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Global Investigative Journalism Conference Kiev 2011 Andrew W. Lehren. Open Secrets: Wikileaks , War and America. The Afghanistan War Logs First brought in for what was, at first blush, a one-day story focusing on war dead and possibly other issues related to the war - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
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Open Secrets: Wikileaks, War and
America
Global Investigative Journalism Conference
Kiev 2011
• Andrew W. Lehren
The Afghanistan War Logs
• First brought in for what was, at first blush, a one-day story focusing on war dead and possibly other issues related to the war
• Obtained the raw data and began, over the Fourth of July weekend, writing a series of story memos
• The one story we could not do with this data was count war dead
• Another important problem: informants are named
• But these documents tell us important aspects of the war: drones gone wrong, the ISI in Afghanistan, shadowy Task Force 373 and capture/kill operations
The New York Times secretly forms a team of reporters from its bureaus around the world to examine the documents
• Collaborating with the Guardian and Der Spiegel
• Comparing with other databases about the war, experience in the field and other ways of cross-checking and verifying information
• Always aware these were daily field reports rarely revised later
• Key approach: Pulling material from various reports to tell a larger story
The Iraq War Logs: Combining other data sets
The diplomatic cables
• Often similar to well-written excellent single-source stories
• Incomplete
• Crossing international borders
Often the most common passages were useless
Sometimes a single cable told the whole story
Sometimes the best came from cables spanning the globe
• North Korean arms deals
• Gitmo detainee efforts
• DEA intelligence gathering efforts
• Diplomats helping Boeing vs. Airbus
Guantanamo and beyond
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