of America acting associate director. He was also a regional BBG media marketing manager responsible for placement of U.S. government-funded radio and TV programs on stations in Russia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries in Eurasia. In the 1980’s he was in charge of VOA radio broadcasts to Poland during the communist regime’s crackdown on the Solidarity labor union and oversaw the development of VOA television news programs to Ukraine and Russia. He is also author of “Wojtyla’s Women: How They Shaped the Life of Pope John Paul II and Changed the Catholic Church” (O-Books – June 2008). In his book he describes the efforts of the KGB and other communist intelligence services to place spies in the Vatican and to influence reporting by Western journalists.

About FreeMediaOnline.org

FreeMediaOnline.org is a San Francisco-based nonprofit which supports media freedom worldwide. 

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us  – which includes summaries of some of the more serious news and commentaries from multiple U.S. government and nongovernment sources. According to Ted Lipien, the web site is designed to compensate for the loss of information from the United States for Russian-speaking audiences due to program and budget cuts implemented by the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The web site, which includes links to VOA Russian Service news reports, is also designed to counter the BBG marketing strategy that has forced broadcasting entities to focus on entertainment programming and to avoid hard-hitting political reporting that might prevent local rebroadcasting or offend local officials. GovoritAmerika.us web site was developed without any public funding and is managed by volunteers. It is also hosted on LiveJournal.com.

BBG officials initially had told the VOA Russian Service that their requests to resume radio broadcasts were a “non-starter” even after Russia invaded Georgia. Only after weeks of protests, including reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG finally allowed VOA to produce a short audio program for the Internet, updated only Monday through Friday. This program is rather difficult to find on the VOA website. We made it available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us website managed by FreeMediaOnline.org.

Bill Skundrich, Respected International Broadcaster, Leaves Voice of America

FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, May 27, 2009, San Francisco –  Friday, May 22, was the last day at the Voice of America (VOA) for Bill Skundrich, one of the most respected and popular U.S. radio and television journalists broadcasting to Russia.  He left VOA for a new job at the Department of Homeland Security.

Bill Skundrich’s colleagues describe him as an extraordinarily talented journalist and hard working manager who was holding the Russian Service together in one of the most difficult times in VOA’s history. They told FreemediaOnline.org that he was leaving his job at VOA with great deal of regret.

A native of Pittsburgh, Skundrich studied Russian language and literature in college. His mastery of the language led to his selection as a member of the U.S. debate team that went to the Soviet Union in the 1980s. Later, he worked at VOA for 25 years occupying broadcasting and managerial positions. He produced programs for radio, television, and more recently also for the Internet. His colleagues describe him as a thoughtful and inspiring leader who was able to bring together people with opposing viewpoints to work on common goals.

Bill Skundrich is one of many talented journalists who have left their jobs at the broadcasting entities managed by the BBG, which in 2008 had terminated VOA Russian-language radio programs. The broadcasts went silent just 12 days before the Russian military incursion into Georgia last summer. At the height of the conflict, BBG members had refused urgent requests from VOA journalists to resume radio broadcasts to the war zone and to other traditional VOA audiences in Russia and in many of the former Soviet republics.

BBG officials maintain that their decision was designed to focus limited resources on improving VOA’s Internet presence in Russia, but as a result of the termination of on-air radio and television broadcasts, VOA experienced an unprecedented 98 percent drop in its audience reach in Russia.  By effectively barring VOA from airwaves in Russia, the BBG added to the restrictions already imposed by the Russian authorities on Western broadcasters. No other international broadcaster has ever seen such a dramatic decline.

The BBG management practices have resulted in one of the worst employee morale in the entire federal government, as measured by the Federal Human Capital Survey conducted annually by the Office of Personnel Management. The survey, which polls workers at 37 agencies, found the BBG to be last in three categories (leadership and knowledge management, results-oriented performance, and talent management). The BBG is 36th, only one short of being the worst, in job satisfaction.

One of Bill Skundrich’s former VOA colleagues said that the BBG is “incredibly short-sighted not to hold on to him for dear life.” “There’s no one there who can touch him for talent, organization and general know-how,” said a former VOA manager, speaking about Bill Skundrich’s departure from the Voice of America.