The Vietnam war is sometimes described as the first TV war.  By this they mean it is the first war that was heavily influenced by TV.  The standard analysis goes like this …  The Americans at home could see what the war was like, in horrible technicolour – and they didn’t like it. A lack of public support weakened America’s ability to continue to fight it, and contributed to their eventual withdrawal.

The truth is that the TV footage of the war was actually mostly positive until the tide turned. The reason for that is simple enough. The TV networks decide what they broadcast based on what they understand their audiences want to see.  Therefore, TV reflected public opinion more than influenced it. However, TV did undoubtedly weaken the ability of governments to “present” wars to their populations.

But this is not a blog about wars, their justifications, or their tactics. Suffice to say, up close – all wars are horrible.  It’s a lot easier to support them when they presented in a tidy package – at a distance.

The Internet has picked up where TV started – but goes a step further. Helicopter gunship footage of “non-combatants” being killed was posted on Wikileaks. In it you see innocent people shot and killed, whilst listening to the callous commentary of the soldiers. Then tens of thousands of military documents were leaked, again through Wikileaks. They expose just how messy the Afgan War is.  Thanks to the Internet, War and all its unpleasant details are becoming more accessible.

The American military has been quick to turn on wikileaks for publishing the content. Wikileaks shouldn’t have published them they say. Wikileaks have risked the lives of people in the war zone. Wikileaks is irresponsible. Wikileaks must be stopped.

But that’s hardly the point. This stuff will get out. If Wikileaks doesn’t post it, somebody else will. That’s the nature of the beast. Even if information should not be broadly available – it will be.

There is some irony in the Internet making life difficult for the American Military. They funded the early development to create a robust, fault-tolerant and distributed network. One that guaranteed information would get through – and it is.

I doubt this is exactly what they had in mind.