letter to the editor

by Richard H. Browne

It is a bit distressing to see the rather one-sided debate now raging in professional circles about how the military -- especially the Army -- conspired the muzzle press coverage during the gulf war.

There ws no monolithic conspiracy to limit access to U.S. journalists to front-line units. There was, rather, an uneven effort by Army public affairs officers to accommodate as many journalists as possible while trying to convince skeptical senior staff officers of the wisdom of supporting this effort. Strange as it may sound to our critics, our mission was to try to facilitate news coverage without comprimising operational security or disrupting combat preparations.

The arrogance and ignorance of many American journalists compounded the difficulty of our mission. This is not to tar all with the same brush -- as critics now tar all Army public affairs representatives. There were some journalists out there who understood the military -- its organization, its requirements, and its limitations. But the number of those who did not understand was sufficient to engender the distrust of many in the military.

Too many journalists in their zeal to pursue the exclusive scoop forgot perspective and the impact of what they reported. And sometimes what they reported was, if not wrong, at least not the full truth. The classic example of this was the furor over the transmission defect of the A2-model of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle -- a defect supposedly shared by all of the more than 500 used in the theater. In fact, only two BFVs were found to have the defect and both were repaired during the hour it took to inspect them. Yet the impression left was that thousands of soldiers were at risk because of the defect, that the entire fleet was incapable of accomplishing its mission.

If the ignorance of many American journalists wasn't enough to turn off Army public affairs representatives, their ignorance was. It astounds me that in his May/June piece titled "The Unilaterals," Chris Hedges should boast of his subterfuges to avoid detection and move freely about among American forces in pursuit of his own personal glory -- to get his story. By donning an American military uniform and equipment and marking his car as a military vehicle in order to gather information on military activities, he came dangerously close to the classic definition of a spy. (I also noted an inaccuracy in his account. There is no Sixth Marine Division. It has not existed since World War II.)

I know from personal experience of a journalist who frantically urged me to circumvent a checkpoint because traffic was backed up at it. He said the delay might cause him to miss his free military helicopter ride. We waited because I knew of at least two machine guns backing the checkpoint that would have fired at us had we tried to crash it.

I know of another incident in which four American journalists came within a heartbeat of having their car and themselves "lit up" by a marine machine-gunner. They had apparently broken away from the Egyptian unit they had been traveling with and had traveled far ahead of them.

Had it not been for the gut feeling of a marine reserve captain who told his gunner to hold fire after firing two warning bursts, the journalists and their car would have been ripped apart by friendly fire from the heavy machine gun's bullets. I wonder what the headlines would have made of that: MARINE GUNNER BUTCHERS U.S. JOURNALISTS.

To support half a million troops in an area the size of the southeastern United States is a monumental logistics task that requires a lot of coordination, which the Army was not able to pull off perfectly. Add the equivalent of another battalion or two of individuals running free in the battle zone and more than a few are going to drop through the cracks, with the resulting howls of neglect.

It is a distraction tactical commanders don't need. Many commanders believe that if you don't contribute to the immediate combat power of the unit, then you are superfluous. (This includes us PAO pukes.) This is not a good long-range attitude, but in combat situations little thought is given to the long-range aspects. There are more pressing matters, like what will help the commander and his or her troops survive the next few hours.

Granted, many units welcomed media visits. They provided a touch of home. But when the bullets began to fly, I found such visits were not as welcome. The journalist is not trained to react as part of the team and his ignorance could cost some of the team members their lives.

That the pool system did not work as well as hoped was as big as disappointment to the Army public affairs officers I knew as it was to the journalists (despite what they might think). Our story was not getting out.

Unfortunately, we suspected it would not work. Some of us knew the obstacles that would lie in our path. However, our entreaties made little impression on those who could help us move the stories, film, and videotape to the rear. There were other priorities -- military priorities.

That Seventh Corps was a "black hole," as William Boot quotes another reporter as saying in "The Pool," even many Army public affairs representatives will admit. Trying to winnow even the simplest of information from the corps was difficult. I know I spent many frustrating days trying to get information or confirmation of reports out of Seventh Corps. I can sympathize with Boot in his frustration over his inability to file his stories. However, I also know the efforts members of my unit made to try to transport media products as part of the "Public Affairs Express."

Unfortunately, we were forced to make compromises because, with limited ground transportation, the "Express" failed to deliver. Yet it would have been unrealistic to insist that the military should tie up precious lines of communication to transmit stories. In retrospect, it probably would have been better if the Army had permitted pools to establish satellite up-links at their own expense at the corps' headquarters.

Looking back on the gulf war, it seems clear to me that the relations between the media and the Army did little to restore the trust that existed in World War II.

Editor's note: Richard H. Browne is a reporter with the Fayetteville, North Carolina, Observer-Times. His Army National Guard unit (the 382nd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment) was mobilized in August 1990 and spent six and a half months in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. His unit was assigned to the Joint Information Bureau in Dhahran for two months and, subsequently, to Headquarters, U.S. Army Forces Central Command. Now demobilized, he writes as an individual and not as a spokesman for the U.S. Army or the Army National Guard.

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