Published Tuesday, April 3, 2001
Editors play a role in ‘I Spy’
BY CICLEY DYSON AND JEWEL GOPWANI
ASNE Reporter
Journalists in town early for the 2001 ASNE convention spent Monday grilling the U.S. Secretary of Defense and other top-ranking national security officials about the recent collision between a Navy spy plane and a Chinese fighter jet.
On a tour of the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency, about 35 editors and reporters met with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld; Gen. Henry Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and CIA Director George Tenet.
The officials said they could not provide any new information on the international crisis, said editors who attended the tour.
The officials had already briefed President George W. Bush, who was giving a news conference on the subject at the time.
“They repeated what has got to be the line (of the day),” said Mike Jacobs, editor of the Grand Forks (N.D.) Herald, “ ‘We want the plane and the crew back.’ ”
In addition to news about the air collision, editors heard about other military information during the tour.
Pentagon officials told the editors that the Bush administration was trying to recruit more people into the military and keep others from leaving – all by providing more financial support for members of the Armed Forces and their families.
USA Today’s senior Washington/world editor, William Sternberg, who organized the trip, said it’s the first tour of its kind for ASNE. Many of those who attended the tour did not expect the presentations to result in breaking news, but “it was useful information thinking about the world,” Mr. Jacobs said.
Bill Harlow, the CIA’s director of public relations, said all discussions during the tour were on the record.
In addition to the crash, CIA officials addressed issues of biological warfare and terrorism.
The international community faces a new kind of terrorism – one that is no longer necessarily state sponsored, but coming from “informal networks based (around) one person like Osama bin Laden,” said Betsy Heil, Middle East correspondent for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, referring to a discussion editors had with the chairman of the National Intelligence Council, John Gannon.
Mr. Harlow said the CIA’s tour remained on the ground floor, featuring an exhibition of items from the Cold War, on display since 1997. Many who took the tour saw exhibits like a cigarette case that doubles as a camera and a tube of lipstick that doubles as a gun.
“But I don’t know what caliber!” said Neil Reynolds, editor-in-chief of The Vancouver Sun.
Mr. Reynolds also said he was fascinated by a book that was filled with the names of dead agents. Blank spaces stand in for the names of those who cannot be identified for security reasons. The CIA also includes biographies of spies and photos from the Cold War.
“It’s good for people in our business to have the chance, any time we can, to make (such a tour) happen – whether it’s in a highly-controlled situation like this or a long interview – because it puts both sides on the spot,” said Frank L. Craig, editor of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
Editors play a role in ‘I Spy’
