Now on her fourth trip to Iraq for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, reporter Moni Basu has captured the full range of emotions experienced by American soldiers and Iraqi citizens. She witnessed the preparation for war and returned to see its impact on Iraqis, who are happy to have the right to vote but long for the restoration of basic services.
Last summer, she and AJC photographer Bita Honarvar arrived in Iraq just as the 48th Brigade Combat Team, Georgia’s National Guard unit, experienced 11 deaths in as many days. On this most recent trip, she’s written about the efforts of a Gainesville-based unit to save an Iraqi child, known as Baby Noor, born with a life-threatening spinal problem.
“This trip has been so different than last summer in every way,” said Basu. “It’s physically a lot less strenuous because it’s not 120 degrees outside, but the military bases are mud baths. Tuesday night, I had to walk through ankle-deep sewage slush in Abu Ghraib; the rainy season makes it nasty to walk around.”
Basu is spending most of her time at Camp Liberty with soldiers from Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 121st Infantry Regiment. This group found Baby Noor during a military raid for insurgents.
“The stories now are different,” said Basu of her latest assignment in Iraq. “Both for the brigade, since most companies have changed missions, and for me. I wanted to report the human side of war.”
For more than a year, the AJC has been following the 48th both at home and abroad. A number of the newspaper’s reporters and photographers have spent time in Iraq, but Basu and Honarvar are the only women.
Honarvar had been to Iraq in 2003 but was eager to return last summer to be with the 48th. She’s now back in Atlanta as a general assignment photographer.
“I was trying to keep an eye out on what life was like there for the troops besides being over there and fighting,” she said. Because of the timing, Honarvar photographed several memorial services.
When they weren’t covering news developments, Honarvar and Basu looked for stories that showed the soldiers in a different light. One such story focused on the changing roles of female soldiers.
“I spent a lot of time reporting that and got to know some fabulous soldiers,” said Basu. “The issue of women in combat has been controversial and has been debated, but I didn’t want to write an issues story. I wanted to tell the story through the eyes of the women and show what distinguishes their experience in Iraq. ”
Basu and Honarvar’s own experiences have been different from though just as dangerous as those of their male colleagues, in part because of their gender and nationalities. Basu is Indian; Honarvar, who was born in Detroit and grew up mostly in Atlanta, has Iranian ancestry.
Both have traveled extensively in the region and are sometimes mistaken for Iraqi women, which Basu said helps her blend in better. She has taken an Arabic class and speaks Hindi and Bengali, which helps her understand a variety of languages.
Honarvar’s Farsi came in handy when the two visited the Kurdish region, since their interpreters spoke mostly Arabic.
The fact that Basu and Honarvar were in Iraq covering the aftermath of the initial invasion was a plus, said Ron Martz, who supervises the AJC’s military coverage. “They knew the ground they were covering and were able to make critical distinctions between then and now,” he said.
Martz said they faced some difficulty covering a predominantly male infantry unit. “There’s an inherent prejudice among infantry units that women are not qualified to cover them and don’t have the strength or endurance to keep up,” he said. “Moni and Bita had no problems keeping up. They also faced the same dangers that soldiers face and without a weapon.”
Special considerations for journalists would be disruptive to the work of the troops.
Basu and Honarvar, who are married to AJC reporters Kevin Duffy and Dan Chapman, respectively, overcame the challenges with professionalism.
In fact, some soldiers are more comfortable talking to them. “They would tell us, ‘We wouldn’t have spoken like that to another guy, ” said Basu.
