The nation reached a sad milestone in late August. With the death of an American soldier in a roadside bombing on August 29, the number of soldiers killed in Iraq after the official end of the war reached 139, exceeding the "postwar" casualty count. Nightline aired a feature; the Associated Press posted a story on the war dead -- but most media outlets continue to ignore an equally dreary reality.
In a summer dominated by the Bryant sex case, Arnold's debut in California's recall election and the killing of Saddam Hussein's sons, no hordes of television cameras await the planeloads of wounded soldiers being airlifted back to the states, unloaded at Andrews Air Force Base, and stuffed into wards at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and other facilities. We see few photos of them undergoing painful and protracted physical rehabilitation, few visuals of worried families waiting for news of their sons or daughters. The men and women injured in Iraq and Afghanistan have become the new disappeared
Liz Swasey of the conservative media watchdog Media Research Center (MRC) confirms this perception. "There have been no feature news stories on television focusing on the wounded," she says. "While there have been numerous reports of soldiers getting wounded, there have been no interviews from hospital bedsides."
The numbers of soldiers wounded in action are hard to come by. Since the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Pentagon has put the figure at 827. But Lieutenant-Colonel Allen DeLane, the man in charge of airlifting the wounded into Andrews Air Force Base, recently mentioned much higher numbers in an interview with National Public Radio.
"Since the war has started, I can't give you an exact number because that's classified information, but I can say to you over 4,000 have stayed here at Andrews," he said. "And that number doubles when you count the people that come here to Andrews, and then we send them to other places like Walter Reed and Bethesda..."
Some journalists also dispute the Pentagon's official count. Julian Borger of The Guardian claims "unofficial figures are in the thousands." Central Command in Qatar talked of 926 wounded, but "that too is understated," Borger maintains. And in fact, a mid-August report in The Salt Lake City Tribune claims that Central Command has acknowledged 1,007 U.S. wounded. (The Pentagon did not respond to inquiries.)
Whatever the actual numbers of wounded, military hospitals are being overwhelmed. "Staff are working 70- or 80-hour weeks," Borger reports. "[T]he Walter Reed army hospital in Washington is so full that it has taken over beds normally reserved for cancer patients to handle the influx, according to a report on CBS television." Some of the outpatient wounded are even being placed at nearby hotels because of the overflow, according to The Washington Times.
Inside these hospitals, there's no shortage of compelling narratives for the interested TV reporter.
For example, an accident in western Iraq threw Sgt. Robert Garrison of Ithaca, N.Y., from his Humvee, according to a June story by the Associated Press. He landed on his head, fractured his skull and slipped into unconsciousness. Garrison "can't speak at more than a faint whisper and breathes with the help of a tube jutting from his neck. A scar runs across the back of the head, and the left side of his face droops where he has lost some control over his muscles."
Sgt. Kenneth Dixon, of Cheraw, S.C., was in a Bradley fighting vehicle when it plunged into a ravine. He "broke his back, leaving him unable to use his legs." These days he's at a veteran's hospital in Richmond, Va., "focusing on his four hours of daily physical therapy."
Marine Sgt. Phillip Rugg, 26, recently had his left leg amputated below the knee, caused by a grenade "that penetrated his tank-recovery vehicle March 22 outside Umm Qasr, nearly shearing his foot off."
The stories of these injured soldiers obviously straddle party lines and should sadden Americans from all walks. So what is it about the wounded that makes us uncomfortable? Why have they been left out of the coverage of the war by the broadcast media?
The consensus seems to be that the wounded are too depressing a topic -- and also that they might threaten Bush's popularity.
"The wounded are much too real; telling their stories would be too much of a bummer for television's news programmers," says Norman Solomon, media critic and co-author of Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You. "Dead people don't linger like wounded people do. Dead people's names can be posted on a television honor role, but the networks and cable news channels won't clog up their air time with the names and pictures of hundreds and hundreds of wounded soldiers."
Former L.A. Times television critic Howard Rosenberg reflects this sentiment, and adds that giving the wounded air time could be perceived as too controversial. "Since 9/11, there is a general feeling among many media outlets that they need to stay away from anything that could be interpreted as disloyal to the country," he says.
John Stauber, author of the recently released book The Weapons of Mass Deception, says the war was sold on television as a sanitized war with minimal U.S. casualties -- which was exactly what the Bush administration tried to engineer. "Showing wounded soldiers and interviewing their families could be disastrous PR for Bush's war," he says. "I suspect the administration is doing all it can to prevent such stories unless they are stage managed feel-good events like Saving Private [Jessica] Lynch."
