Robert Fisk called a liar by peers
cluebat
news:b7ilqf$1baik$1...@ID-186693.news.dfncis.de:
>> Robert fisk went on a bus trip with other Jounos in Iraq, they saw
>> one
> tank
>> on this trip. They were later surprised to see Robert Fisks account
>> of the trip where he said that he saw a tank un der ever bridge and
>> tree, rocket launchers and other stuff was invented into the story.
>
> Cite?
Fiskie in Arab News, April 16
(http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=24653)
Article titled "Iraqi Army’s Defenses Seem Impenetrable" (excerpt)
"In Al-Mussayib, central Iraq — The road to the front in central Iraq is a
place of fast-moving vehicles, blazing Iraqi anti-aircraft guns, tanks and
trucks hidden in palm groves, a train of armored vehicles bombed from the
air and hundreds of artillery positions dug into revetments to defend the
capital. Anyone who doubts that the Iraqi Army is prepared to defend its
capital should take the highway south of Baghdad.
How, I kept asking myself, could the Americans batter their way through
these defenses? For mile after mile they go on, slit trenches, ditches,
earthen underground bunkers, palm groves of heavy artillery and truck loads
of combat troops in battle fatigues and steel helmets. Not since the 1980-
88 Iran-Iraq War have I seen the Iraqi Army deployed like this; the
Americans may say they are “degrading” the country’s defenses but there was
little sign of that here Wednesday."
To which SMH reporter Paul McGeough responded, on ABC radio
(transcript at http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2003/s825145.htm)
"PAUL MCGEOUGH: Well, Robert gets a bit windy from time to time Mark. I was
on the same bus as him and we saw some tanks, you wouldn't say that we saw
an army of tanks.
What's perplexing those of us who have been here for some months now is the
absence of any visual evidence of a consolidation of man power or weapons
power.
We saw two or three tanks on that bus run. We saw multiple rocket
launchers. We saw a convoy of two or three trucks of soldiers pausing to
wash and eat by a creek. But we didn't see an army forming up for war."
Given what actually happened when the Americans entered Baghdad, whose
assesment do you think was closer to the mark... Fisk's or McGeough's?