The U.S.-led war on Iraq, earlier expected to end very quickly, looks likely to drag on for some time. Each Japanese media organization has been making detailed daily reports on the military situation, based on information from correspondents in Arab nations and war reporters traveling with U.S.-led coalition troops. At the same time, lots of space and broadcast time has been devoted to observations on repercussions of the war in the international scene as well as the Japanese government's views.

On the afternoon of March 20, Japan time, over 40 NSK member newspaper companies issued extras on the outbreak of the war on Iraq. Each newspaper has been making detailed reports of day-to-day developments since the evening editions of that same day. Each broadcasting station is continuing to trace the evolving war situation with special programs and other features. Many Japanese media organizations evacuated their reporters from Baghdad just before the outbreak of the war, moving them to Kuwait, Jordan and other neighboring countries. However, one newspaper, one news agency and one broadcaster each kept their respective reporter in northern Iraq. An official of the one remaining newspaper company said that despite the risk, the movements of Kurds in northern Iraq deserve reporting. He said the company decided to keep its reporter in Iraq in order to report the actual situation from inside Iraq.

There are about 600 reporters based at the media center of the U.S. Army's forward command headquarters at as-Sayliyah base in Qatar, and there are many Japanese reporters in that group. At least one Japanese newspaper, one news agency and three TV broadcasting stations have reporters with U.S. troops moving northward from Kuwait. Some others are aboard the U.S. aircraft carrier Kitty Hawk and other U.S. ships in the Persian Gulf. Reports from correspondents traveling with the troops often carry a notice to let readers know that their activities are restrained under rules imposed by the U.S. military.

As for the situation in Baghdad, many media organizations have been using information from freelance journalists or affiliated overseas media.

As the war continues, casualties continue to mount on both sides. On March 23, scenes of Iraqi interrogators questioning captured U.S. soldiers and images said to be bodies of U.S. soldiers were broadcast by the Arab satellite television station Al-Jazeera, using footage from Iraqi state television. The broadcast caused outrage among media organizations worldwide.

In Japan, some sport dailies published the images of the bodies, while TV broadcasting stations used only the footage of the U.S. prisoners. Every general-interest newspaper published in Tokyo reported about the Al-Jazeera broadcast in their March 24 morning editions, but none carried the images of the bodies. Some did prominently feature photographs of the captured U.S. soldiers.

An official of the one TV broadcasting station that used the footage of the U.S. prisoners being questioned said it was broadcast to show the reality of the ongoing information war, while still trying to pay due consideration to the humanitarian aspect of the situation.

According to a survey by the NSK research office, which monitors newspaper editorials and commentaries on major social and political issues, an overwhelming majority of Japanese newspapers criticized the U.S.-led military campaign against Iraq as lacking sufficient justification to win international backing. However, some newspapers still sided openly with the U.S. and British argument that there were sufficient legal grounds to justify the attack on the basis of the series of previously adopted U.N. resolutions on Iraq.