https://soundcloud.com/frontlineclub/the-first-female-war
Clare Hollingworth was signed up to The Daily Telegraph in August 1939 as the world was rushing towards war. In a career spanning 60 years, her big scoops include being the first to spot the massing of German tanks on the Polish border, signalling the start of the Second World War, and identifying Kim Philby as ‘the third man’. She has reported wars and revolutions in Europe, North Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Now 102, she lives in Hong Kong.
Gerda Taro had a similar passion for journalism. Tragically, her career was cut short when, in July 1937 whilst covering the Spanish civil war, she became the first female war photographer to die on assignment. Aged just 26, she was beginning to make a name for herself and it has recently been revealed how integral she was to the early career of Robert Capa.
Clare Hollingworth and Gerda Taro were two of the first female war correspondents, and their pioneering courage and conviction paved the way for many who have followed. We will be joined by Patrick Garrett, Hollingworth’s great nephew who is writing a book about her life, and Jane Rogoyska, author of Gerda Taro: Inventing Robert Capa. They will be exploring the lives and work of these two extraordinary women, united by a passion for journalism.
Chaired by Deborah Haynes, defence editor at The Times.
With:
Patrick Garrett has worked as an editor for many of the major broadcasters, including the BBC, ITN, ABC, CBS and NBC, reporting from Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa.
Jane Rogoyska is a writer and filmmaker. She has worked extensively in filmmaking across a range of genres and has written two feature screenplays. Gerda Taro – Inventing Robert Capa is her first full-length book. With the aid of a Wingate Scholarship, she is currently working on a book about Katyn, the massacre of 14,000 Polish officers by the Soviet secret police during World War II. She is a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the University of Greenwich for 2013-14.
Kate Brooks is an award-winning American photojournalist who has covered the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Pakistan throughout the post 9/11 decade and into the Arab Spring. Her photographs have been extensively published in magazines such as TIME, Newsweek, The Atlantic, The New Yorker and Smithsonian and have also been exhibited in Europe and the U.S. In 2011 she published her first book In the Light of Darkness: A Photographer’s Journey After 9/11. Most recently she has working on her second documentary film project, dedicating herself to Africa’s poaching epidemic.
Photography: (L) Clare Hollingworth & Tim Page, Vietnam by François Sully, 1968 © Archives and Special Collections, Healey Library, UMass Boston; (R) Gerda Taro & Robert Capa, Paris by Fred Stein, 1935 © Estate of Fred Stein, FredStein.com, courtesy International Center of Photography.
]]>How to send stories by carrier pigeon, when to run when you are under fire and the best way to brush off tweets were amongst titbits of information from Alan Cowell’s discussion of his new book ‘The Paris Correspondent.’
Cowell has long been a correspondent with the New York Times, and before that worked for Reuters. This is his third book.
In discussion with Charles Glass, freelance writer and former chief Middle East correspondent with ABC News in Beirut, Cowell says that reporting and producing news has changed for good. The book’s two male protagonists grapple with the fast pace of this change in the news industry. Cowell reads an excerpt:
“News men and newswomen were going down with the ships on which they had once sailed the kindly oceans of expense account lunches, five-star hotels and mortal peril. Print, that great, gorgeous messy alchemy of ink and hot type and whirring reals of paper and working stiffs in stained overalls was expiring, but not quite finished.”
And as Cowell suggests, there is no reason not to reminisce a little about how things used to be:
“I remember in N’Djamena I was doing an interview with [President] Goukouni Oueddei… you had to go across the river to Cameroon to be able to find a phone… and on the bar there, there was a direct dial telephone… located next to an ice bucket where there was always a fresh bottle of champagne…”
“And there was also a curfew… and you had to be poled across the Chari River in a dugout canoe. And I remember saying to President Oueddei, “I’m sorry I’m going to have to cut this short because I have to catch the last pirogue before curfew.”
Those times have gone, says Cowell:
“If you say ‘Is that a more pleasant way of earning a living than slaving over a computer screen all day trying to bat off tweets like mosquitoes?’ Then yes, sure. But we can’t turn the clock back and what we have to do now is… bringing the standards and the values that have always made newspapers sell, into this new era.”
It was in Zimbabwe reporting shortly before independence, that Cowel was able to hone his carrier pigeon sending techniques. With no way to send his stories back he was given a huddle of “cooing carrier pigeons” by the last white mayor of Bulawayo and the last editor of the Bulawayo chronicle.
“…we didn’t know exactly how we were supposed to cope with them and he said look, Sid said “you hold the birds legs between those fingers, you put your thumb over the neck, you give it a little kiss and whisper something nice to it, then you loft it up to the air… And you write the story on a 30 packet of Madison cigarettes – there was a small bit of tissue paper inside and you could write 400 words of spidery script on it.
It is hard to avoid the feeling that news has definitely changed.
]]>Join us at the Frontline Club for an evening with Alan Cowell as he discusses his latest novel and the real life stories that inspired it with broadcaster, journalist and writer Charles Glass.
A long-time correspondent for the New York Times in Africa, the Middle East and Europe, Alan Cowell previously worked at Reuters, achieving the distinction of being the last correspondent to date to file by carrier pigeon.
