The journalistic standards displayed by much of the British and Iranian media in the case of the 15 British hostages clearly do not pass the smell test. Both countries used the media for their own ends, and much of the media willingly played along.
The story was front-page news in both countries for a fortnight. The British Navy insisted their sailors and marines were legally inspecting cargo ships in Iraqi coastal waters. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards claimed they captured them in Iranian waters. The Iranians broadcast videos of the 14 captured men and one woman which made them look like happy campers rather than hostages. Some of the hostages even agreed they had intruded into Iranian waters. When they were released and returned to England, they changed their story and told the British media they had been threatened and coerced by the Iranians and in fact had been captured in Iraqi waters. The Iranian government accused the British government of spin, and vice versa.
There was nothing surprising in all that. The shock came when the British Ministry of Defense announced that the former hostages would be allowed to sell their stories to the media. Some of them immediately signed deals. Leading Seaman Faye Turney, the only woman among the hostages, was the prize catch. She reportedly got the equivalent of more than $200,000 for telling her story to a tabloid newspaper and a television news magazine. She said she would give "a percentage" of the money to her ship's welfare fund, as if that somehow made the deal more acceptable.
There was widespread public disgust, and many military figures were dismayed. William Hague, a leading opposition politician, said the deal undermines respect for the British armed forces, especially when "there are people who have lost their loved ones in Afghanistan and Iraq, but they are not writing their stories." Colonel Bob Stewart, the former British UN commander in Bosnia, said he was "appalled the MoD is encouraging them to profit from a military disaster." Admiral Sir Alan West, former head of the Royal Navy, agreed "it does leave a slightly tacky taste in one's mouth."
Iran's Ahmadinejad with detainees
Both the Iranian and British media broke fundamental rules of journalistic ethics – the Iranians by broadcasting interviews with hostages who were under duress and the British by engaging in checkbook journalism. There are good reasons for these rules. Interviews with captives are untrustworthy because they may not be able to speak freely and may suffer consequences if they do. And an interview that has been paid for may also be untrustworthy because the subject is more likely to say things to please the interviewer. In either case, the credibility of the interview can be questioned.
What is more in this case, the British government's decision to allow the ex-hostages to sell their stories rather than simply allowing them to speak to the media was not only ethically questionable. It was stupid. It touched off a media bidding frenzy that turned a military disaster into a farce.
Realizing he made a mistake, the Minister of Defense has now announced that he is stopping military service members from talking to the media for pay. The temporary ban will not affect any of the 15 who have already sold their stories, but the damage to the image of the Royal Navy has already been done.
