black october. it is the process in the staff for our friend but also to support his family with israeli and palestinian peace builders to struggle to understand we came very close to the family and also of the best friend. then to have the commission of inquiry the rather than holding in a one responsible they had the internal investigation as they do they determine that nothing was done wrong.

not just the seals case but all 12,000 citizens of israel. after the decision was announced the demonstration was led and organized with jewish israeli friends. and they wrote strong letters to the attorney general and got many people twos sign it. and his sister wrote a letter to say you have no idea it gives me straight to demonstrate for him. i am proud of you i am proud

to be your friend and proud to be underside. those words have always stayed in my head. i am proud to be underside of the struggle. a palestinian woman writing to the israelis heavier on the same side. . .

are given equal consideration and that includes palestinians and israelis and jews and christians and muslims. we need that side to be a lot bigger. we need to grow that side as large as we can bet the first step is to refrain how we see the contract. sami said anyone time in the intro of the book that it is better for your children if my children's rights and needs are guaranteed and better for my children if your children's rights and needs a guarantee and contradicted himself after he said that because he said actually there is no such thing as your children and my children because they are all our children. thank you very much for being

here. [applause] >> every weekend booktv offers 48 hours of programming focused on nonfiction authors and books. what it here on c-span2. >> timothy gay presents the history of american war reporting during world war ii following five journalists as they reported from the front lines of battle. walter cronkite, andy rooney they, homer bigart and hal boyle. mr. gay speaks with walter cronkite's and chip cronkite, tim wendell and david maraniss, associate editor of "the washington post" that is next on booktv. >> good evening and welcome to the national press club. i am the aarp bulletin executive better for state news, member of the book and author committee

and former president of the national press club. are booked tonight is "assignment to hel," the war against nazi germany with correspondents walter cronkite, andy rooney, homer bigart, and hal boyle. the authors timothy gay. excited to be doing this book because that just finished reading andy rooney's my war. before we turn to tonight's book but me mention some upcoming books. june 14th, liz quince said the persian look media and satirist will discuss her book is free or die. june 28th, a commanding officer of the uss cole at the time of the attack will discuss his book front burner:al qaeda's attack on the uss cole. on june 12th, the vice president and the republic of donna will discuss --ghana will discuss

the last decades of africa. on july 24th, tom young, member of the national guard will discuss the renegades and on september 19th, jeffrey toobin of cnn will discuss his book the obama white house and the supreme court. if you would like to receive an e-mail i believe there is a list outside so please send out the list and we will keep you in touch. all of our book reps here benefit the national journal institute which is why we restrict outside books. copies of him's book made be purchased outside in the hallway. joining him on the panel this evening is chip cronkite, producer, editor and filmmaker and a son of legendary reporter and anchor man walter cronkite.

his father received the first for the state award for the national press club. glad to have you back. don't wait so long before coming back again. next to him is david maraniss, two time pulitzer prize-winning reporter and to associate editor of "the washington post" and daughter of two books and eight books including his most recent to be published book barack obama:the story. next to david is tim wendell, by year-end president of johns including summer of 68:when baseball and america changed forever. tonight's author timothy gay is a former press secretary for senator jay rockefeller and tom coughlin. he spent two years researching this book and had unparalleled access to the papers and families of the five journalists profiled in the book.

he is a graduate of georgetown and senior vice president at a washington government public affairs firm. this is his third book. he is also author of the speaker:the rough-and-tumble life of a baseball legend and rapid robert, the saga of interracial baseball before jackie robinson. we will follow the usual format. spiegel's will discuss the book for 40 minutes and we will take questions from the audience for 20 minutes and kim will sign copies of the book. i will turn the pan over to tim. >> thank you. much appreciated. it does this irish heart good to see so many old pals at the table. a wonderful thing. can't tell you how much it means to me. as you can tell, it is a little awkward here. i managed to tear up my knee of few weeks ago. i wish i could tell you i got

wounded while storming a nazi stronghold at normandy but the truth is i tripped heading toward a poolside bar in search of a strawberry margaritas. it is pathetic. ernest hemingway just a fepuke. it was that a well-known family resort in florida. it really would have been ernest hemingway who hosted on christmas day, 1944, in luxembourg city, a very liquid christmas bash for fellow correspondents. he wrote for collier's magazine. all the other correspondents following a little thing called the battle of the bulge were invited to pop up's party that

