From Messi to Mortal Kombat: The platformization of neo-propagandistic cultural diplomacy in U.S. wartime communication

This article examines how cultural resources were mobilized within U.S. public diplomacy during the intervention against Iran in early 2026. Building on the concept of neo-propagandistic cultural diplomacy, it explores how cultural diplomacy operates under conditions of wartime political mobilization, platformized communication, and contemporary illiberal leadership. Drawing on qualitative analysis of two case studies- the White House ceremony involving Inter Miami CF and Lionel Messi, and the video Justice the American Way- the article examines how cultural resources were deployed to frame military intervention through celebrity mediation, entertainment aesthetics, and narrative control. The analysis identifies two complementary modalities of neo-propagandistic cultural diplomacy: celebrity-mediated legitimizing diplomacy and entertainment-driven normalizing diplomacy. More broadly, it argues that platformized and populist communication blurs the boundaries between domestic political communication, cultural diplomacy, public diplomacy, and propaganda, reshaping how culture is strategically delimited and instrumentalized. Together, the two cases also show how cultural attraction, conventionally associated with soft-power objectives, can simultaneously become subordinated to military, domestic political, and geopolitical goals under illiberal and platformized conditions.