Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1420-1439)
MR A PAWSON
AND COLONEL
PAUL BROOK
12 NOVEMBER 2003
Q1420 Mr Hancock: Did you have your own
experts?
Mr Pawson: We obviously have experts
inside the Ministry of Defence and they are the experts that gave
the background briefings, they are the experts at the top level
that gave the press briefings.
Q1421 Mr Hancock: What surprised me when
I have been listening to the evidence—I remember the Air
Marshal's evidence here—was that the infrastructure was
shot so badly in Iraq. I would have thought as you were responsible
for the media that one of the things that should have got out
in the first few days once you entered the country was encouraging
the media to show people outside of the country what had happened
to the infrastructure there. There was little or none of that
in the first week or so, yet you told us it was one of the things
that virtually immediately hit the various units when they went
into Iraq. I was interested when they were asking various experts,
"Did you realise that water and electricity was a problem
in Iraq?" and these experts were saying, "no, it was
okay", when you hear of stories from Iraq that it was the
norm. There was no rebuttal from us saying, of course we knew
what the infrastructure was like, fresh water was always a problems
and electricity was not on 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
There was no such rebuttal from you. It was as if we were responsible
for all of the damage that was caused to that infrastructure that
was the substance of life, power, water and food.
Mr Pawson: Whereas in fact it
was a product of the Iran/Iraq war onwards and other internal
policies of Saddam Hussein. When we were in control of an area
and it was safe and secure for the media to go out we did encourage
them to go out to the port in Um Qasr and Basra, down the streets
in Basra. In terms of the areas where we were not in control,
Baghdad, then we in the Ministry of Defence did not have a great
deal of information, certainly from us as opposed to other agencies
which other Government departments are responsible for, or knowledge
of what was happening on the ground in Baghdad. If the water was
not running or they said that the electricity had been off we
were not in a position to rebut that.
Q1422 Mr Jones: The issue of embedded
journalists, to what extent is there a need to educate them about
the battlefield? Certainly in some of the instant pictures that
were linked live from Sky News where someone was saying there
were fierce fire-fights going on there was not a great deal going
on at all, to what extent if you are going to have embedded journalists
and people giving running commentaries of what is happening do
they need to understand what they are seeing?
Mr Pawson: Two or three points:
One, I think that the coverage that was given by the embeds could
not have been obtained in any other way and it did add significantly
and valuably to the overall picture that we were seeing. Secondly,
with the distance in time between major combat operations it is
inevitable that most of the journalists will not have been under
fire and therefore are likely to react in a way in which a trained
soldier would not in terms of his balance and appreciation of
the situation. Thirdly, we would look for the unit with whom the
embed was to try to explain that this fire- fight was or was not
fierce, significant, expected, unexpected, and so forth. From
our point of view I think there is always a natural tendency in
the media to generalise from a particular, so if there was one
fire-fight there must be fire-fights happening everywhere.
Q1423 Mr Crausby: Alex Thomson from Channel
4 News who was deployed in the Forward Transmitting Unit said
it was transmitting but not particularly forward. He justified
that in the sense that he did not get much more forward than just
over the Iraqi border, what assessment have you made of the success
of the Forward Transmitting Unit?
Mr Pawson: I think the advance
in technology and the inclination of those deciding what material
will be used back here in London or in the studios means that
more was taken direct from the embedded units than from the Forward
Transmitting Unit. The FTU moved twice, it was located for safety
security reasons in the rear area of 1 Division. Its aim in our
concept was not to replicate being right up in front as far as
embedded journalists could be, that was naturally their role,
but to add a slightly broader picture and more considered view,
as it were, from divisional headquarters. This is one of the areas
of the Green Book we will have to look at with the media because,
as I say, technology has moved on, we can see it moving on even
further in terms of lighter weight vehicles, easier satellite
communication, better quality pictures and if there is a preference
for "action" material over the more considered material
then whether there is a place for a Forward Transmitting Unit
between embedded journalists, unilateral journalist and a press
information centre, say the Coalition Press Information Centre,
that is something that we would want to look at.
