Scrutiny Grows as NBC Fires Arnett Over TV Interview

In a fast-paced day of media cross-fire over how reporters are covering the war, Peter Arnett was fired by NBC for an interview he gave to Iraqi state television, and a correspondent for a rival network, Fox News’ Geraldo Rivera, found himself under Pentagon scrutiny for a report in which he was shown drawing troop positions in the sand.

NBC News, which on Sunday stood by Arnett after his interview was shown, abruptly reversed itself early Monday and said it had severed ties with the veteran correspondent. Arnett was reporting for NBC and its MSNBC cable channel via an arrangement with his employer, National Geographic Television, which also cut ties with him.

Arnett is a Pulitzer Prize winner whose Baghdad reporting for CNN in the 1991 Persian Gulf War helped put the then-upstart cable channel on the map, although some accused him of being pro-Iraq.

Arnett said on NBC’s “Today” show Monday that the interview was a “stupid misjudgment,” although he insisted his remarks were in line with what experts have been saying. But the venue, coupled with the nature of his comments -- he praised Iraq’s treatment of foreign reporters, said his own reports were helpful to the U.S. antiwar movement, and said the Bush administration’s initial war plan has failed due to Iraqi resistance -- amounted to a clear ethical violation for many observers.

Although a chastened Arnett said on “Today” that he would be swimming off to a desert island in shame, he was hired late Monday by Britain’s Daily Mirror newspaper, which has been vocal about opposing Britain’s involvement in the war.

The move leaves NBC, like CBS, Fox and CNN, without a reporter in Baghdad. CBS voluntarily left; Fox’s and CNN’s crews were expelled. ABC’s freelancer Richard Engel and NPR’s Anne Garrels remain.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon said it was investigating the circumstances surrounding a Sunday night report by Rivera, in which he was shown on air drawing a diagram in the sand showing the location of the U.S. troops he was traveling with and their strategy. Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said that although Rivera was not officially “embedded” with the troops he reported on, the Army’s 101st Airborne unit, “we take all violations of operational security, inadvertent or not, very seriously.”

CNN, MSNBC and several wire services reported throughout Monday that Rivera had been asked to leave Iraq, citing Pentagon and military officials. But Fox reported Monday evening that Rivera was still in the country. A Fox spokesman said, “We’ve been in contact with the Pentagon, and we’re looking into the matter.”

Following increasing criticism from President Bush and military leaders over the tone and scope of coverage from the war zone, both the Arnett and Rivera incidents provided fodder for cable news channels. MSNBC ran Rivera’s Fox report, obscuring the sand diagram. CNN aired reports on both its rivals. Fox brought in CNN founder Reese Schoenfeld, who criticized Arnett. As for Rivera, he said on air that reports of his being kicked out of Iraq “sounds to me like some rats at my former network NBC are spreading some lies about me. They can’t compete fair and square on the battlefield, so they’re trying to stab me in the back.”

Debate over journalists’ roles in the war has grown along with the sheer volume of on-the-ground coverage from reporters traveling with the military.

Former CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite, in a speech Monday at the Museum of Television & Radio in New York, was critical of Arnett’s remarks, saying, “He has committed an almost despicable act in sitting down for the interview and criticizing our forces.”

MSNBC President Erik Sorenson said Monday that granting the interview to a “state-run, Saddam-controlled TV station in Baghdad” was a “complete total outrageous mistake” that was compounded by the nature of Arnett’s comments.

Moreover, he said, “They belie a bigger issue, which is that he has strong points of view about the war and its conduct. For him to be betraying these opinions of his, much less on Iraqi TV, is arguably aiding and abetting the enemy in Baghdad.”

NBC executives said they nonetheless waited a day to sever ties so NBC News President Neal Shapiro could first talk with Arnett. Shapiro said through a spokeswoman that after reviewing “his comments in context, and ultimately, a lengthy phone conversation with him early this morning, I came to a different conclusion.”

Alex Jones, director of Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, said Arnett “displayed incredibly bad judgment in allowing himself to be used as a propaganda vehicle, which ... he should have known was the reason he was invited on Iraqi TV.”

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Times staff writer Brian Lowry in Los Angeles and correspondent Lauren Sandler in New York contributed to this report.