Attempts to control media have a history of backfiring

War against terrorism: Coverage

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Broadcasters summoned for 'propaganda' talks

Leading article: Yet again, Downing Street displays an instinct for wartime censorship

Andreas Whittam Smith: To understand Mr bin Laden, we need to hear him

The Government is insisting it is not being confrontational as it summons broadcasters to meet it at Downing Street. There are simply "legitimate issues" to be discussed at a time of conflict, a spokesman said.

But with the West failing to win over large parts of the Islamic world with its propaganda war against Osama bin Laden, the Government is appearing nervous.

On Friday, its officers trawled the news outlets of the world to catalogue support for Tony Blair and his position on Afghanistan. The Mufti of Marseilles, the leader of the Rebirth Party of Tajikistan and an editorial from a Cairo newspaper were all produced in evidence of global acclaim for the Prime Minister.

The measure looked more desperate than convincing. But the Government's jitters reveal all the signs of following a long tradition.

Just as Downing Street is irritated that Mr bin Laden's video broadcasts are going out "unquestioned", 15 years ago, Norman Tebbit, the Tory party chairman at the time, was incensed by allegedly "uncritical" reporting of Libyan propaganda. He made a formal protest to the BBC over Kate Adie's coverage of the American bombing of Tripoli.

Yet, as history also shows, attempts to control the media in an age of burgeoning outlets and hi-tech communications – in contrast with, say, the Vietnam War when footage took at least four days to reach New York – is more difficult and can frequently backfire.

The six-year broadcasting ban on Sinn Fein from 1988 was a case in point. Not only did broadcasters sidestep the restriction by using actors to dub the words, but republicans quickly realised it could be used to their own ends.

Sinn Fein spokesmen used the ban to make statements while avoiding the cut and thrust of serious questioning on air. Margaret Thatcher's stated mission of starving the terrorists of the "oxygen of publicity" in effect backfired.

Similarly, two years ago in Serbia when John Simpson ventured on to the streets of the Serbian capital, Belgrade, to test the mood at the height of the Nato bombing.

His reports that the campaign had united Serbs in support of their leader, Slobodan Milosevic, prompted Clare Short, the Secretary of State for International Development, to condemn the press for its "carping" attitude. An Allied victory against Adolf Hitler would have been impossible with the modern media, she said.

At another point in the same conflict, the Prime Minister suggested that Simpson was working "under the instruction and guidance of the Serbian authorities".

But the effect of the Government's attacks was to persuade the Serbs that the British Government was getting rattled and that, for all its protestations of liberty, the British were as keen on controlling the media as Mr Milosevic himself.

Part of the problem during the conflict in former Yugoslavia was that it had little formal control over the media, unlike during the Gulf War, when control was handed to the military.

But even in the Gulf, correspondents such as Jeremy Bowen managed to infuriate the Government – just as they had done during the Falklands War when Margaret Thatcher tried to insist that the BBC should refer to British troops as "our" forces.

Yet it would be wrong to say there is no co-operation between the press and Government. At least 17 media organisations are understood to have known that the American government was going to begin bombing Afghanistan three days before the attacks began, but none reported it.

For all its old-fashioned sense of a gentleman's agreement, journalists still sit with the military on the D-notice committee which, at the end of September, issued a request to editors and broadcasters to "minimise speculation" about forthcoming military action in Afghanistan.

Richard Sambrook, the BBC's head of news, pointed out yesterday that the BBC has made clear the circumstances of Osama bin Laden's broadcasts and has used only small segments of his statements. Now that the Taliban is allowing Western journalists to film bombing damage, "health warnings" will accompany the carefully controlled footage. But the footage will be used.

Jeremy Paxman said during the Serbian conflict that neither Nato nor Mr Milosevic was telling reporters the whole truth. But, he noted, nobody suggested that journalists should withdraw from Nato briefings simply because they did not give the whole picture.

"The bombs are being dropped by liberal democracies," Paxman said. "It is a basic principle of such societies that the citizens have a right to be informed of the things that are done in their name."