The October 12 broadcast of ABC's World News with Charles Gibson and the October 13 edition of USA Today made no mention of British army commander Lt. Gen. Sir Richard Dannatt's October 12 claim that the presence of British troops in Iraq is fueling violence, and that British military forces should be withdrawn from the country.

In an interview with the Daily Mail (UK), Dannatt, the chief of the general staff of the British army, said that the British should “get ourselves out” of Iraq “sometime soon because our presence exacerbates the security problems.” Dannatt's remarks were reported on the October 12 broadcasts of NBC's Nightly News with Brian Williams and the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric, as well as in The New York Times and The Washington Post. The Los Angeles Times printed an October 12 Associated Press report.

The October 13 edition of USA Today featured two articles on Iraq: one on the number of journalists killed in Iraq since the war began, and another about two soldiers who were friends in high school and who were killed two days apart in Iraq. The October 12 broadcast of ABC's World News featured no reporting on Iraq.