Peter Arnett | |
|---|---|
 Arnett in 1996 | |
| Born | Peter Gregg Arnett (1934-11-13)13 November 1934 (age 91) |
| Occupation(s) | Journalist,anchorman |
| Years active | 1960−present |
| Notable credit | Awarded the 1966Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting for his work inVietnam |
| Spouse | Nina Nguyen (separated 1983) |
| Children | 2 |
Peter Gregg ArnettONZM (born 13 November 1934) is a New Zealand-born Americanjournalist.[1] He is known for his coverage of theVietnam War and theGulf War. He was awarded the 1966Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting for his work in Vietnam from 1962 to 1965, mostly reporting for theAssociated Press.
Arnett also worked forNational Geographic magazine, and later for various television networks, most notably for nearly two decades atCNN. Arnett published a memoir,Live from the Battlefield: From Vietnam to Baghdad, 35 Years in the World's War Zones (1994). In March 1997, Arnett interviewedOsama bin Laden, leader ofAl-Qaeda.[2] The journalism school at theSouthern Institute of Technology in New Zealand was named for Arnett.[3]
Arnett was born in 1934 inRiverton, in New Zealand'sSouthland region. He isMāori, ofNgāi Tahu Māori andEnglish descent.[4] His first job as a journalist was withThe Southland Times.[5]
During his early years in journalism, Arnett worked in Southeast Asia, largely based inBangkok. In 1960 he started publishing a small English-language newspaper inLaos.[6] Eventually, he made his way to Vietnam, which the French had abandoned after being defeated atDien Bien Phu by communists from North Vietnam.
Arnett became a reporter for theAssociated Press, based inSaigon in the South, in the years when the United States began to get involved in the civil conflict and through the Vietnam War. On 7 July 1963, in what became known as theDouble Seven Day scuffle, he was injured in a widely reported physical altercation between a group of western journalists and South Vietnamese undercover police. The reporters were trying to coverBuddhist protests against the South Vietnamese government. His articles, such as "Death of Supply Column 21," about an event duringOperation Starlite in August 1965, resulted in raising the ire of the American government, which had been increasing the number of forces in the region.[6]
Arnett accompanied troops on dozens of missions, including thebattle of Hill 875, in November 1967. An American detachment was sent to rescue another unit that was stranded in hostile territory, and the rescuers were nearly killed during the operation. In September 1972, Arnett joined a group of U.S. peace activists, includingWilliam Sloane Coffin andDavid Dellinger, on a trip toHanoi,North Vietnam, to accept three Americanprisoners of war for return to the United States.[7]: 274–8
Arnett wrote in an unvarnished manner when reporting stories of ordinary soldiers and civilians. Arnett's writing was often criticised by administration spokesmen as negative, who wanted to keep reporting of the war positive. GeneralWilliam Westmoreland, PresidentLyndon B. Johnson and others in power put pressure on the AP to get rid of or transfer Arnett from the region.[7]: 259–60
In what is considered one of his iconic dispatches, published on 7 February 1968, Arnett wrote about theBattle of Bến Tre: "'It became necessary to destroy the town to save it,' a United States major said today. He was talking about the decision by allied commanders to bomb and shell the town regardless of civilian casualties, to rout the Vietcong."[8] The quotation was gradually altered in subsequent publications, eventually becoming the more familiar, "We had to destroy the village in order to save it."[9] The accuracy of the original quotation and its source have often been called into question. Arnett never revealed his source, except to say that it was one of four officers he interviewed that day.[9] US Army Major Phil Cannella, the senior officer present at Bến Tre, suggested the quotation might have been a distortion of something he said to Arnett.[9]The New Republic at the time attributed the quotation toUS Air Force Major Chester L. Brown.[10] InWalter Cronkite's 1971 book,Eye on the World, Arnett reasserted the quotation was something "one American major said to me in a moment of revelation."[11]
Arnett was one of the last western reporters remaining in Saigon after its fall and capture by thePeople's Army of Vietnam. Occupying soldiers showed him how they had entered the city.[7]: 305
Arnett wrote the 26-part mini-series documentary,Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day War (1980), produced byCanadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC).
