Viet Nam: New Dangers Covering an Old Story

Covering the war in Indochina has always been dangerous for reporters and cameramen. Since 1964, the toll stands at 39 killed, 20 missing and 167 wounded.* But Vietnamization and the concomitant withdrawal of U.S. troops have, unhappily, made life even more hazardous for those who must cover Viet Nam.

Since the South Vietnamese started their counteroffensive north of Hue last month, four cameramen have been killed and Newsweek Reporter Alexander Shimkin is missing in an ambush and presumed dead. Freelance Photographer Gerard Hebert was cut down by artillery while talking with a U.S. adviser on the outskirts of Quang Tri city. British Freelancer James Gill was killed while covering the South Vietnamese marines attacking the city.

Bad Directions. ABC Cameraman Terence Khoo and Sam Kai Faye, Singaporeans and close friends, stumbled into withering fire from a North Vietnamese bunker. Sam was wounded and Khoo, though unhurt and technically finished with his Viet Nam hitch, elected to stay with his friend. Their decapitated bodies were found when the bunker was finally captured three days later.

Correspondents used to contending with Viet Cong rifle and mortar fire must now beware of increasingly accurate heavy artillery fire that can kill at long range. At the same time, the withdrawal of U.S. combat units has reduced both the reliability of battle intelligence and the amount of protection a correspondent can count on. Recalls Associated Press Correspondent Peter Arnett, who started covering Viet Nam in 1962, "When you went out with a U.S. unit, you knew that your ass was covered. You were cared for like an American soldier, and that was very good care indeed."

With the U.S. pulling out, the South Vietnamese do not offer such support. The Americans took much of their transport with them, and it is now much harder to hitch helicopter or other rides. Once on the scene, reporters cannot count on much cooperation from field officers. Most feel that there is nothing malicious in this; Saigon forces are simply not equipped to provide the same amenities and protection.

But New York Times Correspondent Malcolm Browne, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1964 while covering Viet Nam for A.P., disagrees. He charges that he and others have been given "potentially lethal advice" by South Vietnamese officers in the form of bad directions that would take newsmen into areas of intense enemy fire. While correspondents simply blame poor intelligence, Browne insists it is done deliberately, and quotes a South Vietnamese captain as having told him: "We know the foreign press is against us. The press is the agent of the Viet Cong, so don't be surprised at what happens to you newsmen here." A few days later, South Vietnamese troops fired over the head of a correspondent who sought to cover them in action at Quang Tri, driving him back.

NBC Correspondent Bob Jones does not necessarily subscribe to Browne's theory, but he has little faith in directions offered by the South Vietnamese. Camped with a camera crew outside Quang Tri city in an effort to get film of soldiers raising the South Vietnamese flag over the city's citadel, Jones asked how to get to the citadel. "Just walk across that field," said the officer, "and someone will show you the way." Jones noted that not only was the field under intense enemy fire but also that his crew would have to swim a moat and scale a wall as well in order to reach the citadel. "You go," the officer told him with a smile. "I'll stay here." Jones and his crew did not go.

Increasing dangers in the field and decreasing interest in the U.S. have combined to take much of the professional glamour out of the Viet Nam story. "Reporting the war is no longer the noble act it once was," says A.P.'s Arnett. "In the mid-'60s, what you reported had an impact on national policy. Now any piece you do will probably have less impact than one coming out of Washington or Paris." NBC's Jones, who has done several previous stints in Viet Nam, now wonders whether the new risks make the story worthwhile. "If I'd known things had gotten this dangerous," he says, "I'd have thought twice about coming back here."

* TIME-LIFE'S own casualties: LIFE Photographer Larry Burrows and TIME Correspondent John Cantwell have been killed in action. Photographer Sean Flynn, on assignment for TIME, has been missing in Cambodia since 1969. Among the wounded: LIFE Photographers Tim Page and Co Rentmeester, TIME Photographer Le Minn and TIME Correspondents Don Sider, David Greenway, David DeVoss and John Mulliken.

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