A Useful Primer on Covering the Military   

Pen & Sword: A Journalist’s Guide to Covering the Military By Ed Offley Marion Street Press 312 pages; $24.95

Covering the military hasn't exactly been priority one over the past few years. But priorities have switched suddenly, as we all know, and so "Pen & Sword" proves well-timed, provocative and even a little unsettling.

Navy veteran Ed Offley covered the military for 13 years for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and served as editor of Stars & Stripes. He knows his material from his materiel, and "Pen & Sword" is a thorough, well-presented guide for local and regional reporters assigned to military topics.

The book differs from much of the military-journalism literature in that it isn't mainly about war coverage (although Offley offers tips for reporters sent to the field) and it isn't highly anecdotal (although he provides examples to illustrate his points). Instead, it is a how-to handbook aimed at stateside reporters thrown into military matters, the kind of tool that every newsroom library needs.

Apart from its practical value, "Pen & Sword" serves as a primer on contemporary military issues, many of them important and undercovered, and on the challenges of managing what Offley calls "a reporting job that can be as maddening and frustrating as none other in journalism."

Finally, the book is an unwittingly powerful reminder that covering the military requires a tricky balance of expertise, skepticism and tenacity. What leads to some unsettling feelings here is the indication that, while the press was preoccupied elsewhere, the balance of power has swung decisively toward the military. Through its rules and pools, its long memory and political might, the aggressive post-Vietnam military machine may be succeeding in taming a once-combative press.

Offley's point of departure is hard to dispute. Ten years ago, he jokes, the Persian Gulf War press corps was derided as "the invasion of the food editors." Since then military coverage has largely fallen "to a dwindling number of fulltime specialists and an outsized mob of untrained general assignment reporters unprepared for the story."

"For a decade after the 1991 Persian Gulf War," he writes, "coverage of the armed forces, defense and intelligence issues and even foreign affairs...steadily dwindled as a result of economic trends and business decisions."

Presumably, September 11 provided "a major turning point," so that "after a decade of neglect, reporters and editors and producers will be covering military events with the intensity and seriousness of purpose to match" World War II and Vietnam. But Offley believes they will be poorly prepared for the tough assignment and far behind in understanding how military affairs have changed.

"The U.S. military today is in serious trouble," Offley contends. He argues that cuts in pay and personnel have severely strained the armed forces, preventing them from upgrading to meet the times and leaving them dependent on "a physical infrastructure...heading for obsolescence across the board."

In a few short pages, Offley does a splendid job of summarizing what he sees as the current plight of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines and of supplying background and sources for reporting on these issues.

Without being patronizing, he offers detailed, elementary information for understanding such basics as military rank, insignia and structure. The book is full of checklists: how to spot a phony POW, how to cover a military plane crash, how to pack for a field expedition.

And it is full of the gems of experience. For example, he suggests that when you're a new beat reporter getting a courtesy introduction to the commanding general, you should float an idea for an ambitious enterprise story. "If the general turns to his chief of staff and says, 'I don't see any problem with that,' you're on your way."

Offley makes a convincing case that the terms of coverage have changed dramatically in today's political, technological and global environment. Today's "landscape of battle" is not a conventional war zone but dispersed and decentralized. Battles are fought out of sight, from covert operations to computer hacking of bank accounts and intelligence systems. While reporters have extraordinary new tools, from videophones (see "The Videophone War," November) to commercial satellite imaging, they seem more and more at the military's mercy for access and information.

Meanwhile, journalists face tougher-than-ever calls about what to print, what to withhold, how hard to chase. It is an axiom that military institutions are inherently secretive and need scrutiny and exposure. As Sen. Hiram Johnson famously said, in wartime truth is the first casualty. But, as Offley makes clear, the campaign against "a murderous terror network" operating domestically as well as abroad presents legitimate security concerns. "When do you hold something back?" becomes a question with life-or-death implications.

Offley's approach is earnest and professional but has its shortcomings. He tends to glorify the chain of command and the military's public affairs officers, with hardly a word about how to approach the rank and file or what to do when the official sources try to shut you out. You won't find many tips here for cutting through the bureaucracy or playing competing sources against each other or triangulating military propaganda with impartial outside evidence.

Too often he relaxes into a worrisome chummy tone, referring to officers as "he" and "guys" and to senior commanders reverentially as "the man."

All this calls into question, to some degree, Offley's conclusions about such things as military budget cuts. Given his ultra-respectful posture, it is hard to know whether he has his finger on a vital point about crumbling military readiness or whether he has been hoodwinked by the establishment.

"Pen & Sword" doesn't tackle the co-optation issue head-on, but reading it leaves the impression that the military has gained the upper hand on the press. The book is long on helpful information. It could use more skepticism.