The Barack Obama administration is focusing its public diplomacy efforts on persuading “swing voters” in the Muslim world that the group calling itself the Islamic State (IS) is a bigger threat to them than US policies, the State Department’s top communications official says.
Richard Stengel, a former managing editor at Time who became undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs six months ago, told a Washington audience Sept. 16 that the US aim was not to fight a “battle of ideas” with committed members of IS, which he called “a criminal, savage, barbaric organization.”