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Is the Media Safe in Iraq?

Aired October 31, 2003 - 14:36   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.


KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Security issues are a constant concern of the man to my left. He's Eason Jordan, CNN's senior news executive and frequent traveler to the hot spots that we report on everyday. He just returned from Iraq. I know we have a lot to talk about.
First, set the stage for viewers. We have a lot of crews over there. We're trying to work this story. Why did you want to go over there?

EASON JORDAN, CNN SENIOR NEWS EXECUTIVE: We have 65 people on the ground in Iraq. I thought it was important to get a sense of what they're facing on the ground, get a lay of the land first hand, especially since there's been so much controversy about what the news media are doing their job, whether CNN is doing its job in reporting good news versus bad news.

A lot of challenges over there, journalistically, logistically, from a safety and security perspective.

PHILLIPS: We talked a lot about that. I forwarded you a number of e-mails. Eason, are we getting the story? Should we do this? We want to cover this story. Do we have enough crews?

Well, you got there and were a lot of reality checks. No. 1, security. Tell me the things that made such an impact -- I guess the things that impacted you the most, once you got there.

JORDAN: The greatest impact came Monday, just a few days ago. We saw four suicide bombing attacks in Baghdad. I think it's the first time in history there had been four suicide bombing attacks in one day. As far as I know, the only time four suicide attacks ever on the same day was September 11, 2001.

So it really was historic, a real downer for the Iraqi people, U.S. military forces. They were petrified by it. And you have a country in Iraq -- Iraqi people, U.S. military forces, in a state of high anxiety.

They are determined, the vast majority of the Iraqi people, to see an end to these attack. They feel their hands are tied. They are relying on the United States to bring security to their country and they feel like the U.S. is not doing that aggressively enough.

PHILLIPS: You had armored guards around you when you flew in the Helos, specifically in the Chinook, 100 feet above the ground. Did you realize it was that bad? Did you realize it was going to be like that when you were there?

JORDAN: Things turned actually while I was on the ground. My first few days -- I was there for eight days. The first few days were calm. I flew with a colleague, cameraman Scotty McClooney (ph), on a Black Hawk helicopter from Baghdad up to Mosul about 300 miles.

The following day, a Black Hawk just like the one we were on was shot down by a Rocket-Propelled Grenade Fired by some sort of bad guys, resistance fighter, what have you.

The next day, we got on a Chinook helicopter, flying from Mosul, on down to Tikrit. The Chinook team was so fearful of being shot down by an RPG that they flew the 150 mile journey just 100 feet off the ground in an effort to avoid being shot down by enemy forces.

PHILLIPS: Let's look at some of the pictures that you brought back. Of course, you have constantly -- by the way, we're very impressed how you were carrying the sticks there.

(CROSSTALK)

JORDAN: This is outside the Palestine Hotel, Kyra, which is our base in Baghdad. We have about 60 people working out of that hotel. The hotel's surrounded by tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, which is what this is, armor personnel carriers.

It's a hotel that is very much under threat because not only do you have news media, you have U.S. military, you have the FBI in that building, and you also have Halliburton, a big military contractor, in that building.

So you have actually armed gunmen walking the halls with machine guns, flak jacket, helmets, to ensure if somebody gets through the many barriers outside the hotel, that actually you in the hallways of the hotel, that they had guys who would be stopped before they doing any killing.

PHILLIPS: Are you surprised we haven't lost one of our own yet?

JORDAN: It's been a very deadly war for journalists.

If you are a journalist in Iraq, the odds are much higher you will die in Iraq than if you are U.S. military in Iraq. Twenty journalists have been killed over there. It's a very scary situation.

We've had two of our own people shot in Tikrit early in the war. Knock on wood, so far so good, for our people. We haven't lost anyone.

PHILLIPS: With the security concerns and the violence, you got to see a lot of the good things going on. You spent a lot of time with the kids. This is a great picture. tell us about these school kids.

JORDAN: This is at a school up in Mosul, in northern Iraq. The U.S. military had gone in, painted this school, provided it with new desks. This is a school that had been looted in the midst of the war. The military came to the rescue here, along with the defense contractor. They provided all the school supplies for the kid.

In one sense, the kids were thrilled to see us. Not even all the kids were that happy to see us. Our convoy came under attack from children. They threw rocks at us as we were leaving. I don't know if they did that in fun, but one of the U.S. Army soldiers with us was hurt.

PHILLIPS: You saw the boards, too, of all the incidents that happen every single day. You were even telling me that the attacks started off being one number, then by the time you left, it was three times the number attacks on Americans. Also, looking at this picture you took of the type of crimes happening every day, carjacking, murder. Tell me about this.

