JOSH DAVIS found
out how closely entwined a reporter and a military battalion
can become when, as a roving war correspondent for Wired magazine, he hitched a ride with a convoy of supply trucks
returning from Baghdad to Kuwait. “Unfortunately, they
were short-staffed,” says Davis, “and I was placed
in the last vehicle with an M-16 and a radio. My job
was to maintain communication with the lead vehicles.
If there
was a problem, I was to radio it in—‘and if there’s
shooting, you’d better shoot back,’ the grizzled
sergeant told me. I refused to take the gun, replying
that I was a noncombatant. ‘We’ll see about that,’ he
said. Our empty convoy did not come under fire, but every
time we pulled over to fix a broken-down truck, I had
to consider what I would do if it did.”
