It doesn’t matter if the stories are small to the point of being invisible — like patent trolls and podcasting — or big, like the “revelation” that the CIA didn’t used to know who they were hitting with drones. If “outsiders” cover these stories — even outsiders with years of experience covering war and national security for a major newspaper chain — it could take weeks, and even months, for bigger media outlets to catch up. But when they do, apparently, don’t expect any credit.
Do you know who Jonathan Landay is? Probably not, unless you happen to have a McClatchy Company-owned newspaper in your town or metropolitan area. Landay is the National Security Correspondent at McClatchy’s Washington, DC bureau, and two months ago he penned an article with the headline, “Obama’s drone war kills ‘others,’ not just al Qaida leaders.“
In this fantastic article, Landay writes:
Contrary to assurances it has deployed U.S. drones only against known senior leaders of al Qaida and allied groups, the Obama administration has targeted and killed hundreds of suspected lower-level Afghan, Pakistani and unidentified “other” militants in scores of strikes in Pakistan’s rugged tribal area, classified U.S. intelligence reports show.
The administration has said that strikes by the CIA’s missile-firing Predator and Reaper drones are authorized only against “specific senior operational leaders of al Qaida and associated forces” involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks who are plotting “imminent” violent attacks on Americans.
“It has to be a threat that is serious and not speculative,” President Barack Obama said in a Sept. 6, 2012, interview with CNN. “It has to be a situation in which we can’t capture the individual before they move forward on some sort of operational plot against the United States.”
Copies of the top-secret U.S. intelligence reports reviewed by McClatchy, however, show that drone strikes in Pakistan over a four-year period didn’t adhere to those standards.
This was on April 9, two months ago. Compare with this excerpt from an “exclusive” story NBC News broke today, June 5:
The CIA did not always know who it was targeting and killing in drone strikes in Pakistan over a 14-month period, an NBC News review of classified intelligence reports shows.
About one of every four of those killed by drones in Pakistan between Sept. 3, 2010, and Oct. 30, 2011, were classified as “other militants,” the documents detail. The “other militants” label was used when the CIA could not determine the affiliation of those killed, prompting questions about how the agency could conclude they were a threat to U.S. national security.
The uncertainty appears to arise from the use of so-called “signature” strikes to eliminate suspected terrorists — picking targets based in part on their behavior and associates. A former White House official said the U.S. sometimes executes people based on “circumstantial evidence.”
Not a perfect match, but close enough for media work, I suppose. NBC is running with the “exclusive” label, but Landay is fighting back on Twitter.
As it stands, unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like anyone from NBC is planning on responding.
Why would a story that broke two months ago (and apparently didn’t merit any looking-into then) all of a sudden be dubbed an “exclusive” and run all over NBC programming like it has been? Do they feel like Landay isn’t “important” enough, that Richard Engel deserves the “scoop” more?