J.D. Johannes

J.D. Johannes is a "film maker and proprietor" of the blog Faces from the Front. He served as Assistant to Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline beginning in January 2003. Johannes was Republican candidate Kline's campaign manager. .

Johannes is "a former television news producer at WIBW-TV in Topeka [Kansas] and had previously served on the staff of United States Senator Sam Brownback." 

Embedded Reporter
In March 2005, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served during the first Iraq war, Johannes&mdash;known as "JD"&mdash;who "had been out of the Marines for almost 6 years, working in television, radio and politics&mdash;jobs owed to the training received" at the Defense Information School at Fort Meade, Maryland, and "to the experience as a combat cameraman for the Marine Corps, [returned] to Iraq as an embedded reporter," the Faces from the Front website states.

War of Words Project
In the April 6, 2006, Kansas City Strip's The Pitch, Eric Barton wrote that Americas Majority president Richard Nadler "recruited" Iraq war vet U.S. Marine Corporal Richard Gibson "to join two other Iraq vets", including Johannes, who were "convinced that news outlets aren't showing the real war" in Iraq.

With the help of Johannes and Gibson, Nadler called it the War of Words Project, "hoping to get the message out that things in Iraq are relatively the same as they are in Overland Park," Kansas, the headquarters of Nadler's Americas Majority.

Profiles
According to his Speaker's Biography for the May 17, 2006, event at the American Enterprise Institute:


 * "Sergeant J. D. Johannes joined the Marines one week out of high school in 1991. His superiors sent him to combat correspondent training, then to military journalism school at Ft. Benjamin Harrison, Indiana. During Johannes’s active-duty career, he served as a public affairs officer, a combat correspondent, and a platoon leader with the Twenty-Fourth Marine Regiment out of Kansas City. He was transferred to the reserves in 1994, and discharged as a Sergeant in 1999. As the Iraq War approached, Johannes found his way back to his old unit as an independent newsman, providing feeds for local news stations in Kansas and Missouri. By 2005, he was in Iraq covering the Twenty-Fourth Marines out of Camp Fallujah. Johannes accompanied them on ambush operations, ordnance searches, snatch and grab, and security and stabilization operations. He was also present in Baghdad when the members of the Iraqi national assembly finalized their new constitution. His versatile career has included stints as a news photographer, a documentary producer, and a news director. In politics, he has served as an aide to Kansas senator Sam Brownback and as a special assistant to Kansas attorney general Phill Kline."

Quotes by Johannes
"I have concluded, based both on my experience, and the reports of other newsmen, that an unconscionable amount of what we in the press have been feeding the American public regarding the war in Iraq is fashioned by the propaganda arms of our enemies. Ba’athist kidnappers and Jihadi bombers are planning their operations not to win the war in Iraq, but to win it in America. To that end, they are assessing what American reporters are willing to cover, and what American news organizations are willing to risk.

"Stated simply: Al Qaida is not even trying to win the war on the ground anymore. It is attempting to win the war in the press."&mdash;From Speech delivered at the American Enterprise Institute, May 17, 2006.

Related SourceWatch Resources

 * blogging
 * information operations
 * information warfare

Articles by J.D. Johannes

 * "4th Generation Warfare: The Mathematics of the Information War," Faces from the Front, July 5, 2005.
 * "Cheap-skate Media Stilts Iraq Coverage," Daily Dispatch/Americas Majority, April 5, 2006.
 * "Reporting from Iraq. Veterans Speak Out on the Media’s Coverage of the Iraq War," American Enterprise Institute, May 17, 2006. Speakers: Cpl. Richard Gibson, U.S. Marine Corps; Lt. Lawrence Indyk, U.S. Army; Sgt. J.D. Johannes, U.S. Marine Corps; Commentator: F.J. "Bing: West, "author, former assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs."
 * "Text of JD's Speech at the American Enterprise Institute," Faces from the Front, May 17, 2006.

Interviews

 * Max Borders, "Live Bait: Grunt with a Camera Eye," TCS Daily/Tech Central Station, June 15, 2006.

2002

 * Tim Hrenchir, "One vote at a time," The Topeka Capital-Journal (Kansas) Online, July 8, 2002.

2005

 * Transcript: "Secretary Rumsfeld Interview with Jerry Agar KMBZ News Radio 980 Kansas City, Kan.," U.S. Department of Defense/DefenseLINK, June 27, 2005.
 * J.D. Allen, "Faces from the Front?" Mouth of the Brazos, July 20, 2005.
 * Glenn Reynolds, "Watch Out Hollywood. The entertainment industry's real threat isn't piracy, it's backyard Spielbergs armed with digital moviemaking gear," Popular Mechanics, October 2005.

2006

 * "So We've Heard," Fire Dennis Moore Blogspot, February 26, 2006. re dispute over who is editor of the Kansas Political News (KansasPoliticalNews.com) website; "Johannes, a top Phill Kline operative"
 * Randy Hall, "'Job Is Getting Done' in Iraq, Despite US Press, Veterans Say," Cybercast News Service, March 10, 2006.
 * Richard Nadler, "John, Meet Jack. We do have reliable information about how things are going in Iraq," National Review, March 13, 2006.
 * Kevin Holtsberry, "An Army of Davids by Glenn Reynolds," Collected Miscellany Blog, March 28, 2006.
 * Eric Barton, "Good News From Iraq. Brought to you by hometown patriots!" Kansas City Strip/The Pitch, April 6, 2006.
 * David Weigel, "An Army of Bloggers. How to turn low-budget revolutionaries into respectable members of the establishment," Reason Online, July 2006.