The Pentagon is seeking bids for a US$100 million upgrade to the IMN network, adding an all-news channel that would eventually be broadcast via satellite -- in direct challenge to the Arab satellite channels.
The winner of that contract will play a large role in shaping Iraq's media. The BBC is one of those in the running.
IMN and al-Iraqiya were conceived during the State Department's war preparations and are funded by the Defense Department.
After Baghdad fell, the Pentagon sent equipment and media experts from Science Applications International, a US defense contractor whose staff is packed with ex-US military and intelligence officials. SAIC hired 350 Iraqis for the network, which went live May 13.
IMN's current chief executive, Shameem Rassam, is an SAIC subcontractor and an Iraqi exile who anchored Iraq's state TV news in the 1960s until fleeing in 1990.
During Saddam's reign, TV news was stilted and anti-American, and satellite dishes were banned.
Getting Iraq's journalists and TV watchers used to press freedom is a big job, Rassam said.
"I hate to be compared with al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya," Rassam said. "We're working with people who had no chance to think for themselves for 30 years. And our audience, for 30 years, saw only one thing on TV. In six months, you expect them to believe this institution?"
Most Iraqis interviewed said they preferred al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya because of their mastery at covering breaking news.
But three men on a central Baghdad street said they were turned off by the two Arab satellite channels.
"They encourage the terrorists and they broadcast the Saddam Hussein recordings," said Ahmed Sabri, 22, a laborer from the Shiite slum of Sadr City.
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