The role of the media

From the government perspective, a war should be fought in isolation from the media. This would permit it to make mistakes, correct them, proceed in any direction the military wished, and generally conduct operations without any second guessing. Unfortunately, that's not how the world works. The general public demands to know what's happening to its troops in a war zone. The media, a term which includes video as well as written sources, wants to present such information in a way that attracts viewers and readers. The government conducting a war wants to control the information the media can present to the public so that it will look favorable. It should be quickly apparent that these desires can become mutually exclusive.

The Vietnam War came along at a time of technological development in communication which, unlike earlier American military conflicts, gave a certain immediacy to reporting of the war. The war was widely covered, with nearly 500 journalists in South Vietnam at the height of the American involvement in 1968. Color television broadcasting permitted the serving up of rather gruesome images on the evening news as American families were just sitting down to dinner. The very breadth of coverage of the war led to competition among media reporters for stories which would catch the public eye. It was, in a very real sense, a collision of technology and ethics.

In Vietnam, journalists were managed, but not controlled, by public affairs officers (PAOs) at Headquarters MACV and major combat units. The process of covering the war was understood differently by the military command and the major media organizations. There was a lot of information available to the media which seemed to contradict what they were hearing at official briefings. To be fair, the journalists who were actually IN Vietnam reported events in a reasonably factual manner; the editors and network executives in the United States often changed reports in such a manner as to reflect a growing antiwar bias. The result was a series of reports that grew increasingly antiwar as the fighting in Vietnam grew more difficult.

The serious issue here is the role the media played in the eventual United States withdrawal from the Vietnam War. Did the media affect public opinion to the point where the public demanded a disengagement? Did the media report accurately on the war or follow a diffent agenda? Should there have been more (or less) censorship by the government during a time of major military engagement? Or was the media really manipulated by a government which wished to disengage from Vietnam? There is some disagreement among sources about whether the media is culpable in the eventual result of the Vietnam War, as you will see from the brief selection of readings suggested below. Books have been written about this issue; entire college courses are devoted to the topic. It is a topic which is still with us as we move into the twenty-first century, as is evident from the daily news.

Readings:

1. Web Site: Dahm, "The Media and Vietnam"
2. Web Site: McLaughlin, "Television Coverage of the Vietnam War and the Vietnam Veteran"
3. Web Site: Cohen, "The Myth of the Media's Role in Vietnam"
4. Web Site: Kahrs, "Lies, Deceit, and Hypocrisy"
5. Web Site: "Vietnam--A Media Fought War"

Questions for consideration and further discussion:

1. Does the presence of journalists in a war zone help or hinder the overall war effort?
2. Should everything about a war be reported openly and fairly or is there a case for censorship?
3. Why might there be a disparity between journalists in the field and editors in the home offices?
4. In the Vietnam War, why might the reporting have grown increasingly antiwar in nature as the war progressed?
5. Whom do you trust more: The government or the media? Why?