Hiroshima Cover-up: Stripping the War Department's Timesmanof His Pulitzer

[Chicago Democrat]

Democracy Now Story and TV Show link
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/08/05/1548241
Baltimore Sun Op Ed Piece
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bal-op.hiroshima05aug05,1,806243.story?coll=bal-oped-headlines&ctrack=1&cset=true

This weekend marks the sixtieth anniversary of the U.S. bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. William Laurence, the New York Times reporter who covered the bombings was also on the US government payroll. Journalists Amy Goodman and David Goodman call for the Pulitzer Board to strip Laurence and his paper, The New York Times, of the undeserved prize.
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This weekend marks the 60th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and there are commemorations being held in Japan and many other countries around world, including here in the US. Later in the show we're going to take an extensive look back at the bombings. But first Amy, you've co-authored an oped piece in the Baltimore Sun today called Hiroshima Cover-up, challenging the New York Times coverage of this issue 60 years ago.
My brother and fellow journalist David Goodman and I are filing an official request with the Pulitzer committee to strip New York Times correspondent William Laurence of the Pulitzer he was awarded for his reporting on the atomic bomb. Laurence was not just a reporter for the Times, he was also on the payroll of the US government. He wrote military press releases and statements for President Harry S. Truman and Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, all the while faithfully parroting the line of the US government in the pages of the New York Times. We feel that his reporting was crucial in launching a half century of silence about the deadly lingering effects of the bomb. It is high time for the Pulitzer board to strip Hiroshima's apologist, William Laurence, and his newspaper, the New York Times of their undeserved prize.

On August 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima; three days later Nagasaki was hit. General Douglas MacArthur promptly declared southern Japan off-limits, barring the press. Over 200,000 people died in the atomic bombings of the cities, but no Western journalist witnessed the aftermath and told the story. Instead, the world's media obediently crowded onto the USS Missouri off the coast of Japan to cover the Japanese surrender.

One reporter defied the ban and took a train for thirty hours to Hiroshima, the first Western reporter to arrive on the scene.

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I think think is worthy of DU ACTION and lobbying! Start here... end with Judy Miller!Contact Pulitzer Prize COmmittee! Strip all the pulitzers from the govt plant liars!

[Chicago Democrat]

1. This was news to me..- nt