(22.06.2014) I had one source of information while I was a Marine in Fallujah in 2004—my chain of command. It never occurred to me that they would be actively manipulating the information they were feeding me, the other men in my unit, and the journalists imbedded with us. This was a naive assumption that could have cost me my life. Although I survived, others around me did not. (…)

The US military then engaged in a campaign of “shaping operations”, which consisted of IO’s (Information Operations), PSYOPs (Psychological Operations), and air strikes to better control the battlefield for the next siege of Fallujah. The centerpiece of this campaign was the PSYOP to exaggerate the role of Abu Musab al Zarqawi, the alleged leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, who the US military claimed was using Fallujah as a military base from which he was launching attacks all across Iraq. Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, then spokesman for the Joint Task Force, claimed that the goal of the PSYOP was to “leverage xenophobia” in Iraq and turn the Iraqi population against foreign Mujahideen. Beyond creating a false existential threat that was used to justify the US’s 2nd assault on Fallujah, the lies about Zarqawi’s presence in Fallujah also placed an impossible condition for peace on the people of Fallujah. The US and Iraqi Interim Government demanded that the leadership in Fallujah hand Zarqawi over to them or face an all out military assault on their city, even though no one in Fallujah had ever even seen Zarqawi in their city and there is nothing in the way of real evidence to suggest that this man ever set foot in Fallujah.