The moderate rebel industry: Spaces of Western public–private civil society and propaganda warfare in the Syrian civil war

Abstract

This article documents a covert propaganda and civil society operation perpetrated by a consortium of Western governments, private contractors, and NGOs to justify and facilitate regime change in Syria by whitewashing and assisting rebel groups. Using leaked documents from key government contractors, corroborated with journalistic, academic, NGO, and government research already released, the author outlines their rebel media infrastructure to create news stories and feed them to Syrian, regional, and international outlets. This propaganda synergized with administrative programs that built social services in rebel-held territories, constructing media and civil society façades of legitimacy and liberalism for rebel militias. The consortium created the White Helmets, who recorded themselves providing services while documenting supposed war crimes, to serve as a bridge between these propaganda and civil society missions. The author argues that the controlled spaces of full-spectrum intellectual warfare created by this consortium, coordinating state-supported media and civil society and obfuscating it behind private and non-profit entities, can help scholars understand the narrative battles surrounding the Syrian conflict and gain insight into the evolving role of media and information warfare in the 21st century.