|
A war correspondent is a journalist who covers stories firsthand from a war zone. In the 19th century they were also called Special Correspondents.
Methods
Their jobs require war correspondents to deliberately go to the most conflict-ridden parts of the world. Once there they attempt to get close enough to the action to provide written accounts, photos, or film footage. Thus, being a war correspondent is often considered the most dangerous form of journalism. On the other hand, war coverage is also one of the most successful branches of journalism. Newspaper sales increase greatly in wartime and television news ratings go up. News organizations have sometimes been accused of warmongering because of the advantages they gather from conflict. William Randolph Hearst is often said to have encouraged the Spanish-American War for this reason. (See Yellow journalism)
Only some conflicts receive extensive worldwide coverage, however. Among recent wars, the Kosovo War received a great deal of coverage, as did the Gulf War. Many third-world wars, however, tend to received less substantial coverage because corporate media are often less interested, the lack of infrastructure makes reporting more difficult and expensive, and the conflicts are also far more dangerous for war correspondents.
History
Written war correspondents have existed as long as journalism. Before modern journalism it was more common for longer histories to be written at the end of a conflict. The first known of these is Herodotus's account of the Persian Wars, however he did not himself participate in the events. Thucydides, who some years later wrote a history of the Peloponnesian Wars was an observer to the events he described.
The first modern war correspondent is said to be Dutch painter Willem van de Velde, who in 1653 took to sea in a small boat to observe a naval battle between the Dutch and the English, of which he made many sketches on the spot, which he later developed into one big drawing that he added to a report he wrote to the States General. A further modernization came with the development of newspapers and magazines . One of the earliest war correspondents was Henry Crabb Robinson, who covered Napoleon's campaigns in Spain and Germany for The Times of London.
Crimean War
William Howard Russell who covered the Crimean War, also for The Times, is often described as the first modern war correspondent. The stories from this era, which were almost as lengthy and analytical as early books on war, took many weeks from being written to being published.
Russo Japanese War
-
It was not until the telegraph was developed that reports could be sent on a daily basis and events could be reported as they occurred that the short mainly descriptive stories of today became common. Press coverage of the Russo-Japanese War was affected by restrictions on the movement of reporters and strict censorship. In all military conflicts which followed this 1904-1905 war, close attention to more managed reporting was considered essential.[1]
First World War
-
The First World War was the first modern mediated war in the sense that warfare becomes conflicts and controversies between parties who exchange information and arguments indirectly by the mass media and their special correspondents reporting from the front lines of warfare. The discourse in mediated conflicts is influenced by its public character. By forwarding information and arguments to the media, conflict parties attempt to gain support from their constituencies and persuade their opponents.[2]
The continued progress of technology has allowed live coverage of events via satellite up-links. The rise of twenty-four hour news channels has led to a heightened demand for coverage.
Early film and television news rarely had war correspondents. Rather they would simply collect footage provided by other sources, often the government, and the news anchor would then add narration. This footage was often staged as cameras were large and bulky. This changed dramatically with the Vietnam War when networks from around the world sent cameramen with portable cameras and correspondents. This proved damaging to the United States as the full brutality of war became a daily feature on the nightly news.
Notable war correspondents
Some of them became authors of fiction drawing on their war experiences, including Davis, Crane and Hemingway.
-
19th century
20th century
- Mary Marvin Breckinridge (1905-2002); covered World War II.
- Wilfred Burchett (1911-1983); covered the Pacific War, Korean War and Vietnam War. He was known for covering news from the "other side" of the battlefield, and was often criticised of being a communist sympathiser.
- Robert Capa (1913-1954); covered the Spanish Civil War, Second Sino-Japanese War, the European Theatre of World War II and the First Indochina War (where he was killed by a landmine).
- Dickey Chapelle (1918-1965); covered the Pacific War, the 1956 Hungarian Revolution and the Vietnam War (where she was killed by a landmine). She was the first female US war correspondent to be killed in action.
