“I Was a Mouthpiece for the American Military”

[im10ashus]

An embedded TV producer's frank assessment

In an interesting interview published this week in Foreign Policy, Newsweek's Rod Nordland spoke about the difficulties of reporting from Iraq. He said that the Bush Administration has been largely successful in managing the news “to the extent that most Americans are not aware of just how dire it is and how little progress has been made” and revealed that some embedded reporters “have been blacklisted because the military wasn’t happy with work.”

Many embedded reporters have managed to do fine work from Iraq, but there are significant obstacles for even the best and most determined journalists. I recently spoke with a former senior TV producer for Reuters who worked in Iraq between 2003 and 2004. The producer, who asked to speak off the record, arrived in Tikrit soon after the capture of Saddam Hussein on December 13, 2003, and was embedded with American troops for 45 days. She told me that, over the years, she has worked closely with the French army, NATO troops in the Balkans, and UN peacekeepers in covering war and conflict, but she said had never faced the sorts of restrictions imposed by the Pentagon on journalists in Iraq. “I was,” she said, “a mouthpiece for the American military.”

In Tikrit, she was based with U.S. troops at a military compound established at one of Saddam's former palaces, where she provided pool coverage for Reuters TV and AP TV (which was fed to other media outlets). When insurgents attacked civilians, she told me, the American military would rush her to the scene so she could record the carnage and get shots of grieving Iraqis.

When it came to other stories that were clearly sympathetic to the U.S. side, such as funerals for American soldiers killed in combat, the U.S. military was extremely helpful—indeed, encouraging. In such cases, she was granted full access and allowed to film speeches by officials honoring the dead, the posthumous awarding of medals, and other aspects of the ceremony.

cont'd...

http://harpers.org/sb-i-was-a-mouthpiece-1152219764.html

[leftchick]

1. this is important

as brian lamb interviews the fake jouranlists on c-span right now here is reality....

<snip>

But when this producer wanted to pursue a story that might have cast the war effort in an unfavorable light, the situation was entirely different. Every few days, she said, she would receive a call from the Reuters bureau in Baghdad and discover that reporters there had heard, via local news reports or from the bureau's network of Iraqi sources, about civilians being killed or injured by American troops. But when she asked to leave the compound to independently confirm such incidents, her requests were invariably turned down.

“Reuters had an armored car,” she told me, “and we wanted to go out on our own, but I would ask the PIO for permission and he would say he needed to get more information before we could go. Hours would pass, it would get dark—and in the end we were never able to get to the scene.” Even getting an on-camera comment from a military spokesman was impossible in such cases, she said.

[tanyev]

2. U.S. military was extremely helpful re: soldiers killed in combat.

Hmmm....I seem to remember a huge fracas about the photos taken of the coffins being loaded on an aircraft carrier. Wasn't the lady who took those pictures fired?

[im10ashus]

3. I will try and find that information regarding the fired reporter.

But I seem to recall hearing the same thing.

[JHB]

6. If I recall correctly...

...those photos were taken by a civilian who worked at the base (not a reporter).

But I could easiy be wrong about that.

[pecwae]

7. That's what I remember, as well.

Didn't she work for a contractor at the base?

[me b zola]

4. There is a word for this:

`snip~
She and the other journalists stationed at the base in Tikrit grew cynical about their work and came to believe that they were being used. “Other reporters in Iraq,” she said, “especially local Iraqis , were able to get both sides of the story, but we were getting only one side.” During her 45 days in Tikrit, she told me, she didn't file a single story critical of the American project in Iraq. “There was no balance,” she said. “What we were doing wasn't real journalism.”


What they were being used to do, to create in place of real journalism was:

Propaganda

the spreading of ideas, information, or rumor for the purpose of helping or injuring an institution, a cause, or a person

ideas, facts, or allegations spread deliberately to further one's cause or to damage an opposing cause; also : a public action having such an effect

http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?va=propaganda

[ourbluenation]

5. unbelievable...well I guess it's not really. This just adds to my

general state of pissedoffness.My only consolation is that it seems, seems, that the sheeples are starting to wake up.