Media Embeds

The U.S. military's desire to protect its forces and operations is at odds with the media's mission to report the news. Commanders must find the appropriate balance between operations security (OPSEC) and supporting media access. The military practices operations security in order to preserve the element of surprise and safeguard friendly forces. Open media access on the other hand seemingly flies in the face of the military's need for secrecy. In reality, however, the military and the media need each other in order to accomplish their missions, despite their divergent interests. The media ground rules established for media embeds in Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) offer a set of "security controls" that commanders may use to protect their forces and operations. They are a starting point where commanders and embeds can develop a mutual understanding regarding the release of information. Depending upon how the relationship developed between the commander and embed during the opening stages of OIF, journalists were privy to classified information which afforded them greater context and background for the operation they were covering. By trusting journalists with classified and sensitive information, commanders mitigated the inadvertent release of such information and ultimately strengthened its operations security. Since Operation Enduring Freedom and OIF are still ongoing, the Air Force has a multitude of options where it can embed media under the set ground rules to tell the service's story without compromising OPSEC and placing forces at risk.