Journalist Describes Post-War Iraqi Life

Recovery efforts in Iraq are meeting with limited success, an American journalist who remained in Baghdad during U.S. airstrikes earlier this year told a crowd of 300 at the Graduate School of Education’s Askwith Lecture Hall last night.

Anne L. Garrels ’72, a senior foreign correspondent for National Public Radio (NPR), discussed her experience as a journalist in Iraq during the war and the challenges of reconstructing the country.

“My job...[was] to document how Iraqis saw themselves,” she said. “They were numb, waiting, frightened like the rest of us.”

As Garrels interspersed readings from her recent book, Naked in Baghdad, with anecdotes from the months she spent in Iraq, about 100 people watched via simulcast in Gutman Library.

One of 16 American reporters to remain in Baghdad during the war, Garrels described an Iraq tense with anticipation and fear before the attack began.

“Just before the war, [Saddam] opened the prison gates and a lot of criminals were let go,” she said. “Iraqis had very mixed feelings about that.”

As the first round of bombings progressed, rancid smells filled Baghdad—both from the bombs and nearby oil fires—Garrels said.

“With the window open, it got pretty awful in there,” she said of her room at the Palestine Hotel near the center of the city.

Garrels said that many Iraqis had mixed feelings before the war began about how American involvement would turn out.

“They described their fears: looting, a security vacuum, and that’s exactly what we’ve seen,” she said.

She said that American media outlets’ portrayal of crowds toppling statues of Saddam painted an incomplete picture.

“There were as many or probably more [people] standing on the sidelines saying ‘What next?’”

American soldiers, Garrels said, had been optimistic about the possibility of rebuilding Iraq quickly.

“The troops on the ground, they believed what the Pentagon was saying, that it wouldn’t be that hard,” she said.

But Garrels said she continues to question U.S. officials’ statements regarding the progress of recovery efforts.

“If everything is so good on the ground, why is the civilian administration hunkered down behind barbed wire and sandbags?” she said.

The audience included numerous self-proclaimed “NPR junkies,” many of whom said they had enjoyed Garrels’ reports.

“I love her, I think she’s awesome,” Lesley University student Rebecca Howard said.

Cindy Jizmagian, a school psychologist from Cambridge, said that she appreciates Garrels’ reporting more after hearing her in person.

“She was articulate and focused. She spoke very much as she does on the air, which means that she’s genuine,” said Jizmagian.