Book Review: The First Casualty: The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-Maker from the Crimea to Iraq

The First Casualty: The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth-Maker from the Crimea to Iraq, by Phillip Knightley, (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004), 3rd edition, 608 pages, $21.95When Philip Knightly wrote the first edition of First Casualty 30 years ago, its context was post-Vietnam. His purpose in the first edition, he writes, was "to record how war had been reported through the ages and to highlight the unforgiving verdict of history on those reports . . . important parts of the story had been omitted or twisted" (xiii). His new edition of First Casualty: The War Correspondent as Hero and Myth Maker from the Crimea to Iraq continues to document how correspondents got the story wrong war after war.Knightley, for 20 years an investigative journalist for London's Sunday Times, has added six chapters since his first edition (1975). Two chapters fill in gaps not included in the first edition: one on the Boer War, from which British correspondents Conan Doyle and Winston Churchill reported, and a fascinating chapter documenting the severe censorship, propaganda and political dangers facing correspondents covering the French in the Algerian War.Four new chapters chronicle the war coverage since Vietnam. "Britannia Rules the News 1975-1989" examines the poor quality of war reporting from trouble spots after Vietnam: Rhodesia, East Timor, Lebanon, Afghanistan (Soviet invasion) and the Falklands. Then follow chapters on the Gulf War, NATO's campaign against the Serbs and the ongoing Iraq War. Knightley suggests that in these post-Vietnam conflicts, Western correspondents have been incorporated as "an integral part of the [military] task force, propagandists for the... cause" (481). In his forward to the third edition, Knightley challenges "journalists to examine their role in the promotion of war" (xiii).The First Casualty, an excellent overview of major military actions and their coverage, puts the reporting of the current Iraq War in proper context. In his compelling account of World War I reporting, the writer sets up a vivid contrast between the British correspondents and their American counterparts as they reported under the strictures of military censors and an intense propaganda apparatus. Knightley concludes that because British coverage of World War I was such a blatant whitewash of wretched conditions at the front, the public lost confidence in newspapers as a source of truthful information.World War II did not produce much better coverage for the British public. Knightley highlights some of the myths generated by the war's reporting. We learn that the conditions of the Allied forces' heroic escape from Dunkirk were over-glamorized and that, in fact, "Dunkirk need not have happened" (254) because the Allies had superior troops and tanks compared to the German force that routed the Allies into a stampede back to Britain. Another myth Knightley challenges is that the bitter Russian winter defeated the German army on the Eastern front when, in fact, the Russian Army had more tanks, better winter uniforms and leaders capable of matching German military tactics.Although Western correspondents began the Korean War censor-free, first a voluntary system and then strict censorship were imposed in the field. When critical commentary was received stateside, self-censorship stemmed dispatches that might further erode waning popular support for the war. …