The Most Intimate Medium

Friday, Oct. 14, 1966
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reporter's scorn for danger as he tracked down his story. No Marine rifleman was more exposed to enemy fire than Safer and his crew as they lugged their bulky equipment to the outskirts of the hamlet called Cam Ne. The very sound of Safer's voice, excited yet sure, carried a message of urgency. "This is what the war in Viet Nam is all about," he intoned, as the camera panned over crying women and old men. In his careful solemnity there was an echo of CBS Hero Edward R. Mur row reporting World War II on radio: "This is London."

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It was clear what Safer meant. To him, the war in Viet Nam was all about husky, well-equipped Marines burning down an entire village, leveling 150 homes "in retaliation for a burst of gunfire." If there were Viet Cong around, Safer said, "they were long gone." And the Marines, he intimated, were wreaking a kind of harsh vengeance as the day's operation burned homes, "wounded three women, killed one baby, wounded one Marine and netted four prisoners—four old men who could not answer questions put to them in English. Four old men who had no idea what an ID card was."

Perhaps the emotional phrases were only to be expected in an emotional situation. And the fact is that even if Safer had gone out of his way to try to explain or excuse the Marines at Cam Ne, his words would have had little effect. To try to put pictures of one village burning into proper context, to balance that one incident against all the other activity that makes up the war in Viet Nam, would be all but impossible. On TV news, pictures make their own frontpage context; it takes a skillful script indeed to give them an added dimension, to remind the viewer that they are only part of the story. All too often the reporter in the field only adds a little wordy color, or asks an inane question: "Seen action like this before, Marine?"

Bang! Bang! Bang! NBC's Chet Huntley, for one, is worried that too many TV reporters in Viet Nam concentrate far too much on Safer-like shots, the kind of flaming action that ensures an appearance on the air at home. The military thinks that too many correspondents are out there for their "own personal aggrandizement," Huntley told a Variety reporter recently. ABC's Howard K. Smith took the same tack when he returned from a recent visit to Viet Nam. During the Buddhist demonstrations, he said, "television gave the impression that the whole country was rioting, instead of 2,000 out of 17 million." Television, he complained, "still gives the impression that it is an American war out there. You never see a Vietnamese action." His colleagues, he said, were completely ignoring all the work on pacification. They look for what will get on the air, "and that's bang, bang, bang. We're missing all the nation building."

Others among the regular Saigon TV corps agree. "Let's be truthful," said one of them in TV Guide as he offered a straightforward explanation for all the battle footage he and his competitors are sending home. "Here in Viet Nam you can get your face on the network news three or four times a week. It's risky, but it's money in the bank. We're all war profiteers."

The accusation is harsh. Viet Nam is TV's first war; the medium's mistakes are due as