Approximately 40 Boston University students and professors gathered Tuesday afternoon at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies to discuss the relationship between freedom of press and national security.
The discussion featured Carl Woog, former director for strategic communications at the National Security Council and a Boston University alumnus. Woog spoke about his experiences dealing with national security and the media and offered advice to Pardee students.
Woog said in an interview with The Daily Free Press that he decided to come back to BU to give the talk because “BU gave me an enormous appreciation for global affairs and journalism,” adding that without the encouragement he received from the BU community upon graduation, he would not have had the same experiences.
During his talk, Woog said one of the ways he wound up working for the White House was by treating “every opportunity and every setback as a chance to learn,” an advice that he imparted to the students.
Woog also told stories of working at the White House and earlier at the Department of Defense, which include dealing with the Benghazi incident, the 2016 election, the Orlando nightclub shooting and his trip to a British military base in Afghanistan, where there was a failed suicide attack.
In Afghanistan, Woog and the other members responsible for dispensing information decided not to immediately inform reporters of the failed attack. When reporters later found out about the attempted attack, they were understandably upset, which was reflected in their articles, Woog said.
“We had lost the trust of the reporters on our plane, and they wanted their readers all over the world to know that,” Woog said.
Woog was able to repair the relationship with the reporters, which came in handy in future years.
“Learn how to pursue facts and organize them into a strong argument for your goal or policy position,” Woog said. “Always ground your approach in truth because if you’re in government, that’s your responsibility.”
During the discussion section, Woog advocated for continued respect of the press, even in the current political climate.
“Our credibility as a country is at stake when we do not hold ourselves to those standards,” Woog said of visibility and respect toward the press.
One of the hardest but most important tasks Woog faced as a member of the communication team for the Department of Defense and the White House was having to tell journalists that no one knew what was going on yet.
“You have to be honest about what you know,” Woog said. “There’s this idea that [the government is] all-knowing and all-seeing, and in a lot of ways we are, but that’s not always the case. I would rather say ‘I don’t know’ and have momentary confusion than have to reframe and reframe.”
Several students who attended the talk said they gained a greater understanding of the political process and how government and the press work with each other.
Claire Coffey, a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences, said she came to the speech because she wanted to get an understanding of communication careers available in Washington D.C. for students with an international relations and political science background.
“I would love to be able to support the U.S. government,” Coffey said.
Corey Pray, a CAS senior, said he came because as a soon-to-be commissioned Air Force officer, the topics Woog discussed “are definitely pertinent to what I’m going to do.”
Ines Boussebaa, a senior in CAS and the College of Communication, said she came to the talk hoping to get some post-graduation advice from Woog.
“I’m definitely going to be taking [what he said] into consideration,” Boussebaa said.