JORDAN: These are people in one jail cell in Mosul, one police station. There are six police stations in Mosul, in this one town. And in one jail cell, awaiting transfer to a real prison, you had in just a 24-hour period, murderer, carjackers.

The Iraqi on Iraqi crime is horrific. Not getting the attention it deserves because there's so much attention, at least in this country, on the U.S., on military losses, and of course those deserve a great deal of attention too.

PHILLIPS: Meanwhile, the first news exec to be embedded with the 101st Airborne. Sixteen raids. Tell me about this.

JORDAN: Saturday night into Sunday morning, at 3:00 in the morning we set out on 16 simultaneous raids across the city, targets, Ansar al Islam, terrorist targets, Saddam Hussein loyalists, and the people who actually financed the killing of Americans in Mosul. The prior day an American soldier had been killed shot in the neck by some looters.

We went out on these raids in the middle of the night in unarmored Humvees with no doors, and raced across the city. The No. 1 target was so important that they actually put U.S. Special Forces from a group called Task Force 20 on the case. When the Task Force 20 people went in to this home, in search of this No. 1 target, he pointed a gun at them. They killed him and there were two others shot in that raid as well. So there's a fair amount of blood being spilled on these raids.

PHILLIPS: Pretty amazed. No one's had access to Task Force 20 so it's interesting you got an insight on that.

My final question, I know it's a bit of a loaded question. I have to ask you. Are we covering post-war Iraq fairly? Are we balanced? Are you going to recommend changes that we make?

JORDAN: First of all, I have to give a lot of credit to our people on the ground. They're very courageous, working very hard.

Having said that, I'm someone who believes as always there's room for improvement. Can we do a better job? Yes, we can. I think we need to do a better job, for example, on reporting on the U.S. military forces on the ground.

They are doing a lot of heroic things. Not only for the Iraqi people, but in trying to take care of the bad guys over there, who are mostly attacking Iraqis, not attacking Americans, but they're attacking both.

So I think we need to look at the numbers of people we have on the ground, how they're deployed, what stories they're reporting on, and I'll be providing a series of recommendations on what we can do to improve our reporting.

Having said that, I'm very proud of our team on the ground and have to give them a lot of credit.

PHILLIPS: I know you're going back next month. I hope we can brief again.

JORDAN: Thanks so much.

PHILLIPS: Thank you, Eason.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired October 31, 2003 - 14:36   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Security issues are a constant concern of the man to my left. He's Eason Jordan, CNN's senior news executive and frequent traveler to the hot spots that we report on everyday. He just returned from Iraq. I know we have a lot to talk about.
First, set the stage for viewers. We have a lot of crews over there. We're trying to work this story. Why did you want to go over there?

EASON JORDAN, CNN SENIOR NEWS EXECUTIVE: We have 65 people on the ground in Iraq. I thought it was important to get a sense of what they're facing on the ground, get a lay of the land first hand, especially since there's been so much controversy about what the news media are doing their job, whether CNN is doing its job in reporting good news versus bad news.

A lot of challenges over there, journalistically, logistically, from a safety and security perspective.

PHILLIPS: We talked a lot about that. I forwarded you a number of e-mails. Eason, are we getting the story? Should we do this? We want to cover this story. Do we have enough crews?

Well, you got there and were a lot of reality checks. No. 1, security. Tell me the things that made such an impact -- I guess the things that impacted you the most, once you got there.

JORDAN: The greatest impact came Monday, just a few days ago. We saw four suicide bombing attacks in Baghdad. I think it's the first time in history there had been four suicide bombing attacks in one day. As far as I know, the only time four suicide attacks ever on the same day was September 11, 2001.

So it really was historic, a real downer for the Iraqi people, U.S. military forces. They were petrified by it. And you have a country in Iraq -- Iraqi people, U.S. military forces, in a state of high anxiety.

They are determined, the vast majority of the Iraqi people, to see an end to these attack. They feel their hands are tied. They are relying on the United States to bring security to their country and they feel like the U.S. is not doing that aggressively enough.

PHILLIPS: You had armored guards around you when you flew in the Helos, specifically in the Chinook, 100 feet above the ground. Did you realize it was that bad? Did you realize it was going to be like that when you were there?

JORDAN: Things turned actually while I was on the ground. My first few days -- I was there for eight days. The first few days were calm. I flew with a colleague, cameraman Scotty McClooney (ph), on a Black Hawk helicopter from Baghdad up to Mosul about 300 miles.

The following day, a Black Hawk just like the one we were on was shot down by a Rocket-Propelled Grenade Fired by some sort of bad guys, resistance fighter, what have you.

