Journalists should err on side of caution, safety when reporting from front lines

In 2003, Geraldo Rivera, reporting live from Iraq while on location with the Army's 101st Airborne, utilized the sand beneath his feet in order to inform Fox News viewers about vital aspects of military plans and locations. As a result, Rivera was forced to return to the United States, ending his time as a wartime reporter.

According to the First Amendment of the Constitution, "Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…" meaning there is no limit to what a journalist can report on. However when it comes to wartime reporting and matters of national security, a line needs to be drawn - and not by Rivera.

For the most part, journalists accept some type of censorship while covering war due to the 1919 trial, Schenck v. United States. According to "Mass Media Law" by Don R. Pember and Clay Calvert, the Supreme Court's ruling on the trial stated that the Constitution protects coverage during a time of peace, but cannot be expected to do so during a time of war.

This means that the government has the right to use prior restraint, or censor, what the media can cover regarding wartime material. This is due to the fact that reporting from a battlefield environment can become a matter of national security and risk the safety of soldiers.

Access to military locations becomes an issue of debate when it comes to constitutional protection over the press. It is obvious that journalists can report most effectively from the battlefront, but where should they be allowed to go and what should they be allowed to say regarding their location? What can journalists say regarding anything being covered from the front line?

Bryan G. Whitman, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for media relations, was quoted in a New York Times article as saying, "We practice security at the source. If they are in our battle space, they are not allowed to divulge classified information.''

Whitman's statement seems commonsensical. When journalists are embedded with military on a battlefront, they are under the jurisdiction of the Pentagon, according to a Pentagon official in the same article.

Rivera would disagree, as the same article reported that as the Pentagon was waiting for Fox News to remove their reporter before they removed him, he denied having made a mistake in his coverage, which included details of an attack to happen in the future.

I believe the government has no right to oversee reporters doing their job of covering the news, but at the same time, journalists in a wartime environment need to censor themselves and, while reporting daily events, be wary of information that could become a matter of the safety of soldiers, success of a mission and/or national security.

In Rivera's case, he crossed the fine line by divulging military plans and locations to viewers of Fox News. He risked the lives of all the soldiers involved in the operation and enhanced the chance of failure for the mission. A journalist has an obligation to report the news, but not when his or her report could cause the deaths of people or have a negative effect on issues of national security.

If the reporter is not sensitive to the material being reported on, it is the job of the newspaper or network to pull the plug on the publication of harm-causing information. According to a CNN.com report, Fox News officials stood by their broadcaster as they tried to convince the Pentagon to allow Rivera to stay embedded with the 101st Airborne.

The government finally had Rivera removed from Iraq after hoping Fox News would do the right thing and have Rivera pulled as a war commentator.

A FoxNews.com article reported Rivera as saying, when he left MSNBC to cover the war for Fox News, "I'm a reporter, that's how I see myself. And the war on terrorism is the biggest story of our times. I've got to get out there. And when you're an anchor, you're literally anchored. I had to break the chain.''

Unfortunately, Rivera was incapable of properly reporting from a war and should have owned up to his mistakes. In this case, the government had the right to step in and have Rivera moved from his position as a war reporter, but journalists should never allow themselves to report on information that the government should feel the need to stop.

In the case of Rivera, he risked not only the lives of the soldiers he was stationed with, but himself as well. His decision to internationally broadcast intimate details of future military attacks was unbelievably stupid and made a departure from what the coverage of the war in Iraq should have been.