The Press: This Strange War Fascinates Me

I'm no more courageous than anyone else. I just feel that photography is important. And I will do what is required to show what is happening. I have a sense of the ultimate—death. And sometimes I must say, "To hell with that."

—Larry Burrows

Naturally, LIFE Photographer Larry Burrows, two-time winner of the Robert Capa award* for "superlative photography requiring exceptional courage and enterprise," was aboard the first press helicopter to fly into Laos last week. With a few other civilian combat photographers, he had camped on the border for at least four days, frustrated by U.S. and Vietnamese refusal to allow on-the-spot...