Q1424 Mr Crausby: If its purpose is to
give context and a strategic view, how do you avoid journalists
just transmitting directly from the embeds and particularly TV
journalist giving a completely false picture without that being
strategically thought about. It seems to me it is a good idea
that did not really work, although that is not to say that you
should abandon the idea.
Mr Pawson: We are not abandoning
the idea of context, we had an earlier discussions with Ms Squire
about that, what we are saying is that if the media choose and
they are not breaching operational security to use transmission
from embedded journalists then that is their choice and it is
not for us to try to dictate other than by gentle persuasion,
like, "why not show something more general, have you taken
this into account", which is in a sense a Headquarters function
with those that are controlling the output that they have chosen
to send out as opposed to being sent back. That is the sort of
dialogue we want to have with editors and producers in terms of
revising the Green Book for the future.
Q1425 Mr Cran: If one looks back at most
of the coverage from the people you call embeds it came from the
land element of the war, Air Marshal Torpy last week said that
he was unconcerned about all of this, is your perception that
is how it was? Could you tell the Committee how many embeds were
embedded within the Royal Navy and the RAF and why did we not
get as much coverage from them?
Mr Pawson: Again the choice is
for the media, it is not ours. The second point, we made provision
for embedded journalists on the major ships and indeed in relation
to the Royal Marines. We also—as I am sure Air Marshal Torpy
said—made provision for embeds within the Royal Air Force.
I suppose there are a number of issues as to why the media choose
what they did. Firstly, we are back to human interest again, there
is more human interest in army operations and the interaction
of Iraqi civilians than there is in the equipment. Thirdly, the
ability to get good coverage from air forces and maritime or sea
forces is much more difficult, they were covered but there are
only so many photographs of aircraft taking off that editors are
going to be interested in and only so many interviews with pilots
they are going to be interested in. I think that nevertheless
does not detract from the vital part that the Royal Air Force
played in the operation, certainly the Chief of Air Staff gave
a press conference and he outlined some of the achievements of
the Air Force and we gave publicity to some of the equipment there
as well, especially Storm Shadow.
Q1426 Mr Cran: How many embeds were there?
Colonel Brook: I do not have the
numbers to hand, they were proportionate to the size of the contributions
from the three services and effectively all major units, by major
unit in Navy terms we are talking about a ship and in Royal Air
Force terms a squadron or air base would have between four and
six embedded journalists. Each major unit in Army terms, battalion
size would have between four and six journalists. I would be very
happy to give you those figures.
Mr Pawson: We would not be too
far out if we said 100 plus, 100-120 but we will let you have
the figures.[2]
Q1427 Mr Cran: You will let us know,
will you? Have you had any reports from the RAF and Royal Navy
units that had embedded journalists and indeed the journalists
themselves on what their experiences were? Have you compared that
with what happened with the embeds within the Army?
Mr Pawson: Admiral Snelson came
through and talked to me about the media and the war and the embeds.
He was satisfied with the fact that he had adequate cover for
embedded journalists. There were particular times when operational
security was vital in relation to the Royal Navy and indeed in
relation to the Royal Air Force, no doubt the correspondents concerned
would have found that irritating, but that is human nature, they
previously agreed operational security had to be preserved. In
general they were pleased.
Q1428 Mr Cran: As an individual I am
quite surprised that you are both so satisfied with the embeds
and what they produced when in fact I recall myself watching television
back in this country and being irritated on an almost hourly basis
on the basis of the coverage I saw which most of the time did
not have context and was blind comment most of the other times.
I am really quite astonished that my experience is so different
from yours, maybe it is because you are having to work with these
people, I do not know!
Colonel Brook: We went into the
embed process as part of an overall package with our eyes wide
open, really on the understanding that it was under those circumstances
the only real way of providing for the needs of the press in a
combat situation, and that really was where our responsibility
ended. Where it went from there was a matter for the broadcasters
and the newspaper editors themselves. What we must not do is,
if you like, impose extra restrictions on our arrangements just
because of what the output may or may not be. We found ourselves
looking at some things we did not like but we also found ourselves
looking at a lot of things we were content with because it was
factual, it was accurate and it was based on what was happening,
albeit in a very small area.
