Bridge to Baghdad - United States and Iraq

On March 1, 2003, 6 young Americans and 7 young Iraqis participated in a 90-minute dialogue about (what was then) the impending war using satellite technology. American youth gathered at Downtown Community Television Center (DCTV) in New York City, USA; Iraqi youth gathered at the Orfali Art Gallery in Baghdad. The dialogue began with comparisons of cultural differences (like music), but then turned to issues like possible war, failing UN inspections, and the absence of free media and public dissent in Iraq. Participants discussed their perspectives on the conflict. In a filmed debriefing after the satellite conversation, one American panelist, who entered the dialogue adamantly opposed to the war, noted that she was surprised to find that the Iraqi youths seemed to align her anti-war stance to an implicit support of the Hussein regime.

A documentary filmmaker and his team traveled to Baghdad weeks before the satellite conversation to assemble a group of young Iraqis willing to speak openly about their lives, their families, and their opinions. The filmmaker filmed their lives intensively the entire week before the show, creating video diaries of each participant. In these pieces, Saif, 21, shows the camera the steel metal doors his parents recently installed throughout his house out of fear that American soldiers would come door-to-door. Americans panelists portrayed in the film include a former army soldier, the head of an anti-war student movement group, a first-generation Korean immigrant, and the son of a conservative Lutheran pastor.

A one-hour video called "Bridge to Baghdad" was produced by DCTV and NextNext Entertainment. The special was shown on Japanese public broadcaster NHK and on the United States-based WorldLink TV, a public-interest satellite network (as a special on “Chat the Planet" - a WorldLink television series that connects young people from different countries and cultures to break down barriers and foster tolerance - on March 30 2003). The show also aired on alternative media outlets. The video may be ordered by clicking here.

Since the March 2003 dialogue (later renamed "Bridge to Baghdad I"), there have been, as of October 2004, two additional dialogues. In Bridge to Baghdad II, held after the USA declared the war officially "over", young Americans and Iraqis engaged in a satellite conversation to ask questions like: What happened during the war? How do you feel now that Saddam is gone from power? Were there things you wanted to say in the last dialogue but could not because of the regime? This hour-long special featured intimate video diaries in which the same Iraqi youth involved in the first dialogue return to their bombed out classrooms. Viewers follow Hamsa as she begins work as a translator for the myriad of American news agencies that have suddenly flooded her neighborhood. As in the first dialogue, the strategy here is to enable young people actually living through the full spectrum of conflict to speak frankly and directly about the hopes and fears of a new life in a free society. The programme again aired as a "Chat the Planet" special and on NHK.

A third dialogue called Chat the Planet: Baghdad 2-Way (produced by New York, USA's NextNext Entertainment and funded by Shei’rah Foundation, Nike Foundation, and MTV USA) also used television, the Internet, and a network of global partnerships to support a global community of youth conversation and action. In September 2004 in Baghdad, just blocks from the site of several recent car bombings, a handful of young Iraqis sat down to talk via satellite with a group of young Americans. Producers selected Republican, Democrat, and Undecided students from Kent State University in Ohio to represent the American side of the discussion; many of the Iraqi students were from Baghdad University, representing Shi’ite Muslims, Sunni Muslims, Christians and Kurds. They discussed subjects like life, war, democracy, and the upcoming USA presidential elections. According to one of the Executive Producers, "for this show, it was very difficult to find young people who were willing to participate since it seen very unfavorably in Iraq to cooperate with Americans". Producer Linda Saffire agreed: "These kids really took a risk to speak to young Americans to let them know what their lives are like." Chat the Planet: Baghdad 2-Way was scheduled to appear on MTV USA throughout the month of October 2004 as part of the "Choose or Lose Campaign", as well as on the Chat the Planet website.

Conflict, Youth, Political Development.

Many panelists in Bridge to Baghdad I commented that the conversation brought new nuance and empathy to issues usually reported and explained to them by those many years older than themselves.

Founded in 1972, the New York-based DCTV is an independent nonprofit media centre that works to teach people, particularly members of low-income and minority communities, to produce television.