Michael Yon: Message from Iraq

Michael Yon is one of the premier citizen-journalists covering the War in Iraq today. Michael has been likened to Ernie Pyle, the Pulitzer Prize winning columnist who covered the battles of World War II from the ordinary soldiers point of view. Michael's experience as a former soldier and photographer and prolific writer have served him well as he writes about the good, the bad and the ugly aspects of the War being fought in Iraq.

His recent post, "Resistance is futile: You will be (mis)informed." is a clarion call for the West to wake up to the necessity of winning this War against terrorism and recognize that the steady diet of bad news they are getting from Iraq does not reflect the reality of the situation that exists in that land.

Some of the most poingient oberservations he makes in the article cover the differences between what we are told by the mainstream press and Hollywood elitists about what is happening in Iraq versus the day-to-day life and struggle for self-determination that the Iraqi people engage in on a 24/7 basis.

Michael tells of, the bizarro-world contrast between what most Americans seem to think is happening in Iraq versus what is really happening in Iraq. Knowing this disconnect exists and experiencing it directly are two separate matters. It’s like the difference between holding the remote control during the telecast of a volcanic eruption on some distant island (and then flipping the channel), versus running for survival from a wretch of molten lava that just engulfed your car.

Today I am in Iraq, back in a war of such strategic consequence that it will affect generations yet unborn—whether or not they want it to. Hiding under the covers will not work, because whether it is good news or bad, whether it is true or untrue, once information is widely circulated, it has such formidable inertia that public opinion seems impervious to the corrective balm of simple and clear facts.

I wasn’t back in Iraq three days before this critical disconnect rocketed up from the ground and whacked me in the face. There I was with British soldiers, preparing for a mission with a duration of more than ten days in the southern province of al Basra, when someone asked me about the media reports alleging that Basra city had collapsed into violent chaos. Not wishing to trust solely to my own eyes and ears, I asked around and was able to quickly confirm what I’d already noted: conditions in this region had improved dramatically in the months since my previous embed with the Brits.

Read the whole thing here and pass the word around.