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"LIVE FROM THE BATTLEFIELD" (PETER ARNETT).   Term Paper ID:22140 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Reviews journalist's career autobiography. Style, global assignments, war, politics, independence, censorship.... More...

8 Pages / 1800 Words 1 sources, 20 Citations, APA Format $32.00 Return to List of Papers

Paper Abstract: Reviews journalist's career autobiography. Style, global assignments, war, politics, independence, censorship. Paper Introduction: Pulitzer prize winning journalist Peter Arnett has covered the erupting hot spots of the world for more than three decades. As his biographical Live From the Battlefield attests, through his frequent adversarial relationship with the powers that be and his unparalleled tenacity to get the story, Arnett has changed the face of modern journalism. Most influential in his role as war correspondent, Arnett's career has ushered in the era of independent television news coverage, as well as era of the supreme risk taker willing to fall on the sword in defence of the First Amendment. Breaking the traditional vow of silence and collusion with those who govern, he was also among the first journalists to realize that the media was an instrument of power for conveying accuracy, and for correcting the record (Arnett, 1994, p. 51). Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. (189) If Arnett possessed the three qualities paramount to all journalistsin that he was prodigious, perceptive and detailed, he also wound up onassassination hit lists for his frequent risk taking. In the yearsthat followed, he exhibited a willingness to chart the worlds's hot spotsranging from such disparate places as: Teheran; Jonestown; El Salvador;Afghanistan and Baghdad, Iraq. Alsounheard of was Arnett's guerilla news gathering methods requiredaggressiveness and resourcefulness - methods that sometimes mimickedprofessional intelligence gathering. Within 12 months, Arnett was expelled (67-69). The journalists of his generationlearned that, in slavishly touting American policy, the role of the FifthColumn was diminished. Arnett's independence could sometimes be wrongly construed asindifference. He counted onprivately gathered information. Often, as U.S. In 1966, Arnettwas awarded a Pulitzer for his ability to capture the ephemeral moment. His lack of caution andadversarial relationship with officials were all but unheard of. His propensity for risk inspireddaredevil risk taking in the legions of stringers around Vietnam. Whereas the neophyte could be seduced by political passions andtropical intrigues, early on, while others worked in tandem withgovernmental agencies, Arnett established a pattern of out-hustling, out-thinking other reporters to get to the story. He saw the desecrated lives and deaths of civilians as the mostegregious by-products of war: "Duc Co, South Vietnam. even in his very first assignment inLaos, Arnett realized that the military conflict in this case not as ofclash ideologies but the privileged versus the impoverished (5 ). They were armed with an assortment of Thompson submachine guns, Garand M1s and greaseguns and an assortment of older weapons I could not identify. Arnett realized that independent television was the only true way tocover the erupting hot spots of the world. But Sukarno's ministers soon became upset withthe critical tone of the reporting that followed (Sukarno was pursuingempire building schemes in Dutch New Guinea while his own people starved inthe hamlets outside Jakarta). ReferencesArnett, P. Arnett expected little help from public sources. Its reputation had been bolstered in Vietnam with thereputation of Morley Safer (184). Despite having a South Vietnamese anti-communist wife and children, Arnett valued his detachment above all else.Most important is to be first with the true story. Though less than revolutionary. Arnett changed that. Referring to Vietnam as the "Information War" (214), Arnett made thejump from serious print format to serious television reporter. In this medium, Arnett wasless an interpreter of events as an equal partner in the technology oftelevision where past became present. However, in an eraof global communication and global access, such a status could not last. Criticssaid that he was giving the enemy Saddam Hussein fodder for use againstAmerican soldiers, against America itself in the World press. New York: Simon &Schuster.