- Basil Clarke (1879-1947); covered the fighting on the Western Front during WWI.
- Neil Davis - Australian combat cameraman covered the Vietnam War, Cambodia and Laos and subsequently conflicts in Africa.
- Richard Dimbleby (1913-1965); covered World War II
- Kurt Eggers (-1943) World War II SS correspondent, editor of the SS magazine Das Schwarze Korps, was killed while reporting on the Wiking's battles near Kharkov. The German SS-Standarte Kurt Eggers was named in his honor.
- Gloria Emerson (1929-2004); covered the Vietnam War.
- Bernard B. Fall (1926-1967); covered the First Indochina War and the Vietnam War (where he was killed by a landmine).
- J.C. Furnas; covered World War II.
- Martha Gellhorn (1908-1998); covered the Spanish Civil War, World War II, Vietnam War, the Six-Day War and even the U.S. invasion of Panama.
|
- Georgie Anne Geyer (born 1935); covered the Guatemalan Civil War and the Algerian Civil War.
- Al Gore (born 1948); covered the Vietnam War.
- Cork Graham (born 1964); covered the Salvadoran Civil War from 1985 to 1989; imprisoned for 11 months in Vietnam 1983 to 1984 while on assignment for the Associated Press.
- Louis Grondijs (1878-1961); covered Russo-Japanese War, World War I, the Russian Civil War, the Invasion of Manchuria and the Spanish Civil War.
- David Halberstam
- Macdonald Hastings
- Max Hastings
- Ernest Hemingway
- Michael Herr
- Marguerite Higgins; paved the way for female war correspondents.
- Larry LeSueur, CBS radio correspondent, reported from rooftops during World War II London blitzes, went ashore in the first waves of the D-Day invasion, and broadcast to America the Allied liberation of Paris.
- Anne O'Hare McCormick
- Alan Moorehead
- Edward R. Murrow
- Ernie Pyle
- Joe Rosenthal, received the Pulitzer Prize for his iconic World War II photograph Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima
- John Sack
- Sydney Schanberg, his experiences in Cambodia during the Vietnam War are dramatized in The Killing Fields
- Sigrid Schultz
- William L. Shirer
- Richard Tregaskis, author of Guadalcanal Diary, dramatized in movie of same name.
- Eric Lloyd Williams
- Chester Wilmot
|
21st century
General
- Kate Adie (born 1945); covered the Gulf War, Yugoslav Wars, Rwandan Genocide and the Sierra Leone Civil War.
- Christiane Amanpour (born 1958); covered the Gulf War and the Bosnian War.
- Peter Arnett (born 1934); covered the Vietnam War, 1991 Gulf War, the 2001 Invasion of Afghanistan and the 2003 Iraq War. He is known for covering news from the "other side" of the battlefield.
- Martin Bell (born 1938); covered the Vietnam War, Biafra War, The Troubles in Northern Ireland, the Angolan Civil War and the Bosnian War.
- Peter Cave (born 1952); covered the Gulf War, Yugoslav Wars,The Coconut War in the New Hebrides , Iraq War, Tiananmen Square
- Winston Churchill (1874-1965); covered the Siege of Malakand, the Mahdist War and the Second Boer War.
- Richard Harding Davis (1864-1916); covered the Spanish-American War, Second Boer War and the fighting on the Macedonian front during WWI.
- Lady Florence Dixie (1855-1905); covered the First Boer War[3]
- Robert Fisk (born 1946); covered the Lebanese Civil War, the Iranian Revolution, Iran–Iraq War, the 1991 Persian Gulf War, the Algerian Civil War, Kosovo War and the 2003 Iraq War.
- Peggy Hull
- Ryszard Kapuscinski
- Helen Kirkpatrick
- Terry Lloyd
- Anthony Loyd
|
|
See also
Notes
References
External links
| |
