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Rush,

RE: Bernard Shaw... Do you remember this?

An Oldie but Goodie: Mike Wallace: Journalist First, American Second (with Vintage Video)

Now, a reprint of an article I wrote about this PBS show, as published in the April, 1989 MediaWatch, a monthly newsletter then published by the MRC:

Peter Jennings and Mike Wallace Agree: Reporters First, Americans Second
In a future war involving U.S. soldiers what would a TV reporter do if he learned the enemy troops with which he was traveling were about to launch a surprise attack on an American unit? That's just the question Harvard University professor Charles Ogletree Jr, as moderator of PBS' Ethics in America series, posed to ABC anchor Peter Jennings and 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace. Both agreed getting ambush footage for the evening news would come before warning the U.S. troops.
For the March 7 installment on battlefield ethics Ogletree set up a theoretical war between the North Kosanese and the U.S.-supported South Kosanese. At first Jennings responded: "If I was with a North Kosanese unit that came upon Americans, I think I personally would do what I could to warn the Americans."
Wallace countered that other reporters, including himself, "would regard it simply as another story that they are there to cover." Jennings' position bewildered Wallace: "I'm a little bit of a loss to understand why, because you are an American, you would not have covered that story."
"Don't you have a higher duty as an American citizen to do all you can to save the lives of soldiers rather than this journalistic ethic of reporting fact?" Ogletree asked. Without hesitating Wallace responded: "No, you don't have higher duty...you're a reporter." This convinces Jennings, who concedes, "I think he's right too, I chickened out."
Ogletree turns to Brent Scrowcroft, now the National Security Adviser, who argues "you're Americans first, and you're journalists second." Wallace is mystified by the concept, wondering "what in the world is wrong with photographing this attack by North Kosanese on American soldiers?" Retired General William Westmoreland then points out that "it would be repugnant to the American listening public to see on film an ambush of an American platoon by our national enemy."
A few minutes later Ogletree notes the "venomous reaction" from George Connell, a Marine Corps Colonel. "I feel utter contempt. Two days later they're both walking off my hilltop, they're two hundred yards away and they get ambushed. And they're lying there wounded. And they're going to expect I'm going to send Marines up there to get them. They're just journalists, they're not Americans."
Wallace and Jennings agree, "it's a fair reaction." The discussion concludes as Connell says: "But I'll do it. And that's what makes me so contemptuous of them. And Marines will die, going to get a couple of journalists."

-PJ

Peter Jennings and Mike Wallace Agree: Reporters First, Americans Second

Oh yeah. I remember those two VERY well.

I still wonder if anybody in the media paused about a year later (when that thing now called GW1 was on) to wonder why it was they were all stuck 'way off in Saudi so far from the action.

Just read down to the bottom where that Marine bird colonel was giving his opinion of them.

Then reflect on these facts: A colonel is an officer and a gentleman (some add "by an act of congress") who must by nature of that fact and his lofty rank at all times comport himself as if his whole world could come to an end if he PO's the wrong political figure or, in extreme cases, the wrong member of the MSM.

Finally, imagine what would have been said if you had transported yourself into the presence of a group of Marine enlisted types who were viewing this highbrow discussion.

...I will draw a veil of charity over that scene, but very calmly assert that, between this sort of patronizing BS and the Mega Sh**burger our news media had been dishing out to the military since Viet Nam, they didn't want to be anywhere near any armed enlisted members of the US military. And probably not too close to any of those who would have to improvise.