State Dept Touts Anti-ISIS Propaganda Campaign

Senators See Parody Video as 'Bizarre'

The State Department is touting what it believes is a “vital” stage in its propaganda campaign against ISIS recruitment, releasing a new video attempting to parody the ISIS online recruitment videos.

The “Think again, turn away” campaign is aimed at discouraging Westerners from going off to join ISIS, showing images of mosques blowing up and people being decapitated, something Sen. Ted Cruz (R – TX) called “bizarre.”

Some Congressmen are pushing for a propaganda campaign that is a bit more focused and a lot more serious than the parody-style video, which ends by declaring “travel is inexpensive, because you won’t need a return ticket.”

Yet past efforts at propagandizing that the US has carried out during the global war on terror have been similarly unsuccessful, and enormously expensive. The US government simply isn’t very good at these sort of marketing campaigns that try to manufacture a positive view for US war efforts, or a negative view for their enemy of the moment.

Though officials will doubtless continue to hype the large numbers of Westerners joining ISIS as a justification for the campaign, there is no reason to think a single would-be ISIS recruit will be dissuaded because the State Department is making fun of them.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.