The next day, we got on a Chinook helicopter, flying from Mosul, on down to Tikrit. The Chinook team was so fearful of being shot down by an RPG that they flew the 150 mile journey just 100 feet off the ground in an effort to avoid being shot down by enemy forces.

PHILLIPS: Let's look at some of the pictures that you brought back. Of course, you have constantly -- by the way, we're very impressed how you were carrying the sticks there.

(CROSSTALK)

JORDAN: This is outside the Palestine Hotel, Kyra, which is our base in Baghdad. We have about 60 people working out of that hotel. The hotel's surrounded by tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, which is what this is, armor personnel carriers.

It's a hotel that is very much under threat because not only do you have news media, you have U.S. military, you have the FBI in that building, and you also have Halliburton, a big military contractor, in that building.

So you have actually armed gunmen walking the halls with machine guns, flak jacket, helmets, to ensure if somebody gets through the many barriers outside the hotel, that actually you in the hallways of the hotel, that they had guys who would be stopped before they doing any killing.

PHILLIPS: Are you surprised we haven't lost one of our own yet?

JORDAN: It's been a very deadly war for journalists.

If you are a journalist in Iraq, the odds are much higher you will die in Iraq than if you are U.S. military in Iraq. Twenty journalists have been killed over there. It's a very scary situation.

We've had two of our own people shot in Tikrit early in the war. Knock on wood, so far so good, for our people. We haven't lost anyone.

PHILLIPS: With the security concerns and the violence, you got to see a lot of the good things going on. You spent a lot of time with the kids. This is a great picture. tell us about these school kids.

JORDAN: This is at a school up in Mosul, in northern Iraq. The U.S. military had gone in, painted this school, provided it with new desks. This is a school that had been looted in the midst of the war. The military came to the rescue here, along with the defense contractor. They provided all the school supplies for the kid.

In one sense, the kids were thrilled to see us. Not even all the kids were that happy to see us. Our convoy came under attack from children. They threw rocks at us as we were leaving. I don't know if they did that in fun, but one of the U.S. Army soldiers with us was hurt.

PHILLIPS: You saw the boards, too, of all the incidents that happen every single day. You were even telling me that the attacks started off being one number, then by the time you left, it was three times the number attacks on Americans. Also, looking at this picture you took of the type of crimes happening every day, carjacking, murder. Tell me about this.

JORDAN: These are people in one jail cell in Mosul, one police station. There are six police stations in Mosul, in this one town. And in one jail cell, awaiting transfer to a real prison, you had in just a 24-hour period, murderer, carjackers.

The Iraqi on Iraqi crime is horrific. Not getting the attention it deserves because there's so much attention, at least in this country, on the U.S., on military losses, and of course those deserve a great deal of attention too.

PHILLIPS: Meanwhile, the first news exec to be embedded with the 101st Airborne. Sixteen raids. Tell me about this.

JORDAN: Saturday night into Sunday morning, at 3:00 in the morning we set out on 16 simultaneous raids across the city, targets, Ansar al Islam, terrorist targets, Saddam Hussein loyalists, and the people who actually financed the killing of Americans in Mosul. The prior day an American soldier had been killed shot in the neck by some looters.

We went out on these raids in the middle of the night in unarmored Humvees with no doors, and raced across the city. The No. 1 target was so important that they actually put U.S. Special Forces from a group called Task Force 20 on the case. When the Task Force 20 people went in to this home, in search of this No. 1 target, he pointed a gun at them. They killed him and there were two others shot in that raid as well. So there's a fair amount of blood being spilled on these raids.

PHILLIPS: Pretty amazed. No one's had access to Task Force 20 so it's interesting you got an insight on that.

My final question, I know it's a bit of a loaded question. I have to ask you. Are we covering post-war Iraq fairly? Are we balanced? Are you going to recommend changes that we make?

JORDAN: First of all, I have to give a lot of credit to our people on the ground. They're very courageous, working very hard.

Having said that, I'm someone who believes as always there's room for improvement. Can we do a better job? Yes, we can. I think we need to do a better job, for example, on reporting on the U.S. military forces on the ground.

They are doing a lot of heroic things. Not only for the Iraqi people, but in trying to take care of the bad guys over there, who are mostly attacking Iraqis, not attacking Americans, but they're attacking both.

So I think we need to look at the numbers of people we have on the ground, how they're deployed, what stories they're reporting on, and I'll be providing a series of recommendations on what we can do to improve our reporting.

Having said that, I'm very proud of our team on the ground and have to give them a lot of credit.

PHILLIPS: I know you're going back next month. I hope we can brief again.

JORDAN: Thanks so much.

PHILLIPS: Thank you, Eason.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com