There was growing anger and frustration among journalists and television crews at the Coalition Media Centre outside Doha, capital of Qatar, yesterday over the lack of information and the absence of official briefings or news conferences by military commanders. Deaglán de Bréadún reports
Even though hostilities had begun in the early hours of Thursday morning, the head of US Central Command, Gen Tommy Franks, had still not held his first news conference by yesterday evening.
This surprised the hundreds of media personnel from all over the world who had travelled to the US Central Command headquarters at Camp As Sayliyah.
A US military spokesman said information would be made available at the "appropriate" time.
However, there was some speculation among the media that there had been a change of policy, to ensure that the spotlight remained on President Bush at this stage of the conflict.
Qatar is three hours ahead of Ireland and, at about midday local time, there were indications that British and Australian commanders were to answer journalists' questions in the Hollywood-style media briefing room, which had been decked out with plasma television screens at considerable cost.
The briefings were arranged by a journalist with one of the major television networks who then had to inform his colleagues that the event was not now taking place.
A US military spokesman declined to comment on suggestions that the British and Australians were refused permission to use the briefing room, in which US military insignia are prominently featured.
Later, British and Australian commanders gave separate briefings in other parts of Camp As Sayliyah, which were confined to journalists from their own countries.
One of the journalists who attended the Australian briefing, Paul Martin, who reports for Australia's Southern Cross radio network, said he felt the Australians "don't want to be seen as the lead briefers, they want the Americans and the British, who are by far the two biggest forces here, to be seen as the leaders in this".
He added: "I don't think the Australians want to be seen on international television briefing the world when the Americans have not yet done so."
Commenting on military policy towards the media, a former senior adviser to President Clinton, Mr George Stephanopoulos who is now a television news presenter said: "I think they are doing their job which is making our job much harder. There is a lot of frustration here but I don't think they mind, necessarily.
"Their top goal is to make sure that nothing gets out that puts the troops at risk."
There might also be political considerations: "Let's see if it changes after the battle starts."
A spokesman for US Central Command said: "This is not an appropriate time to get that level of information out there."
He described the elaborate facilities provided for news conferences as: "Another example of our commitment to telling the truth and getting the information out, and facilitating you getting that information when it is an appropriate time."
Asked when Gen Franks would be meeting the media, he replied: "When it is the appropriate time."
A typical journalistic reaction was expressed by Birgitte Vestermark, a reporter with the Danish newspaper Berlingske Tidende: "I thought the whole point of having a media centre was that you get information."