IRAQI HIGHWAY 2 TO KIRKUK, Iraq -- While en route to take another stab at Tikrit, I thought I'd answer a couple of questions.
Syria may or may not be the next target, I don't know. No one here knows anything as that decision will be made in Washington. I'll ask around, however, but I doubt anyone will be able to tell me about it.
Someone in the comments asked about an action photo. I'm not fond of having my picture taken, but I'll see if J. can whip something up.
Opie asked when I was coming back. My return ticket was for April 24, but that's scotched at the moment for two reason. One, Swiss Air has gone out of business. Two, I can't go back through Turkey, since I've heard from a buddy in the Newsweek bureau in Istanbul that B2I has come to the attention of the authorities. And since I smuggled myself across the border and I have no exit stamp on my Turkish visa, I would be arrested when I come back. Probably I'd be fined and released after a few hours. Maybe not, however. I don't feel like chancing it, so I'm looking for an alternative exit strategy. Jordan or Kuwait, perhaps. Besides, I've never been to either country. And in my more optimistic moments, I think, "There's always Baghdad International."
Also, I just had another $3000 wired. A guy here in Arbil has a dollar account in Turkey. It's a bank-to-bank transfer, and he keeps 5% of the money and release the rest to me in cash. He's a human ATM machine. Deals like this is how cash gets into Iraqi Kurdistan. The upside is that since my return plans are now a bit up in the air, the money will allow me to stay a little longer, perhaps if I choose.
Lastly, there needs to be an exit strategy for B2I itself. I'm undecided on what to do, other than take a break after this war -- I've been doing the site solo for about 10 months now on an almost daily basis. I need a vacation. But after that? Personally, I'm going to have to go back to work and/or find another job. I'll definitely spin some of the stories on B2I into freelance articles or syndicate some of them. I've had some nibbles on book deals and I'll look into that, too.
But what happens to the site? I think we can declare this experiment in independent, reader-funded journalism a success. But where do we go from here? I'm open to suggestions, so please leave them in the comments section on this entry.
On to Tikrit.
Regarding B2I’s future, I hope you keep it available online after the project is done, so that people can still read it/refer to it.
Best of luck on finding a safe way out, Chris. Take care…
Agreed. You could defray the continuing cost of hosting the website by keeping the donation system intact.
I hope you know how many dedicated readers you have. Your postings have been an amazing personal insight into a culture and a country that are farther away from most of us than the miles on the map. I no longer am moving through my life unaware!!!
I think your choices for “future employment” are endless — there are so many countries, so many issues. I am off to PayPal, perhaps the other lurkers will follow suit!
Stay safe!
I was wondering about the fate of warblogging sites just before I read this. I was a bit taken aback by the news of having to find an alternative exit. I would take it as a sign to push on, write, write, write. You mentioned nibbles of a book deal. Since it’s writing itself, the situation you’re in now, having smuggled yourself into Iraq, makes for great reading and then to have to find another way out, and who knows what you’ll encounter along the way home. The odder the events, the better the read. Like the human ATM. That was cool.
I would hope you’d keep the site going at least until whatever you’re going to do next is concrete, but wait, if you are going to write a book, you could keep us informed of the progress and give out snippets. Better yet, a DYI book with donations from readers. Hmm.
Ahem. I sometimes get carried away. This is one of those times. May the force be with you.
I, being a bookworm, have subscribed to numerous magazines and journals over the years.
The money I sent to Chris was far and away the best subscription (or is it a sponsorship?) I’ve ever purchased.
Chris’s posts are fascinating and plentiful, and make me feel like we have our own sort of embedded presence, unmediated by the Pentagon’s minders.
I don’t know what amazes me more—that the Internet enabled such a successful experiment in journalism, or that the current state of journalism is in such disrepair that Chris’s efforts seem experimental, rather than just ‘the way things are done in the Internet age.’
I agree with them. You definitely need to keep this site up… I have become more informed of Turkomen, Kurdish, Arab, etc. that I have gone researching on the Internet to educate myself about their issues, their culture,and their customs. I have expanded my horizon because of your blog and others that I have discovered just recently because of the war. Your personal take on what is going on over there is very refreshing because the TV news that they show is mostly repetitious even if you go channel surfing.
