By Menachem Wecker
“How does anyone introduce Bob Woodward?” said Karl Inderfurth, John O. Rankin Professor of the Practice of International Affairs. “How would you for instance try to introduce the Washington Monument, or maybe the Lincoln Memorial?”
Amb. Inderfurth, director of GW’s Graduate Program in International Affairs, admitted the comparison might be a bit hyperbolic. “But there is no question that Bob Woodward is a bona fide Washington institution,” he said, “and almost certainly the most celebrated journalist of our time, or I would say perhaps any time.”
Mr. Woodward, associate editor of the Washington Post and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, addressed about 175 people at the Elliott School of International Affairs in an event billed as a discussion about his new book Obama’s Wars.
But in his remarks and while fielding Amb. Inderfurth’s and the audience’s questions, Mr. Woodward spent more time discussing his four books on former President George W. Bush, the secret documents publicized by WikiLeaks, his journalistic methodology, the importance of supporting the military and his advice to aspiring reporters.
He was also more than happy to veer off topic. For instance, Mr. Woodward admitted he set up Google alerts for his name and reads blog posts that mention him. His assistant, Evelyn Duffy, B.A. ’07, maintains a Facebook page for him. “I think I never looked at it,” he said. “She’s got me doing all kinds of weird things.”
In an interview, Ms. Duffy, whom Mr. Woodward has called “a terrific editor” and “a young wizard of old and new media [who] can track down anything and anyone,” said she landed the job with Mr. Woodward a week before graduating.
“I remain convinced that English is the best major, because you can do anything with it,” she said. “It taught me how to write, and if you can write you can do anything.”
“Evelyn you make us all proud, and we are delighted to have you here,” Amb. Inderfurth said in his introduction of Mr. Woodward.
Asked by GW Today what he thought of the WikiLeaks documents, Mr. Woodward called them “authentic and credible,” but said the documents are only “secret,” whereas “top secret” is where “the real story is told.”
“You are seeing something without the really good stuff. It is necessarily distorting,” he said, adding that the documents’ “standing” is questionable. Most ambassadors’ cables never make it to the White House, which, particularly in the Obama administration, is where decisions are made, he said. “A lot of this does not have standing.”
The New York Times has called the WikiLeaks documents “an unvarnished account of how some of the biggest decisions are made in the United States government,” Mr. Woodward said. “I think that is an extreme exaggeration. It’s a glimpse. It’s not a complete story.”
Mr. Woodward also addressed two matters he holds very dear – the military and the role of journalism.
“Our wars define who we are to the world, and I think in a more important way, they define who we are to ourselves. They go down in the history books for good reason,” he said. “I don’t think you can cover the war enough.”
When asked for advice by a student in the audience who was going to Afghanistan to conduct interviews, Mr. Woodward said quantity is worth sacrificing for quality. Rather than conducting a single interview each with 20 people, Mr. Woodward recommended interviewing 10 people and then going back and re-interviewing those 10 people.
“You peel the onion and you get down to more central truths,” he said. “I think going back is central to understanding … You need to convince people you take them as seriously as they take themselves.”