NEW YORK - Operation Truth (www.optruth.org), a national non-partisan group made up of the nation's newest Veterans, is announcingtoday that it has agreed to officiallysign-on with a new documentary and is beginning a fundraising drive that could result in the group becoming an Executive Producer of the film.

The Ground Truth, directed by Los Angeles filmmaker Patricia Foulkrod, tells the story of the war and the effect it is having on those who served, from their own perspective. Foulkrod has amassed hundreds of hours of interviews with Veterans of Operation Iraqi Freedom, and aims to finish production of the documentary for a Spring 2005 release.

Operation Truth sent an email to its membership base, asking supporters to raise $200,000 to complete production of the film. If the group reachesthat goal, Operation Truth will be an executive producer of the film.

"This is stuff Hollywood is scared to produce," said Paul Rieckhoff, Executive Director of Operation Truth, and himself a Veteran of the war. "But these are the stories that people need to hear. Had documentaries like this been out a year ago, issues like the lack of armor for Humvees might have been raised in the public awareness and something could have been done about it before a lot of our men and women died. Hopefully this film will raise awareness of a host of other issues, including mental trauma and other psychological illnesses facing returning troops,and move people to hold their elected officials accountable to create positive change."

A special screening of a short version of the documentary will be held tonight in New York City. Event details are available at Operation Truth's website, www.optruth.org.

A trailer of the film can be found here.