----------------------- 1 Oftenplaced in situation above his head, he proved a quick learner (55-56). The living rushed unashamedly to the tiny bunkers dug into the red clay of the hilltop; the wounded squirmed toward the shelter of trees that had been blasted to the ground. Arnett and the AP were primetargets for the administration's efforts to contain the accurate reportingof equipment failures, troop casualties, use of poison gas, and overallbattle assessments (169). Thus, it was vitally important for him toprotect his sources (a policy has often bought the press head-to-head withjudicial system). Often, such reliance onindependent fact checking meant hanging out with the grunts on the frontlines instead with the official information officers back in comfortableSaigon. Alwayshaving as little to do as possible with public relations officials (nowcommonly referred to as spin doctors), Arnett put a distinctly modern faceon war: "War painted the living and the dead the same gray pallor on Hill 875. He came up with accurate if controversialmaterial beyond governmental control. They were chattering to one another in apparent unconcern, though they knew that theywould soon be flown into combat." (82)Often, such copy went unedited from source to publication. It is not fair to kill the messenger for the unwantedmessage. Armed with these, despite strong criticism from the LyndonJohnson White House, AP president Wes Ghallagher backed Arnett'scontroversial Vietnam war reporting. By the mid-196 s, the Southeast Asian theater would be filled withArnett-inspired risk takers. It was the rule rather than the exception that analysis wasconfined to a reading of the political scene by a journalist reviewingwhose writings could make no impact. In describing a young Marine unit early on in Vietnamin August of 1962 Arnett exhibited his eye for detail filtered through aromanticist's lens: "Across the airstrip a score of H-34 helicopters were parked in a row, the designation `Marine' emblazoned with white paint across their tail sections. Lien Huong is searching for the wounded. Traditionally, war correspondents had a long history ofchampioning the efforts of the empowered right up to World War II and theKorean War. To this new medium, Arnett brought his policy of exposing thegovernment's credibility gap, challenging official stories and statisticsremains controversial. 51). Before Arnett, the journalist was something akin to a skilled, well-disciplined lap dog waiting for its master to dispense with table scraps ofinformation (journalists were considered lucky to have a place in the houseat all). During the North Vietnamese EasterOffensive of 1972 that swept through Quang Tri and routed many governmentunits, Arnett helped carry the several wounded soldiers under sniper fireto the safety of hospital transport trucks. In the past, such pacts were very necessary means to an end(covering a story) (57). The previously unheard-of adversarialrelationship which began to shift with the Kennedy administration,culminated with Nixon and his Watergate-style "dirty tricks" perpetrated onmembers of the press. Live From the Battlefield. Possessing all of the traits necessary for anywould-be journalist to study, he developed excellent communication skills,writing efficiency, and personable narrative that was arresting. Hemade it his ultimate mission to avoid entangling relationships withentrepreneurs and politicians, as well as to stay clear of both businessenterprises and the mistresses of the power elite that would compromise hisposition (57). Following Vietnam, the first war Arnett covered outside ofSoutheast Asia was Cyprus, where the Turkish Army had invaded in 1974. Only the dead, didn't move, propped up in the bunkers where they had died in direct mortar hits, or facedown in the dust where they had fallen tobullets." (235)In dispensing with the well-orchestrated coverage of the past, Arnettetransformed war-time news gathering into the ultimate rite of passage foran objective reporter. Bands ofstringers would brave war-torn streets and battlefields for a few dollarsto take pictures for various news services coverage flow back to New York. Another distinguishing quality of Arnett washis singular prose. Often bucking the prevailing stonewalling optimistic view of war,Arnett adopted a search and report style to cover the search and destroymissions of the military. Such inclination manifested itself in astubbornness not to succumb to national interest. Pulitzer prize winning journalist Peter Arnett has covered theerupting hot spots of the world for more than three decades. Thus, it was vitally important that Arnette demonstrated how to workunder the new phenomenon of close public scrutiny: when in doubt, stick tothe facts. A New Zealand puritanical upbringing instilled in him an unwaveringpersonal moral rectitude. When Ghallagher offered him the chance to go toHanoi to cover an antiwar delegation that had arranged to bring home threePOWs, Arnett was well aware of the potential controversy. military confidence waned and anxiety plugged thevoid, Arnett was accused by government officials of incompetence or ofhaving subversive tendencies (165). Televisionhad only recently transformed from a showbizzy poor cousin to printjournalism. The only way to tell who was alive and who was dead amongst the exhausted menwas to watch when the enemy mortars came crashing in. ThenPresident Sukarno initially welcomed him and allowed Arnett to travel withhim around the countryside. Nevertheless, hewas eager for the opportunity. In Vietnam, he almost exclusively relied on what he sawpersonally, in addition to his private sources. When the night comes and the mortar rounds start slapping this Special ForcesCamp, a thin wraith of a girl will slip through the exploding shadows like a ghost. (119). Breaking the traditional