Warblogs in Iraq

Introduction

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Nobody can deny today the current importance and popularity of the Internet. In the 21st century more and more people are getting involved with this technology each day; and it means that we are creating a new society, a new way of communicating and a different method to create and distribute information.

Weblogs are a quite recent but very popular phenomenon through which everyone can easily create his own information and publish it on the Internet. Warblogs appeared after the S-11 terrorist attacks in New York, when the invasion of Afghanistan started. It was the beginning of a new way of journalism that combines the traditional war report and the advantages of the blogging technology. The II Gulf War, then called the Internet war, was, without any doubt, the origin of a blog revolution. Journalists, soldiers or just Iraqi citizens demonstrated through their writings on the Net the human face of a modern war.

The Iraq war: a conflict in the 21st century

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On the 17th March 2003 George W. Bush decided to send an ultimatum to Saddam Hussein, if he does not leave Iraq in 48 hours, it will start a military attack. During the early morning of the 20th March the US – British coalition started the air assault over the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. Several dozens of Tomahawk missiles were thrown against some of the target places, such as palaces and military centres, were Saddam Hussein was supposedly hiding.

On the 9th April, after three weeks since the war started, the Saddam’s regime was finally declared ended. In the Fardus square, in the city centre of Baghdad, one of the largest statues of the dictator was demolished. This demolition is now consider as the symbol of the coalition triumph in Iraq, a short but hard war that took the lives of thousands of people, including soldiers, Iraqi civilians and also journalists.

Although the II Gulf War supposedly finished that 9th April 2003, the violence is still alive in Iraq and it will certainly continue. Meanwhile, militaries and civilians are continue being killed in terrorist attacks and Iraqi citizens are very far away from reaching the normality.

Weblogs and their application to war journalism

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Blogging played an important role in the Iraq war, according to the information distribution issue. Many journalists and photographers that were correspondent in the Iraqi territories started writing their own blogs in order to show the other reality of the conflict. Weblogs turned into the brand new alternative information system of the II Gulf War.

Weblogs started being published just after the 9-11 attacks, when the shadow of the Afghanistan invasion was gliding upon us. When the war began, some correspondent journalists and also other people who were interested in discussing the reasons of the war and its political aspects started creating their own warblogs.

Warblogs had demonstrated that when a conflict is being developed somewhere in the Earth, thousands of people get involved and compromised by writing their own opinions about what is happening, what are the real reasons of our politicians to take part in the war… all those questions and answers we want to know and the traditional media do not publish.

Warblogs in Iraq. The blogosphere revolution

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The II Gulf War, from 20th March to 9th April 2003, triggered the maturity and spreading out of the warblogs. During those three weeks the whole world was putting their eyes in Baghdad.

Iraq was the “war of Internet” because of the thousands of web pages and blogs that were created in the wake of the war. Many reporters who were in the front line created their blogs and published articles independently from their newspapers, radio stations and television channels.

See Salam Pax, Kevin Sites and Christopher Allbritton’s blogs.

Conclusions

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Blogs have become an important part of online journalism just because blogging means and alternative way of communicating.

Nowadays more and more people are starting their weblogs and it is a good opportunity to improve writing and also to publish your own opinions.

A war is always a happening that needs to be covered by journalists and as worried and concerned citizens, we are always looking for new information. Warblogs are those places we need to get that kind of new resources and information.