Monday, 24 September 2001 : "disinformation"

"This is the most information-intensive war you can imagine...

    WE'RE GOING TO LIE ABOUT THINGS,"

said a military officer involved in the planning. "If it is an information war, certainly the bad guys will lie."

Retired Air Force Gen. Perry M. Smith said the administration's approach is justified. "Rumsfeld's trying to clamp down on everything and, at least for the moment, he's been very successful," Smith said. "In Kosovo and the Gulf War, keeping secrets wasn't all that important because everyone knew the bombing campaign was coming. Now, with a lot of special operations stuff and going into dangerous countries, if you telegraph what you're going to do, it might cause a lot of deaths."