Maybe you can do a B2US just so you can keep us updated on what goes on with you after B2I is a completed endeavor. Definitely you need a break after this but first of all, you need to watch your back over there constantly. Be safe and thanks.
a book of your adventures, complete with entries, photos, sidenotes and thoughts once you’re safely back, would be a great read.
I have to agree with the above posters, a book about this experience would be a fascinating read. Not only from the insights you could offer about the politics, but the anecdotes too. Hell, you packed up a bunch of gear and snuck into a foreign country that was about to go to war… do you realize how interesting that is to those of us who get up/feed kids/drive/boring job/drive/feed kids/go to bed every day?
Note to lurkers: If Christopher has people that are considering paying him to write a book about his trip, then they’re going to want to know how readers might respond to such a thing. Now is your chance to help him out by making your voices known. That’s what I did.
Yes, most certainly leave the site up for future reference, and write it all up in more depth in a book!
Oh, the site will most certainly remain up, and the hosting costs are trivial. Don’t worry about B2I, once this project is over, disappearing. It will stay online and available. The question is how to push it forward?
I hope once you’ve safely returned you take a well earned break and refresh your batteries. Then you will be able to see the scale of your achievement and hopefully will decide to keep the site going (in what ever form seems appropriate). Then get on the promotional trail sell your book/movie/album whatever ;-) and (just as important) push the kind of journalism you’ve been pursueing, independent, inquisitive and supplied direct to the audience without filtering by Execs with an agenda. A few months on the chat show circuit (my cunning plan is revealed) and you’ll be desperate to head for the next warzone - lets face it, sadly there will be a great need for ballsy reporting from the Middle East for years to come.
As for the site, you have an eager audience that have become used to first rate, first hand journalism. Its very much your own journalism that keeps it alive (and I’d understand if you were wary of diluting the standards you’ve mantained) but maybe you could open up a section and get some of the people who you’ve met in the region to contribute updates on the situation on the ground? Or offer it as a medium for others who may be travelling through - aid workers or reconstruction experts for example.
Keep it ticking over until you get the itch to go back.
Chris, you and the B2I site are a great story in itself. Amidst the pompous opinionising of the armchair generals and keyboard warrors of the blogosphere you’ve used the medium to distribute good old fashioned non-embedded journalism. I suspect where you have led others will follow (I know I’m tempted!) but for now you have a unique experience to draw upon and a great story to tell.
All the best whatever you decide,
Matt
Chris,
Have It may be worthwhile to start thinking about a B2I sister site- Back to Syria?
An Iraqi blessing
May the road rise to meet your feet, but not meet your head
May the wind be always at your back and bullets be always above your head,
May the sun shine warm upon you but not burn your face off, and,
Until you are home again,
May the version of God subscribed to by the closest weapon wielding person hold you in the palm of his hand.
I know you’re tired Chris but I actually hope you stay right where you are just a bit longer, you seem to be on the verge of yet another great story. You have truly become my source for a perspective and analysis on the war that’s engaging, thoughtful, and human and I think that your last few dispatches tease the beginning a powerful story. How does Kirkuk begin move on from the effects of Arabization. You’ve effectively described this potboiling mix between the Turkomen, the Kurds, and Arabs and how each can claim a sense of honor and even innocence in their cause. There’s issues of ethnicity, identity, reconcialition, change all there. I’ve always believed that real story is what takes place after the war and how Kirkuk responds to this shift in who holds the ethnic highground while services are being distributed is a story you’ve got in you, particularly since one of your primary strengths is in recording the reactions of people to their circumstances in a way that makes them memorable and vivid. Go to Turkey and come back to Kirkuk, keep writing.
P.S I know, easy for me to say!
Chris,
I think after this is over, a vacation will be well-deserved…. Maybe just chill in one of the middle-eastern countries since you’re already there? I hear they have beaches..
Christopher, I have a couple of thoughts on your possible future plans.
Of course you need to write a book, maybe two books. There is the obvious Iraq book, but then there is also the totally different book, which is the experiment in independent sponsored journalism. This is a much bigger issue than just your trip to Iraq. It is a concept that could be explored on many levels, and you could conduct further “experiments” as well.
