Yeah, was saying the other day that in general International Relations has a much higher level of brainwashing and most everyone in general is extremely naive around just how poor the ethics of it are. We see how some news stations operate where Democrats can do little wrong, and others how Republicans can do little wrong. You wind up with a good chunk of the population living in alternate realities.
But the news stations are very good at painting external parties as the enemies du jour when the asset owning class wants them to. Bush's approval rating basically hit north of 70% when the bullshit war started which tells you just how effective propaganda is, especially since folks in traditional ally countries in Western Europe, Canada, Oceana etc in general could much easily see what was truly going on.
You can also see the exact same playbook being used of "never letting a tragedy go to waste:
1) pretend history started the day of the tragedy and there is no context required at all,
2) turn it into reductionist story of a battle of good versus evil,
3) take the opportunity to do war crimes abroad and reduce other people's rights domestically around privacy etc - things you always wanted to do given the free pass it provides as dissenters are easily accused of being "unpatriotic"
4) milk the tax payer and funnel money upwards though corrupt dealmaking and contracts