day including a 20-year-old united press correspondent who happened to be chip cronkite at that. owed to a fly on the wall at that gathering. tiger tanks working on the countryside, pawpaw scored two booze despite the eggnog. the whole thing went wild beyond midnight. the only one who did not get high eyed and that is a direct quote from walter cronkite was cronkite who was a wire correspondent had deadlines to meet that night. could not get as high eyed as everybody else. [laughter] [talking over each other] >> that is what he told your mom in a letter and i am inclined to believe him. hemingway makes several cameo

appearances none particularly flattering. as andy rooney said you should never meet one of your literary heroes because of your illusions that shattered. this will be a lot of fun. a lot of back and forth going here. we have a great panel and i want you to know how honored i feel to spend the last three years and how lucky i am to write something i care about as passionately as world war ii journalism and to follow these five great correspondence. walter cronkite, and amazing guy and we are fortunate to have chip cronkite with us but chip cronkite is lucky to be here at all. his old man flew on bombing missions over nazi germany tracking u-boat's and those reconnaissance rattletraps they had that flew at such low altitude, he was the only

american correspondents to fly a bomber over d. day. on august 16th, 1944, he was sitting in a c 47 on a runway set to become one of only two correspondence to witness the incredible, dramatic parachute drop to liberate paris bet at the last second eisenhower canceled the mission because the first and third army were advancing across northern france. one month later cronkite fulfilled his wish and went into holland in a glider carrying the top command of the 101 including general wolfe who a couple months later would be famous for saying nuts to the germans when they demanded surrender. that is a brief snapshot.

homer bigart, cronkite's great friend was like cronkite, trained by the eighth army air force to fly on combat missions. he covered the 300 third bomb group and after that he moved to the mediterranean theater. homer bigart went on two commando raids behind enemy lines. one in sicily and one in the south of france. the first celebrated incident in the movie at and i am sure you are familiar with where george c. scott watches his underling and says all your courage, always courage. very controversial moment in world war ii history. he wanted that raid to move

forward. he had reporters ready to go and he didn't want to be embarrassed and pull back. that is why there was the great tug-of-war. homer bigart later covered the great push up the boot of italy. he was on the pink shed 52 months and then covered the liberation of rome. andy rooney of "stars and stripes" went on five combat raids and earned a bronze star he never told anybody about for his courageous coverage. he stood shoulder to shoulder with two other guys. they were covering the first army. he was among the first in to paris but did get his story out

but he was the first correspondent on the scene when we captured the bridge over the rhine in tact. andy rooney stage we 2 weeks until the bridge fell. he was among the first american correspondents to visit the awful death camp. just an amazing world war ii career for a kid of 23 or 24. the fourth guy is a.j. liebling who fled hitler's storm troopers across france in 1940, he was a great francophile and recovered the british in his beloved paris and also earlier in the war covered africa brilliantly. andy rooney, cronkite's wire service senator, probably wrote more words about the european

theater than any reporter. he was at operation torch from its first day. stayed in the european theater all the way through. the first american newspaperman on the scene when the awful massacre of the prisoners was discovered. just an amazing series of guys and i say they were a journalistic band of brothers. i am barely scratching the surface. and i am waiting for hundreds of starring moments. takes a village to write a book like this. the guys at this table helped me in return. tim wendell writes beautifully on everything from baseball to world war ii. a great tradition of hal boyle. he is a great teller of tales.

hal boyle won a pulitzer in 44 for his brilliant coverage of italy in the post normandy. homer bigart the person great power of betsy wade of the new york times, later worked for the new york times and was his great friend told me whenever homer bigart was introduced as a pulitzer winner he would say two time. two time pulitzer winner. spoofing the pretentiousness of it all but he had won journalism's most prestigious award twice and were honored one of the few people in the history of journalism. it used to be -- let me say this. be dated stuff, newspaper stuff,

very few people can write with the bite and the breadth of homer bigart. blogger forms of, books, very few writers can write with the style of the wheat joe lee bling. the most frightening words in america used to be michael more is in the lobby. now it is maraniss sir is interviewing your ex-girlfriend. famous person especially when your real dad is everybody else at surrogate dad. i called him a few weeks after his dad died. could not have been more

