In 1963, the American journalists David Halberstam and Neil Sheehan played pivotal roles in turning influential Americans and South Vietnamese against the Diem regime. ... South Vietnam's elites, who regularly read Vietnamese translations of American press articles, viewed the New York Times and other U.S. newspapers as mouthpieces of the U.S. administration, with the result that negative articles on the Diem government undermined South Vietnamese confidence in Diem and encouraged rebellion. Although the American journalists hoped that their reporting would bring about the installation of a better South Vietnamese government, it actually caused enormous damage to South Vietnam and to American interest there. Once the coup that they had promoted led to a succession of ineffective governments, exposing them to blame for the crippling of South Vietnam, Halberstam, Sheehan, and fellow journalist Stanley Karnow disparaged Diem with falsehood so as to claim that South Vietnam was already weak beyond hope before the coup. This turn of events would distort much of the subsequent analysis of the Diem government.
I think it would make for interesting research to examine elite media news coverage in modern America with an eye to seeing if an identifiable foreign policy can be determined from their opinions, editorials, and news coverage over the decades. Treat the articles like memos, official white papers, and diplomatic cables as if the papers are conducting a foreign policy. What might that angle reveal, eh?
