1. Introduction

In the first weeks of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, newspapers registered record readership levels (^{Pavlik, 2022}). The Times, for example, gained 1,000 daily subscribers in the first two weeks, one of its highest growth rates; likewise, The Guardian announced February 2022 as its fifth most successful month in page views (^{Kersley, 2022}). Although attention waned later, the conflict’s geostrategic, economic, and humanitarian implications generated significant interest. However, little attention has been paid to what happens behind the scenes of the media coverage. This analysis asks who is covering the war in Ukraine, what this says about war reporting, and what it implies for journalists. Ultimately, this article explains the role of war correspondents in the platform era.

This issue is relevant. A Reuters Institute survey showed that audiences in four countries followed the war closely; Germany stood out, followed by Brazil, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The survey results also showed a public demand for the media to focus on the broader implications of the conflict (^{Eddy & Fletcher, 2022}).

War coverage is as old as armed conflicts, given that, since its beginnings, war journalismhas been part of the armed forces. The first unarmed civilian sent to the front with a reporting mission was William Howard Russell, who covered the Crimean War of 1854 for the British newspaper The Times (^{Sánchez Gómez, 2018}, p.6).

The emergence of 24/7 television news in the 1980s meant that journalists were required to constantly update audiences, especially in times of war (^{Sambrook, 2010}). But the advent of the Web and, later, social platforms, coupled with the ideological polarization of media and public opinion (^{Makhortykh & Bastian, 2022}) and cutbacks in foreign correspondents and bureaus (^{Sambrook, 2010}) posed a significant challenge for international coverage. While brands can build trust (^{Sambrook, 2010}), today, more people are turning to alternative providers, such as blogs and platforms, which typically do not verify or edit information (^{Information Agency, 2021}). For example, 40% of Americans said they are finding out about the war online, 31% from television, 5% from radio, and 3% from newspapers (^{Eddy & Fletcher, 2022}). Although most news organizations are on the Web, this tension indicates that less conventional ways of getting information are gaining space.

This article explores who covered the Ukraine invasion to investigate new war coverage patterns. The invasion of Ukraine has been chosen because of its hybrid character,as disinformation plays an important role (^{Pavlik, 2022}). We first review the role of foreign correspondents and the evolution of war coverage in Spain and the USA, where the chosen newspapers are based.

2. Reference framework

3. Methodology

The research questions are: Who is covering the war in Ukraine, and whether major newspapers in Spain and the U.S. rely more on war correspondents, freelancers, news agencies, newsroom stories, or other types of authorship. The objective is to elucidate the relevance of war correspondets. We have conducted a text analysis of 11,268 11,268 bylines or signatures to respond to the questions.

Concretely, the analysis investigates how some of the most widely read newspapers in Spain (El País, El Mundo, El Correo, and La Vanguardia) and the U.S. (The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times,USA Today and New York Post) reported on the war. The bylines were a) published duringthe first week of the war (February 24 to March 2, 2022); b) extracted from the newspapers’ digital archives; c) filtered using Google’s search engine, using keywords such as “war,” “invasion,” “Ukraine,” or “Russia;” or c) manually selected to detect headlines without relevant terms. Some headlines may not have been detected due to human error. The Google search was done using terms that do not reflect the point of view of pro-Russian media who may use the terminology offered by the Russian regime, calling the war “an operation.” However, it is difficult to state that this would influence the research results.

The bylines are used to track the authors of the articles, their names, and their working relationship with the newspaper. This relationship has been established through descriptions provided by the organization or by examining the correspondents’ personal accounts on platforms such as Twitter or LinkedIn. According to their employment relationship, the authors have been classified into six categories and three subcategories.

Only reporters who report from outside the country where their newspaper is based havebeen considered international correspondents. For this study, reporters from different U.S. states or Spanish provinces presented by their organizations as correspondents have been registered as part of the editorial staff. In cases where a byline combined different authors, the category with the least representation in the sample was prioritized to offer a broader picture. For example, a byline signed by an international correspondent and another reporter from the newsroom were counted as an international correspondent.