At the time of theSoviet Invasion of Afghanistan, Arnett was working forParade magazine. With a contact named Healy, he entered Afghanistan illegally from Pakistan; both men were dressed in traditional clothing as natives and led byMujahideen guides. They continued to aJalalabad hideaway of approximately fifty rebels. The trip came to an end when Healy fell into theKunar River, ruining the pair's cameras. Later, Arnett would recount the story to journalistArtyom Borovik, who was covering the Soviet side of the war.[12]
Beginning in 1981, Arnett worked forCNN for 18 years, ending in 1999. During theGulf War, he became a household name worldwide as the only reporter to have live coverage directly fromBaghdad, especially during the first 16 hours. His dramatic reports often were accompanied by the sound of air raid sirens blaring and US bombs exploding in the background. Together with two other CNN journalists,Bernard Shaw andJohn Holliman, Arnett brought continuous coverage from Baghdad for the 16 initial intense hours of the war (17 January 1991). Although 40 foreign journalists were present at theAl-Rashid Hotel in Baghdad at the time, only CNN possessed the means — a private phone line connected to neighbouring Amman, Jordan — to communicate to the outside world.[13] CNN broadcast Arnett's extended call live for several hours, with a picture of Arnett as video. Soon the other journalists left Iraq, including the two CNN colleagues, which left Arnett as the sole remaining reporter.
His accounts of civilian damage caused by the bombing were not well received by the coalition war administration. Its spokesmen had emphasised terms such as "smart bombs" and "surgical precision" in their public statements, in an effort to project keeping civilian casualties would be at a minimum.White House sources would later attack Arnett, saying that he was being used as a tool for Iraqi disinformation.
Two weeks into the war, Arnett was able to obtain an exclusive, uncensored interview withSaddam Hussein.[14] Due to Arnett's reporting from the "other side", for a period of five weeks, the Gulf War was the first to be broadcast live on TV.
About halfway through the war, representatives of theCIA approached Arnett. They believed that the Iraqi military was operating a high-level communication network from the basement of the Al Rashid Hotel, which is where Arnett and other staff from CNN were staying. The CIA wanted him out so the Air Force could bomb the hotel, but Arnett refused. He said he had been given a tour of the hotel and denied there was such a facility.[15]
In March 1997, Arnett ofCNN interviewedOsama bin Laden, leader ofAl-Qaeda, after Bin Laden declared jihad on the United States. Asked by Arnett, "What are your future plans?", Bin Laden said, "You'll see them and hear about them in the media, God willing."[16][17]
In 1998, Arnett narrated a report on the joint venture (between CNN andTime magazine) programme calledNewsStand, covering "Operation Tailwind" in Laos in 1970.
The report, titledThe Valley of Death, claimed that in 1970, theUnited States Army had usedsarin, anerve agent, against a group of deserting U.S. soldiers in Laos. The men who allegedly conducted the attack were an eliteGreen Berets A-Team. The report was expressly approved by both CNN Chairman Tom Johnson and CNN President Rick Kaplan. In response,the Pentagon commissioned another report contradicting that of CNN's. CNN subsequently conducted its own investigation. It concluded that the "journalism [in theValley of Death] was flawed" and retracted the story. While all 12 men of the Green Beret A-Team were wounded in action during Operation Tailwind, no sarin was involved.
Due to a number of rebuttals claiming the CNN report was flawed, three or more of the individuals responsible were fired or forced to resign.[18] Arnett was reprimanded, and left the network in April 1999, apparently due to "lingering fallout" from Tailwind.[19]
On assignment forNBC andNational Geographic, Arnett went to Iraq in 2003 to cover theU.S. invasion. After a press meeting there, he granted an interview to state-runIraqi TV on 31 March 2003. In it he said:
[N]ow America is re-appraising the battlefield, delaying thewar against Iraq, maybe a week, and re-writing [sic] the war plan. The first plan has failed because of Iraqi resistance[;] now they are trying to write another war plan.
