[Leica] Military censorship (long)

["Sal DiMarco,Jr." <sdmp007@pressroom.com>]

Luggers,
        To further confuse the issue....
        In Vietnam, the accredited media agreed to follow a set of
guidelines set down by the military. Basically, it was don't report anything
which could give the enemy tactical information. Unit size, exact location,
etc....
      For this, the media was given free access  to the battlefield,
transportation, etc. when possible.
      According to a Department of Defense (DoD) statement their
"guidelines" were broken in Vietnam only twice, and by newbies who didn't
know better.
      Another factor, was Lyndon Johnson... He was a very powerful man, and
did not like to be told bad news. He said many times,  he did not want to be
the first American President to lose a war. So, things like "body counts"
started and the military particularly the officers lost creditability with
the media. Remember the "creditability gap?"  Looking after their careers,
they blamed the media for their problems and the inept way they either
conducted or were forced to conduct the war.
     General William Westmoreland came out of the Vietnam War as a loser,
not a hero. Unlike, Eisenhower in W.W.II and MacArthur in Korea.
    I think the military leadership in this country felt the media was
against them and decided for the next "war" the media would be "handled"
differently.
    The next "war" (my word) was Grenada. The military tried to sneak in
without alerting the media. Probably a good from a strategic point of view,
but some people found out and were on hand when our troops landed. (please
note-- they did NOT tell the bad guys.)
    After the news broke, the military tried to limit access. This
eventually led to
the establishment of the DoD pool for future battles. The pool was a TV
crew, a radio reporter, wire service reporter, wire service photographer and
magazine photographer. These people carried pagers and had to be ready to
leave in a moments notice. They were to be given access and
transmission facilities for their material until the situation was
stabilized enough to allow more media on site.
    The first test of the system was Panama. It failed. The military did not
allow the pool access to the action. TIME magazine sent
me to Dover AFB to photograph first returning causalities and to pick-up the
DoD magazine pool film. The film was not on the flight. I later was told,
the officer in charge of handling the packet deliberately delayed it.  FYI-
He failed to realize how
resourceful we can be. Sam Donaldson hand carried the film to Washington the
next day.
    This brings us to the Gulf War. With months of planning, a system was
agreed to by both sides. Again, the military failed to keep their promises.
Dispatches were delayed, lost and often heavily censored.
    Two things I remember very well, David Turnley's photo of the soldier
crying when he heard the person in the body bag next to him was his friend,
was held by the military censors for almost a week. The other was the pool
reporter's dispatch from the first carrier based sorties. The reporter
described the returning pilots as "giddy." The ship's captain without
telling the reporter, changed the word to "pumped" along with changing other
non-military details and finally delaying transmission for an inexcusable
amount of time. It may sound minor, but I think there is a big difference
between giddy and pumped.
    It turned out the best work was done by the reporters and photographers
who after trying to work with in the pool, abandoned it.
    To be fair, I should remind everyone, the media and military are
opposite side of the coin. In the military you are taught to obey and follow
orders. A good journalist learns to question authority and hopefully search
out the facts. Anyone who has ever contradicted a general knows what I mean.

Cheers,

Sal DiMarco, Jr.