Mr Pawson: We did not look to
the embeds to provide for a sophisticated audience, if I can put
it like that. The public, the Independent Television Commission
Report, the Cardiff University work, our own media research agency,
Echo Research, all reported satisfaction by the public in terms
of its lack of bias and generally thinking it was accurate. There
is a level, and I suppose it is back to this context, beyond which
on its own it is not satisfactory and we are not happy with that.
Q1429 Mr Cran: How do you take it from
where it was to where you would like it to be? God forbid there
was ever another configuration like that, but supposing there
were how are you going to be able to move it from where it was
to where you would like it to be? I was not satisfied.
Mr Pawson: This comes back to
the discussion that we are going to have to have with editors
about changes that we want to make to the Green Book and this
question of context and whether or not there is something that
we in the Ministry of Defence can do to help or not, it is only
an offer of help, it is up to the media to decide how they operate
this. It applies not only to having worthies late at night discussing
the future, it is how you anchor the reports from the embeds.
Most of it was done from London rather than from theatre. We need
to have an understanding I think with the media at editorial level
in advance as to how they are going to do this because then we
can deploy appropriately. We had more resources that we expected
to use in Qatar and part of that was because the statistics seem
to show they anchored more from London and they used more embeds.
That is what has happened and we will have to try and correct
it for the future.
Q1430 Mr Jones: Can I follow it up, you
have answered about what you would change differently for the
future, by having embedded journalists one advantage was that
you knew where they were, it helped in terms being able to manage
the news. You touched on it earlier, on how you deal with journalists
that were not embed but were on the frontline? I refer to John
Simpson when he was not an embedded journalist, he was with a
team in Northern Iraq. He made one comment about where they told
the MoD and the Americans where they were but they said they were
not interested. Is there not a responsibility on you if you have
people like John Simpson on the battlefield that you should take
notice of that?
Mr Pawson: Yes, if it is coming
into the media area because they are media they certainly deserve
exactly the same considerations that you would give to any civilian
party. Under the Geneva Convention if you knew there was an innocent
party being attacked you should do something about it. I have
no knowledge of any conversation that may or may not have taken
place. John Simpson was well in the North so I am slightly surprised.
I would have thought he would have been well enough informed to
realise that was very clearly an American area, if he came to
us I am sure we would have passed it on to the Americans.
Q1431 Mr Jones: He made the point about
the very tragic circumstances of the friendly fire incident he
was involved in and he said on the programme they contacted their
security people, and I think he used the words, "they were
not interested". What procedures are there for journalists
who were not embedded? What is the procedure for ensuring that
commanders in the field know where they are?
Mr Pawson: If a journalist does
not tell us they are there we do not know where they are.
Q1432 Mr Jones: I accept that.
Mr Pawson: If they tell us and
say, "we are under attack" if it came to us, to our
press office then we would pass that on to the coalition commanders.
Q1433 Mr Jones: That was not the point,
he said they were informing the Americans and the MoD of where
they were and he used the phrase, "they were not interested".
What I am saying to you is, is there a procedure for dealing with
journalists who are not embedded in one of your units but is in
theatre somewhere if they tell you, "I am going to this village
in the next few hours", is there a way of feeding that through
to the commanders on the field so that they do not attack or ensure
that the commanders know where they are. Is there a procedure?
How would it be dealt with?
Mr Pawson: I am not sure there
is a standing operating procedure but how it would be dealt with
would be the information would be passed on from us to the operational
command and we would do the same if there was a school full of
school children, shall we say?
Colonel Brook: As we have already
mentioned the opposite is true, if one of the press centre unilateral
journalists declares an intent to go a particular area we are
entitled to say under the Geneva Convention to that journalist,
"we think that it is too dangerous for you to go there and
we cannot guarantee your safety from our side or from any opposing
side". In fact other than war correspondents who have status
under the Geneva Convention the status of all other journalists
is that of civilian and they get the same protections as a civilian
would be entitled to, we use our best efforts to ensure they are
not injured or deliberately targeted.
