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CNN Talkback Live

Do Journalists Belong on Front Lines?

Aired November 29, 2001 - 15:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOIE CHEN, HOST: Do journalists belong on the front lines?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: As you know, U.S. reporters or international reporters have not been able to get anywhere near U.S. forces.

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. CARL LEVIN (D), MICHIGAN: They can't worry about having the press to protect.

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CHEN: Should reporters arm themselves for battle?

Also today: America's first combat casualty inside Afghanistan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was a patriot, obviously. We need more of it if we are to win this battle against terrorism.

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CHEN: What really happened in Mazar-e Sharif?

Good afternoon, and welcome to TALKBACK LIVE: AMERICA SPEAKS OUT. We're ready to speak out today. The Pentagon and the media. In all, it's been a rocky relationship during wartime. Some say, though, that the war in Afghanistan has presented even more challenges than usual. We will get to that in the minute.

First, though, we want to check on what is happening on war front today. Somebody who is on the ground near Kabul, here's CNN's Ben Wedeman. Ben, if you could talk to us, there are some developments around Kandahar.

BEN WEDEMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, it appears the pressure is increasing on Kandahar, which is the last Taliban stronghold in the country. According to reports we are hearing, anti-Taliban Pashtun tribal elements -- militias, essentially -- are poised around that city.

However, the Northern Alliance is now -- is denying earlier claims that their forces had entered the city. But we do know the situation is very tense inside that town. According to one report, a -- one of the residents of the city was hung there, accused of being a U.S. spy. They kept the body hanging there as a message to the people of Kandahar. Joie.

CHEN: Ben, talk to us also about the developments and what has been learned at Mazar-e Sharif with regard particularly to the American, the CIA operative, Mike Spann.

WEDEMAN: Well, it appears he was killed during this uprising by the Taliban and al Qaeda prisoners who were taken following the fall of Konduz. Now the situation is very unclear in that they still, in fact -- there are still Taliban soldiers and al Qaeda elements inside that compound.

The latest report is in fact that two workers who had come to clear away bodies from there were shot by the Taliban or al Qaeda -- it is not clear --elements within the -- within the compound itself.

U.S. forces, we know of course, were involved. Not only air forces but special forces as well. By and large, despite these reports of the shooting of workers clearing away the bodies there, it does appear that the situation is under control. Joie.

CHEN: Ben, you know that this hour we do want to talk about the media's relationship with the military and with the situation at large, about how you cover events in a war region like this. Can you talk about your own sense of safety, security, ability to get to the front lines and whether you have the access you feel you need?

WEDEMAN: Well, certainly, what I've been covering is from the Northern Alliance side. By and large the access is not too difficult to get to the front, which is actually part of the problem in some cases.

People have been killed when the Northern Alliance essentially invited them to hop on top of an armored personnel carrier and drive into battle into pitch darkness. That sort of access is not the sort of thing that you -- that you necessarily want to take advantage of.

It's not a safe environment up at the front lines. It's -- it's chaotic. There's no protection in terms of places to hide, necessarily. You have to wear your flak jacket, your helmet.

But the fighting can be very chaotic here, because neither side has trained soldiers. These are essentially just people from the village who have lived all their lives carrying automatic weapons and they don't necessarily fire them with the most precision.

Another danger, of course, is that God forbid in the event that somebody is hurt, there are no medical facilities. I have never seen a Northern Alliance medic, for instance. Their field hospitals, I'm told, are quite ghastly. Basically that is where they take people to die. They don't really have much in the way of -- of medicine. So if by chance you are hurt here, you are in big trouble. Joie?

CHEN: One can imagine, Ben. We want you to stand by here. We want to add a couple other voices to the conversation today.

At the Pentagon for us is our old friend, CNN correspondent Bob Franken. He's our national correspondent, now working at the Pentagon. Also in our Washington bureau today, retired Army General Edward Atkeson. And Rich Noyes is with us. He's the director of media analysis for the Media Research Center. We thank you all for being with us.

Bob, I want to start with you because this is where the question arises: The relationship between the media and the military. There is some feeling now that the media has not had much as much access as it is entitled to or needs to cover the story properly from the U.S. Defense Department.

BOB FRANKEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it is a complicated question. First of all, what responsibility does the military -- the United States armed forces -- what responsibility do they have to do the independent job of the media? Should they be responsible to take us along?

The problem that I've have had when I have accompanied official Pentagon pools and the like is that they -- they impose such severe restrictions and oftentimes make it so difficult to file that you have to wonder if in fact we should operate as independently as possible.

What we are seeing is that those -- those news units that are operating independently are getting in fact remarkable coverage.

What we do not have access to -- however, that probably is the problem -- is the actual operation of the U.S. military. For instance, it is very limited, very, very strict control on the U.S. Marine setup in Kandahar, and there's -- for lot of good reasons -- pretty strong censorship.

The question is, should the independent media -- all of us -- take the time and the effort and the money, go on our own to try get as close as possible. It is a complicated problem. It's always a problem.

