A 30 April 2003 Media Lens database search, covering the period leading up to and including the invasion of Iraq found that, of the 5,767 articles published by "The Guardian" and its sister paper "The Observer", only twelve made any mention of Scott Ritter. According to Edwards, this constituted "a shocking suppression of serious and credible dissident views", which he said were "soon to be entirely vindicated". Eddie Girdner agreed with Media Lens and cited it as one of the few who had drawn this conclusion before the war began.