Peter Arnett was the only correspondent allowed in Iraq during the second Gulf War

WASHINGTON , December 28 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – Hundreds of journalists who seek to cover the action as it happens will be allowed to join the American fighting forces in the war against Iraq , a U.S. newspaper reported Saturday, December 28.

The New York Times said that the Pentagon and military officials said that "limits on access to frontline units, which they defended in past years as necessary to guard the secrecy of missions or to protect correspondents unskilled in the arts of war, would be loosened if U.S. President George Bush ordered military action."

In addition, correspondents, photographers and video crews will be offered military training so that they can "maneuver safely with the troops" reported the Times adding that it was still premature to announce how many would be included.

"Pentagon officials say the evidence of their commitment is that for the first time, they are organizing 'media boot camps' like one here at the Army's infantry training center, to prepare journalists so they can report on the troops," reported the paper.

Sig Christenson, military writer for The San Antonio Express-News who is a founder of a journalists' advocacy group, Military Reporters and Editors, said: "It certainly appears on the surface that the Pentagon is serious," reported the Times.

On their website, the group said that one of their missions was to ensure that journalists have access to places where the U.S. military and its allies operate.

During the gulf war, 10 years ago, CNN’s Peter Arnett was the only television journalist allowed to stay in Baghdad after a U.S.-led coalition began bombing the Iraqi capital.

The Times reported that senior Defense Department and military officials admitted that there is a self-interest in their new media strategy.

They spoke of how the "military had too often damaged its image by failing to engage the news media."

The result, they said, is that "the military has found itself surrendering the fight over world opinion to the propaganda of adversaries."

Bryan Whitman, the Pentagon's deputy spokesman, also said that it was a good idea to give access to reporters because Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, he claims, is a "practiced liar."

"What better way to combat disinformation on the battlefield than to have you report objectively about what the situation really is?"

In a week-long training in Fort Benning , correspondents were taught "combat first aid, land navigation and dead reckoning, camouflage and concealment, small-unit maneuvers under direct and indirect fire, protection from chemical or biological attack, minefield detection and the laws of war," said the Times.

"The military has been slow to learn that it has lost two of its traditional wartime monopolies.

"It can no longer control access to the battle zone, as proven by the numerous correspondents who were on the ground in Afghanistan even before American combat troops.

"In addition, it can no longer exert command over the instant flow of information from those fields of combat in an era of inexpensive satellite communications," said the paper.