We use “byline” as a synonym for “news story” since we only consider one byline per news item. For this analysis, the typology of Table 1 has been considered to code the news. Elaborated by the authors based on Sánchez Gómez (2021), A.P. (2021), and ^{Encyclopedia Britannica (2023)}.

Some authors’ labor relationship with the newspaper is unclear without access to their contracts. All newspapers, except USA Today, provide information about their bylines, butit is difficult to assess their employment status even when they do. Sometimes, the information provided only includes journalists’ previous jobs without specifying their current assignments. Meanwhile, the “about the firm” section of El País and La Vanguardia does not identify whether special correspondents have been sent to cover the war, although it does specify the news source. In others, such as WSJ and NYT, it is more difficult to determine whether reporters assigned to cover the war were sent to the battlefield. Both provide summaries of their reporters’ portfolios but lack information on where they are located. One example is Valerie Hopkins, presented by NYT as “an international correspondent covering the war in Ukraine, as well as in Russia and the countries of the former Soviet Union.” The description leaves room to classify her as an international correspondent in Ukraine, Russia, or neighboring countries. Going to her LinkedIn page, she appears to be a NYT correspondent in Moscow; still, we have coded her byline as an international correspondent in Ukraine, as another article places her thereduring the first week of the invasion (^{Maher & Turvill, 2022}).

Another challenge has been to detect independent workers, as few newspapers are transparent about their contributions (^{Argiz, 2006}). However, some working relationships are long-lasting (^{Gutiérrez Cuesta, 2021}). As a result, they are often presented as part of their staff. For example, Mikel Ayestarán, who defines himself as a freelancer on his website, is portrayed by El Correo as its correspondent in the Middle East. For this reason, his articles have been assigned to the freelancer category. Also, NYP refrains from providing information about his freelancers. We identified Hollie McKay and Vladislav Davidzon, who reported from Ukraine and contributed to NYP, asfreelancers after reviewing their Twitter and LinkedIn accounts.

While the agencies are always credited, their correspondents receive little credit. Only a few

A.P. correspondents are identified by name in a series of USA Today articles. Anonymity conveys the idea that news stories are of equal quality, which is common in agency news (^{Murray, 2023}). However, the absence of bylines is uncommon in magazines; evenso, some media, such as The Economist (three of whose articles were published in La Vanguardia), also defend anonymity as a way of empowering a single collective voice (^{The Economist, 2013}).

A small percentage of the articles observed come from other media of the same group. This is the case of articles from The Topeka Capital-Journal, Florida Today, and others published by USA Today; all belong to Gannet (^{Gannet Co., 2023}). Finally, the contributions of experts who are not part of a newspaper are challenging to identify and required verifications. Such were the cases of historian José María Faraldo, Professor Clara Portela, and analyst Javier Solana, writing for El País.

We converted the absolute numbers into percentages by dividing the amount of news found per category by the total amount of war news in each category and multiplying thenumber obtained by one hundred. The formula was applied first to each newspaper, thento all Spanish and U.S. newspapers, and finally to all media. The numbers in the subcategories are also included in their respective categories.

4. Results

The first result of this analysis is that international news agencies have made a remarkable, although not massive, contribution (12.46% of total coverage). U.S. newspapers outnumber Spanish newspapers, with 14.94% of their stories from agencies, compared to 10.11% in the Spanish media. The most significant variations are observed between newspapers. El Correo published no agency content, and El País published a tiny percentage (1.75%) from OTR PRESS and other unspecified agencies. Meanwhile, 11.38% of what La Vanguardia published were reports from the EFE agency and others from unidentified agencies, which specify the origin of their news stories from Kyiv, Moscow,Beijing, Berlin, Brussels, or Geneva. Likewise, El Mundo, with more than a fifth of its content coming from news agencies (24.36%), is the Spanish newspaper with the most agency content (from Europa Press, EFE, AFP, AP, Tresb, Servimedia, and GTRES). However, USA Today is ahead, with 38.94% of its content coming from a single agency, AP AP’s contributions to USA Today are mostly audiovisual content. The presence of agency content in the rest of the American newspapers is anecdotal, with 5.18% and 4.75%, respectively; NYT and NYP only included news from A.P. and Reuters, a British agency, while WSJ did not publish agency content (see Table 1).

