[Media-watch] FW: PENTAGON THREATENS TO KILL INDEPENDENT REPORTERS IN IRAQ :Kate Adie on US War Censorship

[david Miller]

> PENTAGON THREATENS TO KILL INDEPENDENT REPORTERS IN IRAQ
> 
> 
> BY FINTAN DUNNE, EDITOR
> http://www.GuluFuture.com/news/kate_adie030310.htm 10th March 2003
> 
> The Pentagon has threatened to fire on the satellite uplink positions
> of
> independent journalists in Iraq, according to veteran BBC war
> correspondent, Kate Adie. In an interview with Irish radio, Ms. Adie
> said
> that questioned about the consequences of such potentially fatal
> actions, a
> senior Pentagon officer had said: "Who cares.. ..They've been warned."
> 
> 
> According to Ms. Adie, who twelve years ago covered the last Gulf War,
> the
> Pentagon attitude is:"entirely hostile to the the free spread
> ofinformation."
> 
> "I am enormously pessimistic of the chance of decent on-the-spot
> reporting, as the war occurs," she told Irish national broadcaster,
> Tom
> McGurk on the RTE1 Radio "Sunday Show."
> 
> Ms. Adie made the startling revelations during a discussion of media
> freedom issues in the likely upcoming war in Iraq. She also warned
> that
> the
> Pentagon is vetting journalists according to their stance on the war,
> and
> intends to take control of US journalists' satellite equipment --in
> order
> to control access to the airwaves.
> 
> Another guest on the show, war author Phillip Knightley, reported that
> the
> Pentagon has also threatened they: "may find it necessary to bomb
> areas
> in
> which war correspondents are attempting to report from the Iraqi
> side."
> 
> Transcript follows below.
> 
> Audio of this very frank discussion of the problems facing reporters
> in
> Iraq. Guests: Kate Adie, BBC; Phillip Knightley, author of The First
> Casualty, a history of war correspondents and propaganda; Chris
> Hedges,
> award winning human rights journalist, and former Irish Times Editor
> Connor
> Brady on the Sunday Show, RTE Radio1 9th March, 2003.
> 
> Tom McGurk: " Now, Kate Adie, you join us from the BBC
> in London. Thank you very much for going to all this trouble on a
> Sunday
> morning to come and join us. I suppose you are watching with a mixture
> of
> emotions this war beginning to happen, because you are not going to be
> covering it." Kate Adie: " Oh I will be. And what actually appalls me
> is the difference between twelve years ago and now. I've seen a
> complete
> erosion of any kind of acknowledgment that reporters should be able to
> report as they witness."
> 
> " The Americans... and I've been talking to the Pentagon... take the
> attitude which is entirely hostile to the free spread of information."
> 
> " I was told by a senior officer in the Pentagon, that if uplinks
> --that
> is
> the television signals out of... Bhagdad, for example-- were detected
> by
> any planes ...electronic media... mediums of the military above
> Bhagdad...
> they'd be fired down on. Even if they were journalists ..' Who cares!
> '
> said.. [inaudible] .." Tom McGurk: "...Kate ...sorry Kate ..just to
> underline that. Sorry to interrupt you. Just to explain for our
> listeners.
> Uplinks is where you have your own satellite telephone method of
> distributing information." Kate Adie: " The telephones and the
> television
> signals." Tom McGurk: " And they would be fired on? " Kate Adie: "
> Yes.
> They would be 'targeted down,' said the officer." Tom McGurk: "
> Extraordinary ! " Kate Adie: " Shameless."
> 
> " He said.. ' Well... they know this ...they've been warned.' "
> 
> " This is threatening freedom of information, before you even get to a
> war."
> 
> "The second thing is there was a massive news blackout imposed."
> 
> "In the last Gulf war, where I was one of the pool correspondents with
> the
> British Army. We effectively had very, very light touch when it came
> to
> any
> kind of censorship."
> 
> " We were told that anything which was going to endanger troops lives
> which
> we understood we shouldn't broadcast. But other than that, we were
> relatively free."
> 
> " Unlike our American colleagues, who immediately left their pool,
> after
> about 48 hours, having just had enough of it."
> 
> " And this time the Americans are: a) Asking journalists who go with
> them,
> whether they are... have feelings against the war. And therefore if
> you
> have views that are skeptical, then you are not to be acceptable."
> 
> " Secondly, they are intending to take control of the Americans
> technical
> equipment ...those uplinks and satellite phones I was talking about.
> And
> control access to the airwaves."
> 
> " And then on top of everything else, there is now a blackout (which
> was
> imposed, during the last war, at the beginning of the war), ...ordered
> by
> one Mr. Dick Cheney, who is in charge of this."
> 
> " I am enormously pessimistic of the chance of decent on-the-spot
> reporting, as the war occurs. You will get it later."
> 
> - PeaceUK.net Staff
> 
> 
> 
> 
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