War reporter Arnett makes comeback in Baghdad

War reporter Arnett makes comeback in Baghdad

Steve Gorman
Reuters
Los Angeles

Veteran war correspondent Peter Arnett is back in Baghdad
reporting the U.S. bombing of Iraq's capital just as he did 12
years ago -- but this time he's not alone, not being censored and
not with CNN.

And his goal is not just the story -- he sees it as a chance
at professional redemption.

A Pulitzer Prize winner for his reporting from Vietnam, Arnett
was CNN's man in Baghdad during the 1991 Gulf War but left the
network under a cloud four years ago in the fallout over the
retracted documentary Operation Tailwind.

The documentary alleged that the U.S. military had used the
nerve gas sarin against American defectors in the Vietnam War. It
was strongly denied by the Pentagon, and Arnett tried to distance
himself from the program he narrated by saying he had contributed
"not one comma" to the piece. CNN ended up letting him go after
18 years.

While CNN was expelled from Baghdad last week, Arnett has
remained one of the few broadcast correspondents still working
there for a U.S. network -- in his case two -- reporting for NBC
and its cable outlet MSNBC which is linked to his current
employer, National Geographic Explorer.

"Of course it is ironic, particularly that CNN is not here,"
he said in a call with a small group of reporters on Tuesday. "I
do get a perverse pleasure out of it because, after all, CNN did
dump me four years ago, I thought unfairly."

"I think Tailwind was almost a death blow to my career as a
correspondent," Arnett said. "I felt that being hit like that for
Tailwind, it was something I had to dig myself out of. And
actually, in the four years since, I've been trying to find a way
how best to redeem myself."

The 68-year-old New Zealand-born broadcast journalist has more
company in Baghdad this time -- competition from scores of other
journalists, many of them from the Arab media. And, unlike 12
years ago, he is reporting free of the censorship that led some
critics to brand him as a propaganda tool.

Indeed, one could make the argument that Arnett and other
Western reporters in Baghdad enjoy greater freedom to tell their
stories without prior restraint than their colleagues "embedded"
with U.S. troops.

"They're requiring no censorship at all. ... There are no
minders around us when we broadcast. I'm sitting here in the
hotel and ... we can talk on the phone freely," Arnett said.
While he assumes that his calls may be monitored, Arnett said
that at no time in the months he's been in Baghdad have Iraqi
officials questioned him about his telephone contacts or about
the contents of his stories.

Still, Arnett said he and other foreign correspondents in
Baghdad do work under certain restrictions. Except for rare
circumstances, they are permitted to transmit TV footage only
from Iraq's Ministry of Information building and are expected to
attend daily briefings by government officials.

"The ministry has made it clear that if you do not attend
those press briefings, they don't see why you should be here. If
you don't go to those briefings, they get very unhappy."

In addition, no Western reporters are permitted to travel
about the city without government escorts, or minders, and
journalists are kept away from military areas, he said.

Returning to Baghdad on assignment for National Geographic
Explorer afforded him a chance to rejoin the broadcast big
leagues when NBC pulled its own news team out of the Iraqi
capital just before the bombing started.

Arnett gained international notoriety in 1991 by remaining in
Baghdad with his CNN crew after other reporters had left at the
outset of the Gulf War. But he also drew fire for submitting to
Iraqi censors.

Besides the lack of censorship during the current conflict,
the biggest difference between then and now is that bombs are not
necessarily the greatest threat to immediate safety.

Having survived the "shock and awe" air assault on Baghdad
unscathed -- "it was thunderous, horrendous and frightening, but
it was all a half mile away" -- Arnett said his biggest worry now
is the ground invasion on its way.

"The battle is coming right to the heart of Baghdad, so as far
as I'm concerned the worst is yet to come," he said. "If it turns
out to be a vicious battle here and many civilians are hurt, I
don't think there will be much happiness about the Americans'
arrival."

For that reason, Arnett said he is actually counting on Iraqi
authorities to protect journalists from enraged civilians who may
be looking to take their anger out on Westerners.

"I want these minders around when the battle starts," he said.

REUTERS

GetRTR 3.00 -- MAR 27, 2003 05:11:17