helpful, went for his dad's personal papers and the the bunch of stuff. and after his wartime correspondence was found, i am delighted his son working at cbs held his former hamilton college professor bringing l a book -- it file i anyone to read the letter walter cronkite wrote to his wife on christmas eve 1943 and not to tear up. chip cronkite's sister kathy and i am looking at it in a restaurant and started to pour

rain. we exchanging e-mail newts and -- notes over classic cbs news video. historical recreations fills. this one happened to be a dramatic recreations of december 7, 1941. could you run a little -- sir >> located in the cbs newsroom in new york. regularly scheduled news program the world today is now on the air. a few seconds at 2:30 p.m.. >> look at this. that is the guy who used to be on i dream of jeannie.

so i immediately notified him of that effect. i regretted it. he went -- he is going to think i am a no cultured dream and just shot my credibility and the program wasn't even on cbs. so i was sitting there really upset with myself and two seconds leader -- later my computer beat and it was chip cronkite. the actor's name was hayden work. i was thrilled to deliver a crypt -- script to him once in hollywood. we loved i dream of jeannie in the cronkite household. having bonded over barbara eden we were friends for life. hundreds of themes we can explore here but i kind of

boiled it down to three, especially how those affected two great correspondents and two great friends who stayed inseparable friends for the rest of their lives. they covered the 300 third bomb load which was brilliantly month over month in 1943. the first thing is how these five correspondents rose to the challenge despite being so what's behind the ears. there was nothing about their backgrounds to suggest they could cover a global conflict. not to put too find a point on it but we are talking about cronkite and homer bigart leaders will cronkite was a fuzzy wuzzy guy looking at kansas city and hal boyle covered street crime. there was little about their backgrounds to suggest they were

ready for this kind of challenge. let me read to you this. this is from chapter iii. homer bigart live the parochial existence. future n.y. times editor harrison solve very apt portrait of the early work homer bigart with no for an experience or more--no more knowledge of war than he could glean from the headlines accurately describe the other three as well. just as world war ii brought out the best of general eisenhower and bradley its third something within cronkite, andy rooney, homer bigart that they did not know they had. the physical and mental courage it took for these guys to cover dead and wounded soldiers day

after day. there are no shortage of apps and heart rending moment in the book and looking at a few of them and the spirit is the legacy they left to all of us in post war journalism. i don't know if you saw robert macneil's review of my book but i am so honored at a journalist of his stature -- he challenged my premise that the end of the book that the guys came home after the war and created the greatest era of press integrity in american history. we got a very distinguished panel and a lot of great people in the audience kicking that around. with that, a second ago we were laughing about the historical recreations of cbs as part of the fifteenth and chip cronkite's dad was such an instrumental part of. in describing it to those of you in the younger generation who

weren't around, could we run a click herp here. >> the damaged battleship nevada, west virginia legal pennsylvania the bridge will repaired and performed valiantly as the board ruled on. pearl harbor, the long hard heroic road to victory for guadalcanal, iwo jima, okinawa, midway, on the deck of the battleship missouri with the surrender of the japanese. equally hard, our men who fought on a rough sand of africa and the beach of normandy, along the rhine washington--they're not the counterparts for freedom and

equality. a day like all days to illuminate our time and you were there. >> who else misses that guy? that is what i was thinking. here is our first question. what is it that we miss about this guy? what is it that we miss about walter cronkite and this generation of journalism? why does it stirred the soul to see stuff like that? i will open it up to you guys. >> i should recuse myself. >> you were there. >> recused myself because i was there. the question is meant to be historical, not personal. i can only -- there are so many

journalists today that there are plenty like him. that is my counterarguments. >> i wish that were true. >> my first reaction is not to your question i was about 12 years old when those shows were running and i remember them vividly. but what struck me is that was 12 to 14 years after world war ii but world war 2 -- world war ii in ancient. out of the realm of the baby boomer world. yet go back 12 or 14 years from now and where are you? the clinton administration which seems like yesterday.