Now heading the New York Times web-based breaking news operation in Paris, it is the shift from print to digital news that provides the backdrop to The Paris Correspondent, his second novel.
The book follows Ed Clancy and Joe Shelby, both reporters for The Paris Star, an English-language newspaper based in French capital. Having survived reporting from war-torn countries they now find themselves under attack from something very different to enemy fire: the Internet and 24-hour news cycle.
With:
Alan Cowell, a senior correspondent for The New York Times based in Paris. He is also the author of A Walking Guide: A Novel and The Terminal Spy: The Life and Death of Alexander Litvinenko.
Charles Glass, a broadcaster, journalist and writer, who began his journalistic career in 1973 at the ABC News Beirut bureau and was chief Middle East correspondent from 1983 to 1993. Since then, he has been a freelance writer, regularly covering the Middle East, the Balkans, southeast Asia and the Mediterranean region. He has also published books, short stories, essays and articles in the United States and Europe.
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A packed house at The Frontline Club heard Matt Frei regale them with tales from his long and illustrious career. The former BBC Washington correspondent, recently poached by Channel 4 News, was on fine form as he spoke to former BBC executive Vin Ray about more than 20 years with the BBC:
“The BBC is mother, and it’s been a very good mother to me, but now and again it’s a good idea to leave mother and elope with a mistress. I’ve always admired Channel 4 because it’s a cross between current affairs and news. Newsnight with a bit more of a newsy edge at a decent hour. I’ve had my eye on it for some time, and I guess they may have had their eye on me for some time.”
The event was delivered in conjunction with the BBC College of Journalism, as part of the ongoing Reflections series in which journalists including Alex Crawford, Jon Snow, Bill Neely and Martin Bell have discussed their experiences as journalists.
Frei spoke of the time he met Bell in Serbia, during the Bosnian war, and the valuable lessons that he took from him:
“He taught me the craft of television. It’s a very strange craft because it’s more about what you deny yourself than anything else, he said: ‘If you can’t say it in one minute and 42 seconds you can’t say it. Don’t bother.’”
Delivering his reflections alongside a series of memorable video clips, he discussed some of the high and low points of his career, including his coverage of the fall of the Berlin wall:
“I was told by a famous American journalist that this was the best story I would cover, and that it was all downhill from here. He was sort of right – it was such a happy event.”
He also spoke of some less orthodox approaches to stories, including one particular experience during his time in Rome:
“Giorgio Armani was accused of bribing the financial police. I got an interview by saying I was a fashion journalist for the BBC – I said I wanted to talk about hemlines and colours. Halfway through the interview he turned to me and said, ‘You know **** all about fashion, don’t you?’ I said, ‘Did you pay the money?’ He said, ‘Yes, in brown paper bags.’”
With regard to the challenges facing the next generation of young journalists Frei expressed some optimism:
“I think the challenges are going to be the same: find a story, tell it well and make sure somebody is going to pay you for it. If you’re starting out now you have an incredible range of tools at your disposal – much better than the tools we had, and cheaper.”
The issue of social media was subsequently raised, and the question of what it meant for the future of sending journalists like him around the world – particularly in light of the numerous journalists who have recently been killed and injured whilst reporting from warzones:
“I don’t think most serious organisations are thinking social media will replace what they have. It’s just another source of information – if you can’t get into Syria but you have evidence on your mobile phone you’re going to use it.”
As the evening drew to a close he discussed his only regret, the fact that he had to cover the Iraq war from Washington:
“I never went to Iraq, and in some ways I wish I’d covered it. In some ways talking about it from Washington makes you a bit of a fraud: unless you’ve seen the impact of policy on the ground you can’t really talk about it.”
Watch the full event:
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Veteran war correspondent Martin Bell was at the Frontline Club last night to look back on his long career as a journalist and share some pearls of wisdom for aspiring foreign correspondents.
Bell, who later went on to become MP for Tatton, a UNICEF ambassador and prolific writer, was talking to former BBC executive Vin Ray for a Reflections event in association with the BBC College of Journalism about a 35-year career that took him to 102 countries.
Inspired to take up journalism after observing the press corps while serving in Cyprus with the Suffolk Regiment back in the 1960’s, Bell covered numerous wars including Vietnam, Bosnia and the troubles in Northern Ireland during his 30-year career.
Twice winner of the Royal Television Society’s TV journalist award, he got into the BBC with the help of an ex-girlfriends father: “You didn’t apply for jobs back then,” he said.
Three years later he was broadcasting from London and ended up ‘unintentionally’ covering the Vietnam War in 1967 after catching they eye of the BBC bosses for his coverage of the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah the previous year.
His initial broadcasts were, in his own words, examples of “How not to do television news.”
His first clip, in black and white, showed a young Bell covering American operations in Vietnam where “You’ll see no Vietnamese from start to finish.” He still looks the other way while the clip is shown, hands over his eyes: “I imitated the voice of the officer class and eventually I found my own style. By 1972 I’d humanised myself; I was talking Vietnamese, going to refugee camps and had better connections in the government.”
