Madeleine Byrne

One of Frank Moorhouse’s stories in his collection The Americans, Baby (1972) vividly describes two people’s tentative steps across a divide. It is a sexual overture, but also one that defies the constraints of national stereotypes. Carl, an Australian university student, bristles at an American man’s advances. Uneasy about his new sexual identity, he is unable to shake the sense that he is consorting with the enemy, at a time of mass protests against the Vietnam War. At the story’s end, the two men lie together in bed holding hands. The American urges his Australian lover to wipe his tears, then comments obliquely: ‘I guess this is the way it is with us.’

Now that the generals have announced the end of the military campaign in Iraq, media organisations will conduct their own post-mortems. Pundits and politicians agree that the war was the most televised in recent history, but what does that mean in terms of quality journalism? One of the most surprising aspects of the rolling, often repetitious, coverage was the way that basic tenets of journalism were proven true: that is, good reporting is based on firsthand observation and powerfully evoked detail. No amount of studio analysis can equal a journalist – notebook or microphone in hand – speaking to people on the streets. The journalism of Osmar White, the noted Australian war correspondent, exemplifies this.