ABC Radio (AUS) "Cultures of Journalism" -- 8:45

A series of radio interviews about journalism's future, episode 10 featured this interview with Michael, speaking by sat-phone from Baghdad.

ABC Radio -- 8:45

Read More...

Leonard Lopate Show, WNYC -- 33:08

Leonard Lopate Show, WNYC -- 33:08

TIME: Into the Hot Zone

After weeks of preparation, the U.S. launches a full-scale assault to take back Fallujah. TIME follows one platoon as it carries out the most dangerous operation since the beginning of the war
 
By MICHAEL WARE

Read More...

NBC: Battle for Fallujah

2004_1112_NBC


Tom Brokaw introduces a clip that uses footage Michael shot during the battle, along with some recorded commentary about the fighting. (Clip size is same as original.)

Length: 2:11

Read More...

CNN, American Morning: Fallujah [transcript only]

During the battle, Michael called in a live report. This is the transcript as posted by CNN...


Read More...

TIME: Appointment in Samarra

The U.S. has a lot of work to do if it's going to take back Iraqi cities held by insurgents. The job began last week, as 3,000 U.S. and 2,000 Iraqi troops stormed Samarra. In September talks with tribal groups there helped the U.S. begin to seat a city council. But the accord broke down, and the city slipped into rebel control. Baghdad bureau chief Michael Ware reports from Samarra, which is a tune-up battle for tougher strongholds like Fallujah.

By MICHAEL WARE


Read More...

TIME: The Enemy With Many Faces

By MICHAEL WARE / BAGHDAD

The grenade was visible when the insurgent stepped in front of our car. His sinewy arm was cocked, ready to throw. Fifteen more men poured out from the corner of a nearby tenement, swirling about the car like angry floodwaters. They brandished grenades and AK-47s, pistol grips nudging out from under the folds of their shirts. Spotting me in the backseat, they went into a frenzy, yanking on the handles of the doors, thumping the window with the grenades. Across Iraq, the insurgents have gone on a kidnapping spree, seizing Italian aid workers, French journalists and American construction workers. As they ordered us out of the car, I wondered whether we were about to become their latest catch.

Read More...

ABC TV (AUS) Lateline: 'No hope' for British hostage [transcript]

'No hope' for British hostage
Reporter: Tony Jones

TONY JONES: Back now to our top story -- and what may be the last hours of a man who, having seen his two American friends taken away to be murdered on video, has been put in front of the same camera to beg his government to save him.

But the 62-year-old Briton, Kenneth Bigley, is in the hands of the most ruthless killers in Iraq.

The Tawhid and Jihad group led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi are simply milking Bigley's life for whatever propaganda benefit they can derive.

One of the very few Western journalists to have made contact with al-Zarqawi's group, and who knows exactly what they're capable of, is Michael Ware of 'Time' magazine.

As many of you will know, a Brisbane boy who's made his name by taking risks few other journalists wouldn't even consider.

Read More...

NPR: Iraq Update: Hostage Crisis Confusion

NPR's Alex Chadwick talks with Michael Ware of Time magazine about a disputed announcement earlier Wednesday that two Iraqi female prisoners would be released in exchange for a British hostage held by insurgents.

NPR: 4:21

Dateline (AUS): "In all regards, we regard ourselves on our own."

2004_0915_DatelineAUS

Michael appears on an Australian show to discuss reports that two Aussies had been abducted in Iraq.
 
(This clip was posted online in .RM format, which I converted. The size of the window is the same as the original.)

Length: 7:50

Read More...

ABC TV (AUS) 7:30: Hostage claim could be genuine, journalist says [transcript]

Hostage claim could be genuine, journalist says
Reporter: Kerry O'Brien

KERRY O'BRIEN: One Australian journalist who has more feel for the motives and make-up of the different insurgency groups involved in kidnappings and murders, And has had regular contact with many of them, is 'Time' magazine's Iraq correspondent Michael Ware, who joins me now from Baghdad.

Read More...

TIME: High Noon on Haifa Street

By MICHAEL WARE

The booby-trapped artillery shell detonated shortly before midnight. In the roar and smoke, bodies ripped apart. Suddenly the nine-man foot patrol from Task Force 1/9, composed of infantrymen and cavalry troopers, was down to five, alone, in a darkened Baghdad alley and cut off from help. One soldier was dead. Three others lay bleeding but still alive as fire from AK-47s rained down on the scrambling troopers. Company commander Captain Thomas Foley hollered orders above the din, desperately trying to stave off the attack while getting some kind of aid to his wounded men. One had lost a leg in the massive blast; two others were critically wounded. Grenades were lobbed down from houses and apartments above. Foley banded the survivors together to cover their fallen comrades. A minute elapsed, then another and another. The onslaught didn't cease, but they held on. Forty more minutes would pass before rescuers could fight their way to them. It felt like a lifetime.

Read More...

TIME: Uniting to Resist?