the difference of that era, everything changing so dramatically that it seemed like it was from a different place completely. that is part of the romance of it that the world changed so dramatically. >> after the korean war why should people's memories of the heroic -- >> the korean war is the forgotten war. >> forgotten immediately? >> not at the moment but the other thing as you mentioned, there might be journalists like that to overwhelming amount of information and misinformation and different platforms of information. it gave it much more power. >> these guys were under

deadlines, amazing deadlines. but there was more pause. we are in this 24/7, you write for the internet or whenever run in your story and whatever it may be and what i love about that voice today is it has the authority but also it has-pause or look back that has the empathy and compassion too and that is difficult to find these days simply because the gerbils are running and running faster on the treadmills. >> the beauty is they were completely emblematic of the g i. they were not professional soldiers. the fact that the press went

through the same thing echoes that. >> when i see cronkite i see gloom. and the television personalities leaders the look call them what they will are abrasive. it is all polarizing now. seems to me he represented the absolute best in trying to pull things together. that is why we have such nostalgia. >> i wonder if we are even allowed to pull things together these days. the ones that tend to get a bigger shows get the bigger ratings of one this that are the most polarizing and therefore simply catering to what the audience may be. >> the other thing that strikes me as if it is true that 40% of graduating american high school seniors believe we flood russia in world war ii maybe it is time to recycle the old humor.

>> some teachers -- >> there has got to be something we can do to reach kids. >> i don't think human nature changes but culture changes around it. there are as many people who had problems with fdr. you had colonel mccormick and those people what they would be like if they had the power of the technology today and that would be split. >> continuing the same theme if you would show the still picture which is indecipherable but i will explain it in a second. >> there it is. that is one of my all-time

favorite photographs. chip cronkite got that out of his old-time paper is. >> which is why it is so blurry to figure out what it is. that is walter cronkite and the great homer bigart in front of the barracks at the 300 third bomb group and if you didn't know better what views where it was peter graves and william holden? those are the good guys. that is how the good guys live. imagine what it was to be in a german -- anyhow, hi know from my research, correspondence to his mom that photograph was taken on february 19th, 1943, exactly one week before the assignment to help raid. these two guys had been trained by the u.s. army air force to fly along, that range.

they were right in the middle of their training. they were supposed to cover that day's mission but because of bad weather that day's mission was scrubbed so they borrow a couple bikes and paddled around the countryside and visited across east tavern not once but twice. i don't know how many pictures went down before the photograph was taken. you can see mr. cronkite holding up a sign, and be known as to homer the idea was to surprise him with this. keep off the grass. there was no grass to keep off of. this was an airdrome base. it is absolutely amazing to think that on february 19th, 1943, they were both anonymous grunts with little to distinguish themselves in their wartime correspondence.

all of that change when they went on an amazing bombing run. we had been bombing the third reich sins july of 42 but we only bombed germany proper three times. think about that for a second. 14 months after pearl harbor the only real action to speak of in the european theater are these amazingly brave bomber boys who risked life and limb to take the fight directly to heller and yet it has taken all this time to get the manpower, the material, everything required to amount a meaningful bombing campaign against hitler. that day, february 26, 1943, the writing of 69 or the flying

typewriters, after a few beers the legion of the doomed. deletion of the doomed took off in a series of b 24s. about 70 planes in that day's attack formation. the original objective was the fighter factory in brandon but they got over germany that they and it was all cloud cover so they ended up attacking hitler's great you both on the north sea. it was the second time u.s. bombers had attacked and the u.s. attacked during the day. the british believe in nighttime bombing. what they called area bombing. we believe in daylight bombing. we call it strategic bombing. precision bombing. this was very early in the war. there were no fighter escorts. the british spitfires turned around and returned to their

bases and these guys were flying completely exposed over the north sea. absolutely remarkable stuff. so the writing 69th would go on constant missions. let me give you a little flavor of what their training was like. and give you some sense how brilliant a writer homer bigart was. we didn't realize until the top boys cleared the idea, andy rooney recalled, we have to attend batteries will. we were going to go on the bomber battle we better know how to shoot a gun in case we got in trouble. the instructional base, the entourage was instructed in oxygen maintenance. aircraft identification and digging out which meant abandoning a plane by parachute

or dinghy on february 8th. it was during lt. alex hogan's lecture but some of us felt like going back to london's paddington station but the lieutenant is a pleasant lad from mississippi but his discourse was a bit grim. what would happen if he ditched into the north sea and an enemy plane swooped down to investigate? in that event tell them you are waiting for the r a f and waved them on. lieutenant hogan wasn't alone. other trainers gave the 69th equally unsettling council. one medical officer painted an unforgettable picture if we took off our gloves at 30,000 feet. another was constantly hard to swallow after takeoff to relieve pressure on the air jerome's in honor of my 19-year-old sun. if it offends anyone i

