Churchill Bust Donated to Pentagon by UK Ministry of Defence

From The Churchill Centre

On 6 May a new bust of Winston Churchill was unveiled at the Pentagon by United States Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert Work and General Sir Nicholas Houghton, Chief of the British Defence Staff. The finished bronze, created at 1 1/2 times life-size, was crafted by British sculptor Vivien Mallock and is a gift from the British Ministry of Defence to the permanent collection of the United States Department of Defense.

The unveiling ceremony was held in the Pentagon’s Hall of Heroes and was attended by senior military officers of both nations, including Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Joseph  Dunford, the recently nominated Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with the Chiefs of Staff of the Army and Air Force and the Chief of Naval Operations, as well as the British counterparts. In addition to Executive Director Lee Pollock, The Churchill Centre was represented by Trustees Elliot Berke and Paul Brubaker.

In presenting the bust, Sir Nicholas remarked: “How delighted Churchill himself would be to see we are following the final piece of advice that he ever gave to his ministers upon leaving Downing Street for the final time in 1955—‘Never be separated from the Americans.’” The alliance between the United States and Britain is more than just shared national interests, he continued, “it is shared human ideals and a profound trust in democracy.”

In accepting the bust, Secretary Work said: “It is a most appropriate time to celebrate the legacy of Winston Churchill as this Friday we mark the seventieth anniversary of VE-Day, Victory-in-Europe day. Churchill did so much to make that victory possible—along with the British people, who truly gave their blood, sweat, and tears during that titanic struggle of the twentieth century.”

Centre Executive Director Lee Pollock expressed the appreciation of the Churchill family and the artist for the placement of the bust and thanked both Departments, as well as donors Alan Spence and John Michaelson, for making it possible. After noting that Churchill was a graduate of Sandhurst and that his first profession was that of army officer, Pollock concluded: “In years to come, as you walk through this corridor, pause for a moment and think of Winston Churchill. He still has much to say to all of us today, civilian and military alike.”

Files Prove Pentagon is Profiling Reporters

From Stars and Stripes


Contrary to the insistence of Pentagon officials this week that they are not rating the work of reporters covering U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Stars and Stripes has obtained documents that prove that reporters’ coverage is being graded as “positive,” “neutral” or “negative.”

Moreover, the documents — recent confidential profiles of the work of individual reporters prepared by a Pentagon contractor — indicate that the ratings are intended to help Pentagon image-makers manipulate the types of stories that reporters produce while they are embedded with U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

This pie chart was extracted from a report by The Rendon Group, evaluating the focus of coverage by a reporter for a major U.S. newspaper. It indicates the firm’s conclusion that the reporter’s coverage was 83.33 percent neutral and 16.67 percent negative in relation to the military’s mission objectives.

One reporter on the staff of one of America’s pre-eminent newspapers is rated in a Pentagon report as “neutral to positive” in his coverage of the U.S. military. Any negative stories he writes “could possibly be neutralized” by feeding him mitigating quotes from military officials.

Another reporter, from a TV station, provides coverage from a “subjective angle,” according to his Pentagon profile. Steering him toward covering “the positive work of a successful operation” could “result in favorable coverage.”

The new revelations of the Pentagon’s attempts to shape war coverage come as senior Defense Department officials are acknowledging increasing concern over recent opinion polls showing declining popular American support for the Afghan war.

“The purpose of this memo is to provide an assessment of [a reporter from a major U.S. newspaper] … in order to gauge the expected sentiment of his work while on an embed mission in Afghanistan,” reads the preamble to one of the reporter profiles prepared for the Pentagon by The Rendon Group, a controversial Washington-based public relations firm.

Read the rest of this entry >>