Amongst his other assignments that included reporting the election of Ronald Reagan, Bell covered the conflict in Bosnia. Safety standards were less rigorous at that time and journalists only began wearing flak jackets in the summer of 1992; just weeks after Bell narrowly missed a sniper bullet. For him, Libya today is a sharp reminder of those days 15 years ago, where journalists once again are at risk.
“The real heroes of this business are people like Tim Hetherington, but they don’t get the recognition they deserve,” he said. “I’m glad I’m not doing it anymore.”
Bell expressed concerns that reliance on security advisers has had a negative impact on journalistic neutrality. He is also critical of the kind of reporting that developed, particularly during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, when journalists remained in hotels in green zones and be at a distance from the conflict. This has led him to be somewhat critical of reporting today as for him there is no alternative to being as close to the action as possible.
“I always made the habit of hanging out with the bad guys because you have to understand why it is that they are doing what they are,” he said.
As UNICEF ambassador Bell enjoys “going to places where they can’t send celebrities like Robbie Williams and David Beckham” and a greater level of access compared to his time as a journalist.
Bell closed with a reading of one of his poems that looked back on his career from his latest book, For Whom the Bell Tolls: Light and Dark Verse. The closing line read: ‘You may recall I made no bloody difference at all.’
Join us this evening with veteran war correspondent Martin Bell as he reflects on a career that has seen him report from more than 80 countries and 11 wars since he joined the BBC in 1962. Tomorrow we will be discussing the situation in Somalia, a country caught between political instability, conflict and famine.
Screenings in the week ahead include When China Met Africa, exploring the ever-shrinking world in which we live and a preview screening of Kissinger.
Next week the only free member of the Angola 3, Robert King will be in conversation with director of Reprieve, Clive Stafford Smith, and for October’s First Wednesday we will be discussing Afghan perspectives on the past ten years of occupation.
JOB OPPORTUNITY: The Frontline Club Charitable Trust is looking for a documentary and workshop coordinator as, sadly, after two and a half years at the Frontline Club, our documentary programmer Charlotte Cook has left. Details of the job description and how to apply can be found here.
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Watch event here.
If you want to take part in further discussion about the impact of the War on Terror on our world today and how it might shape our future, come along to our FIRST WEDNESDAY SPECIAL: Changing world – conflict, culture and terrorism in the 21st century on Wednesday, 7 September.
The purpose of the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 in the wake of the 9/11 attacks was ill-defined from the beginning, according to panelists taking part in a discussion last night that gave little grounds for optimism about the country’s future.
Asked by David Loyn, the BBC’s international development correspondent who was chairing the event when it was that the mistakes were made after the attacks on the Unites States of 11 September, 2001, the answer from Jean MacKenzie, senior correspondent for GlobalPost was: “September 12,”
The former programme director for the Institute for War & Peace Reporting in Kabul, said the major problem with the operation in Afghanistan was a lack of definition about what it was setting out to achieve:
“I think when we went into Afghanistan, the major problem with our invasion, or intervention, was that it was ill-defined as to scope, ill-defined as to purpose and we really had no clue what we were trying to accomplish there. The people who carried out the attack on the United States were not the Taliban and those who did, namely al Quaeda and Osama bin Laden had left by November 2001, said MacKenzie.
“They’re gone, we’re still there and we’re fighting [without knowing] who the enemy is, we don’t know how to define the enemy and we don’t know what the enemy is fighting us about, and I think our central mistake is to get involved with a war with a country that we don’t understand, with a goal that we never bothered to define.”
Malte Roschinski, a security consultant, political analyst and author who is based in Germany, said the “players” who drew up the December 2001 Bonn Agreement on the future of Afghanistan were not representative of the country because the Taleban were left out.
“We might not have liked them but they were the decisive actors in Afghanistan at that time,” said Roschinski, who as a journalist with AFP news agency reported from post-Taliban Afghanistan in late 2001.
He was also critical of the way that different countries took responsibility for different areas and of the German approach of institution building at the cost of providing security for the people:
“The international community never got around to creating a unity of action, which is obviously very important if you want to be successful. If eventually 44 countries are playing single ball games then you will not really come to decisive conclusion because you have 44 different strategies, as well as the civilian players, the development agencies.”
Frank Ledwidge, author of Losing Small Wars said it was “a matter of record” that it was “right within the purview” of al-Quaeda operators and Osama bin Laden that western governments, and the United States in particular, be drawn into wars in the Islamic world that they could not win.
Discussing Britain’s presence in Afghanistan’s Helmand Province, Ledwidge said a “very well informed” Helmand Plan put together by the SAS and well-placed Afghan civilians might have been successful, but had never been implemented:
“We went there looking to create a Belgium in Asia and right now, the truth is we’d be lucky to get a Bangladesh,” said Ledwidge, whose military record includes serving in the the Balkans conflict.
“Success and failure has to be measured against cost and the cost that we’ve sustained, the very least of which is national reputation, then military reputation, then the lives and limbs of our own soldiers and of Afghans and the money, I simply can’t draw a success from that.”
To come: What difference have counterinsurgency strategies made to the life of the Afghan people and in Iraq?
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