apologize. sins flatulence at a rarefy altitude could be painful and hazardous, he also prescribed avoiding gashes foods such as beans, chips and red cabbage and treat beer like the plague. in england the reporters protested what else are we supposed to eat and drink? benny always an expert teacher having flown in 4 dozen combat missions over germany. his yorkshire accent was baffling at first. he kept talking about positions until some of us began drying out lines of a spherical dutch cheese. he was referring to aircraft

approaching -- cronkite remembered his stirring it barely intelligible tribute to britain's hurricane fire. this year the r a f man said while displaying a silhouette under a domed ceiling is the hurricane, mighty nice aircraft. it helped our troops when they were on the run in the desert. protected the boy is getting out of gay -- getting out of greece. and fact it was essentials in all our defeats. anyhow, get back from sullivan in one piece of the three planes, >> hit by a german fighter was andy rooney's b-17 banshee.

cronkite survives, andy rooney survives the old soldier and they get back by a design to solve murray --salisbury and get some very bad news. robert perkins host, original fraternity member legal and reported from the new york times people is beat 24 had been shot down. they saw two parachutes but sadly post was not one of them. so ended abruptly the writing 69th. there had been planned for them to go and constant bombing missions baths in as people realized how perilous it was that was all canceled. andy rooney went on four more missions over the third reich earning his air medal. cronkite when on an incredible

mission at lower altitudes with medium bombers. in february of 1944, five months before d-day cronkite went on an attack and you know what he was attacking? v1 rock at one site. he said it was fought rocket launch site. he had to use euphemisms about superweapons. chip cronkite got into hot water with his bosses on admission and produce the two-month-old memo saying you told me i could go on this trip. >> they would not do that day.

>> fascinating. he hammered away on a 50 caliber with a plastic nose. homer bigart was the waste gun hammering away. andy rooney who was the "stars and stripes" guy chose not to use the machine gun. cronkite said it was impossible to keep track of the german fighters. the bombers were going to the north sea at 300 miles an hour. the magician that coming up at 500 miles an hour. a tiny speck on the horizon. cronkite never shot one of these before. all the friendlys and b-17s information with you.

and robert perkins -- closing the formation. he was tormented by that. >> they had to write obituaries? how many wrote obituaries the same day? >> amazing sorry that chip cronkite was up four days and what would be the famous assignment was then -- february 27th, cbs calls and john charles daly, got to the old for this. what did he host? they used to wear black ties. he was one of the -- in london

and interviewed chip's dad to get impressions of the raid. first time your father ever was on cbs. just looking at these two guys and this great picture and knowing what they meant to future journalism, what do you think about homer bigart and cronkite together? >> childhood and adolescence. almost the voice of god. and complete authority. homer bigart, because i am a writer and didn't know about

cronkite's rating. later became one of their heroes. and most journalists, and sensibility and sense of humor. everything about it seemed perfect. and the other is the voice i have as a writer. >> what strikes me often with these guys is being together is a -- how green they were at the correct point that they mirrored the military guys over there.

and anybody who has been in this business knows you get better when you emulate or pushing you along that maybe you even have the computer or the laptop -- hands these guys -- what he has done is taken some names that are commonplace and other names we haven't heard as much about that you realize the synergy and the kinship between all of them and elevate all their games because of the company they kept. >> incredible influence beginning with andy rooney who he hero worship during the war because homer bigart always asked the obvious question nobody else would ask: why?

explain that again? explain it one more time? it seems to me the persistence that is missing in today's journalism. larry is giving me the high signs. could we skip ahead to the last couple -- thanks to chip cronkite we were able to pull out of cbs's and knows a copy of d-day plus 20, classic 1964 cbs news documentary that mr. cronkite did with dwight eisenhower. let's show two clips. you might want to stand up to see those. wonderful moment. very early on in the shooting this happened. >> you can see from back here, walter, this is where the battle took place at a natural thing to

do because you knew you could blow out roads if necessary but these were more avenues and this is what we are trying to get through and the battle finally developed and everything went fine but this first day was really a tough one. here comes -- that is something. how do you do? just testing. i must say that this has been the most interesting thing to take it attach. 20 years ago if i had seen that that would have been something. ♪

