Amanda's Story—Flintoff

NPR’s Corey Flintoff—Becoming ‘Invisible’
By Amanda Clyde
1130 Feature Story

Corey Flintoff from National Public Radio spoke to students at Utah State University this week about his experiences in Iraq as a journalist.

One thing he advised future journalists is that reporters must figure out how to be in many places a once when, in times of war, reporters can no longer move independently around the country.

“It is all about being invisible [when in Iraq],” said Flintoff referring to the danger Americans face in the unstable Middle East.

Flintoff went on to explain that one of the challenges of being an imbed reporter is a tendency to have a bias for the troop you travel with that ultimately protects you. Reporters must learn to look past this and report fairly and accurately.

This can be especially challenging when reporters are offered a limited view. It is difficult to go to multiple locations around Iraq and most facilities don’t have the resources reporters need as they are far too expensive.

For example, a seven mile taxi ride from the airport to Baghdad can cost over two thousand dollars said Flintoff.

He told a memorable story of one taxi ride when a sniper hit the bulletproof car. A suitcase was hit and the laptop inside still worked.

When asked if he felt safe Flintoff answered, “I feel safer than I would if we lived in the green zone,” though they live only ten minutes away from it.

Another experience Flintoff shared was of a business manager he worked with in NPR who was kidnapped.

An Armenian Christen the manager understood the relations between the society groups in Iraq and was a man of “enormous good will” said Flintoff.

The manager was car jacked, driven around and beaten up savagely. Flintoff said he was taken to an unknown location and chained up in a shower stall for days.

His ransom was paid but the man was unable to walk and had to crawl to a taxi cab. He was traumatized as he felt this was his home city, said Flintoff.

Flintoff watched as strings were pulled to get the man and his family to Jordan and eventually a visa to move to the United States.

This did not mean an easy life now; Flintoff called it a death sentence for an Iraqi to work in the U.S. media.

Flintoff said that he has yet to encounter any kind of censorship from the government on what he reports. He said there is no need to censor because the options are so limited.

If he ever saw an American soldier abusing civilians or community war crimes Flintoff said he wouldn’t hesitate to report it but he has not witnessed of anything of the sort.

When asked the question asked to Mike Wallace in Vietnam if he found from a source that the American military would be ambushed if he would warn them, Flintoff answered that if it wouldn’t harm his sources he would. If it would harm his sources, he couldn’t answer what he would do.

Flintoff was an entertaining speaker and shared much valuable advice and life experience with students interested in journalism.

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