Tod Ensign directs Citizen Soldier, a GI rights advocacy organization. He thinks the failure to cover the wounded indicates an implicit loyalty to the White House, and a reluctance to address a failed Iraq policy. "The American media is by and large controlled and dominated by corporations that line up politically with the Bush administration," Ensign says. "They appear to be increasingly incapable of grappling with such a highly charged issue as the wounded."
President Bush landed on the U.S.S. Lincoln on May 1 and declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq. Since that overhyped media event, the president has repeatedly visited with troops that have returned intact, and he has issued statements honoring the dead.
But the president has not shown up at Walter Reed Army Medical Center to shake hands with the recovering Robert Garrisons or Kenneth Dixons. Journalists should pay these visits for him, to tell us the stories of these men and women, whose problems will stretch into the coming years. And they should ask the president why he is so reluctant to see these troops he sent so confidently into battle.
posted on August 31, 2003 08:47:46 AM new
All the arguments over whether CNN is more liberal than MSNBC and so forth look kind of silly really. I'd say the mainstream media is ALL complicit in giving us only what the White House wants us to see.
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I want to have Ann Coulter's babies
posted on August 31, 2003 08:55:44 AM new
Once again an article complaining about the war. Do many of you here honestly think that if a democratic president should get into office he's/she's going to withdraw our troops? They won't. AND they won't be elected if they say they will.
Anyone who takes over where Bush left off will be inheriting a monumental mess on all fronts. That includes his war and withdrawing troops will not be an option.
I agree with that.
posted on August 31, 2003 09:14:52 AM newAnyone who takes over........well....see. then there's no reason for you to worry. Bush will be elected in 2004.
posted on August 31, 2003 02:35:40 PM new "I, personally won't read a big copy paste, unless you have comments of your own there, bolded something, and have an opinion about it."
Sorry I taxed your concentration, Nearthesea. Perhaps you should heed your own advice?
posted on August 31, 2003 04:28:23 PM new
We're taking the war to the enemy. Casualties are to be expected. You seem to forget the fact that there have been no terrorist attacks on US soil since 9/11. How many millions of muslims would love the chance to attack us at home? But no attacks? Bush is doing a good job.
posted on August 31, 2003 04:39:47 PM newWe're taking the war to the enemy. Casualties are to be expected. You seem to forget the fact that there have been no terrorist attacks on US soil since 9/11. How many millions of muslims would love the chance to attack us at home? But no attacks? Bush is doing a good job
posted on August 31, 2003 05:23:08 PM new
Oh THAT thread Helen. Yeah the Planet X cult, well, I was going to put MY website, devoted entirely to debunking the cult up as link, but thought better of it.... not until I talk with my publisher
Art Bell Retired! George Noory is on late night coasttocoastam.com
posted on August 31, 2003 11:56:11 PM new
Ebayauctionguy; How many millions of americans are Semiteophobes.
Creating enemy myths, taking us all to war.
Little sympathy from certain Judeo-Christian groups; Hollywood, energy, and neocon lobby are doing a good job.
Linda, if Bush the father and the son weren’t in politics, would any of this have happened, including 9/11?
posted on September 1, 2003 07:26:31 AM new
austbounty - Linda, if Bush the father and the son weren't in politics, would any of this have happened, including 9/11?
Most likely. This BS in Iraq didn't start with Bush the father. Look at the J F Kennedy history and you will see regime change being discussed even then. And all the US presidents since then have had to deal with the issue of Iraq. Under both it's leaders. Look at some history under Iraq....maybe on a google search.
And do a search under Clinton/Iraq too. You will find his speeches about how Saddam needed to be removed.
posted on September 1, 2003 10:13:56 AM new
Wars of Liberation
"The war liberated millions. But the post-war period proved difficult. Members of the former regime went underground and continued to fight, using terrorist tactics - even against their fellow countrymen. Those who had been freed lacked essential services, including food, clean water, jobs and housing. Opposition to the "occupation" persisted. The reconstruction progressed slowly. True democracy took years to establish.
"Nevertheless, most Americans today agree that President Lincoln was right to wage the Civil War. Eventually, a similar view will likely prevail regarding the U.S.-led war to liberate Iraq.
"...Americans will see that just as the Ku Klux Klan's terrorism was one response to the Union victory, so it was to be expected that Ba'athist remnants - and their jihadist allies from abroad - would employ terrorism against U.S. soldiers, international civil servants and free Iraqis working to build a decent society."
- Columnist Clifford May
Veritas vos Liberabit"..... (the truth will set you free)
