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The Media and Africa: The Portrayal of Africa in the New York Times (1955–1995)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2021

Peter J. Schraeder  and
Brian Endless
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Extract

Eighteen U.S. soldiers were killed and dozens were wounded in a fierce battle in Mogadishu, Somalia, on October 3–4, 1993. Their deaths were a direct outgrowth of the Clinton administration’s handling of a series of United Nations (UN)-sanctioned military interventions in Somalia, which are popularly referred to as Operation Restore Hope. With the Cable News Network (CNN) providing almost instantaneous transmission to audiences in the United States and abroad, the victorious Somali forces not only paraded a captured U.S. helicopter pilot, Corporal William Durant, through the streets of Mogadishu, but also dragged the naked corpse of a U.S. soldier past mobs of Somali citizens who vented their anger by spitting on, stoning, and kicking the body.

Type
Foreign Policy Actors
Information
African Issues , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , 1998 , pp. 29 - 35
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1998 

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References

Notes

1. For a discussion of this battle and its implications, see Bowden, Mark, Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1999).Google Scholar

2. Thomas L. Freidman, “U.S. Pays Dearly for an Education in Somalia,” New York Times, October 10, 1993, sec. 4, p. 1.

3. Quoted in B. Drummond Ayres, Jr., “A Common Cry Across the U.S.: It’s Time to Exit,” New York Times, October 9, 1993, Al.

4. Clark, Jeffrey, “Debacle in Somalia,” Foreign Affairs 72, no. 1 (1992/93): 109–123 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5. For an introduction to this literature, see Hawk, Beverly G., ed., Africa’s Media Image (New York: Praeger, 1992)Google Scholar. See also Issue: A Journal of Opinion, 22, no. 1 (Winter/Spring 1994), a special issue edited by Hawk, and devoted to the topic of the media and Africa.Google Scholar

6. See Schraeder, Peter J., United States Foreign Policy Toward Africa: Incrementalism, Crisis, and Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), ch. 2, passimCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7. Powell, Colin (with Persico, Joseph E.), My American Journey (New York: Random House, 1995), 588 Google Scholar.

8. See Logan, Carolyn J., “U.S. Public Opinion and the Intervention in Somalia: Lessons for the Future of Military-Humanitarian Interventions,” The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 20, no. 2 (Summer/Fall 1996): 158 Google Scholar.

9. Johnston, Harry and Dagne, Ted, “Congress and the Somali Crisis,” in Learning from Somalia: The Lessons of Armed Humanitarian Intervention, eds. Clarke, Walter S. and Herbst, Jeffrey (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1997)Google Scholar.

10. Ibid., p. 14.

11. Logan, “U.S. Public Opinion and the Intervention in Somalia,” p. 156.

12. Ayres, Jr., “A Common Cry,” p. 6.

13. Clifford Krauss, “White House Tries to Calm Congress,” New York Times, October 6, 1993, A6.

14. Ibid.

15. Ibid.

16. See Stech, Frank J., “Winning CNN Wars,” Parameter: U.S. Army War College Quarterly 24, no. 3 (Autumn 1994): 37–56.Google Scholar

17. Logan, “U.S. Public Opinion and the Intervention in Somalia,” p. 161.

18. Ayres, “A Common Cry,” p. A6.