Mik: We All Lose a Legend

Jim Miklaszewski, one of the best reporters I've ever worked with, has finally retired as NBC's chief Pentagon correspondent thus giving me, once again, the opportunity to report on what I regard as his greatest story.
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Jim Miklaszewski, one of the best reporters I've ever worked with, has finally retired as NBC's chief Pentagon correspondent thus giving me, once again, the opportunity to report on what I regard as his greatest story.

On September 19, 1980, a nuclear tipped missile in Damascus, Arkansas had fallen on its side and reporters flocked to the scene. The Air Force refused to confirm or deny the presence of nuclear warheads and denied that the missile posed a threat to anyone or anything. The reporters, Mik among them, believed them and went home--in Mik's case, to Texas.

I had been working in CNN's Washington Office that day and when I got word of the event, I called Atlanta and discovered that Mik had left the scene along with the other reporters. At the time, we were the only news organization in the country that had a satellite mounted on a truck, which gave us an edge on everyone else in the business. I told CNN's assignment editor Jim Rutledge to call Mik and tell him to get back to Damascus as fast as he could. And we arranged for the truck to meet him there.

When Mik approached the missile site he was greeted by an Arkansas sheriff leading what looked like a group of sharecroppers toting bags on their shoulders and carrying bags in their hands. Mik asked the sheriff what was happening and the sheriff said, "I don't know, I've just been told to get them out of here." The Air Force in Washington had refused to comment about the event except to say there were no nuclear hazards.

By that time, our truck had arrived and Mik was directed to report every half hour. When Mik began reporting, the Air Force moved two large vans in an attempt to block the view. A telephone lineman installing temporary lines saw that Air Force was blocking Mik and offered him a ladder so that he could climb up and shoot down on the site where they saw troops searching back and forth for parts that had broken off the missile when it fell. An Air Force General told Mik that radiations from the truck were "cooking his pilots." He demanded we shut down but Mik did stand down and for the next few hours did live voiceovers while our camera focuses on soldiers trying to hide their "mystery package." The last thing Mik reported was that Air Force personnel were chaining the canister to the back of a truck.

Throughout that long September weekend, CNN had the only camera watching the Air Force live as it attempted to cover up a potential nuclear disaster. On Monday, the 22nd we showed the missile covered up and on its way out of Damascus. I believe to this day that if Mik had not been there, the Air Force never would have revealed the full threat the missile posed.

When NBC brought Mik to Washington, at his first meeting with the Air Force, he was informed that he was the only reporter who ever forced the Air Force to change its PR about a potential nuclear disaster. The officers informed him that their rules had changed and they no longer said that an accident "poses no threat to human life." The line was changed to ""

After Mik left CNN for NBC as their new Pentagon correspondent the Air Force invited him to lunch and laughingly admitted that after the Damascus story, it had changed its PR policy: in the case where the public safety or security was an issue they would no longer deny the presence of nuclear material but they wouldn't confirm it either. They also told Mik that he was the first reporter who had ever made the Air Force change its policy on anything.

My guess is he still has every right to claim that title and all CNNers honor one of the dozen or so people who contributed so much to the birth of what has become a great worldwide news source.

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