>> reporter: that is why we like a lake. those wonderful moments. i think we are running out of time. if it is okay could we skip ahead to the final thing? is important we close on this note. my book -- my book begins at the normandy cemeteries. in that same place with those great iconic figures. >> 86th battalionthe cold 90th

division -- from new jersey, 8 second airborne. i think there are some 9,000 boys who live here. most of the casualties of td da overlooking omaha beach. >> a lot of them were taken home. >> unidentified and the names are missing. [talking over each other] >> 1500 missing never were found. >> the names are on the wall. >> this cemetery includes all the d-day casualties back to the normandy fighting. >> that has been the quartermaster at contemporary

cemetery's and gathering -- as far as -- [inaudible] >> and of course this is just one of the cemetery's that stretch from here around the world. >> thd-day has a special meanin to me. part of sending in an invasion where you knew that many hundreds of boys were going to give their lives and remain forever. mind goes off and to this fact. on the day my son graduatd-day

west that the. on the day he was graduated-not to gain anything for ourselves, not to fulfil any ambitions america had for conquest but just to preserve freedom. systems of self-government in the world. many thousands of men have died for ideals such as these. here again in the 20th century for the second time americans along with the rest of the

world, americans had to come across the ocean to defend those same values. my own son has been very fortunate. he has had a very full life, the children are very precious to my wife and me. but these young boys, so many of them. wondering and contemplating about bear sacrifices. they were cut off in their prime. their families agreed but they never knew about each experience coming to life and can enjoy. i can only hope that we will remember again and to see such scenes as these and hope and

pray that the -- we learn more. but these people gave us a chance and they bought time for us to do better than we have before. so every time i come back to these beaches or any day that i think about that day 20 years ago, i say once more, we must find some way to works for peace and to gained each journal piece for this world. >> thanks. >> now you see why i am honored to write this book and all of you are part of this discussion. we are happy to answer any questions you may have. >> what do you think the common g i said if you asked at a time

of combat, philosophically why is he over there and what is his cause? what motivates him and what makes him wish to get home alive? >> two things. stephen ambrose brought it back beautifully. all the great books that he wrote. it was really about company camaraderie. it was about looking out for your friend. great statements about idealism and all the rest did not work when it came to that combat on the ground and there was a great desire to get home. yes, sir? >> he told me once i am not a brave man. i am not a military man. i just didn't want to make

excuses the rest of my life. >> what is incredible to me and didn't get a chance to read one of my favorite quotes, the great admiration he had which translated into great admiration for astronauts. at one point in forty-three and early 44 there were chances of getting back in those combat missions which were better than one or six or seven. imagine having to cover those kids. you would see that breakfast and they would fly off and 10% or 20% wouldn't come home. some raids more catastrophic than that. i am not the only person who roll their eyes when politicians say they want a government as good as the people of the united states or how inspired they are by the people of the united states because we have all seen people in less than inspiring

moment. walter cronkite and homer bigart saw americans at their absolute best. pacific. i am curious. the stories were quite extraordinary. has there been a similar book on reporters like bob who covered the pacific war the way you have on this story? >> there is a guy i know who is thinking of doing that book? would you be happy if i did it? >> fascinating story in itself. >> the pacific war too often gets overlooked especially the journalists and all the rest were phenomenal reporters. homer bigart was there for the last year and won his pulitzer covering the pacific. ice 0 love homer i would love to

>> tell us about the genesis of the book. >> my buddies from georgetown university -- when walter cronkite passed away i was struck by two things. rather than the usual jaded e-mail exchanges it was pure reverence. the depth of the respect that mr. cronkite engendered in so many of us and so few obituaries mentioned his world war ii legacy. was an afterthought. as tim said a second ago, this baby boomer obsession. everything was through the prism of all the issues we associate mr. cronkite within a 60s and 70s, vietnam, the kennedy

assassination and watergate and all those things are important don't get me wrong but if he were with us he would say world war ii really defined him. i will defer to chip cronkite. >> they went to vietnam too and asked why. i don't remember who was asking why in korea. but the general took over for westmoreland was associated with a friend of my dad's from the battle of the bulge, gregory abrams with whom he had dinner before he left on his

fact-finding or mood finding trip in february of 1960. after the tet offensive he goes to check it out for himself and has dinner with his old buddy abrams who apparently is saying the same thing. ..

