From the rural, rebel-ravaged Democratic Republic of Congo to the urban battles of Iraq; from scrambled reports in middle of tragedy to the documentation of long-silent war zones, Kevin Sites (Medill ‘89) spent an entire year covering 22 conflicts around the globe for Yahoo! News.

“There is a myth about war we aren’t willing to give up, that it is about the combatants, the clash of armies,” Sites said. “War is really about the destruction of civil life.”

Not only did Sites want to cover every one of the world’s known conflicts, but he wanted to do it from a different perspective. Usually when war comes into homes via television or other communication, viewers get a brief recap of battles and body counts. What they don’t get, Sites said, is a sense of what it is like to be there, what the people are going through, what soldiers are really doing on a day-to-day basis and how it all affects civilians. Sites said it was important to cover conflict as civilians experience it.

“In the Congo, for every combatant killed, there are 60 non-combatant deaths,” Sites said.

The roots of Sites’ mission can be traced to an earlier controversy in Iraq. In November 2004, the unit with which Sites was traveling had subdued some insurgents in a gun battle. Afterwards, the insurgents were treated for their wounds, but left in a mosque as non-combatants. The following day, Sites shot video of a Marine shooting an unarmed, wounded Iraqi inside the same mosque. Shortly afterward, the video and the facts were presented in a package that aired on NBC.

“We got nominated for an Emmy; we shouldn’t have,” said Sites. “We buried the lead of the man being shot. We set it up for our viewers to have an opinion. That’s not reporting, that’s advocacy.”

Initially, he thought censoring the video was in the best interest of the American public, but Sites later reconsidered his decision and posted the entire video on his blog.

It wasn’t well received. He soon began getting more than 300 hate mail messages a day, many of which were death threats accusing him of being anti-American. Shortly thereafter, Sites left NBC to work for Yahoo! News. The Internet offered Sites much more freedom and allowed him to execute his idea of covering every war zone in the world in one year for a section called “Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone.”

“I was able to use the ‘net to tell a fuller story,” Sites said with a smile. “How lucky was I? A network would have laughed me out of the office.”

However, the venture was far from profitable: Yahoo! News lost about $1 million.

Over the next year, Sites produced 131 video clips, 183 text stories and 1,320 photos from across the world, documenting conflict and the people affected by it. His content ranged from interviews with child-soldiers in the Congo to young Iranians speaking about their government. Every piece put a face to strifes distant from Americans.

Sites said his adventure was successful.

“You as a citizen need to have all the information you can get to make good decisions,” Sites said. “These stories need to be told.”

Sites’ work has been made into a full length documentary, A World of Conflict, featuring most of the people and places he visited. The documentary was presented to its first audience at Fisk Hall on Wednesday evening. The images are gripping, raw, and difficult to view at points. For Sites, this honesty to his subject matter is the most important thing of all.

“I’m angry at the ignorance in the world,” he said.

Looking back, Sites said he is pleased with his work, but also said it was tiring beyond belief.

“I wouldn’t do it again for a million dollars and a date with Scarlett Johansson,” Sites joked.

Visit Sites’ “Hot Zone” Web site to see his complete coverage.