The second result is that the presence of freelancers was generally low (2.03% of the total).

U.S. dailies also outperformed Spanish dailies, with 2.57% of the coverage signedby freelancers compared to 1.52%. The low presence of freelancers covering this war from the major dailies stands out. According to the data, their contributions have been more of an exception than the rule. El Correo and El País are the two Spanish media with more freelance content, with 2.80% and 2.05%, respectively; in them, Mikel Ayestarán from Kyiv and Lviv, Miguel Gutiérrez Garitano from Odesa and Jorge Said from Zaporizhya stand out. It is also worth mentioning the publications of Hollie McKay and Vladislav Davidzon from Ukraine for NYP, making it the newspaper with the highest percentage of freelance content (6.01%). Meanwhile, Marchichka Varenikova, a freelancejournalist and producer based in Kyiv, and Masha Froliak, a journalist and audiovisual content producer, for NYT, accounted for 1.62% of the coverage by freelancers (Table 2).

Thirdly, the study indicates that, perhaps because of Ukraine’s geographical proximity and its emphasis on quantity of production, the Spanish media offered more international news than the American newspapers -9.25% versus 4.25%, respectively- (Table 1). In Spain, all newspapers used a single correspondent to cover the Russian side of the border: Gonzalo Aragonés, from La Vanguardia, Javier G. Cuesta, from El País, Xavier Colás, from El Mundo, and Rafael M. Mañueco, from El Correo, based in Moscow. Special envoys covered the Ukrainian side to the main cities where the war front was advancing (Lviv, Zhytomyr, Avdiivka, Sloviansk, Vuhlevar, Dnipro, Medikam, and Zaporizhya), as well as to Poland, the leading country receiving refugees (^{DatosRTVE, 2023}). Few journalists were sent to Ukraine. In El País, the bylines are by Pilar Bonet, María R. Sahuquillo, and Luis de Vega, with the support of Cristian Segura from Poland. El Mundo had two special correspondents, Javier Espinosa and Alberto Rojas. La Vanguardia deployed Félix Flores and Plàcid García Planas, with the support of María-Paz Flores, the international correspondent in Berlin, temporarily sent to Poland. El Correo only sent Álvaro Ybarra Zavala (Table 2).

In the U.S., a different picture is found, as some media had bureaus in those countries andsent larger teams. A fourth result indicates that bylines were recurring, implying a limited number of journalists writing from the heart of the war. For example, WSJ and NYT followed the same pattern, covering the Russian side from their permanent bureaus thereand the Ukrainian side from their bureaus and with special envoys. According to WSJ, its Ukraine coverage was led by James Marson, a journalist covering the country for 15 years. As of January 2022, his team included Yaroslov Trofimov, chief international affairs correspondent, who had already covered the 2014 Maidan revolution, and special envoy Brett Forrest, the first reporter to gain access to theKyiv suburb of Bucha after the withdrawal of Russian troops. On the Russian side, this newspaper relied on contributions from Ann M. Simmons, the Moscow bureau chief, Alan Culison,a reporter in the area since 1999, and Evan Gershkovich, detained on espionage charges since March 29, 2022. Also, the NYT relied on information from its Moscow bureau chief, Anton Troianovsky, and Valerie Hopkins, a Moscow correspondent relocated to Ukraine (See Table 2). In addition, the newspaper included two articles written by Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian presidential bureau and a contribution by Ukrainian journalist Veronika Melkozerova. As for NYP and USA Today, bylines from the field were scarcer. NYP had one reporter focused on war coverage, Evan SimkoBednarki, whose presence on site could not be determined. Meanwhile, USA Today had Katelyn Ferral in Ukraine, Anna Nemtsova, East Asia correspondent for The Daily Beast, and a USA Today contributor in Moscow. This newspaper also published Gabriela Miranda, a reporter assigned to the war in Ukraine (Table 2). The latter was forced to resign after an investigation proved irregularities in her use of sources and lack of transparency (^{Gordon, 2022}). In short, Russia was covered by regular correspondents already in the country, while Ukraine left room for more special envoys.