vow of silenceand collusion with those who govern, he was also among the firstjournalists to realize that the media was an instrument of power forconveying accuracy, and for correcting the record (Arnett, 1994, p. For him, CNN represented even furtherindependence, more in depth coverage, and airing points of view that themajor networks could not dream of (327-328). In the early 198 s, CNN represented aninfantile video version of the existing wire services. (1994). Such tenacity did not endear governments to Arnett. Unlike many other reporters, Arnett survived Vietnam physically andemotionally. In banging heads with American military censors, Arnett uncovered thefailure of the American Strategic Hamlet Program - a sociomilitaryexperiment that, by attempting to close rural village hamlets to thecommunist Vietcong insurgents, intended safe communities that were inreality internment camps (92-93). After an incident atSong Be, where a carbine was put into his hands and he was instructed toguard a mortar pit on a long night under Vietcong attack, he learned thathe could operate despite overwhelming fear, and that he was willing to takeany risk for the sake of a good story (15 ). For a journalist such as Arnett, it is a seductive worldwhere misrepresentation and subterfuge are snares for unwitting pacts withthe devil. Such a quality allowedhim to navigate the shark-infested channels of power with less risk. For 35 years, Arnettcalled home the overcrowded and desperate haunts of the world. His firstassignment for the Associated Press was to Indonesia in 1961. For example, when army captain KongLee led a short-lived military coup in Laos and shut down all forms ofcommunication, the chain-smoking Arnett swam the mile wide Mekong River todeliver his story in Thailand (55). Such daring allowed him toremain behind to finish his story and observe the incoming Vietcongconquerors even after the fall of Saigon in 1975 and the last evacuationtransports had left. There heproved that truth is always the most worthwhile pursuit. During the Iraq Conflict, he came under fire frommany sides for exposing that what the allies claimed was a bombedbiological weapons testing center, Arnett visited several times, andinstead, discovered the strewn wreckage of a baby formula plant. Suchindependent reporting could only complicate matters and the chances for aquick victory. He would have liked to have donesomething as a human being, but as a reporter, he couldn't - a chain ofevents would have ensued that could propel him into Vietnamese politics.His role as a reporter would have been compromised along with hisintegrity. As hisbiographical Live From the Battlefield attests, through his frequentadversarial relationship with the powers that be and his unparalleledtenacity to get the story, Arnett has changed the face of modernjournalism. Through a "save your ass but get the story" philosophy, Arnett honeda difficult to achieve sense of emotional detachment (87). Their crew were sitting beside their crafts in spotted camouflage uniforms and soft khaki uniforms. His stories and writing grew more substantive as he matured. Hisnative land with its tales of by-gone days of the rogue adventurer,instilled in Arnett a desire to circle the ramparts of war seekingadventure and the potent embrace of destiny. In fact, his compassion and sensitivity was reserved for theinnocent. When action heated up as during the time that Americantroops began operating in War Zone C in the autumn of 1965, Arnett packed agas mask and began wearing a steel combat helmet for protection. It was time for him to masterand cross-over to a new medium. She will probably be weeping as she crawls from bunker to bunker, sometimes wearing a steel helmet that wobbles unsteadily on her head." (159)He also intervened for humanitarian reasons that did not conflict with hisduties and objectives as a reporter. Global politics is a strange place inhabited by super-powers like theUnited States locked in anaconda grips with legions of carnival-likemilitary strongmen, often from the most impoverished places known to man.The manipulation of the press through dissemination of false information bysuch disparate groups as CIA and pro-communist insurgency groups iscommonplace. Criticism thathe should have prevented the young monk who immolated himself in front ofArnett and his fellow reporters. Atrue veteran, he felt at home amidst the chaos and crisis. At first impressed by propagandadistributed about the camps, Arnett later vowed to hold to his simple rule- report only what he could see, only what he could substantiate. Most influential in his role as war correspondent, Arnett'scareer has ushered in the era of independent television news coverage, aswell as era of the supreme risk taker willing to fall on the sword indefence of the First Amendment. Along with several of his peers, Arnett had an immediate impact onnews gathering methods very early on. In the early years of the war, Arnett discovered that the best way toget a story was to hop into his white Kharmann Ghia and drive around untilhe found one (79). If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.