[Media-watch] No Embeds at Landstuhl

Julie-ann Davies jadavies2004 at yahoo.co.uk
Sun Nov 14 10:20:26 GMT 2004


http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000718295

No Embeds at Landstuhl
Far from the battleground, and the eyes of reporters and cameramen, more 
than 400 wounded U.S. military personnel have been airlifted to Germany for 
medical treatment since the start of the Fallujah offensive.

By Greg Mitchell

NEW YORK (November 11, 2004) -- Dozens of embedded reporters re-enlisted 
this week, and hundreds of newspapers breathlessly recounted the invasion of 
the insurgent stronghold (which turned out to be not quite as strong as 
expected), as if it was the turning point in the war. The embeds were far 
from the scene, however, when several other rebel centers exploded in death 
and fury.

And they are completely missing from the American tragedy unfolding this 
week at the military's Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany, where 
most of the seriously wounded U.S. troops in Iraq are taken. As of early 
Saturday, according to hospital officials, at least 412 U.S. military 
personnel had been airlifted to the facility from Iraq since Monday, forcing 
them to add beds and expand their operations.

And the pace is only quickening. The number of arrivals this week stood at 
227 on Thursday, for four days, but has jumped to 412 in just the two days 
since.

To be fair to the brave men and women serving in Iraq, shouldn't the press 
place a few embeds at Landstuhl? While American fatalities receive major 
play in press accounts, you have to look deeply to find the numbers on the 
wounded and maimed. You don't get airlifted to Landstuhl for a nick or 
scratch. A hospital spokeswoman told Stars and Stripes today that most of 
the damage came from burns, blasts and gunshots, with spinal and brain 
injuries and "traumatic amputations" among them.

As bad as it is in Fallujah, imagine if most of the rebels had actually 
stood and fought? Having been warned for weeks of the coming attack, and 
knowing it would be tied to the results of the U.S. election, many melted 
away, perhaps to Mosul. Of course, if the assault had not been postponed 
until after the White House was re-secured, perhaps that mass flight could 
have been prevented (not that any newspapers I've seen are pressing this 
point).

Even so, the American dead and injured toll is bad enough.

As for the Iraqis in Fallujah: Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the 
Joint Chiefs, said Thursday there have been "hardly any, if any, civilian 
casualties so far." I'll leave it to you to judge how likely this seems. One 
thing we do know: for the Iraqi civilians still in the city and the refugee 
camps, a humanitarian crisis is unfolding, according to local officials. And 
when the smoke clears, it will be interesting to discover whether battered 
Fallujah will become known as the Hue of Iraq.

Jackie Spinner, the Washington Post embed with the Marines in Fallujah, said 
in an online chat from the battleground (the mind boggles) on Thursday: "No 
one I've talked to believes that solving the Fallujah problem will end the 
violence in Iraq. But, as one Marine officer told me, not solving the 
Fallujah problem will not end it either."

Well, that just about covers it.

Spinner also relayed without comment the official military explanation for 
why it seized a Fallujah hospital, and tied up all its doctors, on the first 
day of the invasion: they had to make sure the docs were not "insurgents" 
and also, "One of the persistent problems for the military ... was the 
misreporting of civilian dead and wounded by the propaganda machines at the 
hospitals."

This comes just weeks after the Allawi government itself released figures 
showing thousands of civilian casualties in the country, with estimates from 
others reaching into the tens of thousands.

Given Gen. Myers' claims today of no civilian casualties in this week's 
assault, it is odd that the Marines told Spinner that they had secured the 
"propaganda" hospital first "to make sure that civilians had access to 
medical care during the offensive."

What's to be done if the chaos continues in Iraq? Thursday, New York Times 
columnist Thomas Friedman joined his paper's editorial board in calling for 
more combat boots on the ground, two divisions worth. Now, where are those 
boots going to come from? The Times' editorial, earlier this week, suggested 
that all the military had to do was raise "recruitment quotas" and, presto, 
enlistees would appear. Why? With the promise of 40,000 more troops in Iraq, 
the editorial declared, these young men wouldn't worry so much about their 
safety if they got sent there.

Just don't show them any footage from Landstuhl. 




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