Q1434 Mr Jones: What would the procedure
be if a responsible journalist like John Simpson said "I
am going to a village in the next hour or so", is there a
mechanism or anything else to feed it through to the actual commanders
on the field? It is obviously to do with to the point that you
want to know where people are.
Colonel Brook: Yes, as a matter
of course somebody in the press centre or perhaps just a combat
unit at the side of the road would pass that information on as
a matter of course. What we could do about it thereafter is difficult
to ascertain.
Mr Jones: Thank you.
Q1435 Chairman: In one of your earlier
answers, Mr Pawson, you said that some research had been commissioned
on the quality and quantity of media reports, you mentioned having
some policy institute, and you rattled the names off, could you
let us know what research has been commissioned on the performance
of the media and if it is not classified we would like to have
a look at it because I know after the Falklands there was some
very good stuff published by Kings College. It is obviously very
relevant to the quality of the media and we would like to look
at the documents if that is possible.
Mr Pawson: Yes. We will put a
pack together.
Q1436 Mr Jones: Can I ask about the journalists
behind the enemy lines in Baghdad. Richard Sambrook has reportedly
said they were warned by the MoD and the Pentagon to leave Baghdad,
what steps were taken to discourage journalist from staying in
Baghdad? What were the grounds for that advice or encouragement
to leave?
Mr Pawson: Our assessment and
that of the Foreign Office was that all foreigners should leave
Baghdad, it was going to be a very dangerous place and, we did
not know what the regime would do with United Kingdom or United
States personnel. We thought that it was very dangerous and we
informed the editors accordingly, I remember writing to them.
Q1437 Mr Jones: Can I ask about some
of the pictures they sent back. Obviously the Iraqi media were
using them to a certain extent to get their message over, what
strategy did you employ to counteract some of the stories that
were coming out of Baghdad? Did it affect the operation of the
campaign in any way in terms of knowing you had journalists in
certain parts of Baghdad and that certain places would be targeted?
Mr Pawson: In relation to the
first part of that, information that was coming out of Baghdad
was treated in a number of ways, first of all obviously we analysed
it and we analysed it in conjunction with the Foreign Office and
with the United States. If it was something of particular interest
to the UK and we felt that it was something that we needed to
positively rebut what was said or ask questions about it then
we would respond in the usual way, a minister would appear on
a programme, we would give a briefing or respond to questions.
In relation to whether it affected the military campaign I think
my answer would be in the event not.
Q1438 Mr Jones: On the basis that the
individuals concerned had been warned?
Mr Pawson: The Iraqis did not,
as it were, herd up the whole of the press core that was left
and put them in a place where we would have had some very difficult
decisions to make.
Mr Jones: Thank you.
Q1439 Mr Crausby: The speed of the operation
and the technological advance with the media seems to have caused
some problems, maybe predicted problems in the sense that journalists
tell us that in some instances they were out in front of Whitehall
and the Pentagon in their reports and that was difficult for politicians
to respond to sometimes, how do you prepare for that, for what
was a predicted increased tempo not just in this operation but
in future operations? How do you ensure that ministers and others
who were to give briefings were kept up to speed with such a rapidly
developing situation? The Iraqi Minister of Information who said
on TV that the Americans were miles away might well have been
laughable, but it is understandable. I would like to know about
the tempo of these operations, how do we protect ourselves from
such embarrassing situations?
Mr Pawson: We have to make a continual
judgment of the trade-off between authoritativeness and accuracy
on the one hand and speed of response on the other, I mentioned
that earlier. It is very difficult with the sort of technology
and virtually realtime possibilities that the media now have,
and which may increase ones in future, to match that because for
the media it seems to me that the speed and the looseness of language
is a possibility that is not open to us in Government without
severely damaging the credibility of what we say. In particular
for such things as statements to the House we air on the side
of authoritativeness, which can mean ministers are caught behind
what the television is showing in some types of conflict and some
situations. I do not have an answer to that.
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