A rchive Date
[ 06-04-2003 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Mass Media ]
|
[http://www.canoe.ca/Columnists/steward.html
Turning war into a bit of reality television
By HARTLEY STEWARD -- Toronto Sun
April 6, 2003
By the end of this war, the world will have a generation of war correspondents exceedingly familiar with the military. There are more than 500 journalists from around the world "embedded" in the coalition forces marching through Iraq. They share the sandstorms and the dangers with the troops. The same deadly bullets fly over their heads.
They have already learned the soldiers' jargon and talk with ease about things military in the language of the military. In militarese, "Central Command" becomes "Centcom" and "reconnaissance" becomes "recon." You never say anything in full if a short-form version with a little pizzazz can be found. I guess it saves time.
I've listened to interviews from the battlefield and even in the TV studio in which the interviewer and the interviewed used so many military short forms and initials that no one without a military background could possibly have understood them. I get an urge to call Peter Worthington to interpret. Some of the retired generals speak a language which could have originated on another planet. Even the talking heads in the studios have it all down pat.
Today Show host Katie Couric often sounds like a five-star general.
To the military experts and even solders in the field, she is "Katie." It has a casual American familiarity about it, but it gives the impression that the media and the military are in this together and we, at home in front of our television sets, are outsiders. In fact, we have every right to feel the media are working on our behalf.
To my mind, it all serves to turn this war into a bit of reality television. I found myself the other day saying I couldn't do the dishes because I wanted to watch the war for an hour or so, as if it were an episode of Survivor. Even the network morning shows, normally preoccupied with the latest Hollywood gossip and exercise fads, have given over to the war in Iraq. They interview grieving wives and mothers and worried fathers in the same fast-paced, upbeat fashion they use when whipping up low calorie desserts with celebrity chefs.
Everyone involved - the generals and politicians included- seems to be performing for the cameras, of which there are literally thousands. The news media, right there inside the tanks and bouncing about in the back of the giant transport trucks, seem to me as much a part of the story as the soldiers and the military hardware. NBC correspondent David Bloom, with the 3rd Infantry Division, with his helmet, goggles, gas mask and full military fatigues, looks more like a fighting soldier than the guys giving the briefings at Centcom.
There are so many television journalists traveling with the 3rd Infantry it must look like the set of an Arnold Schwarzenegger action movie. The media - especially those embedded reporters seeing the action first hand, living side by side with the young soldiers through the dust storms and dangers - are bonding with the troops like no war correspondents ever have before.
The curious military choice of the word "embedded" to describe the procedure where the media travels with the troops is unfortunate. It sounds way too much like "in bed with." Journalists often become closely involved with the principals in stories they are covering, travelling with police, say, and even accompanying officers on stakeouts and raids of one sort or another, but I had never before heard the term "embedded."
Despite alarm in some quarters, I don't believe for a moment that the veteran correspondents assigned to travel with the troops are in danger of being compromised to any serious extent, but there should be no doubt the American military agreed to the process in an effort to get good press. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Gen. Tommy Franks are doing their best to use the media to get their message out. To see that their war is presented in the most favourable light.
To a large degree, they've been successful. The propaganda at Centcom gets piled higher than the rubble in Baghdad and while the cameras would not be pointed in the opposite direction should American soldiers run from the fighting, the "embedded" cameras - at least the American ones - show a brave and highly competent American military.
The daring rescue of wounded Pfc. Jessica Lynch by special forces from a hospital in Iraq is just the sort of thing those in charge of the war's press relations had in mind when they invited the media to come aboard. It was no coincidence that the rescue was caught on videotape. Steven Spielberg couldn't have made it more dramatic.
The reality war has arrived.
Steward appears Tuesdays and Sundays. E-mail: hartleysteward@canoemail.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
|