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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. military launched a secret campaign to counter what it perceived as China’s growing influence in the Philippines, a nation hit especially hard by the deadly virus.
The clandestine operation has not been previously reported. It aimed to sow doubt about the safety and efficacy of vaccines and other life-saving aid that was being supplied by China, a Reuters investigation found. Through phony internet accounts meant to impersonate Filipinos, the military’s propaganda efforts morphed into an anti-vax campaign. Social media posts decried the quality of face masks, test kits and the first vaccine that would become available in the Philippines – China’s Sinovac inoculation.
Good job of reporting, Reuters. Of course, it's just another reason for the rest of the world to hate our guts, but it's not morality that concerns me at the moment. What perhaps Reuters could investigate next is all the antivaxxing and antimasking sentiment that occurred here in the United States at the same time our enforcers were encouraging it in another country. Was what happened by design in the Philippines just happenstance in the land of the free and the home of the brave? Or was it also by design? If so, who did the designing? The Pentagon? The Octagon? And for what purpose? I doubt it was to curb Chinese influence in Alabama.
