War News: A Young Reporter in Indochina

Based in Saigon and Phnom Penh in 1969-1970, Anson ( Exile: The Unquiet Oblivion of Richard M. Nixon ) covered the war in Southeast Asia as a Time correspondent. Here he writes about the fierce competitiveness among Western journalists (accusing Newsweek 's Arnaud de Borchgrave of feeding him false information), and their readiness to risk their lives for a story. Two of his more swashbuckling colleagues, Sean Flynn of Paris-Match and CBS cameraman Dana Stone, for example, who zoomed into enemy territory on their motorcycles, haven't been seen since. The most dramatic section of this exciting reminiscence tells of Anson's capture by North Vietnamese forces; apparently marked for execution, he was spared when his captors learned he had rescued Vietnamese civilians during a rampage by Cambodian troops. His homecoming was as unconventional as most of his experiences in Southeast Asia related here: he was greeted by a New York Daily News headline that read, ``Freed Yank Writer Calls Reds `Pals.' '' (Sept.)