>> and one another pulitzer and partnership with marguerite higgins. she was every bit as tough but she wanted give homer grief and he would return it. when word came down, you know, what is coming? [laughter] >> word is she is expecting an he sad who is the

mother -- . [laughter] then homer inquired if marguerite had eaten it. and betsy his great protege worked up the courage to say which of those is true? he said yes. [laughter] >> how did this affect the experiences have do people live their lives and in europe? i never asked questions. i wish that i had. >> he was in europe and the pacific. >> everybody has their own

war. i have never been a combat into an it is, and not to bring home the blood and guts stories home but instead the funny ones to the dinner table. i don't know. >> [inaudible] [laughter] >> if lbj said cronkite is not with us. if i lost cronkite i lost america. to think the be had no more was not worth pursuing something valuable that with your father's mind that

world war ii should have been the last looking at vietnam and korea may cannot measure up. >> no more measures up to report to. it was unquestionably right again strong. also lot shorter. people got home quicker. of the war today going on in the tenth year, has a much different impact on all of us because it only in packs in a very small number of

bus. these folks who were told to go out and say and then told to go back. is not the question but it is the question. >> i would like to ask about mr. mcneil suggesting that i had exaggerated they came back from the war to create something that had not been proposed journalism was honorable and the central part of the democracy that it had not the four. they created the greatest era of integrity in history

i would like to throw it out to get people's reaction. >> my dad trained the pilots from world war ii and flew between korea, 94 missions as a first navigator. he said he had great admiration for walter cronkite because he thought it was something to do. but i asked him did he think about the people on the ground when you drop the bombs? you do not. you just think of the mission. as soon as they bombed the bridges they would be built with the fast turnaround but

the press was helpful to keep the numbers straight they could look at the same piece of turf but some would say four or some would say six. they kept the redundancy and exaggerations to a minimum. but i would also like to use the more books on currie yet. undeclared war one hell of a fight to. >> my dad pointed out with the two were three missions they chose whether to go up. your dad went up 96 more times than that. >> [inaudible] >> they kept secrets because they had to the. >> but this total of heroic

war which was rolled word to and the consequence that is the same question whether the revolutionary war and politics that came after word is not the same question. it has an effect on us. we do not have that to. >> that is a very perceptive point*. >> with the odds against you and the support we had to have france. we almost lost. >> not to the golden age of journalism. [laughter]

>> it did inaugurate some incredible combat journalism lasting through vietnam then it changed again because of the repression of the government. >> i wish we could have gotten into that. >> george c. marshall, the marshall plan, a story is generals were telling enlisted reporters what to write on stars and stripes and he said let them write. he supported them 100%. >> he did not want cheerleading. they were writing these editorials and he said cut out. he wanted real journalism.

and the rooney was a part of that. >> the baby-boom generation group with many world were to movies and with your research and experience, what did you learn about the correspondence and what the air men felt about them? >> they appreciated like marshall and i appreciated having the story told. their own stories and the fact checking i have heard from vietnam they appreciated asking why. >> one of the things the gis

admired about the five correspondents that they were with them in the trenches. not everyday and to the extreme but 30 per i/o became so wildly popular is the press felt comfortable and he began to write wonderful profiles. hal boyle said he would write for the people who read ernie pyle over the shoulder of people reading the ernie pyle. [laughter] he was handicapped because the ap insisted on calling him herald.

is unsecured the accounting professor. but finally it became hal boyle. >> he did not have the same amount of notoriety. what is the difference between the experience in iraq and these correspondence? >> >> aside from the technological differences there is a cultural difference with the relationship between the press and military. as i said at the beginning

most soldiers in world war ii were thrown in there is a much closer parallel. the press and military are two separate cultures. good journalist can do it and write the truth but there are more obstacles to overcome and they were embedded. >> they could do it from more than one perspective. some got lost and became said cheerleaders. >> italy went sideways quickly and it was the miserable place it had the feel of world war i trench warfare.

both had very pointed reporting and with mark clark and the stalemate that took place this you have to give them credit. >> we have gone over but we will take one more question. >> now we have film and tweaks and famous but we don't have letters. will that make a big difference in the future? >> absolutely. [laughter]