I've just been looking at the video of the scene moments before the blast that so shockingly injured ABC anchor Bob Woodruff and his cameraman, Doug Vogt. Both are riding on the outside of an Iraq armed forces tank near the town of Taji, northwest of Baghdad. The reporter has on a helmet and a bulletproof jacket while the sun shines on his face. He seems calm, almost confident. But suddenly, the video goes black.

      That was when the roadside bomb exploded. The blast was big enough to stop the camera as well. ABC executives managed to rescue the video and broadcast it as part of their news coverage. The reporter and cameraman, involuntarily, became news. And we have to ask, is all this worth it?

      The answer is indisputably "yes." Reporters are our eyes during a war. Without them we've no idea what's really happening. For the most part, I am never wholly trustful of politicians and even less when they are involved in such a lethal issue as war. No matter how objective they claim to be, the main interest of politicians (of any country) is simply to show their constituents they made the right choice, and thus they bend reality.

      A newsman does not have that pressure. Good reporters will narrate only what they see and nothing else. Without them, the world is blind.

      Let's be frank: Things are not going well in Iraq. The number of dead American soldiers has already reached 2,235. The United States spends a daily $13 million, on average, to finance military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

      And even President George W. Bush himself acknowledged in his recent State of the Union address that: "A sudden withdrawal of our forces from Iraq would abandon our Iraqi allies to death and prison."

      The new democracy in Iraq, therefore, is artificially propped up by the rifles of 138,000 American soldiers.

      That is why we need newspeople in Iraq. They can tell us what is really going on there. But the price has been terribly high. From March 2003 to date, 61 reporters have lost their lives in Iraq, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. That number is getting close to the 66 reporters killed covering the Vietnam conflict over nearly two decades. Conclusion: Today, reporters are dying more frequently than before.

      Others have been abducted, like freelancer Jill Carroll, who was on assignment for The Christian Science Monitor. And, as my courageous friend Gustavo Sierra from the Argentine newspaper El Clarin told me, hundreds more will forever suffer the psychological effects of reporting on death.

      What makes a journalist like Woodruff, who has four children and one of the world's most prestigious jobs in television with a multimillion dollar salary, risk his life in Iraq? It is an age-old question.

      Renowned journalist H.D.S. Greenway, who currently writes for Foreign Affairs, was recently pondering just that though he did have the wisdom to suggest an answer.

      "Why do journalists seek out wars? Is it for the glamour, the adventure, the adrenaline? Is it the desire to be in the front-row seat of history? Is it the public duty, professional advancement?" he asked. "All of the above... "

      That's true. I have been in five war conflicts _ in El Salvador, Kosovo, the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan, and recently in Iraq _ and you never stop asking yourself, "What the hell am I doing here?" Covering a war is repulsive and, at the same time, irresistible.

      The best journalists make a name for themselves during wars. Not only because they have to produce their information on deadline but before anything else they must survive the violence. A dead reporter is of no use to any news organization.

      The strange thing is that most journalists I've met in war zones are there by their own will. Some have even paid for their own airfare and expenses to be there.

      And that reminds me of author Nora Ephron's comment:

      "The awful truth is that for correspondents war is not hell. It is fun."

      I would hardly call it fun. But few times have I felt more alive in contrast to being surrounded by so much death. And I acknowledge that there is a certain degree of irresponsibility every time we cover a war.

      During the initial days of the conflict in Iraq, I and a small TV crew managed to cross into the southern town of Safwan. And almost irrationally, we impulsively entered deeper into Iraq, first walking and then on a truck. Producer Rafael Tejero, cameramen Jorge Soliño and Angel Matos accompanied me. We were completely alone, without any protection at all.

      We worked very fast, did a few interviews and a couple of video standups for the newscast before fleeing. But that heightened perception and intense rush _ of being in the exact place where the world is changing _ is unbeatable. There is nothing like being there. Besides, we knew we were getting information and video that put the news about the war in the right context. We were some of the first to report that the Iraqi people were not welcoming U.S. troops with flowers and music. Today, that sounds trite, but it was news then.

      Our risk was minimal if you compare it with the ones taken by reporters who covered the war from Baghdad or joined troops in combat. Others, much more courageous, would follow us. But at that moment we felt we were taking a big risk and that it was worth it.

      I guess Woodruff and Vogt were feeling something similar before personally experiencing that terrible explosion. Neither of them was forced to cover the war in Iraq. But, now, only they can say: I actually saw it, nobody told me.

      And there is nothing more valuable to a journalist than the satisfaction of knowing you are telling the truth ... and that people believe you.