15-6-2024 (MANILA) In a shocking revelation, a Reuters investigation has uncovered a secret campaign launched by the US military at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic to counter China’s growing influence in the Philippines, a nation hit particularly hard by the deadly virus. The clandestine operation, previously unreported, aimed to sow doubt about the safety and efficacy of vaccines and other life-saving aid supplied by China.
Through fake internet accounts masquerading as Filipinos, the military’s propaganda efforts morphed into an anti-vax campaign, decrying the quality of face masks, test kits, and the first vaccine that would become available in the Philippines – China’s Sinovac inoculation. Reuters identified at least 300 accounts on the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, that matched descriptions provided by former US military officials familiar with the Philippines operation. Almost all were created in the summer of 2020 and centred around the slogan “#Chinaangvirus” – Tagalog for “China is the virus.”
“COVID came from China and the VACCINE also came from China, don’t trust China!” one typical tweet from July 2020 read in Tagalog, accompanied by a photo of a syringe beside a Chinese flag and a soaring chart of infections. Another post stated: “From China – PPE, Face Mask, Vaccine: FAKE. But the Coronavirus is real.”
After Reuters inquired about the accounts, the social media company X removed the profiles, determining they were part of a coordinated bot campaign based on activity patterns and internal data.
The US military’s anti-vax effort began in the spring of 2020 and expanded beyond Southeast Asia before its termination in mid-2021, Reuters determined. Tailoring the propaganda campaign to local audiences across Central Asia and the Middle East, the Pentagon employed a combination of fake social media accounts on multiple platforms to spread fear of China’s vaccines among Muslims at a time when the virus was claiming tens of thousands of lives each day. A key strategy involved amplifying the disputed claim that, because vaccines sometimes contain pork gelatin, China’s shots could be considered forbidden under Islamic law.
The military program started under former President Donald Trump and continued months into Joe Biden’s presidency, Reuters found – even after alarmed social media executives warned the new administration that the Pentagon had been trafficking in COVID misinformation. The Biden White House eventually issued an edict in spring 2021 banning the anti-vax effort, which also disparaged vaccines produced by other rivals, and the Pentagon initiated an internal review.
While the US military is prohibited from targeting Americans with propaganda, Reuters found no evidence that the Pentagon’s influence operation did so.
A senior Defense Department official acknowledged the US military engaged in secret propaganda to disparage China’s vaccine in the developing world but declined to provide details. A Pentagon spokeswoman stated that the US military “uses a variety of platforms, including social media, to counter those malign influence attacks aimed at the US, allies, and partners,” noting that China had started a “disinformation campaign to falsely blame the United States for the spread of COVID-19.”
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it has long maintained the US government manipulates social media and spreads misinformation.
Some American public health experts, when briefed on the Pentagon’s secret anti-vax campaign by Reuters, condemned the program, stating it endangered lives for potential geopolitical gain. “I don’t think it’s defensible,” said Daniel Lucey, an infectious disease specialist at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine. “I’m extremely dismayed, disappointed and disillusioned to hear that the US government would do that.”
The effort to stoke fear about Chinese inoculations risked undermining overall public trust in government health initiatives, including US-made vaccines that became available later, experts warned. While the Chinese vaccines were found to be less effective than the American-led shots by Pfizer and Moderna, all were approved by the World Health Organization.
Academic research has shown that when individuals develop skepticism toward a single vaccine, those doubts often lead to uncertainty about other inoculations. Health experts pointed to a similar scenario in Pakistan, where the CIA’s use of a fake hepatitis vaccination program as cover to hunt for Osama bin Laden led to a backlash against an unrelated polio vaccination campaign, contributing to the reemergence of the deadly disease in the country.
“It should have been in our interest to get as much vaccine in people’s arms as possible,” said Greg Treverton, former chairman of the US National Intelligence Council. “What the Pentagon did crosses a line.”
The revelations have sparked outrage among some Filipino healthcare professionals and former officials, who were unaware of the US anti-vax effort. “Why did you do it when people were dying? We were desperate,” said Dr. Nina Castillo-Carandang, a former adviser to the World Health Organization and Philippines government during the pandemic.
The Pentagon’s secret campaign highlights the escalating information warfare between the United States and China, as both nations seek to advance their geopolitical interests in the wake of the pandemic. While the US military justified its actions as a response to China’s own disinformation efforts, the collateral damage to public health and trust in government initiatives has raised serious ethical concerns.
