The greater the acceleration, the quicker does reality evaporate. But if before, media merely unhinged space-time awareness and immaterialized the human body by transforming it into transmissible light waves, during the Gulf War, apart from the devastation of derealized land, information as such became incredible. In Virilio's chronology, Desert Shield and Desert Storm were followed up by Desert Screen. The same strategic developments that helped visualize the Gulf War in the Arabian Desert are also occurring in the public sector. Just as generals can direct field campaigns without ever leaving their bunkers, so the viewers can do their jobs without leaving their homes.
All information converges on, and radiates from, the screen, the pole of inertia.
Whereas, time and again, Virilio has described the history of control over the external world as an acceleration and refinement of observation techniques and their logistics, with data transmission acquiring the speed of light total fascination turns out to converge with absolute disbelief. The news that reaches us as information through the media communication weapons can always be disinformation. If information is a weapon, disinformation is the shield. The viewers can no longer believe their eyes. But if they cannot, the world as we know it will disappear, as Virilio has warned us for years.