Jerry Huffman
Jerry Huffman, middle, circa 2002, with the co-anchors of the first-ever live televised debate of candidates running for parliament in the Kyrgyzstan Republic.
In the last three weeks I have logged a lot of chair time in my living room watching Russia invade Ukraine. Instead of the military cakewalk that was expected, Ukraine has fired back with a passion no one, especially Vladimir Putin, saw coming.
Twenty years ago, I spent almost two years bouncing around the former Soviet Union teaching journalism to groups of primarily young people. A “free media” was a new concept then, but a basic tenet of democracy we were teaching in these former Soviet states.
I had been hired by Internews, a California nonprofit, to be the broadcast news advisor for a group of newly independent nations across four former Soviet states in Central Asia — Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and the Kyrgyz Republic. But we moved around a lot, and I spent time teaching in Ukraine as well as Azerbaijan and Moscow.
Journalistically, Internews was and is a solid company. We survived on both public and private grants, including ones from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The surprise to me was how much freedom USAID gave us to call our own shots in the field.
Don’t misunderstand. There were heated and sometimes emotional discussions but nothing you wouldn’t expect from any other news organization and policy shop. I worked under both the Clinton and Bush administrations and my hat was off to both of them for leaving the journalism to my teams — and we left the policymaking to theirs.
Since the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Soviet government had decided what was news. Now, our job was to help the young journalists we were working with to differentiate between what was propaganda and what was news.
Our students in Ukraine quickly became favorites. They were no longer dreaming about freedom but were living it in spite of government efforts to still control the news.
Our classes stressed the basics: fairness, accuracy and balance. Hardly radical in thought and practice by Western standards, but the new media was still seen as a threat to the government. As hard as the students fought for their freedoms, the largely still corrupt post-Soviet government fought even harder to control the flow of information. This is not unlike what we see now happening in Russia. Putin has made it a crime to report anything that doesn’t parrot the party line. You can’t even call his invasion a war without a threat of 15 years in prison hanging over your head.
Lenin said ideas were more dangerous than bullets. The government, in theory, had the power but journalists had ideas which gave them the courage to do the right thing. The goal for the journalists was to eventually hold those with power accountable.
“Pochemu?” (“Why?”) was often considered a risky question. The idea that these young people might ask such an openly argumentative question infuriated politicians who were used to complete control of the media.
We taught a by-the-book style of journalism. Check and double-check your facts. Be afraid of no one as journalists have an essential role to play in democracy. Keep your own emotions and bias in check. There will be people who will stop at nothing to stop you.
Threats of beatings were part of a day’s work. Annoy the mayor too often and your station’s electrical power could be turned off. Your general manager’s spouse’s job might disappear or their children might be kicked out of college all because you ran a negative story about the government. In the Soviet world, there is nothing fair about fighting for a free media.
We didn’t talk about reporting from a war zone more than 20 years ago because it never occurred to us that it might happen. The fight, such as it was, was about freedom, not invading other countries. In a war zone everything is intensified. Journalists don’t carry weapons because you are there as an observer not a combatant.
One video that circulated early after the Russian invasion of Ukraine showed a group of Russian soldiers riding on a tank and taking pot shots at anyone who moved. Adults and children were running for their lives, but a lone photographer stayed filming the scene.
You’re wearing a helmet and bullet-proof vest with “MEDIA” plastered all over your body. But the Russians don’t care. They don’t see you. They see a target. End of the discussion. So far, four journalists have been killed covering the Ukraine invasion.
But even the Russians have seen footage of their fellow citizens protesting the invasion. People being taken off the street by the thousands on Putin’s orders. It’s clear this “special military operation” is unlike any seen before in Russia.
I have a hard time reconciling the Kyiv I knew then with the one being torn apart by war today. Ukraine is a nation of heroes setting an example for the world. But at the same time it must be terrifying watching your neighbors take up guns and Molotov cocktails to fight for their survival.
I watch the news almost constantly. If I could see my friends, I would tell them how proud I am of them. How they are writing the first draft of a new history of Ukraine. I would beg them to be careful. Don’t take unnecessary chances. Be constantly aware of your surroundings. And when you’re scared, for God’s sake, keep your head down. I am praying for you.
And so is the rest of the world.
Jerry Huffman of Madison is an Emmy Award-winning journalist. During his career, he was also in two other war zones, Israel and Tajikistan. He’s been e-mailing former colleagues across Ukraine but hasn’t heard from anyone.