Earlier in the interview he said:
[O]ur reports about civilian casualties here, about the resistance of the Iraqi forces, are going back to the United States. It helps those who oppose the war when you challenge the policy to develop their arguments.
— Peter Arnett[20]
When Arnett's remarks sparked a "firestorm of protest", NBC initially defended him, saying he had given the interview as a professional courtesy and that his remarks were "analytical in nature". A day later, though, NBC,MSNBC andNational Geographic all severed their relationships with Arnett.[21] In response to Arnett's statement on Iraqi TV, NBC stated:
It was wrong for Mr. Arnett to grant an interview with state-controlled Iraqi TV, especially at a time of war and it was wrong for him to discuss his personal observations and opinions.
Arnett responded:
My stupid misjudgment was to spend fifteen minutes in an impromptu interview with Iraqi television. I said in that interview essentially what we all know about the war, that there have been delays in implementing policy, there have been surprises.
— Peter Arnett
Later that day, Arnett was hired by the British tabloid,The Daily Mirror, which had opposed the war. A couple of days later he also received work from Greek television channelNET television, and BelgianVTM.
After retiring as a field reporter in 2007, Arnett lives in Los Angeles.
He also teaches journalism atShantou University in China. In New Zealand, the Peter Arnett School of Journalism was named for him at theSouthern Institute of Technology; the journalism school closed in 2015.[22][23]
In 1964, Arnett married Nina Nguyen, a Vietnamese woman. They had two children, Elsa and Andrew. Nina and Peter separated in 1983, divorced more than 20 years later, then reconciled in 2006.[24]
Elsa Arnett attendedStuyvesant High School in New York andHarvard University. After graduating, she went into journalism, became a reporter, worked for several months onThe Washington Post as an intern and then joinedThe Boston Globe.[25] She worked with her father on his 1994 memoir about his reporting life. Elsa Arnett is married to former White House lawyerJohn Yoo.[26]
In the2007 New Year Honours, Arnett was appointed anOfficer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to journalism.[27]
Peter Arnett appeared in Robert Wiener's bookLive from Baghdad. He appeared as a character in the 2002HBOfilm of the same name, where he was portrayed by actorBruce McGill.
The book, as well as the film, features Arnett's work as part of Wiener's crew inBaghdad. Arnett joined the team as tensions between Iraq and the West were escalating toward an imminent military encounter. CNN sent Arnett to Baghdad because of his experience in covering military conflicts. Arnett was part of the live coverage beginning on 16 January 1991, the start of theGulf War air campaign, where he and colleaguesBernard Shaw andJohn Holliman kept broadcasting from theirAl-Rasheed Hotel room amid extensiveaerial bombing by theWestern Coalition forces.
Arnett's interview with Bin Laden in 1997 became the subject of the movie 'A War Story' produced for television. Arnett's role was played by John Leigh.[28]
| External videos | |
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 Booknotes interview with Arnett onLive from the Battlefield, 20 February 1994,C-SPAN |
Elsa Arnett is my daughter. She's 25 years of age, born in Saigon. My wife was a Vietnamese woman. We separated a few years ago, but we're still in touch. Elsa, a bright young lady, and she went to Stuyvesant High School in New York, as an accomplished student, went on to Harvard University. I never had a university education. Well, Elsa compensated for that by going to Harvard University and graduating with high honors and, lo and behold, went into journalism, became a reporter, worked for several months on The Washington Post as an intern and then joined The Boston Globe; spent a couple of years there and, thank goodness, agreed to help me get this book done.
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| National | |
| Academics | |
| People | |
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