TNR breaks the suspense, comments on Beauchamp

Since our last statement on “Shock Troops,” a Diarist by Private Scott Thomas Beauchamp that we published in our July 23 issue, we have continued our investigation into the article’s veracity. On Wednesday, for a brief period, The Drudge Report posted several documents from the Army’s own investigation into Beauchamp’s claims. Among those documents was a transcript of a phone conversation that TNR Editor Franklin Foer and TNR Executive Editor J. Peter Scoblic had with Beauchamp on September 6—the first time the Army had granted TNR permission to speak with Beauchamp since it cut off outside contact with him on July 26. During this conversation, Beauchamp refused to discuss his article at all: “I’m not going to talk to anyone about anything,” he said. In light of that phone call, some have asked why The New Republic has not retracted “Shock Troops.”
(The Plank at The New Republic)

That, and why TNR said nothing about the conversation.

The explanation goes on to say that TNR just wanted to get out the truth. Apparently not the truth that Beauchamp was free to talk to the press but chose not to talk to the press, however. The update admits that Beauchamp's words in the phone converation "raised serious doubts" but not enough for TNR to tell anybody about it.

The next day, via his wife, we learned that Beauchamp did want to stand by his stories and wanted to communicate with us again. Two-and-a-half weeks later, Beauchamp telephoned Foer at home and, in an unmonitored conversation, told him that he continued to stand by every aspect of his story, except for the one inaccuracy he had previously admitted. He also told Foer that in the September 6 call he had spoken under duress, with the implicit threat that he would lose all the freedoms and privileges that his commanding officer had recently restored if he discussed the story with us.

So how's that investigation going?

"I'm saying that I'd rather you not to talk to the Washington Post, Newsweek or whoever else until we put our final judgment on your piece."
(leaked document)

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