Did embedded journalists produce worthwhile journalism during the Iraq War?
I'm claiming the Pulitzer Prize Board as a fellow advocate of the affirmative position.
Dallas Morning News Photographers David J. Leeson and Cheryl Diaz Meyer won the 2004 award for Breaking News Photography while embedded with the U.S. Army's Third Infantry Division and the Marines' Second Tank Battalion as they advanced toward Baghdad.
Their images can be found here.
The National Press Photographers Association ran a short story on the pair after they won the Pulitzer.
Asked if there was any one special photograph from the essay that stands out for her today after winning the Pulitzer, Meyer said, "Probably the one of two Marines helping an old man after he had accidentally been shot in their crossfire. In the middle of the battle he was trying to sneak by. Not really knowing if he was a guerilla or not, the Marines shot him. Then when they realized he was a civilian, they went back to get him. It was the lead photography in the entry. It was a very heroic and generous moment for the Marines, it was a risk they didn't have to take."
That seems to me like a pretty compelling description of something an embedded journalist captured that would've otherwise been impossible to capture.
Michael Luke @ September 21, 2006 - 4:55pm
Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't the only way these pictures hit American presses if the Pentagon allows the photographs to be published? Didn't policy change before Desert Storm?
Nonetheless, the photos are stunning. However, what would happen if the photographers took a picture of something that the Pentagon found offensive or might damage war morale back in the States? Would they be in our papers?
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