> US media is not controlled by the US government

This might be true, but specially about countries that don't have a media presence the main source of news about that country is white house press releases. The same goes for news about civil wars and such.

The way Syria war was reported, outside of a few good journalists who did amazing reports, was basically just standard US government play book.

The reality is journalist are lazy, and its easy to just pick up the narrative pushed by the US government and the associated standard think thanks.