U.S. military mounts plasma screens in the desert

CAMP AS SAYLIYAH, Qatar -- In a warehouse in the bleak Qatari desert, the U.S. military has erected plasma TV screens, high-speed phone lines and a fancy stage to serve as platform to tell the world its side of the story in a possible war against Iraq.

The media center at Camp As Sayliyah, the Persian Gulf headquarters of the Tampa, Fla.,-based U.S. Central Command, is more "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" than gritty wartime command post. But it's not the only surreal scene for correspondents waiting for action in the Gulf: It competes with ice skating at the mall, poolside lounging and locally sponsored belly-dancing shows.

U.S. Navy Seabees, the military's construction unit, built the $1.5 million media center in one of the beige hangars that dot this 262-acre camp about 12 miles south of the capital, Doha.

The camp, which stores equipment for American military units in the Gulf, has been designated the command center if President Bush orders U.S. forces to attack Iraq. U.S. Gen. Tommy Franks, who would run the war, arrived Wednesday -- although it's not clear if he's here for good.

If war does start, Franks and his staff will brief the world's media in a state-of-the-art center that features flat plasma television screens that can show maps and graphics of what troops are doing in the dusty desert or cities of Iraq.

The backdrop features a hazy blue-and-white flat image of the world, crowned by the U.S. Central Command seal. Running along the back are digital clocks featuring a half-dozen time zones, including Tampa, Zulu -- or Greenwich Mean -- military time and Baghdad.

It's a far cry from the "five o'clock follies" of the Vietnam War and even the stage for news conferences at the U.S. military base in Kandahar, Afghanistan last year: an empty pool, where TV cameras were set up in the shallow end and the U.S. officials in the deep end.

"Thanks to technology, we have escaped the days of flip charts," said Navy Lt. Mark Kitchens, a U.S. Central Command spokesman.

On Thursday at As Sayliyah, as a sand storm swept through the region, engineers were fixing the spotlight fixtures above the podium. In the main media area of the 175,000-square-foot facility, technicians fiddled with newly laid cables for high-speed ISDN phone lines.

U.S. Navy Capt. Frank Thorp, the U.S. Central Command spokesman here, said the military sought input from news organizations to create a media center "for a contingency of this magnitude."

Indeed, U.S. officials say more than 320 journalists are already accredited to work at the center and the number rises daily as more crews pour into Doha, filling up hotels along its waterfront.

That's not including the more than 500 journalists who are traveling with U.S. military units in much rougher conditions, or those based in Iraq itself.

For journalists working in the relative comfort of Qatar, Bahrain or Kuwait, "It's a first-class war," said Peter Lloyd, correspondent for Australian Broadcasting Corp., of his accommodations at the Ritz-Carlton hotel, which puts out a free buffet every afternoon and evening, complete with an open bar.

Free food and belly-dancing were also available earlier this week to reporters covering the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet in neighboring Bahrain, courtesy of the Bahrain information ministry.

The ministry hosted a reception for foreign journalists and Navy public affairs officers in a hotel rooftop lounge that featured three Russian dancers, who after a folk dance and the can-can, invited guests to join them for some hip-shimmying.

Such incongruities are by no means unique in the Gulf, where traditional Muslim society -- women are often covered head-to-toe in public -- lives side-by-side with very Western, 21st century mall and consumer culture.

In Doha's City Center mall, for example, a few journalists have taken advantage of the ice skating rink on the ground floor, where the accompanying music is interrupted for Muslim calls to prayer.

With diplomatic wrangling delaying any war for now, other news crews in the region have spent days at hotel gyms or poolside, although the sand storms kept most people indoors Wednesday.

Lloyd, who covered the recent nightclub bombings in Bali, Indonesia, said he was trying to reconcile that he might have to report on much higher death tolls in a possible war "and I'm in a six-star hotel, being fed 24-seven."

"It's the most comfortable war I'll ever attend," he said.