Finally, the last thing that is extremely difficult to deal with is the improved technology. Back in World War II, of course, there was no television. In the Vietnam war it was filmed but it was sent back somewhere and sometimes the reports were delayed for quite a while.

Now the battle is over whether there should be live coverage of the war, and that is quite a difference between the media and the military establishment that really doesn't want to lose control by allowing live coverage of the war.

CHEN: General, are the circumstances different this time? Circumstances that might require even more limitations than, say, during the Gulf War, when a lot of the media had a lot of trouble, a lot of disagreement with the Pentagon over access.

GEN. EDWARD ATKESON, U.S. ARMY (RET.): Enormous difference in this war. This isn't a conventional campaign of any sort. It's largely a bunch of tribes wandering -- very competitive tribes.

We've lost four reporters just traveling from Pakistan in toward Kabul. Just ambushed by we don't have the vaguest idea who they were.

The United States is not running these operations. They are not in command of the various different districts. We just have advisers and assistants with the local forces and we have really no command authority over them all. At all. So it is very difficult to say we ought to just turn these chaps loose.

CHEN: I want to ask Ann here to talk to Rich Noyes from the Media Research Center about your concerns about the media not having as much access.

ANN: Well, as somebody who remembers Vietnam and -- and Lyndon Johnson and so forth, I am really, really concerned that we know what is going on. I think that in a democracy the public's right to know is just as important as many other rights in our country.

CHEN: Rich, speak to that. Balancing the military's right and responsibility to do the job they're supposed to do.

RICH NOYES, MEDIA RESEARCH CENTER: Well, I think the military does have an obligation to provide access to journalists wherever and whenever it -- it feasibly can.

But one of the problems with this war, as the general just alluded, it's very -- been very unconventional. You cannot send a reporter along with a group of only six or eight or 10 special forces. And so far, you know, we really have not had ground access to the American military because the American military hasn't had much of a presence until just recently.

The access has all been through the Northern Alliance. And you've seen American reporters and other international reporters traveling with the Northern Alliance and getting the story from that vantage point. Now, there has been a small beach head established by the Marines in the southern part of Afghanistan.

There's a beginning of some journalists who are getting in there, and I think it will probably grow over time. But the war may also be over more quickly before there can be much of a greater journalistic presence. So I think, you know, from the vantage point that the war is going to continue on and we will know whether we are winning or losing, I think, rather quickly. There won't be the same situation you had in Vietnam where it dragged on for years and years and it was hard to figure out what really was happening on the ground.

CHEN: Hear you. We do want to continue this conversation but we do have to take a break here. As we go to it I just want to read Artie's comment to us by e-mail. "Reporters have a purpose: to report the events to a point. If they just go to make a name for themselves, well shame on them."

I also want to mention to you the TALKBACK LIVE on-line viewer vote. Not a scientific poll. But the view from the public on-line here saying, "Should journalists have unrestricted access to the front lines in Afghanistan?" No, the Pentagon has the right to limit access," by far. 78 percent of you say the Pentagon does have the right to limit access. Only 22 percent say they do not. We'll take a break, come back with more right after this.

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WALTER CRONKITE, FORMER CBS EVENING NEWS ANCHOR: The importance of their being there is that the American people have the right to know -- they have the duty to know what their boys and girls are doing in their name and it must be reported.

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(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi. I'm Kimber Jackson (ph) from Boston University. It is a reporter's job to inform the public of what is going on in the world. There is a war and people are dying, and I want to know the whole truth about it.

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CHEN: The truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth. We did have to say good-bye to Ben Wedeman, our reporter at Kabul. He did have to go back to work. But joining us now is Tom Bowman, military affairs correspondent for the "Baltimore Sun."

Other panelists are staying with us as well. But Tom, since you're just joining us now, talk to -- talk to us a little bit about what it is reporters want now that they are not getting?

TOM BOWMAN, "BALTIMORE SUN:" Well, first of all, we want access to Army ground forces. We're going into eight weeks now, and no reporters have yet to be with Army forces either in Uzbekistan, where the 10th Mountain Division has more than a thousand forces. And again, some of those forces are now moving into northern Afghanistan to set up some security areas down there.

And secondly, there are special forces aboard the USS Kitty Hawk, a carrier in the Arabian Sea, and there is no access to them either. So I think all of us are heartened that we were able to go with the Marine Corps down in southern Afghanistan but we'd like greater access at this point.

CHEN: We've got Bob out here in our audience, a vet himself. One with a little bit of concern about the media and its access.

BOB: Well, my concern is the front-line troops, these guys are a well-oiled machine, they are working hard, they've got a lot of things to do, a lot of things in mind, but aren't the other guys are getting in their way? They're busy. They don't have time to take care of and babysit a reporter.

CHEN: Yeah, Tom, they are busy.

BOWWMAN: Well, I would just like to point out that some of greatest understanding of war fear, particularly in the 20 the century, has come from having reporters on the front lines.

We think of Guadalcanal Diary and the writings of Ernie Pyle, the photos that Robert Cappa took at D-Day, and perhaps one of the most famous photos ever taken in the 20th century, the flag raising at Iwo Jima. Those occurred because reporters were with the troops on the front line.

