Journalist shares stories of Iraq

Iraq Correspondent Comes Home, Shares War Stories

By Christopher Falvo

Two years ago this week Evan Osnos, a 1994 Greenwich High School graduate, was sent to Kuwait as an embedded journalist to report on the War on Terror. The Middle East correspondent for the Chicago Tribune, Osnos, 28, returned to his hometown on Dec. 27 to speak about his experiences at the Arcadia Coffee Co. in Old Greenwich. He is scheduled to return to Baghdad next month for Iraq's national elections.

"To describe the experience of Iraq over the last two years, for the Americans, for Iraqis, and certainly for journalists, it is one of disillusionment," Osnos told the gathering. When Osnos first arrived in Kuwait he was embedded with the First Battalion of the Seventh Marine Regiment. In March 2003, he traveled with the unit on the road to Baghdad. At that point the feeling was one of complete optimism," he said.

He was with the Marines in Baghdad when the invasion was complete and the statue of Saddam Hussein was toppled. "At the time we were all flush with victory over this very promising moment," he said. The Harvard graduate went on to speak of a world in constant turmoil, a place where sanctuaries become prisons and views of American values are skewed. "(Iraqis) have a truly, profoundly, corrosive, disastrous understanding of what American values are and what the United States represents," he said. "Their image of the United States is sadly distorted."

The vast majority of Iraqis have limited, if any, access to western media, according to Osnos. Most people in the Middle East receive their coverage through Arab satellite television, which includes Al Jazeera and a handful of other outlets. The Arab media's major theme is that the United States is persecuting Arabs from the shores of the Mediterranean to the Tigris River, and have successfully blurred the lines between conflicts in Palestine and Iraq, according to Osnos. "The United States has become a synonym for Israel," he said.

This theme carries itself into other areas of the Middle East, such as Egypt, where it connects people who are not directly related to the situation in Iraq. "It's something that they can latch onto," said Osnos. "It's a response to frustrations about their own situations. "I've never heard a discussion in the Arab media about whether the war in Iraq will have a positive affect on democratizing the region," he said. "That theme has been lost over the past 18 months."

While the majority of Iraqis, about 70 percent according to Osnos, are opposed to American occupation, they realize that a quick exit by the U.S. would be more detrimental than helpful. He also stated that depending on the day the opinions of the populace vary. "On any street you'll get 10 different opinions, and it changes every week," he said. Osnos gave an account of these varying opinions by telling of two men he had befriended. The first was of a man of stature in Hussein's army, who has lost everything since the American invasion of Iraq and now drives a cab.

"Mostly what he does is seethe and imagine what he could do to get rid of Americans," said Osnos. The other was a man who had become Americanized. He listened to the Eagles, played the guitar, wore blue jeans and used the word "cool." He would sit and talk with Osnos about what it would be like to visit the United States. "Guys like this are the promise this project will work," he exclaimed.


The Making of a Correspondent

Osnos, whose first internship was at the sports desk of the Greenwich Time, was working in New York at the national desk of the Tribune during the 9/11 attacks. He was in Washington, D.C. at the time of the attack and covered the events that unfolded at the Pentagon. He then returned to New York to cover the fallout. His experience from Sept. 11 prepared him for his time in Iraq, as he was able to familiarize himself with the major players in the War on Terror. In addition to Iraq, he has covered stories from Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Israel and the Palestinian Territories. He contributed to a Tribune series on America's troubled air travel system, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2001.

Osnos is currently the Cairo Bureau Chief for the Tribune and lives in Cairo, spending approximately four to six weeks at a time, in Iraq. He stays in a rented house, in a residential area, with two or three other correspondents. The correspondents are equipped with a team of "incredibly brave" Iraqi drivers and translators. In the house they posted two maps, one of Iraq and the other of Baghdad, on which they have highlighted areas they believe to be to dangerous. During the past month the situation in Iraq has become more restrictive than ever before. After a series of kidnappings the group decided it was safer to leave their previous house for a hotel, one they had deemed unsafe just a few months prior.

"The last period I was there was certainly the most restrictive environment I've ever reported in," said Osnos. He and the other reporters relied on translators as their source of information. They would meet at the hotel and discuss a series of questions. "They became our eyes and ears," he said. Osnos described the situation as coming "full circle." He had gone from being isolated with the American troops, to having a year to discover Iraq, to once again being isolated, this time in his own house.

"Three months ago we would never have predicted the situation would be as restrictive as it is today," said Osnos. "There is no reason to be confident the situation will improve, for journalists at least, over the next few months." One situation Osnos is confident in, is the upcoming Iraqi election. Most Iraqis, especially Shiites, see voting as a religious duty, according to Osnos. "The Iraqis of all colors and stripes believe that this is something that is going to happen," said Osnos. "Too many people have a stake in what is going on."

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