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Tuesday, December 20, 2005
It took a week just to get to the war
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Baghdad, Iraq — Covering the war in Iraq is a challenging assignment for journalists. But first, you have to get to the war.
And that, as I discovered on this, my fourth trip to Iraq in three years, can be almost as challenging.
After a 20-hour flight from Atlanta to Kuwait City via Frankfurt, I arrived at my hotel almost at midnight Dec. 11.
The military encourages reporters who are going to embed with military units to travel through Kuwait, where we board C-130 transport planes into Baghdad. I spent a day in Kuwait sorting out passport and visa issues and made the hour-long journey by bus to Ali Al Salem Air Base at 1:30 a.m. Dec. 13. The sun was rising by the time our bags were finally loaded up onto the palette.
It was breakfast time but for only those with military or contractor credentials. Passport holders (this reporter included) had to wait at the wooden picnic bench near the luggage staging area. Luckily, a good-hearted bus driver brought me a gravy-slathered omelet and a passion fruit drink from the chow hall.
No times for military flights are ever announced because of security concerns; we are simply given a code name for the flight - our flight was Chrome 15 - so that “folks up north” can come to the airport to pick you up. In my case, it didn’t matter. No one would be waiting for me at Baghdad airport, commonly known as BIAP.
Chrome 15 finally took off at about 9:30 in the morning. Almost two hours later, I was on the ground in Baghdad, lugging all my gear - computer, satellite phone, battery chargers, notebooks and enough clothes and supplies for two months - through dust and gravel to the covered waiting area on the military side of BIAP.
I had been ordered by the military to make my way to the International Zone, the heavily fortified area of central Baghdad formerly known as the Green Zone, to obtain press credentials that would theoretically allow me to move freely on military bases.
I tried to call a company called Catfish Air that has the power to manifest passengers on helicopters to the IZ. After three tries in vain (the woman on the other end either put me on terminal hold or hung up on me), I gave up and waited another hour to catch a shuttle bus to nearby Camp Striker, a military base that houses transients.
This was familiar territory for me. A chunk of the Georgia Army National Guard’s 48th Brigade Combat Team had been stationed here last summer. I had called Tent 5-35 home for almost three months.
Upon arrival, employees of Kellogg Brown & Root, an arm of the Halliburton Company that runs the camp, issued me a room that was basically a shipping container with a bed. I dumped my belongings there and several hours later was back waiting at the KBR office for a ride on the Rhino, a large armored bus. In the thick of night, the Rhino traveled from Striker through western Baghdad and into the IZ, arriving at 3:30 a.m.
There, we did as we had been ordered to do at Striker. Help unload baggage, a process that exhausted every last bit of energy in me. Where was a high-powered, calorie-filled Hooah Bar when you needed one?
About 45 minutes later, a soldier from the Combined Press Information Center (CPIC) came to pick me up. I was the sole remaining passenger at the Rhino stop by that point. It was late. It was dark. Thoughts of bad things happening had floated in and out of my head.
The CPIC soldier directed me to a loft space with several Army cots. I had never been happier to see one of those aluminum and green canvas folding contraptions.
About 10 a.m. I was taken to the credentialing officer. It took all of 6 minutes and 32 seconds for my credential to be renewed. I asked for a six-month renewal since I plan to return to Iraq in the spring. But that was not possible. Ninety days is all I would get. I would have to go through this rigamarole again.
Next stop: a session with several senators and the U.S. ambassador that ate up a good bit of the afternoon. I made my way to the IZ helipad, where I hoped to catch a chopper back to Striker at 6 p.m.
After several delays, the two Blackhawk helicopters finally landed at 9 p.m. The passengers were told to strap themselves in. I was dreaming of ahot shower and the little bed in the connex at Striker.
But that turned out to be many, many hours away.
Citing weather conditions, the crew ordered the passengers to be off-loaded. I went back to the Rhino pound to see if I could catch the armored bus back to Striker after midnight. But no one was available to manifest me. I had just about burst into tears when a kind-hearted soldier from the helipad returned to tell me that a Chinook helicopter was on its way to BIAP. He whisked me back to the helipad in his golf cart.
I could feel the draw of that bed again once I buckled myself in the seat.
We landed at Camp Falcon, where we sat on the tarmac for what seemed like an eternity. By the time I got into my bed at Striker that night, I had been traveling for more than six days. And yet, I had not reported one word for a story on the 48th Brigade.
“For what?” I asked myself. For a credential whose credibility is questioned by gate guards all over Iraq.
I can hardly complain given the hardships soldiers in Iraq endure. But for journalists, the clock is ticking. The pressure is on to begin filing stories.
I planned to hook up with a Georgia unit at Camp Liberty - Charlie Company of the 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment. I had been warned by military officials that I could not begin to interview soldiers until I was with my embed unit, no matter how much good news they had to offer.
Because the 48th Brigade is now dispersed across Iraq, embedded journalists must inform not the unit with which they are embedding of his or her intentions but also every military unit that has any sort of authority over the 48th. In my case, I was ordered to inform at least four different public affairs officers of my plans.
That was done easily enough through e-mails.
Early Friday morning, I was ready to be picked up by Charlie Company soldiers. My colleague, AJC photographer Curtis Compton, who was already with the unit, called around 11. “There’s a problem,” he said. Some officials in the 10th Mountain Division were not aware of my arrival; the message had not filtered down. I would have to wait until it was cleared.
I finally made it to Charlie Company by dinner time. Seven days had elapsed since I left Atlanta. I still hadn’t reported anything on the 48th Brigade.
I understand there are serious security issues at play in Iraq, but why make it so difficult for embedded journalists to get to the soldiers they want to cover? Military officials often complain the media report only the negative from Iraq. But how are we to report the full story when it is so tough to even get to it?
Worse still, this kind of arduous process may actually deter journalists from embedding with military units at all. One American journalist I met in Kuwait told me he had second thoughts about doing this again. The process had plain worn him out even before he got to the real action.
I, too, am exhausted just thinking about having to go through all this again.
Oh and that CPIC credential? It couldn’t even get me through the door of the chow hall at Camp Striker.
