ABC and VANITY unFAIR!
Posted on 11/12/2007 1:08:35 PM PST by james500
Dramatic new video shows how American soldiers in Afghanistan are being set up for deadly ambushes after trying to make peace with village elders in Taliban-controlled areas.
The effort to win the "hearts and minds" of village elders in the Korengal Valley of Kunar Province in Afghanistan has proved to be a dangerous one for U.S. troops, with elders often suspected of tipping Taliban fighters to the soldiers' schedule and whereabouts.
The video to be broadcast tonight on ABC News' "World News With Charles Gibson" and "Nightline" was shot by "Vanity Fair" contributing editor Sebastian Junger and photographer Tim Hetherington embedded with the 2nd Platoon, Battle (B) company of the 173rd Airborne on a joint assignment for ABC News and "Vanity Fair" magazine.
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.abcnews.com ...
That's the only cure for this type of blasphemy...
If you have ever seen the Ethics in America show (PBS) dealing with the media and the military you wouldn’t ask this question. It was brought up in the discussion. One of the anchors said he’s warn the troops and when asked what he’d do next he said he’d do nothing since he’d be dead. Then another of the anchors castigated him up one side and down the other for wanting to warn the Americans. The first anchor thought about it and said something to the effect I wish I could answer that way but I can’t. A crusty Marine officer then made a comment about how the very next day that same reporter who wouldn’t warn the Americans would get in trouble with the enemy and call on the American military to bail him out and the American military would go because it’s their job. The press came off looking like the jerks they are except for the one anchor who would have died to warn the Americans.
I’ll add more to the front end of that discussion because it illuminates their motivations:
http://www.11thcavnam.com/main/mike_wallce.htm
But while Jennings and his crew were traveling with a North Kosanese unit, to visit the site of an alleged atrocity by U.S. and South Kosanese troops, they unexpectedly crossed the trail of a small group of American and South Kosanese soldiers. With Jennings in their midst the Northern soldiers set up an ambush that would let them gun down the Americans and Southerners.
What would Jennings do? Would he tell his cameramen to “Roll tape!” as the North Kosanese opened fire? What would go through his mind as he watched the North Kosanese prepare to fire?
Jennings sat silent for about fifteen seconds. “Well, I guess I wouldn’t,” he finally said. “I am going to tell you now what I am feeling, rather than the hypothesis I drew for myself. If I were with a North Kosanese unit that came upon Americans, I think that I personally would do what I could to warn the Americans.”
Even if it meant losing the story? Ogletree asked.
Even though it would almost certainly mean losing my life, Jennings replied. “But I do not think that I could bring myself to participate in that act. That’s purely personal, and other reporters might have a different reaction.”
Ogletree turned for reaction to Mike Wallace, who immediately replied. “I think some other reporters would have a different reaction,” he said, obviously referring to himself. “They would regard it simply as another story they were there to cover.” A moment later Wallace said, “I am astonished, really.” He turned toward Jennings and began to lecture him: “You’re a reporter. Granted you’re an American” (at least for purposes of the fictional example; Jennings has actually retained Canadian citizenship). “I’m a little bit at a loss to understand why, because you’re an American, you would not have covered that story.”
Ogletree pushed Wallace. Didn’t Jennings have some higher duty to do something other than just roll film as soldiers from his own country were being shot?
“No,” Wallace said flatly and immediately. “You don’t have a higher duty. No. No. You’re a reporter!”
Jennings backtracked fast. Wallace was right, he said: “I chickened out.” Jennings said that he had “played the hypothetical very hard.”He had lost sight of his journalistic duty to remain detached.
Yep - and it's a thing of beauty, IMNSHO.
George Connell, a Marine Corps Colonel, reacted with disdain: "I feel utter contempt. Two days later they're both walking off my hilltop, they're two hundred yards away and they get ambushed. And they're lying there wounded. And they're going to expect I'm going to send Marines up there to get them. They're just journalists, they're not Americans." The discussion concluded as Connell fretted: "But I'll do it. And that's what makes me so contemptuous of them. And Marines will die, going to get a couple of journalists."
“I am the slime on your video”.
BTW...turn it off.
I am putting that on my FR profile page — thank you!
There does seem to be some misunderstanding about this article. As it reads, the ABC/VF cameramen are embedded with the 2nd Platoon, Battle (B) company of the 173rd Airborne.
There’s no indication that cameramen had any advance warning of the ambushes.
They put the pieces together that they were being set up by the elders. “one called to discuss details of a U.S.-financed water pipe project” and on the way out, they were ambushed.
Thanks for the post.
I could have sworn that Donaldson was involved in it. Too bad that Jennings backed down on his initial opinion.
I think that if there is a pattern of ambushes after a meeting with certain “Afghan leaders” those leaders need to meet their demise.
_________
That's not how I read the story at all. I understood the reporters to be embedded with the troops at all times, not forwarned of the villagers' betrayal, and being caught in the same attack themselves.
"We went from being the hunters to the hunted," said photographer Tim Hetherington who was with the troops when they were attacked last month.
thanks for the background...I’m suprised Jennings backed off. He loved the U.S.
ABC,NBC,CBS,CNN,BBC the dreck of the earth. rot in hell! God bless our boys and girls and all the vets who served this great land. main stream media , we spit on the ground before you!
It still gets shown, time and again, on PBS. It’s one to look for as it unmasks the left.
“That’s not how I read the story at all. I understood the reporters to be embedded with the troops at all times, not forwarned of the villagers’ betrayal, and being caught in the same attack themselves.’
Looks the same to me.
Hmmmm, I wonder how the journalists would feel if someone were embedded with a stalker who wanted to kill a high profile journalist and refused to warn said journalist? Would they feel the same? These folks should be hung for treason, pure and simple.
Thanks for posting that!
p
As long as they just surround themselves with civilians, they will be safe, because the Pentagon brASS and the politicians are p*****s.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.