The next step that you take as far as reporting or travelling will be largely determined by what you personally want to do. Do you have a hunger for living on the road, risking your life? There are reporters and book writers who spend much of their lives on the road in dangerous places. Look at some of the corespondents for Gear Magazine during the 90’s, they were always putting in dispatches from where ever there was trouble. Is that the lifestyle you want? Some people love it, others hate it. You can do anything you want, the question becomes, what do you want to do? There are endless ways that the concept of sponsored independent journalism could be applied, from travelling around ANWAR in Alaska, to solving true crime murder mysteries. On the other hand, maybe this experience will open up some more traditional opportunities for you that you won’t want to pass up on.
I’m sure you’ll have a better idea of where to go with this after you’re back home and you’ve had some time to reflect on this adventure.
Whatever you do, Back To Iraq has been a great success and most of us thank you more than you can know for risking your life so that we can find out a little more of the truth.
Chris, I’m writing from Namibia. Your site kept me on the edge of my seat. Along with BBC journalist Stuart Hughes’ (injured in an accident) weblog your reports brought this conflict to life. It helped me understand the broader issues of the war and beats the haze of mainstream journalism.
As to the future of B2I: I tend to buy authors and not titles. While your risky endeavours make for fascinating reading, I will probably also sponsor future, less dangerous, projects of yours. So keep us posted on new project ideas, even if it is only to test the waters!
P.S. PayPal doesn’t seem to support my currency (ZAR)??
Aren’t you already vacationing in the beautiful country of Iraq? ;) lol! This is not the end of the war on terror, as the focus is now shifting to Syria now. After Iraq, the U.S. will go after another country, and I don’t expect that we would go through that debacle again in the UN. So, B2I may be not dead and I believe that maybe it could be in hiatus for a while, but I am sure that it will be up and running in the next battle in the war.
Opie, you can’t possibly be serious. Are you telling us that you support yet another unprovoked attack on yout another middle eastern country? Where are the chemo/bio weapons that Iraq was supposed to have had?
According to Powell’s book report to the UNSC the US knew exactly where they were. If that is the case why don’t we simply go there and pull the cover off the chemicals? I’ll tell you why: because there aren’t any. At least not in the quantities the Bush regime led the UNSC to believe. There may be one or two warheads lying around, left over from the Iran-Iraq war, but all those thousands of gallons Powell said were there, aren’t.
The aggression against Iraq was based on a pile of lies, and when the US attacks Syria that will be a pile of lies as well.
No need to get so riled up Michael. Eventually you’ll probably get used to how most politicians are lying, obfuscating snakes. There have been some speeches made by Bush saying that he now dislikes Syria. I think it is ridiculous to go to war against Syria now. But I thought the same about Iraq. But remember that there is no popular support for it yet, no authorization from Congress yet, no chem weapons found in Iraq yet, Saddam is not captured yet, Blair promising that there are no plans for war against Syria, etc. I hope for the best for Iraq. But there is an old arab saying - “do not judge me until you have lived under my successor.”
On to the topic….
You write well and could probably write a good book if you decided to. The problem is, that doesn’t mean people will buy it. It might help to get a little article about you in say the NY Times or better yet to get a spot on a popular TV show. Look what happened to “Salam Pax.” Sigh, Fox might love to have your report of their popularity in Iraq. If you wanted to do book writing my feeling is that the experiment in journalism should be in the same book as your experiences in Iraq, keeping a narrative going.
The other obvious continuation of B2I is more reporting. Unfortunately the kind of thing your model works for is rather limited. If there is war on Syria, well, that would work. Reporting from the borders of Israel might work.
Congratulations on your experiment’s success and on your excellent reports Chris!
RE: Where are the chemo/bio weapons that Iraq was supposed to have had? (- and other remarks which may not glorify the war effort)
I wrote a carefully worded “letter to the editor” of my childhood hometown newspaper, asking some questions and venturing a few facts precisely as folks posted on this page. My letter was printed, and I got blasted out the following week. I was called a freedom-hater and told I should be tried for treason; that I should be sent to North Korea and stay there; that I have no right to question our government or expect to have any say in it; that if I am so smart, I should join the CIA and become a worldwide assassin; that it is a privilege to pay taxes to support killing of anyone outside the US ever since 9/11; that I am stupid and “ridiculous” for thinking any civil rights have been endangered, and I do not deserve to live in America.
