Embedded journalism

An embedded civilian journalist taking photographs of US soldiers in Pana, Afghanistan.

Embedded journalism refers to war correspondents being attached to military units involved in armed conflicts. While the term could be applied to many historical interactions between journalists and military personnel, it first came to be used in the media coverage of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The United States military responded to pressure from the country's news media who were disappointed by the level of access granted during the 1991 Gulf War and the 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan.[1]

Journalists who instead opted to cover the invasion of Iraq on the battlefield while unattached to any military force came to be called "unilaterals."[2] Journalists chose to act as unilaterals to avoid the restrictions imposed on them by the military, and sometimes embed restrictions, which required embeds to stay with assigned units. Journalists sometimes opted to act as unilaterals out of concern that being under the constant protection of troops in the US-led coalition on the battlefield would bias their judgement in favor of coalition forces. The military often regarded unilateral journalists as sources of trouble on the battlefield and refuse to talk to them or not recognize unilateral journalists as "official" media.

The practice has been criticized as being part of a propaganda campaign whereby embedded journalists accompanied the invading forces as cheerleaders and media relations representatives.[3]

2003 invasion of Iraq

At the start of the war in March 2003, as many as 775 reporters and photographers were traveling as embedded journalists.[4] These reporters signed contracts with the military promising not to report information that could compromise unit position, future missions, classified weapons, and information they might find.[clarification needed][5][6] Joint training for war correspondents started in November 2002 in advance of start of the war.[7] When asked why the military decided to embed journalists with the troops, Lt. Col. Rick Long of the U.S. Marine Corps replied, "Frankly, our job is to win the war. Part of that is information warfare. So we are going to attempt to dominate the information environment."[8]

  1. ^ Center, Pew Research (2003-04-03). "Embedded Reporters". Pew Research Center's Journalism Project. Retrieved 2023-11-03.
  2. ^ Shafer, Jack (May 1, 2003). "Embeds and Unilaterals". Slate. Retrieved 3 July 2023.
  3. ^ Cockburn, Patrick (23 November 2010). "Embedded journalism: A distorted view of war". The Independent. Retrieved 3 September 2020.
  4. ^ "Reporters, commentators conduct an in-depth postmortem of Iraq war's media coverage". www.berkeley.edu.
  5. ^ "Pros and Cons of Embedded Journalism". PBS. Archived from the original on 2003-04-21.
  6. ^ "War in Iraq -- Media embed ground rules". Archived from the original on 2009-09-02. Retrieved 2010-03-24.
  7. ^ Borger, Julian (1 November 2002). "Flabby journalists sent to boot camp". The Guardian – via www.theguardian.com.
  8. ^ "Postmortem: Iraq war media coverage both dazzled and obscured". www.berkeley.edu.