T2k and the Media

[helbent4]

Very true. once the war had reached a point that the civilian reporters were no longer seen as Non-Combatants, it'd be like 'Monk' in the T:2013 story in the Stage 1 Rules they gave out... given a gun and taught how to use it.

Nate,

More to the point, I think in an actual shooting "hot" war zone in Europe, foreign civilian reporters and journalists wouldn't be allowed in the first place, at least on the front lines.

Exceptions might be the someone making a tour of the rear areas when the balloon goes up, but if not evacuated would probably find themselves conscripted in some sense.

Back home, they could be conscripted as well, although it also seems likely that civilian reporters and journalists would be useful if not shanghied into service.

While it is useful to rely on stereotypes, an example of a more complicated war reporter character is Anthony Loyd, a former British soldier (Light Division) who felt at odds after serving in the Gulf War and basically went to Bosia on his own dime as a freelancer. My War Gone By, I Miss It So is his subjective memoir of covering one confused part of that conflict and his own drug addiction.

http://www.ralphmag.org/AN/war-gone-by-rev.html

Tony

[Targan]

Targ, have you read 'We are soldiers still', about Hal Moore, Joe Galloway, Basil Plumley and others returning to the battlefield a couple of years ago and meeting, among others, the NVA commander. Fantastic read, very humbling and moving. Amazing how well so many of them got on with their estwhile enemies.

No I haven't read it, in fact I didn't know it existed. Thanks for the tip, I'll try to source a copy.

[Nowhere Man 1966]

Paul,

Not an unreasonable expectation behind the "lines" in Poland, where everwhere is like the A-Shau valley! In other areas, it's not that simple. In a real declared war, do combat photographers carry weapons

Tony

My father was a photographer in the Army from 1955/57. When he was stationed on Korea at Camp Casey, he carried an M3 Grease Gun at first but with all the heavy equipment he lugged around, he was allowed to carry a M1911A1 .45ACP instead. A lot of soldiers wondered why he carried a pistol some only officers, sergeants and MP's were issued them. Maybe in Twilight, depending on the nationality, they might be issued M4's, various submachineguns or even handguns.

Chuck

[dragoon500ly]

Combat photographers are service members, so they would be issued firearms. Even chaplain assistants are issued rifles, in armored units, they are issued M203s!


What TO&E states are to be issued and what is "modified" in service can be worlds apart. On a M-577, the driver and TC are issued pistols, while, the S-2 and his assistant are issued M-16s. Funny, how the modification routes the pistols to the officers and the rifles to the crew.

[Trooper]

Dehumanizing Soviet citizens...

Very strange information war!

Disco, Emmanuelle and J.R Ewing fighting against communist manipulation in soviet Estonia...

Disco & Atomic War

http://www.youtube.com/watchv=D8Ocuy6LsDw&feature=related

[weswood]

Sitting around, enjoying my vacation and thought I'd start a new thread QUIT YOUR CRYING!!!!! Sit back and enjoy!

Had this pop up at a recent FTF game...one of the players wanted his character to be an embed reporter from CNN, complete with his GI-issue camera man. Now, in true CNN-fashion, this player proceeded to annoy the ever-living $@$#@^#$#$^#$$*(!(%$ out of all of the other players, with his man-in-the-street interviews, and maneuvering to get the best shots of whatever combat that we were involved in. It was an intresting, if over-down treatment of a real-life situation, sooooooooooo...

Anybody else have this happen or any thoughts on how to game this one

In the story I was attempting to write, the main character was a freelance photo-journalist. Even though he didn't have a means of sending his photos & print copy to any existing newspapers, he kept taking pictures and downloading them to his laptop, as long as the batteries were charged. He wasn't actually embedded, he just went where he thought he could get away with going.

[Legbreaker]

Laptop Digital camera 1997(ish) technology

[weswood]

Laptop Digital camera 1997(ish) technology

I didn't do any research, I'm way too lazy for that, but I'm pretty sure I got my 1st digital camera in '97. Paid way too much for it and I think my cheapy cell phone has more memory. As far as laptops, weren't the police using Panasonic Toughbooks by that time

Just did a search, if you can believe Wikipedia, the first commercial laptop was available in Sept 1975.

[Legbreaker]

It's possible, but I doubt there'd be much storage capacity in it. Probably have to make some very tough decisions about which photos to keep and which ones to delete to make space. May also be constantly scrounging about for useable storage devices - 3 1/2 inch floppy's, Zip, blank CDs, etc. Could even have cobbled together a tape storage device. Of course finding this stuff after EMP hits could be problematic.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

My first laptop was a ca. 1996 Pentium 166 laptop with 64mb RAM and a 1.2gb hard drive. Nice screen, stereo sound...

I know the trend is to strip the convenience of a post TDM world but the fact is lots of things we think of as "here and now" were prevalent before then too. My Sony Mavica disk camera, for example, dates back to '97.

We weren't exactly whip and buggy technology in the mid to late 90s.

[Graebarde]

Paul,

Not an unreasonable expectation behind the "lines" in Poland, where everwhere is like the A-Shau valley! In other areas, it's not that simple. In a real declared war, do combat photographers carry weapons

Tony

You talking civilian photographers or military combat photographers Military would be considered combatants, and carry weapons for protection at least. At least they use to.. in the PC (proverbial crap) world of today, probably not.

[Targan]

My first laptop was a ca. 1996 Pentium 166 laptop with 64mb RAM and a 1.2gb hard drive. Nice screen, stereo sound...

Yeah, that would do nicely if you could keep it running during TEOTWAWKI.

[Sanjuro]

I've always had a soft spot for MSNBC- ever since I posted an account on www.pprune.org about mobile phone interference with aircraft systems, and found myself quoted verbatim on msnbc less than two hours later!
Cyberpunk, of course, had journalist as a character class...

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Yeah, that would do nicely if you could keep it running during TEOTWAWKI.

Well, yeah, clearly that goes out the door when the nukes fly but ca. 1996, prior to the war, digital cameras and laptops weren't exactly unknown; that was my point.