Seried exposing Vietnam atrocities wins top honor

[JoFerret]

http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040406/NEWS08/404060355/-1/NEWS

Three Blade reporters won the Pulitzer Prize - journalism's highest honor - yesterday for uncovering the atrocities of an elite U.S. Army fighting unit in the Vietnam War that killed unarmed civilians and children during a seven-month rampage.

Michael D. Sallah, Mitch Weiss, and Joe Mahr received the investigative reporting prize for their series - "Buried Secrets, Brutal Truths" - which detailed how the Army failed to stop the atrocities after commanders were told about them. The reporters also discovered that the Army failed to prosecute soldiers who killed unarmed civilians after an investigation found the platoon had committed war crimes.

<snip>

"I'm glad we won, but it's really a somber victory," Mr. Weiss said. "Tiger Force killed innocent men, women, and children and the men who committed these acts continue to go unpunished."

Mr. Sallah agreed.

"What's important to me is the Army get to the bottom of who killed this investigation 29 years ago," he said.
<snip>

The Blade reporters scoured government records, interviewed 43 former Tiger Force members, and went to Vietnam to talk to family members of the victims to detail a pattern of violence by the unit during a seven-month period in 1967.

What the series found was that the highly trained reconnaissance unit killed unarmed civilians, including children, and that Army leadership knew of and in some cases encouraged the unit's actions.
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[Judi Lynn]

1. This is such good news.

Good investigative journalists, we have learned, are damned scarce these days when it's so much safer to go along with the crowd, not rock the boat, not make waves, etc., etc.

I hope they'll go on to even bigger and better stories, and not whore out, like Bob Woodward.

[JoFerret]

8. This IS a pretty big story

Trouble is that the paper is small. If the series had run in the NYT or WP it would have made a splash. I agree with you that we can hope that this kind of in-depth reporting is encouraged (thanks Pulitzer)and takes off in other important areas.

[slor]

2. Sad, but this should take the heat...

off Kerry and the accusation that he slandered our troops.

[DarkPhenyx]

3. Interestingly enough the coverup that happened was...

...while Ford was in office and Cheney was chief of staff, with Rumsfeld as Sec. of Defense.

[Judi Lynn]

4. Thank you for making this point!

I think a lot of us have missed it altogether, speaking for myself.

Very glad to know it now.

[DarkPhenyx]

6. I didn't know it myself.

Picked it up on NPR yesterday when they were talking to the reporter from the story. The Blade is my old hometown paper. I was really happy to hear they got recognized for such an important story.

[ithacan]

5. and I'd bet money

that this kind of thing is happening right now, as we speak, in Iraq.

[lumpy]

7. It is happening

right now. It happened the first day of the Bush invasion. The atrocity is thousands of innocent civilians being blown to bits by US bombs delivered by the president of the US. Supposedly in the defense of the United States.

[dfong63]

9. and powell helped cover up my lai.