Dave Moniz has covered the military for USA TODAY for three years. Previously, he reported on the military for Knight Ridder newspapers for eight years in South Carolina. He has a bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Maryland and has read more than 100 books on military tactics, history and strategy in the past decade. He also has attended seminars at the U.S. Army War College and the Knight Center for Journalism. He is a co-founder of Military Reporters and Editors, an organization designed to promote professional reporting on the military and advocate for reporter access to American troops in the field. Last year, he won the Gerald R. Ford Prize for distinguished military reporting. He frequently speaks to military officers about the relationship between the Pentagon and the press.
Behind the Story: A Reporter's Notebook
Below are notes Dave provided us as background information on several articles he has written recently about the war and Iraq which were compiled for a case study on “Confronting Iraq.” Click here to view the case study.
As a reporter, getting your arms around the Pentagon's planning for Iraq is very difficult. The Bush administration and the Pentagon are masters at withholding information, in many cases where disclosing that information would do no harm.
In the case of war planning, there are legitimate concerns about revealing war plans. This story was an attempt to look at how the U.S. might structure an attack against Iraq if we go to war a second time. The outline was drawn from interviews with key Gulf War planners now retired from the military, some Pentagon sources and some bright people who study U.S. military tactics. In a sense, the goal was to show how the military has changed since the 1991 Gulf War and reflect the thinking of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who has offered hints at how he would like the armed forces to operate in future conflicts.
The story is part speculation, part informed reporting based on the Pentagon's post 911 view of the world. Our goal was not to disclose war plans -- which we have not seen -- but make some sense of how a war might unfold based on logical assumptions and a few projected war goals:
How does the U.S. fight best?
What is the country's objective in attacking Iraq? Is it defeating the military or getting rid of Saddam? How might Rumsfeld's world view be reflected in this scheme?
