"Michael Wolff, from New York magazine, told of his treatment by
Wilkinson when he raised critical questions during one press briefing. “He
said, ‘this is war, (bleep) hole’. He said, ‘don’t (bleep) around with
things you don’t understand’. And then finally it was; ‘no more questions
for you, why don’t you just go home?’”
Where the embeds were not enough, the military would simply write their
own reports, or shoot and edit their own films, Kampfner explained, and
distribute it to news channels that would lap it up.
Or they would simply lie.
Following the bomb explosion at a street market in Baghdad, during
which 14 people were killed, US and British forces at first obfuscate, and
then deny any involvement. Even after a second market bombing two
days later, where US missile parts were recovered, US and British
sources briefed that the Iraqi military were responsible. UK Defence
Secretary Geoff Hoon asserted that journalists’ reports could not be
trusted, unless they had been officially blessed. “What is important about
this is all of us should look very sceptically at these kinds of reports,
relying only on known and agreed facts,” he said."
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