Journalists Get the Raw Taste of a Military Life in Australian Outback

My partner and I dripped sweat as we inched nervously across the field, trying to spot the “enemy” soldier who lay waiting in the backlighted shadows from the sinking subtropical sun.

Our efforts at stealth in the rustling brush were laughable. Rifles bounced clumsily against our hips. I’m sure our target, bored with our ineptitude, wiggled a branch on purpose--probably more than once--to get our attention.

I followed the sound and saw a boot protruding from behind a tree about 20 feet away. I fired a blank cartridge, dived unceremoniously to the ground and rolled to the nearest bush for cover.

Our instructors offered praise, but I knew I would probably have been dead if it weren’t just an exercise, part of a program to train reporters and photographers as war correspondents.

This part was intended to give us a sense of the gut-clenching, uncertain life of the foot soldier. It worked.

Handling the rifles, even without live ammunition and only for a few minutes, made most of us jittery.

We would not be asked to carry weapons while covering the military in action, even in a real war. Instead, we were told our rights under the Geneva Convention if we were captured.

I figured the program was easily worth the discomfort, effort and military meals if it could help keep me alive in some future conflict.

Some fellow correspondents in training disagreed. They just could not see what eating cold corned beef, sleeping on the ground and learning hand signals had to do with reporting a war.

I found the field rations tasty, at least compared to the freeze-dried stuff hikers take on long trips. On the other hand, some comrades went without dinner rather than eat lamb stew heated in the can.

In the Gulf War, reporters had to prove their physical fitness before being accredited to cover American soldiers.

The rules on filing stories from the field--press pools, censorship, use of military communications--caused numerous complaints. Journalists bridled at escorts by public relations officers, believing their presence could keep soldiers from speaking frankly.

Australia seems to be seeking a middle ground between the media demands and the need for security on strategy and maneuvers. Reporters undergo two days of military training to help them understand a soldier’s work.

Mutual trust is the basis of the system: The military offers unescorted access to accredited correspondents who agree to let an officer read their material for errors and details that could compromise operations.

The military promises freedom from censorship, which media representatives demanded when negotiations for the program began.

Disagreements about what constitutes an error or threat to security are taken to command level and can go from there to the army’s director of public information. David Tyler, a Defense Department spokesman, said the second step had never been necessary.

Most journalists on this training program seemed to approve of the army’s approach, and when the soldiers realized we knew enough to find the latrine alone, they warmed to the idea of not toiling in obscurity.

Several Australian journalists were grateful that errors had been caught, such as the wrong number for a fighter jet or referring to a brigade as a company.

The system got its first tryout at Kangaroo ’86 and first operational use during the Gulf War, when reporters and photographers accompanied the Australian warships.

Terry O’Connor, then with the Australian Associated Press, said the Australian navy “didn’t try to stop me sending pieces critical of the Australian involvement. . . . Several officers did attempt to influence stories by ‘explaining’ the effect ‘negative’ pieces would have on the crews’ attitude to me, but the sailors knew I was there to do a job.”

During the field-training program, soldiers got particular joy from introducing journalists to the less enticing aspects of military life.

An experienced hand could turn a simple nylon sheet into a taut rain cover in seconds. Our sorry efforts required long, tortured minutes that would have left us soggy in a sudden rain.

A storm taught one journalist an uncomfortable physics lesson. Smug and largely dry beneath his “waterproof” nylon, he touched a sagging area where rain had pooled. The water streamed through onto his head.

Another reporter chatted with instructors in the dark. An officer passed around a bottle of insect repellent. Distracted by the conversation, she thought it was a flask of alcohol. She quickly spat out a short swig.

It seemed every soldier within 200 miles had heard the story by the next day. They were still laughing a week later.

Learning hand signals--crucial for silence on field patrols--also was a comedy of errors.

Communications professionals should have no trouble passing on the three signals that translate: “Stop. Obstacle ahead. Tell the lieutenant to come see me.”

But like the childhood game “telephone,” the message was unrecognizable by the time it passed through eight journalists and reached the befuddle officer.