Vietnam War Reporter Malcolm Browne Dies

[kamui]

Vietnam war reporter Malcolm Browne dies

A journalist who captured an iconic image of a burning South Vietnamese monk in 1963 has died at the age of 81.

 

Associated Press (AP) correspondent Malcolm Browne won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting from Vietnam in 1964.

 

But his photograph of Thich Quang Duc, an elderly monk who set himself on fire in Saigon, became one of the first defining images of the escalating conflict.

 

Browne died near his Vermont home after a long battle with Parkinson's disease.

 

After spending decades as a globe-trotting reporter, covering conflicts for the New York Times for some 30 years after leaving AP, Browne spent his final years struggling to move around and using a wheelchair.

 

"Malcolm Browne was a precise and determined journalist who helped set the standard for rigorous reporting in the early days of the Vietnam War," said Kathleen Carroll, AP executive editor and senior vice president.

 

"He was also a genuinely decent and classy man."

 

Browne's image of a burning Thich Quang Duc highlighted the disquiet within South Vietnam, then separated from communist North Vietnam and run by a US-backed regime.

 

The image reportedly made it directly to the desk of US President John F Kennedy, who told his newly appointed ambassador to South Vietnam: "We have to do something about that regime."

 

Within months South Vietnamese leader Ngo Dinh Diem was deposed in a coup as the country's struggle against Viet Cong insurgents intensified.

 

Browne, born in New York in 1931, got his first job in journalism at the Middletown Daily Record in New York.

 

He later became one of a pioneering group of Vietnam war reporters who covered the conflict in its early days, winning a Pulitzer alongside rival reporter David Halberstam in 1964.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk...canada-19401031

[Bangkoktraveler]

Interesting photo.

 

It doesn't even look human.

[Flashermac]

I remember comments on whether a journalist had a duty to try to prevent it, instead of just filming it.

[kamui]

I remember comments on whether a journalist had a duty to try to prevent it, instead of just filming it.

 

The discussion still goes on. I mean journalist film everyday people being shot at, being wounded or killed. And they film the wounded lying in the streets in Syria, Kabul and elsewhere and move on.

 

In the 60s the life of journalist in a war zone or any other dangerous area was less dangerous. Of course journalists could be killed in danger zones, but usually the shots were not meant for them and both sides showed some respect. Today journalists are being directly attacked and their death rate seems to go up all over the world (Mexico, Syria, e.g.).

 

Also after the experience of the Vietnam war all sides in a conflict try to control the journalists and their message much more thoroughly. Perfect example was the first Gulf war when journalists were completely cut out of independent reporting by the US army. Journalist couldn't move freely anymore and got only to see what the military wanted to see them.

 

Another big change is of course the advent of social media. In previous conflicts the news agency and main stream media controlled which reports and message were published - today the most interesting videos from Syria are provided by local citizens or soldiers, like the Youtube video of the helicopter which went down in flames in Damaskus two days ago. But the facts behind those videos and citizen news are becoming more shady, since there is no instance which is able to do a fact check.

[sayjann]

I remember comments on whether a journalist had a duty to try to prevent it, instead of just filming it.

difficult i would have thought?.

times were dangerous and who knows if the monk may have been planning a suicide mission?.

one of the 3 iconic images of that era along with the guy being shot in the head and the little girl running down the road after being burned by napalm.

[unit731]

Sadly he protested the wrong government.

The Peoples Republic of Vietnam as with many purist communist countries frowned upon religion.

 

Sad anyway no matter what the cause.

 

I have my own war pictures that I keep planning to digitize.

[Coss]

I have my own war pictures that I keep planning to digitize.

 

Please do and post, I'd be very interested...

[Flashermac]

Please do and post, I'd be very interested...

 

 

Here is one of mine:

 

[BelgianBoy]

you're the one in the middle, reloading ......?

[baa99]