By: Joe Strupp At least 10 embedded journalists have left their assigned slots with U.S. military units in Iraq, according to a Pentagon spokesman, who said twice as many people have requested to leave but chose to stay after being told their news organizations would lose the slots for good if they departed.
"If you leave, you give it up," said Col. Jay DeFrank, director of press operations for the Defense Department. "You can be put back on the list along with everyone else, but once you leave, someone else can take the slot."
DeFrank said the embedded reporters who have given up their spots have done so for a variety of reasons, ranging from weariness of the battlefield to concerns that they are not getting many good stories from the units they are with. "Some are convinced that they have seen everything they will see from a particular unit," DeFrank said. "It is a relatively small number."
Among those who have given up their slots is photographer Damir Sagoj of Reuters, who was forced to leave the Third Battalion of the First U.S. Marine Regiment in Iraq after breaking his foot, according to Reuters spokeswoman Nancy Bobrowitz, who said he is now in Kuwait City. "He couldn't travel and that is unfortunate," she said. "We are hoping, given the circumstances, that we can replace him in that unit." Sagoj left the Marines shortly after taking the moving photograph, which appeared on numerous newspaper front pages Sunday, of a Marine doctor holding a child whose mother had been killed in recent fighting in Iraq.
Jerry Zremski of
The Buffalo (N.Y.)
News also gave up an embedded position with a U.S. Army unit, relocating to Kuwait on Friday due to safety concerns. "I feel like a hostage," he said in an e-mail that was published on USAToday.com. "I was told I would be going to Iraq for two days, but a general's change in plans changed this to at least a five-day adventure -- and far more danger than I'd expected."
Other news organizations have asked to switch embedded journalists from one unit to another, a practice that has been regularly denied, DeFrank said. "Those requests are contrary to what the embeds are doing, which is to see the war from the view of one unit," he explained.
More than 600 journalists have been embedded with U.S. troops in or headed to the Middle East. DeFrank said more slots may become available as more troops are sent to the war region, but offered no specifics on how many might open up or when. "There will be some additional opportunities," he said. "We will work with them as that happens."
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