In the face of the Russian blockade, one might have expected that Ukrainian openness to international media would have favored sending more correspondents to Ukraine and limited coverage from Russian soil (^{Corral, 2022}). However, a fifth finding is that greater access to Ukrainian terrain and sources did not translate into greater coverage. The data indicate that only 3.48% of the news came from Ukraine, while another 3.36% came fromRussia (Table 1). This result points to the fact that, in general, the dispatch of reporters to Ukraine is matched by the presence of bureaus in Russia. Despite their costly maintenance (^{Sambrook, 2010}), maintaining foreign bureaus proved their relevance in a context of closure.

We have also analyzed part of the health status of foreign bureaus and correspondents. International correspondents were responsible for 15.23% of the news, thus surpassing the percentage of coverage from news agencies and freelancers. The USA, with 12.37% of the total number of international correspondents, loses out to Spain (with 17.93%) due to the nonexistence of correspondents in USA Today and NYP. However, WSJ and NYT had the most extensive and solid network of foreign correspondents. The NYT, the newspaper with the highest percentage, 31.82%, of its total war stories written by correspondents, claims to have 31 bureaus outside the U.S. In the sample, NYT correspondents reported from Berlin, Brussels, Rome, Geneva, London, and Paris, coinciding with the traditional U.S. interest in the U.K. and Europe. The sample also included articles from many other cities. At WSJ, which shows a high percentage of international correspondents (responsible for 24.77% of its coverage), authors were basedin Frankfurt, Berlin, Europe, Paris, London, and Brussels. The sample also included bylines from North Africa, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. However, the sixth finding is that most newspapers relied on newsroom reports, accounting for 65.64% of all war news. This work has been enriched with experts from outside the staff of the newspapers, whose knowledge of history, geopolitics, or economics was essential to provide the keys to the conflict. In El País, these collaborations accounted for 11.40% ofthe coverage (Table 1).

Finally, a seventh finding is that most of the headlines belonged to male reporters, whilea small percentage, 18.45% of the coverage, was signed by women. In most cases, the female headlines were signed by a small group of women reporting from the Ukrainian side. Only Ann M. Simmons, WSJ Moscow bureau chief, and Anna Nemtsova, special Moscow correspondent for USA Today, sent their articles from Russia. In the U.S., freelancer Hollie McKay at NYP reduced women’s fieldwork to pieces. At WSJ, apart from Simmons, only freelancer Natalia Ojewska was broadcasting from somewherenear Warsaw. At USA Today, Nemtsova’s work was enriched by Katelyn Ferral from Ukraine and a single contribution from Ukrainian journalist Nastia Gospinchenk. The NYT had the most significant number of female headlines in the U.S. (10), signed by international correspondents in Ukraine, Valerie Hopkins and Lara Jakes. The work of photojournalist Lynsey Addario was recognized in Andrew E. Kramer’s bylines and, in this analysis, her contribution was taken into account as a woman working from the front. Correspondent Carlota Gall and Kyiv-based freelancer Marichka Varenikova also worked for the NYT from Ukraine, as did Ukrainian contributor Veronika Melkozerova.

Table 2 shows the results obtained, providing a framework for comparing countries and newspapers.

Table 3 lists the names of the journalists and agencies mentioned to make it easier to match their work with their media and country of origin.

Finally, Table 4 summarizes the results to provide a clear and concise picture beforediscussing the results and conclusions.

As seen in Table 4, the results show a reliance on international news agencies for war news, while the number of unaffiliated freelance journalists. The analysis shows a difference between the Spanish and the American newspapers, which published relatively less news from the ground than their European counterparts. Alternative sources, such as platforms, blogs, or citizen journalism, filled this gap. Also, the analysis of the bylines shows that the Russian blockade did not prevent the overall coverage, although the Ukrainian openness facilitated a more direct coverage from the ground. Crucially, the war was mostly covered from the security of newsrooms, while most of the bylines were by male reporters.

