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It feels rather damning that Hersh didn’t verify some of the easily verifiable claims that his source made. Why would you not have researchers do some fact checking on the story before publishing it so loudly?
he did do fact checking, with people he had previously worked with at New Yorker https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/politik-gesellschaft/seymour...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
His contention involved the manner in which UBL's location was discovered. The popular narrative is that a courier was tracked with the aid of intelligence gathered during "enhanced interrogation" sessions. Whereas his claim is that an ISI officer walked in and received cash for the information.
If this is an accurate summary of what he's claiming, this seems a bit more ridiculous than that: > The truth, Hersh says, is that Pakistani intelligence services captured bin Laden in 2006 and kept him locked up with support from Saudi Arabia, using him as leverage against al-Qaeda. In 2010, Pakistan agreed to sell bin Laden to the US for increased military aid and a "freer hand in Afghanistan." Rather than kill him…
It feels rather damning that Hersh didn’t verify some of the easily verifiable claims that his source made. Why would you not have researchers do some fact checking on the story before publishing it so loudly?
he did do fact checking, with people he had previously worked with at New Yorker https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/politik-gesellschaft/seymour...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
He's in "I want corroboration" territory for me. The big scoops - My Lai, Abu Gharaib - were backed up with hard evidence and other organizations confirming the allegations. Stuff like "the US faked Bin Laden's burial and chucked chunks of him into the mountains" have, thus far, not been.
His contention involved the manner in which UBL's location was discovered. The popular narrative is that a courier was tracked with the aid of intelligence gathered during "enhanced interrogation" sessions. Whereas his claim is that an ISI officer walked in and received cash for the information.
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v37/n10/seymour-m.-hersh/the...
> The retired official said there had been another complication: some members of the Seal team had bragged to colleagues and others that they had torn bin Laden’s body to pieces with rifle fire. The remains, including his head, which had only a few bullet holes in it, were thrown into a body bag and, during the helicopter flight back to Jalalabad, some body parts were tossed out over the Hindu Kush mountains – or so the Seals claimed.
> There never was a plan, initially, to take the body to sea, and no burial of bin Laden at sea took place.
If someone was feeding Hersh false information why would they reference the Alta class? Assuming it was some Intel op or some insider, did they just google some Norwegian navy ships that could plausibly fit the picture? Or did Hersh draw that connection himself? Hersh has been criticized for listening to cranks. Maybe some Intel officer (or adjacent gov/military worker) heard some rumours internally but there was com…
Presumably it's for the same reasons that people gave him faulty technical information about Sarin gas in his debunked Syria story, or whatever weird details he was fed about the notion that the Osama bin Laden raid never happened, or the idea that USSOCOM is secretly controlled by a sect within the Vatican. Because he'll run with it, and people pay attention to him. People troll all the time on the Internet; why wou…
It might not affirm "the West blew up Nordstream" but it certainly does not affirm "the West NOT blow up Nordstream".
It feels rather damning that Hersh didn’t verify some of the easily verifiable claims that his source made. Why would you not have researchers do some fact checking on the story before publishing it so loudly?
If you fact check and you're right, you've wasted your time. If you fact check and you're wrong, you either can't publish (wasting the time you took for the story) or you publish anyway knowing it's wrong, in which case, it's still a waste of time.
That is not how it works. First of all there is no “you’re right”. The journalist doesn’t have first hand observations. They cannot be “right” or “wrong” only their source can be.
The journalist goes and checks what can be verified independently. No matter what the outcome of these checks nobody wasted their time. The result is a stronger article, and continued respect for the journalist in his profession.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
His contention involved the manner in which UBL's location was discovered. The popular narrative is that a courier was tracked with the aid of intelligence gathered during "enhanced interrogation" sessions. Whereas his claim is that an ISI officer walked in and received cash for the information.
No, these specific claims are definitely made by Hersh. https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v37/n10/seymour-m.-hersh/the... > The retired official said there had been another complication: some members of the Seal team had bragged to colleagues and others that they had torn bin Laden’s body to pieces with rifle fire. The remains, including his head, which had only a few bullet holes in it, were thrown into a body bag and…
It feels rather damning that Hersh didn’t verify some of the easily verifiable claims that his source made. Why would you not have researchers do some fact checking on the story before publishing it so loudly?
If you fact check and you're right, you've wasted your time. If you fact check and you're wrong, you either can't publish (wasting the time you took for the story) or you publish anyway knowing it's wrong, in which case, it's still a waste of time.
I see it differently. I used to be a test engineer.
My tests made it onto documentation accompanying a $50,000 RF snooper (in 1985), and were verifications that the item passed the test.
I like it when tests don't fail.