Cronkite and Vietnam: Beyond the Hype

Media eulogies for Walter Cronkite -- including from progressive commentators -- rarely talk about his coverage of the Vietnam War before 1968. This obit omit is essential to the myth of Cronkite as a courageous truth-teller.

But facts are facts, and history is history -- including what Cronkite actually did as TV's most influential journalist during the first years of the Vietnam War. Despite all the posthumous praise for Cronkite's February 1968 telecast that dubbed the war "a stalemate," the facts of history show that the broadcast came only after Cronkite's protracted support for the war.

In 1965, reporting from Vietnam, Cronkite dramatized the murderous war effort with enthusiasm. "B-57s -- the British call them Canberra jets -- we're using them very effectively here in this war in Vietnam to dive-bomb the Vietcong in these jungles beyond Da Nang here," he reported, standing in front of a plane. Cronkite then turned to a U.S. Air Force officer next to him and said: "Colonel, what's our mission we're about to embark on?"

"Well, our mission today, sir, is to report down to the site of the ambush 70 miles south of here and attempt to kill the VC," the colonel replied.

Cronkite's report continued from the air. "The colonel has just advised me that that is our target area right over there," he said. "One, two, three, four, we dropped our bombs, and now a tremendous G-load as we pull out of that dive. Oh, I know something of what those astronauts must go through."

Next, viewers saw Cronkite get off the plane and say: "Well, colonel, it's a great way to go to war."

The upbeat report didn't mention civilians beneath the bombs.

That footage from CBS Evening News appears in "War Made Easy," the documentary film based on my book of the same name. Routinely, audiences gasp as the media myth of Cronkite deconstructs itself in front of their eyes.

Also in 1965 -- the pivotal year of escalation -- Cronkite expressed explicit support for the Vietnam War. He lauded "the courageous decision that Communism's advance must be stopped in Asia and that guerilla warfare as a means to a political end must be finally discouraged."

Why does this matter now? Because citing Cronkite as an example of courageous reporting on a war is a dangerously low bar -- as if reporting that a war can't be won, after cheerleading it for years, is somehow the ultimate in journalistic quality and courage.

The biggest and most important lie about an aggressive war based on deception is not that the war can't be won. The biggest and most important lie is deference to the conventional wisdom that insists the war must be fought in the first place and portrays it as a moral enterprise.

From the "War Made Easy" film transcript:

NORMAN SOLOMON: "A big problem with the media focus is that it sees the war through the eyes of the Americans, through the eyes of the occupiers, rather than those who are bearing the brunt of the war in human terms."

WALTER CRONKITE: "We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders both in Vietnam and Washington to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds."

SOLOMON: "In early 1968, Walter Cronkite told CBS viewers that the war couldn't be won."

CRONKITE: "It seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate."

SOLOMON: "And that was instantly, and through time even more so, heralded as the tide has turned. As Lyndon Johnson is reputed to have said when he saw Cronkite give that report, 'I've lost middle America.' And it was presented as not only a turning point, quite often, but also as sort of a moral statement by the journalistic establishment. Well, I would say yes and no. It was an acknowledgement that the United States, contrary to official Washington claims, was not winning the war in Vietnam, and could not win. But it was not a statement that the war was wrong. A problem there is that if the critique says this war is bad because it's not winnable, then the response is, 'Oh yeah, we'll show you it can be winnable, or the next war will be winnable.' So, that critique doesn't challenge the prerogatives of military expansion, or aggression if you will, or empire."

Comments

[XanthanGum]

Mr. Solomon,

Thank you for reminding us that Walter Cronkite was a party to big corporate media back when their audiences were bigger than what they are now. While Cronkite did the right thing in commenting on what he learned about the Vietnam war, where was he all those years before 1968? Both he and Dan Rather had plenty of chances to speak out when they earned their big salaries at CBS, but, of course, how long would they have lasted at the corporate news desks if they had? They were cheerleaders for the two illegal wars (Vietnam and Iraq) while reporting from those desks. Only after they left the anchor desks did they speak out.

Thank goodness we have a healthier independent media with groups like Democracy Now, The Huffington Post, Consortium News.com, TomDispatch.com, and so on. We need to find a means to fund these independent media so that we no longer need corporate news programs hosted by men with pretty voices.

XG

[Chblotm]

Lots of us supported the Vietnam War early on, and the July 1965 addition of American troops on the ground. Problem was, the military and political types were either lying about how much progress was being made, or drinking their own moonshine.

I don't understand your allegation about "an aggressive war based on deception.­" Dulles gave anti- and non-communist elements in Vietnam the opportunity to develop a non-communist state. The resulting Republic of Vietnam was a problem child from its inception, and ultimately could not sustain itself. That doesn't mean that helping it was wrong, just that it didn't work.

[noaxe397]

It seems as if you are saying a person can't (or shouldn't) change their opinion/be­liefs/mind when the facts and circumstances change.

Another fact that is often mis-reported on the Vietnam War is LBJ's March 31, 1968, announcement he would seek re-election, the single most significant political decision made in the 2nd half of the 20th century. The CW was he did not think he could win, given the support early on for McCarthy and the challenge from RFK.
In reality, when LBJ received word from North Vietnam that they wanted peace, Johnson decided not to run so that his moves in securing a treaty would not be evaluated through the prism of a presidential campaign. Five days before the Nov, 1968 presidential election they were popping champaign corks on what was thought to be a done deal, until the South Vietnamese representatives walked away from the peace process.

We learned later it was Nixon's back channel communications with the SV government that the south would get a better deal with Nixon that motivated the south to walk away.

How did we learn this. In Watergate tapes Nixon is heard telling people to break into the Brookings Institute to retrieve some documents. "Blow the safe if you have to" he is heard saying.
What documents? LBJ had Nixon wiretapped and knew all about his dirty dealings with the SV government and he had the redacted transcript stored at Brookings. Nixon wanted it back to cover his tracks.

[Weirdwriter]

Yes, the man reported what he saw as genuine -- because he didn't know better. This is an old WWII-era reporter, and this was a different war. When that finally became clear to him -- and give him props for seeking the truth out himself -- Cronkite came through.

[sail]

Was there anybody who didn't already understand that 1968 was when Cronkite MADE A MAJOR CHANGE in his reporting on the war? What's the big scoop? The fact that he reported it the way he saw it rather than just following the officail script is what made him different. No one needs to believe that he was always correct and could not be fooled, or as easily swept away as the next gung-ho patriot. That was EXACTLY WHY his 1968 report had so much impact. He reported what he saw on the ground and what he thought it meant. Plain and simple. He certainly had no reason to suddenly go off about the morality of war in the first place. That was not his job. His job was to report the facts. And he took that job seriously. Unlike today's TV infotainment clowns.

[LMPE]

It's worth noting that while Bobby Kennedy was an anti-war candidate in 1968, he started out as a hawk (and got his start in HUAC). John Kennedy, supposedly a crusader for civil rights, tried to stop the March on Washington and did everything possible to undermine Cuba's revolutionary government.