I was surprised - it is a very small town which used to be peaceful and, if anything, a little bit anti-government. Someday I may get used to the extent that propoganda/PR has effectively reached its public. If I do not post again, it may be because I have tried and shot for treason, then ridden on a rail to North Korea (or Syria?) as a forced CIA assassin and sentenced to live there forevermore after being forced to assassinate somebody.
Re:Eventually you?ll probably get used to how most politicians are lying, obfuscating snakes.
I expect a certain amount of lying from a politician. It’s how they do their job. What gets me really riled is the brazen way in which the Bushies lie about simply everything, get caught, and keep lying. Every single lie they have been caught in and it just doesn’t faze them. And the gullible American public eats up those lies.
I don’t understand it.
Time to get the meds adjusted Jan.
Michael, are you talking about the lies about Chinese espionage money being used to fund their political campaign; Laura’s missing billing records from when she represented the S&L that was milked by her & her husband through a fraudulant land deal with their business partner; or the 2500 FBI files of top democrats in the basement of the White House in the hands of a political stooge?
I can’t agree more with the general consensus with regards to B2I and the possible book. I’m more than willing to help with funding - or indeed in other ways, like technical expertise, etc. You’ve earned yourself a lot of loyal fans Chris!
Cheers
One quick comment.. You mentioned that “…Swiss Air is out of business.”
Um, Yeah. Swissair went out of business well over a year ago, and reincarnated as “Swiss,” and is absolutely still flying at this very moment..
I assume your ticket is on Swiss, as you mentioned transiting in Zurich on your way to Turkey originally.
http://www.swiss.com/ To check your flight status and whatnot. I imagine you’ll want to change your return leg somehow..
I didn’t say I supported another pre-emptive strike against another country. But, it’s obvious the U.S. has a plan, which I guess is called the “Bush Doctrine”. It’s going to be a process, just like the Iraq issue. And eventually the U.S. will attack Syria unless Syria does what the U.S. demands it do. Syria is “Iraq”, but without the oil.
Opie, is someone posting in your name? If you have a fact to connect to the fantasy that we are on a course of Syrian invasion, I’d like to know what it is. The only reason we drove to Baghdad was because Saddam was a megalomaniac, and gave us no other option. Assad my be dumb as a box of rocks, but I’m guessing that he’ll catch on.
I’m not sure who is next, but right now it looks like Syria. Obviously, after Iraq…the U.S. is going to go after nation sometime in the future. We will try to settle things diplomatically but if it doesn’t work then we may launch some kind of an attack. But, that’s my opinion.
Hector……other options…..like letting inspections continue?
Chris, don`t worry about the B2I site now. First things first. Get out of Iraq safely and come back. I´m sure a vacation and some talks to friends will help to come to decisions. Take care now and think about the site later.
Did you know that the UN got 2 1/2 % of everything that went through the food for oil program as an administrative fee? That’s about $600 mil US to date. Their costs were nowhere near that. Looks like the end of the status quo in Iraq creates a real cashflow problem for our cosmopolitan friends. Now what were you saying about inspections?
Hector, did you know that Bush gets millions of dollars in “donations” from the same oil companies that he is helping to get contracts in the new Iraq? Do you think that Bush might have some conflicts of interest that would disqualify him from making objective decision about what is best for America, rather than what is best for him and his business and political associates personally?
Does the amount of money Bush is being paid by corporations who are pro-war bother you, as much as it bothers you that the United Nations is helping with humanitarian aid?
Most of your posts sound like so much talk radio propaganda.
Well Ron, perhaps I don’t have the right kind of tinfoil hat to receive the special info to which you are privvy. Can you squeeze your rant real hard and get one fact out of it? One fact, i.e. names, and figures. Who are these prowar corporations, and how are they giving money to “Bush”? What has the President done to tilt the table to benefit US oil companies?
My point is clear. The UN had a hard dollar symbiotic incentive to keep the Iraqis eating from their hand. To keep that relationship alive required that Saddam stay in power. Now they’re fucked six ways from Sunday, and anybody that loves liberty is very glad.