My War Scrapbook

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war photographers were everywhere in war they followed the men,but lots were killed.
 
Keep in mind that guys taking photos in those day, at least for the Americans, were soldiers. They were combat correspondents. It was a two-fold purpose, one, the film and photos they took could be screened before they went to the press. Two, they knew how to handle themselves accordingly when the fit hit the shan and didn;t need to be protected like the reporters of today.
 
I think my old man would have just tried to make his reports without getting in anyones way too much.

Trouble is, it only takes one hack to do dumbo things to tar the rest of them with the same brush.
 
I can't speak for the British reporters. I have just watched some American ones do some really stupid things during the latest war. Geraldo Rivera pretty much gave away the position they were in. I saw one where a Marine was in the prone position and a reporter walked up and asked what he was doing. The marine replied "I am protecting you, now get down". Egads!
 
Its the general consensus that the BBC ones are the most sober and mature in both their coverage and conduct in conflict situations.

One guy who worked with my dad when he was just starting his career roughly fifteen years ago, was embedded with Royal Marines from 40 Commando when they assaulted the Al-Faw peninsula.

As far as I knew him, he was a really friendly and sensible guy. I remember showing him a rather bodgy model of an F-16! (I was only a Minimed at the time!)
 
For Christ's sake, isn't there some kind of national security loophole that can be used to end that sort of nonsense once and for all?

Politics! Sheesh!!
 
I know. Personally, I think that Geraldo should have been shot. Treasonous work. To make matters worse, as a civilian, he was supposed to let the military protect him. He carried a gun into a combat zone! That classifies him as a combatant. If he had been grabbed by the Iraqis, it would have been bad for him.
 
Well, if I'd been the C.O of those Marines, the questions I'd have been asking would have been why this guy was allowed to wander around like that? - who was meant to be baby-sitting him? - had he been made fully aware of what he was and wasn't expected to do?

Any future conflicts are going to be 24 hour coverage, and there's no avoidance of that, so a sensible option would be to insist any correspondents go through a 'boot camp' so that they're left in no doubt what is required.

This won't stop the freelance journalists who operate outside the media pools, but then, the army isn't responsible for them, and it's their head alone.
 
I don't like the idea of Press close to the front its a distraction from the mission and uses resources (troops) that can be better employed elsewhere it also causes people at home to get a very false view of events as one 5 minute clip is too isolated from the overall flow of things and it ends up as propaganda Eg although not press film the military in Iraq 1 made the mistake of showing bombs going down chimneys or going through doors and all the people back home started saying this is going to be a piece of piss so when the body bags start coming home no one can relate the two events and they start loosing faith in the information which can under mine support for the guys doing the business.
I think as far as WW2 go,s the US had far more people recording events than anybody else this is why the largest proportion of film is of US actions.
On D-Day my old man saw a beached landing craft that had LCT(P) on the side it turned out it was a photographic processing vessel for US film/reporting crews.
 
You brought up some excellent points, trackend. While I found myself glued to the CNN coverage, watching the guys going through the desert on the tanks, I don't think it is something set for live TV. The other thing I was concerned about is if it got real ugly, real fast, as things often do in a war zone, my family would get an eyeful of gore. I've seen it before, but my family has mercifully not. Personally, I don't really want to see it again either.
 
I doubt if I have seen as much of that kind of thing as yourself but I do know what you mean. Even in my current job on the railroad I occasionally come across dismembered and mangled body parts and its still not a very nice sight.
I have a question for Evan
As Vietnam was the first televised war do you think it was this that turned a large amount of public opinion against it and caused the US government to withdraw its forces. (Via the ballot box, as I seem to remember Nixon used (was it, Peace with Honour as a slogan?) during his campaign). Although I know little of the conflict the US appeared to have the upper hand and could have won had it not been for pressure applied from the public.
I just thought it would be interesting to hear your take on the use of TV/The Media in that particular conflict, cheers Evan.
 
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