Harry in Afghanistan

ITV News though do excel in these situations and had clearly prepared well for tonight's bulletin. Only skimmed through News at Ten but even beyond the Harry stuff their seemed to be several live links as well.


Absolutely pathetic of the BBC to claim their bulletin was extended - that really is a cheap trick. And an insult too to Newsnight viewers that they have to wait even longer for their bulletin (OT, but it be interesting to know how many of Newsnight viewers watch the Ten o'clock News before it.)

Very interesting. I now see what was in it for them, and am wondering why it took so long for the all clear to be given. It was leaked in January.

Not sure that's been confirmed as the US website that leaked it today later removed the references to both the Australian and German publications and claimed it as an exclusive.


The media though do seem a bit self-congratulatory in their ability to keep a secret for ten weeks. I wonder how many people in the media actually knew - considering what ITV had on air within an hour of the news breaking it could hardly have been top secret within ITN.

You watched both in full did you

Would make sense for you to watch them both back to back and then make a comment like that.

Cue dots are still used by ITN to signal their breaks - so both ITV Plc and non-ITV Plc franchises can safely get to their adverts.

Have to agree with Brekkie, BBC, ITV and Sky News do have an air of 'Your majesty, we kept it a secret for all these weeks - we're not so bad after all, it was those nasty foreign journos!'

BBC News 24 might as show the footage on a loop I don't find the story particularly exciting at all.



*Nods*

It's quite nauseating to watch. He might want to be there (and that's admirable) but has to accept he can't be there because of who he is. They're idiots for sending him in the first pace and fools for thinking the whole world was going to keep schtum. So many lives are at even more risk because of his self indulgent presence simply for the sake of headlines like "Harry The Hero" and "One of Our Boys".

The TV news agencies shouldn't be covering it at all! Just so an American website I've never heard of just so happens to leak the story, doesn't mean every other news agency in the world gives a crystal clear signal to the Taliban that Prince Harry is in Afghanistan. If you want to kill him, now is your chance.

This is the biggest cock-up the world of news has ever committed. Thanks to you, Harry's life is in danger (he was in danger anyway but if the Taliban didn't know Harry was in Afghanistan, they're certainly know now).

Do you think Harry is being withdrawn from Afghanistan. They seem to be keeping THAT abit secret too

http://www.gorillaenterprises.co.uk/upload/uploadFiles/Harry.jpg

Just because you heard of it, it doesn't change the fact that the Drudge Report is a massively influential and well known American political website.

I'm pretty sure I saw Tim Marshall on Sky say that they checked with the MoD who basically said the cover has been blown and so they can go ahead with the reports.

Having watched the excellent Ross Kemp in Afghanistan I now have a much better appreciation of what's going on out there, and what Harry's role in co-ordinating air support is all about (and how much it means to the men on the ground whose lives depend on it).

Err - you may not have heard of The Drudge Report - but that doesn't mean others haven't. It is an amazingly influential website - that has a huge global audience. It has "interesting" journalistic ethics (I don't know how much it checks out the stuff it links to) - and is not a touchstone in accuracy or impartiality - but equally it is often used as a "We'd better check that story out" source by many news organisations - and not just the ones signed up by the MoD to the Harry pool. The Drudge Report is in a hugely different league to the other websites that posted the story earlier - hence the change in attitude once the story was posted there.

AIUI Drudge was also the first source for the Monical Lewinsky / Bill Clinton scandal of the 90s... It is not a tiny little website in the back of beyond...

Effectively the UK and some overseas broadcasters and press did a deal with the MoD to allow them good access to Harry during his service, on the basis they wouldn't break the embargo until he had completed his service safely, massively reducing the risk both to him and his colleagues. HOWEVER - once broadcasters and press not in this pool got wind of it via the Drudge Report there was no way it could be kept secret - the genie was well and truly out of the bottle. The non-pool news organisations had no incentive to respect the embargo - and they didn't...

As soon as Drudge reported it - anyone with any savvy knew Harry was there - long before it was on the TV and in print.