By MICHAEL WARE

Intense fighting broke out last week between U.S. troops, backed by Iraqi forces, and fighters loyal to the radical Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. But while al-Sadr's Mahdi militia represents a serious threat to Iraq's stability, an equally vexing challenge to Iraqi order is taking shape in the Sunni Muslim--dominated area northwest of Baghdad, where Sunni terrorists, Baathists and nationalists are thriving.

Read More...

ABC TV (AUS) Enough Rope [transcript]

There are two types of war correspondent - those who stick to the circuit of military briefings, safe hotels and careful excursions into unstable areas, and those who throw themselves at the job with apparently reckless disregard for their own safety. Mike Ware is one of the latter. Writing from Afghanistan and Iraq for 'Time' magazine, he spent much of the past few years behind enemy lines, bringing back stories of the Taliban, Afghani war lords and, more recently, Iraqi insurgents. A few weeks ago some of those insurgents sent him tapes showing in chilling detail just how they go about their work, tapes whose images were soon flashed around the world.

Read More...

NPR: Iraq Propaganda

All Things Considered, July 12, 2004 · Both sides in the Iraq war use propaganda, but the insurgencies are becoming more and more sophisticated - broadcast quality videos of actual attacks, and the like. U.S. commanders sometimes use the videos to show their troops how the other side fights.
NPR's Philip Reeves reports.

Iraq Propaganda -- 7:29


Deep in the heart of terror (Courier-Mail)

A Brisbane journalist has penetrated Iraq's network of insurgents, writes foreign editor David Costello
 
MICHAEL Ware has watched Arab extremists argue over whether he should be executed during terrifying encounters with insurgents in Iraq.

Read More...

CNN: When the reporter becomes the story

2004_0707_CNN

From a CNN report: Michael becomes the story when the insurgent groups with which he had made contact start sending him videos of their attacks.

The original intro:

Among the believers: an Australian journalist penetrates the Iraqi jihad and finds himself the insurgents latest pipeline to the international press.

It takes a special kind of courage for foreigners to live in Iraq right now. It takes a stunning kind to put your life in the hands of people who kidnap and kill foreigners.

Journalist Michael Ware, a correspondent for "Time" magazine, has been working on special assignment in Iraq, getting inside the groups who are leading the campaign against coalition forces and the new government the coalition installed.

What he found is an extremist movement that had never before existed in Iraq, but is growing in size, confidence and sophistication there.

On our program today, seeing the insurgency from the inside.

Length: 3:44

Read More...

TIME: Meet the New Jihad

By MICHAEL WARE / FALLUJAH

The safe house lies on the outskirts of Fallujah in a neighborhood where no Americans have ventured. Inside, a group of Arab sheiks has gathered to discuss the jihad they and their followers are waging against the U.S. The men wear white robes and long beards and greet each other solemnly. They are all Iraqi, but their beliefs are those of the strict Wahhabi strain of Islam repressed under Saddam Hussein. Unlike most Iraqi sitting rooms, this one has no pictures adorning its walls or a television or radio nestled in a corner. Such luxuries are forbidden, just as they were under the Taliban in Afghanistan. At the back of the room are a few men from Saudi Arabia, who stand silently as one of the sheiks, the group's leader, addresses me in Arabic and stilted English. The war in Iraq, he says, is one of liberation, not just of a country but of Muslim lands, Muslim people, Islam itself. There is no room for negotiation with the enemy, no common ground. What he and his men offer is endless, righteous resistance. "Maybe this war will take a long time," he says. "Maybe this is a world war."

Read More...

TIME: A Chilling Iraqi Terror Tape

A new video from jihad leader Zarqawi provides insight into the nature of the fighters — and the fight
 
By MICHAEL WARE
Read More...

TIME: Where's Bin Laden?

By MICHAEL WARE / NANGALAM

The men of Camp Blessing know they are bait. They dangle far from the formidable, heavily fortified perimeters of other U.S. bases in Afghanistan. Instead of the hundreds or thousands of troops that are in the large encampments, there are only a dozen Green Berets from what is known as Operational Detachment Alpha (ODA) 936 and a smattering of Marines. But they are dangling far from safety to attract a big catch. "This is Osama bin Laden's backyard," says the team sergeant. "And part of the solution to tracking him is having guys like us out here in isolated areas."

Read More...

Charlie Rose -- 3:10

Charlie Rose -- 3:10

Charlie talks to Mick by telephone after the bombing at the Mount Lebanon Hotel.

Read More...

TIME: Karzai on the Dangers He Faces

By MICHAEL WARE, TIM McGIRK

Afghan President Hamid Karzai talked with TIME's Tim McGirk and Michael Ware in Kabul:

Read More...

TIME: Remember Afghanistan?

By TIM McGIRK / KABUL and MICHAEL WARE / KANDAHAR

Hamid Karzai is lonely. He is huddled, as always, deep inside his presidential palace in Kabul, protected by towering stone walls, growling dogs and U.S. bodyguards. Visitors to the palace must undergo three separate body searches before passing through the arched gates, all under the gaze of trained marksmen standing sentry in a watchtower.

Read More...