5. Discussion and conclusions

The results do not match the initial assumptions. Based on ^{Molina (2012b}), it was expected that most of the international news would be covered by agencies and freelancers. Considering the international perspective of U.S. media and more significantresources than Spanish media (^{Brüggemann et al., 2016}), the former was expected to deploy more journalists. The better access granted by Ukraine to the war zone (^{Prieto, 2022}) also led to expect a more prominent presence of foreign journalists there than in Russia. Finally, because of the availability of online information and the costly maintenance of international bureaus abroad (Sambrook, 2010), it was to be expected thatthey would not play a decisive role.

The data analysis contradicts the notion that news agencies and freelancers led the way in war coverage. Economic pressures and media corporatization have been blamed for prioritizing profits and exclusives over news quality (Sambrook, 2010). As a result, it hasbeen said that on-site coverage has been replaced by content generated by news agencies and precarious freelancers (^{Brüggemann et al., 2016}). This study contradicts this idea, although its limitations prevent generalization. Probably the conclusions would have been different if the object of study had been independent newspapers with fewer resources instead of eight large-circulation dailies belonging to conglomerates. Membership in these groups allows newspapers to operate beyond profitability. The NYP was not profitable until 2022 (^{Turvill, 2021}) but could operate because of funding from the company to which it belongs, News Corp. This corporation, owned by tycoon Rupert Murdoch (^{News Corp., 2022}), also absorbed WSJ publisher Dow Jones and Company (^{Maher, 2022}). Another corporate giant, Gannet, owns USA Today and 109 other media outlets (^{Bomey, 2019}). The Sulzberger family has controlled the NYT since 1896 (^{Villalonga & Hartman, 2007}). As for Spanish newspapers, all of them are part of large media groups. El País belongs to the most prominent Spanish media group, PRISA (^{Dircomfidencial, 2023}); La Vanguardia is part of Grupo Godó (^{Cuesta & Planas, 2023}); El Correo belongs to Grupo Vocento (^{Sousa et al., 2023}), and El Mundo is part of Unidad Editorial (^{Unidad Editorial, 2023}).

Coverage of the conflict has been affected by the poor health of the media in their home countries. Shorter war stories and an audience focused on national news might have meantthat the Spanish deployment on the ground was smaller than the U.S. one. However, the data collected show that the Spanish field teams, with 9.27% of the total Spanish media coverage, outnumbered the U.S. teams, which did not exceed 5% of the total U.S. coverage of the war. However, although the percentages indicate that there has been a more significant Spanish on-site deployment, the reality is that the U.S. media continue to have a greater overall international deployment. This is evidenced by the higher percentage of international correspondent bylines in two U.S. newspapers and the greater global reach of U.S. foreign bureaus. Spanish media bylines’ recurrence and origin indicate that they tend to have single-person bureaus and a smaller geographic spread. Thus, thanks to the larger size of their media and better financial support, the U.S. continues to provide better coverage of events from abroad.

The percentages extracted cannot reflect the disappearance and reduction of bureaus abroad (^{Gray, 2017}; Molina, 2012) since the analysis is limited to exploring the current media situation and does not compare it with previous scenarios. Even so, the closure ofbureaus is a widespread reality that began in the U.S. Without going any further, the WSJ has closed its bureaus in Budapest, Madrid, and Riyadh and has reduced those in Moscow,India, Scandinavia, and Berlin (Gray, 2017). In Spain, newspapers limit their foreign coverage to major European cities and the largest American cities and have little presence in Latin America and the Middle East. El Correo has the highest percentage, 24.77%, ofinternational correspondent firms, but, about its websites, El País stands out as the Spanish medium with the greatest international projection. Its presence extends to 45countries (^{EdP, 2023}). Despite the scope of its foreign bureaus, most of them cannot compete with the North American ones’ size, staff, and equipment.

