A Freedom of Information Act request recently revealed that The Army’s “Training with Industry” program has been placing Psychological Operations soldiers as interns at several local US television stations since 2001.
The stated purpose of the program is to train the soldiers to “…influence the emotions, motives, objective reasoning, and ultimately, the behavior of foreign audiences.”
In 2000, when a Dutch newspaper reported that PsyOps soldiers had been placed at CNN’s newsroom, CNN discontinued the internship program and publicly stated: “It was inappropriate for PsyOps personnel to be at CNN, they are not here now and they never again will be at CNN.”
However, the “Training with Industry” program is alive and well at CBS affiliate stations, WRAL5 in Raleigh-Durham, NC and WTOC11 in Savannah, GA which regularly hosts soldiers from the Army’s 4th Psychological Operations Group.
US Army Lt. Col. Stacy Bathrick commented that “both of those stations are very supportive of the military and think very highly of the program.”
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