When you listen to briefings giving by the US military the reporters are very hostile and cynical. However, when you hear the embedded media and anchors, they're extremely respectful. While the embedded reporters are always stating we can't say so and so for security reasons, these people constantly ask the same questions trying to get an answer that should not be given. Have these people just not grown any relationships to understand military personnel? or those people don't understand the answers in military terminology being given? or are these people under pressure to crank out articles and they have very little exact information? or have they become hostile because they're used to dealing with the pentagon and government which often gives extremely broad answers as a spokesperson. It's funny to watch fox after one of the briefings because they make fun of these people, although it's sad when they defend the military with illogical reasoning.
I swear every news conference starts with:
how long will the war last? the war is event based not time based, we don't know.
can you confirm you killed 100 iraqis in baghdad? we can't confirm that until we're inside
will you admit you underestimated forces in your plan? war is fluid, a plan is made with contingencies
will you admit serious setbacks in the south? we continue to perform our operations successfully
will you admit you lied to us (gives example of conflicting info)? there is the fog of war, we try to collaborate our data to give you the best answer we can
In my opinion, they need to go read military doctrine books of our armed forces to understand the thought process and terminology being used by these people. Once they do that, they'll finally understand the difference between strategic, tactical, and operational goals. Obviously future tactical and operational goals will not be provided, so just ask questions on strategic goals in order to understand the success of the war, or tactical/operational goals that have been achieved and perhaps operational capabilities. It seems to me they're trying to take bits of information to piece together how the war is doing, analogous to micro/macro.
I swear every news conference starts with:
how long will the war last? the war is event based not time based, we don't know.
can you confirm you killed 100 iraqis in baghdad? we can't confirm that until we're inside
will you admit you underestimated forces in your plan? war is fluid, a plan is made with contingencies
will you admit serious setbacks in the south? we continue to perform our operations successfully
will you admit you lied to us (gives example of conflicting info)? there is the fog of war, we try to collaborate our data to give you the best answer we can
In my opinion, they need to go read military doctrine books of our armed forces to understand the thought process and terminology being used by these people. Once they do that, they'll finally understand the difference between strategic, tactical, and operational goals. Obviously future tactical and operational goals will not be provided, so just ask questions on strategic goals in order to understand the success of the war, or tactical/operational goals that have been achieved and perhaps operational capabilities. It seems to me they're trying to take bits of information to piece together how the war is doing, analogous to micro/macro.
