It’s all a bit obsessive – a U.S. reporter who’s been dead for 49 years wins an “apology” from the employer who had fired him 18 years earlier! Who cares? Actually there’s an important principle at stake here.
Associated Press (AP) wire reporter Ed Kennedy broke the embargo on the news of the German surrender in 1945. He and 16 other reporters were allowed to witness the occasion on condition that they hold the story for what turned out to be 36 hours.
The other 16 kept their promises. Kennedy broke his and issued the story; he was first reprimanded and then fired, by general manager Kent Cooper. Now, 67 years later, the AP has decided that Kennedy acted correctly. He “did everything just right”, according to AP chief executive Tom Curley.
Woah! Wait a minute!
Every war correspondent accepts that information must be withheld or delayed if its publication might endanger the troops who are protecting you. But in this case the delay was for “political” reasons, so that the Red Army could stage a similar surrender in Berlin.
According to Tom Curley, if it’s “political”, it’s up to the judgement of the individual reporter whether to respect conditions imposed by whoever is issuing privileged information. Promises can be broken at will, it seems, if you judge it to be in the public interest.
Oh, and if it gives you a worldwide “scoop”, makes you a hero with your editors and all your rivals look stupid, then that is purely incidental. None of these factors, of course, can play any part in the honest reporter’s decision as to whether to honour a commitment or not.
(And, to declare an interest, as a former Reuters correspondent, I can share the anger of my distant predecessor at Kennedy’s treachery.)
It’s not actually the job of people like Ed Kennedy to decide whether keeping the Soviets sweet in 1945 is a valid cause – and given the 45 years of communist dictatorship imposed subsequently on tens of millions of East Europeans it is clear that the stakes were high.
But leaving that aside, there is a more important point. One of the reasons journalists are so often held in contempt is their perceived arrogance. Reporters who happily break promises fuel the perception that they have, to borrow the words of British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, “power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot through the ages”.
The honourable journalist keeps his or her word. It encourages people to talk to you and serves the common good. There is, sadly, a certain machismo in the profession that keeping promises is for wimps; there’s rarely any comeback so long as you get a scoop for the editor.
It’s something worth considering for those who have dealings with the press. You have to choose carefully when you share a confidence with a journalist. And next time an Associated Press reporter promises to respect an embargo, remember Tom Curley’s words. But I think Kent Cooper got it right.
Oliver Wates, MediaTrain director