CHEN: And -- and did that help your understanding? I mean, is that the balance that you seek, Bob?

BOB: The flag raising happened after the battle. The battle was -- was just winding down.

BOWMAN: That is not true, sir.

BOB: I mean, it was not the front line of action at that moment.

CHEN: Tom?

BOWMAN: Well, first of all, I'd like to point out that the misconception is that the battle was over when the flag was raised. The battle raged for several more days. Many more were killed. And again, reporters have been reporting military conflict since the Civil War. And again, it is important for us to be there.

CHEN: Bob Franken, you know, there's these lessons of history. Some of the folks in audience here have been talking quite a bit about Vietnam.

FRANKEN: Well, it's an interesting -- interesting argument about Vietnam. Many in the military -- many in the military -- believe that the reason the Vietnam war was lost because of reporting that was so adversarial by the independent media in the United States that it caused the loss in Vietnam.

The other side of that, of course, is were it not for the independent reporting in the United States that that war that many continued corrupt would have continued without any truth, quote unquote, getting to the American people.

That is really at the core of this, the argument for the press having as much access is that the independent media -- the independent media needs to in fact inform the people free of government restriction. Because no matter how honorable the people in government are, they have a point of view which they are going to present in an unbalanced way unless there are independent media out there.

CHEN: And the public did not know about the bombing in Cambodia for like a year. So.

FRANKEN: On and on and on. The problem that I felt that I had when I was in the Pentagon pool during the Iraq war was that the -- the restrictions were so severe that I was not able sometimes to show just how awful the war was. It was kind of a sanitized version of the war. And we deprived as a result our viewers of the, quote, total truth.

CHEN: And Maya has another concern about that relationship, actually between the media and the military getting too close.

MAYA: Well, the concern is that if the -- the journalists actually arm themselves, then the question becomes: can they be as objective as they need to be in their reporting?

So I mean, I totally agree with you in terms of making sure that we have a free and open democracy in terms of making there's journalism on the front lines. But they can remain objective if they indeed start to arm themselves and do other things in order to protect themselves?

CHEN: Or even if they are just with...

FRANKEN: Well, I think there are two reasons not to arm yourselves.

Number one, is that you then are considered a combatant. And actually, number two is that you are considered a combatant. You carry ID -- usually -- which says this is an unarmed person. He is a noncombatant. He is here to do a specific thing. Arming yourself takes that away and suddenly I believe what happens is you then become a target for more people who might not have targeted you if they thought you were unarmed.

CHEN: Right. And some folks might not read that ID until they've killed you and come up to your body. In any case.

FRANKEN: That could be, yes.

CHEN: General, talk to us a little bit about these concerns, perhaps, of the media and military becoming close in a way that blurs the objectivity?

ATKESON: Well, I think there is an aspect that we have not addressed here at all and that is the morale of the troops. Soldiers like to be reported on. They like to have something in their -- in their home paper that will tell what they are doing. They like to know that the American people are interested in what they're doing.

So the commander has to take that into consideration as he balances the risks he takes by allowing information to get out through unauthorized channels that may compromise his operations.

CHEN: Yeah, and before we take a break...

BOWMAN: That's a good point. He makes such a good point. CHEN: Before we take a break here, I do want to read an e-mail from James in San Francisco. "More journalists than U.S. troops have been killed in Afghanistan. However, we aren't calling them heroes. Without reporters on the front lines we'll never know what's going on over there." That from James.

Audience, we are going to ask you to take a break. Panelists, you as well. We will back and talk more after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHEN: Welcome back. We have just a few moments here on TALKBACK LIVE. Before we leave you this hour I want to stop with Linda from Nebraska who's here in our audience. Linda, can the media be trusted if the military lets them go along or gives them more information?

LINDA: I think they could. I really do. Because yes, they are out there to let the people know but I think that they can be trusted. Maybe I am just too much of a trusting person.

CHEN: Rich, got any concerns about that?

NOYES: Well, the Pugh Research Center just did a poll and they found that about 40 percent agrees with Linda, that they would like the media to figure out how they can cover this war. But 50 percent -- more than that -- wanted to let the Pentagon have more control over how journalists were able to access this war. So the public is really not giving any pressure to the Pentagon to open this war up any further.

CHEN: Tom, last word from you. Should there be more trust? More in that relationship?

BOWMAN: Well, I think, again, we should have access to the front-line forces. And some Army officers I talked to are frustrated, as are the journalists.

The Army officers want reporters with their troops. And one Army officer today mentioned to me -- a little bit tongue in cheek -- he said the reason we have journalists and Marines on the ground now is because the Army special forces made it safe for them to be there.

CHEN: Unfortunately, we are going to have to leave the conversation there. Quickly ran out of time this afternoon with so many good guests. Thank you all for being with us today. And to you in our studio audience and at home as well.

Please join us tomorrow afternoon at 3:00 eastern when TALKBACK LIVE: AMERICA SPEAKS OUT will speak out again.

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