Usually, the outbreak of war produces the largest deployment of media on the ground. This is common; when a country goes to war, so does its media. However, the bylines in both countries were recurrent, and only 6.84% came from the war zone. Due to the study’s time frame, only the work of journalists whose names appeared in the bylines was considered, without considering other professionals sent afterward. Despite this, it was possible to see how much media space was reserved for the war. Ukraine occupied almost one-fifth, 22.72%, of the total coverage of the analyzed media.It seems contradictory that, with so much media attention, the content of each media outlet from the war zone has been so scarce. This has to do with the transformation of journalists from witnesses to part of the conflict (^{Greste, 2017}), as, for example, happened in the coverage of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. President George Bush used the media to support the false idea that Iraq was behind the September 11, 2001 attacks and was hiding nuclear weapons (^{Merchant, 2023}).

The Russian blockade of international media limited coverage on Russian soil (^{Corral, 2022}), while Ukrainian openness allowed special correspondents to be sent to its territory. While the increased access to Ukrainian terrain has favored benevolent coverage by Western media (^{Makhortykh & Bastian, 2022}), it has not translated into more coverage.

Both countries included the media in their military strategies, which led them to control their access to sensitive areas to prevent the dissemination of uncomfortable information.Russia forced the closure of media outlets and attacked journalists on Ukrainian soil(^{Corral, 2022}). This did not prevent veteran correspondents based in the country from broadcasting news, mainly from Moscow. The productivity of correspondents stationed in Russia has meant that, despite being fewer than those sent to Ukraine, they have produced practically the same number of news stories. On the other hand, Ukraine offeredgreater access to sources and territory. (^{Prieto, 2022}). In this country, platforms such as Telegram, Viber, and Twitter have played a key role, offering the possibility of citizen journalism and open-source intelligence (OSINT). A survey by Research and Branding Group found that, in 2021, Ukrainians chose the Internet as their primary source of news over traditional television (^{Information Agency, 2021}). Perhaps the greater availability of these sources meant that correspondents’ and special envoys’ bylines were less prominent.

The analysis concluded that the newsroom dominated the coverage of the war, occupying 65.64% of the total number of bylines. Consequently, most of the news content was produced thousands of kilometers away from the war scenes. However, face-to-face coverage continues to be valued. Thus, the digitization and outsourcing of war coverage have compensated for the lack of resources and reduced access to war zones. Not much remains of the great international newsrooms of the 20th century. Today, oneperson bureaus covering large regions are common, and correspondents are sent around the world to perform different assignments. However, Ukraine demonstrates that correspondents are still useful, although most international sections are written from newsrooms.

Many women are now involved in war journalism, but their contribution is still less than that of men. A small percentage of bylines (18.45%) belonged to women, mostly writing from Ukraine. Only Simmons of The WSJ and Nemtsova of USA Today wrote from Russia. In Spain, only El País had two women in the field, Sahuquillo and Bonet. This confirms that war journalism is still a field where equality does not occur (UndaEndemaño et al., 2022). The reasons go beyond the scope of this study.

The challenges facing the media are evident in war journalism. Those who cover wars must deal with precariousness, increased competition and shrinking audiences and face inaccessible scenarios, biased sources, and censorship. Digital technology has confronted the media with the rupture of time and space, giving rise to journalism’s worst and best moments. Today, anyone can transmit information instantly from anywhere. The digitization of information has democratized it, but it has also corrupted and devalued it (^{Sánchez Gómez, 2018}). If before it was an elite of foreign correspondents who offered exclusive information from abroad, now the latest news reaches the newsrooms in advance. Faced with the impossibility of restricting the circulation of information and disinformation, governments resort to blocking digital platforms and launching hoaxes; this is amplified in times of war. Conflicts incorporate powerful emotions into coverage, and the information field interferes with the battlefield, giving rise to hybrid conflicts (^{Nazaruk, 2022}). Many journalists are no longer subject to protection and are exposed to imprisonment, censorship, attack, or assassination (^{Springer et al. 2022}). The audience, with more prominence than ever before, is increasingly turningto online sources of information.

This analysis suggests that the newsrooms themselves mainly cover the war in Ukraine. Although the media rely significantly on agency content, the study detected a downward trend in the contribution of freelancers. The most prominent international correspondents were already based in Russia, and the analysis documents the advantage of having foreign bureaus already in place. Meanwhile, the coverage from Ukraine was mainly in the hands of special envoys.