Pool principle

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The pool principle describes a strategy of media work that became particularly well known in connection with war reporting . Only selected journalists are informed on site or brought to certain points of the combat area by the army.

After protests by media representatives, the pool system was first established during the 1989 invasion of Panama . From the multitude of journalists, a few were selected to report on certain theaters of war and then to make their reports available to the other journalists. The military hoped to be able to control the content of the reporting and to determine what the reporters got to see. This system was initially based on suggestions from the press itself. Because the journalists believed that they would get better access if they renounced part of their independence - a hope that was not to be confirmed.

During the Panamanian invasion, the Pentagon selected twelve reporters for the pool, but held them at the Panama City airfield until the fighting ended. Despite thousands of victims, the impression was of a clean and quick action. For the government - still believing that the Vietnam War could have been won had it not been for the coverage of anti-war attitudes by the press in the population - the prescription of media control had proven its worth. Knightley writes: "[...] Panama can be seen as the final testing ground of a military media strategy that was to change forever the ways wars would be reported in the West and which was deployed in all its notoriety in the Gulf War."

In other wars in which the US armed forces were involved, this principle was largely retained, especially in the Gulf War . The embedded journalism system represents a further development .

Individual evidence

  1. cf. Thrall, Trevor: War in the Media Age, New Jersey 2000, pp. 152ff
  2. cf. Knightley, Philip: The First Casualty. The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-Maker from the Crimea to Kosovo, London 2000, pp. 484f
  3. cf. Knightley, Philip: The First Casualty. The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-Maker from the Crimea to Kosovo, London 2000, p. 485