Review Robert Weiner, Live from Baghdad, Gathering News At Ground Zero, Doubleday, 1992

 

Weiner, Robert, Live from Baghdad, Gathering News At Ground Zero, Doubleday, 1992

 

Robert Weiner was a CNN producer who was in Iraq during the start of the Gulf War. He provides an inside look at how the news is put together. It’s actually not as interesting as a reporters’ accounts and things don’t really get going until the bombs started dropping.

 

CNN was one of the only news organizations that stayed in Iraq when the Gulf War started. That’s the main selling point of Live from Baghdad because it gives an account of what it was like to be there at that time. It’s in fact the best part of the book. Weiner explains how each part of the CNN crew had to decide whether they would stay or go as the U.S. government asked for all reporters to leave Iraq.

 

When the war started CNN was right in the middle of things. A cruise missile for example hit a target right outside the hotel they were staying at blowing out all the windows and throwing Weiner across the room. He was lucky he wasn’t seriously hurt. While everyone ran down into the basement to the bomb shelter three CNN reporters Bernard Shaw, Peter Arnett and John Holliman continued to report live on what was happening around them. Their coverage was picked up by networks across the United States and the world which was a turning point for CNN establishing itself as a leading news organization.

 

Unfortunately most of the book is not as good. Most of it is about the production side of making the news. Weiner is constantly calling CNN headquarters in Atlanta to tell them about their access to Iraq and how the staff was doing. He was also always talking to Iraqi officials from the Information Ministry to get interviews with Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz and Saddam Hussein and to travel outside of Baghdad. A lot of times Weiner writes about trying to get equipment into Iraq. It just doesn’t hold your attention like the excitement of the war starting.

 

Live from Baghdad is in no way a must read on the Gulf War. Two-thirds of the narrative is about getting into Iraq and getting stories produced. Only the last part is about when the war started. Not only that but Weiner left a few days into the conflict because it was getting too dangerous with the bombing. The production side of the news just isn’t as interesting as journalists who were actually doing the reporting.

 

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