After reading The Secret Keeper I was very interested in the journalistic aspect of covering an area of conflict. Author Paul Harris was kind enough to write a guest post sharing his experiences:

The thing that most people want to know about covering a conflict is simple
enough: what is it like? There is no easy answer. It depends on the
journalist, the sort of conflict it is and the sort of medium they work in.
For example, a photographer or cameraman has an intense need to get action
pictures right from the frontline. A print journalist does not. As a result
it is the photographers and TV crews who often experience the most danger
as their job forces them to seek it out.
For me, conflict journalism was something I always wanted to do and I ended
up dipping in and out of it. I am glad I did it. Despite some very
stressful and unpleasant moments I came out of it okay. I enjoyed the
amazing cameraderie of fellow journalists. I believed, at times, that I was
doing a good thing by shining a light on some forgotten and benighted parts
of the world. At other times, if I am honest, I was chasing a
thrill-seeking high.
It all, pretty much, came to an end, not in Africa, but in Iraq. I was
embedded with the British army on a two month assignment in 2003 that
spanned the invasion of Iraq by America and Britain. In the first few weeks
of the war the British unit I was with ended up as part of the ring of
forces surrounding the southern city of Basra. For a while, on most days,
myself, some other journalists and a TV crew from Sky News would drive in a
couple of cars to the front lines to interview any refugees we could find
who might have escaped the city which was still controlled by the Iraqi
army. On one day we headed to the front lines and passed British army
checkpoint after checkpoint. We were waved through them all. We quickly
found ourselves on a road heading towards the city outskirts, looking for
the last line of British troops where we planned to stop. We seemed to
drive for quite a while. The city border seemed strangely close. But we
were in a hurry to reach the front line and start some interviews so we
drove on. Eventually we reached a huge flaming oil trench, billowing out
thick black smoke. The Sky team wanted to stop and do some filming of the
fire. I, and other print journalists, did not as we felt in a rush. After a
“discussion” the Sky team won out. We stopped and tapped our feet
impatiently waiting for the Sky team to finish filming. We were eager to
resume driving forwards. At that moment, we heard a roar. A British tank
has coming down the road behind us. It stopped and a soldier popped his
head out and asked us in no uncertain terms where we were going. “The front
lines,” we replied, gesturing ahead of us. The soldier shook his head and
pointed back the way we came. “The front line is about a mile behind you,”
he said.
It suddenly dawned on us. The last British checkpoint we had driven through
had for some reason waved us on. Yet they had been the front line. The next
checkpoint we would have run into would not have been British. It would
have been Iraqi. Faced with two strange vehicles approaching from British
lines, it would have been hard to imagine the frightened Iraqi soldiers
doing anything but opening fire on us. Only the Sky crew’s need for a quick
film shoot had stopped us from that fate. It had been a simple moment of
sheer luck that had prevented a disaster. We turned tail and drove back at
high speed. Later that night, though not a shot had been fired, I realized
it had been a very close brush with danger, perhaps even death. I had begun
to realize I did not want to put myself in those situations anymore. After
I left Iraq, and returned to England, I never did.

Thanks Paul for taking the time to share your fascinating experiences.