This really is a very serious question here.
Did you know that there have been reporters on the gound in Iraq since the beginning ???
How is this one considered a Marketing ploy?
Neets, what I mean by ignorance is that he is not a reporter he is an anchor. After Jennings died the producers and marketers came up with the idea to have the anchors do the shows from different locations where major stories were occuring as opposed to Washington or New York. Their commercials tout that the anchors are not anchored. This is the marketing decision -- to broadcast from locations such as this rather than have their anchor in a centralized location such as New York.
The decision to have the anchors in places like this is part of a marketing campaign. This is why he was doing the show in Iraq, not DC or New York. You also seem to be ignorant of how TV programming and marketing/advertising campaigns work.
It's not hard to understand, nor is it a conspiracy, nor was it meant to get him killed.
It was, as it turns out now, a bad decision.