Crikey

For the record: Wilfred Burchett did not report the Korean War but the Armistice Talks to end the war.

In 1951, he was in China gathering material for a book on Mao’s “New China” (China’s Feet Unbound, 1952). He was about to head home to Australia with his manuscript when the French evening daily Ce Soir asked him to cover the ceasefire talks in Kaesong. He expected to stay three weeks and ended up being stuck for two and a half years on the Chinese-North Korean side of the demarcation line: to his great chagrin he discovered that the US had little interest in ending the war. On the contrary, Pentagon hawks wanted to extend it to China and beyond.

One of the most contentious issues during the talks was that of prisoners of war, with both sides hurling accusations of atrocities at each other. Like any reporter worth his salt, Wilfred Burchett investigated the Chinese-North Korean version of events and in the process established that a number of POWs reported dead were in fact alive, among them the highest-ranking US POW in Korea, General William F Dean and Australian Keith Gwyther. Gwyther’s mother later said that the day she learned her son was alive was the happiest day of her life.

Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Frank “Pappy” Noel was also held in a POW camp in Korea. This is what he wrote about Wilfred Burchett in a letter to fellow newsman Bob Tuckman, dated 21 March 1953:

“Burchett and I did have a couple of good visits and fun, especially appreciated when he showed up here as he and I knew each other in Berlin during the blockade days. He and Chu Chi Ping have a warm place in my heart and I hope someday to meet them under different circumstances.”

In the same letter, “Pappy” Noel describes conditions in the camps:

One thing I’m thankful for is my health is first class and also it is comforting to know the Chinese have very good medical facilities, just in case my frame should start acting up.”

Tuck, there isn’t a thing I need and I realize and appreciate very much the thought of the staffers wanting to send me something now and then. Anything I would ask for would be in the luxury department and we can make up for lost time in that division ‘Later, but good!”

There is a good little library operating and I help pass the time reading. A good variety of material by Upton Sinclair, Steinbeck, Jack London, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, etc. etc. and a variety of pictorial magazines of which the Chinese do a very good job with theirs. The Czek (sic) and German magazines are my favorites as I see many places and persons I have made photos of.

The winter here was very mild, only a couple of weeks of real cold but our uniforms are warm and the quarters heated. That at least has been in our favor even if the Armistice talks were not.

Neil James and others will no doubt have us believe that this is an example of a confession extracted by Wilfred Burchett after long torture and brain-washing sessions.

What utter (and sinister) nonsense!

There is overwhelming evidence suggesting that Burchett acted in Korea:

1. As a reporter investigating serious allegations and counter allegations in a conflict that could have easily escalated into World War III.
2. As a compassionate human being who consistently tried to alleviate the suffering of his fellow men and bring comfort to their families by informing them that their loved ones were alive.

Despite turning up on the “wrong side” in Korea, Wilfred Burchett forged life-long friendships with fellow journalists like James Cameron, one of Britain’s most distinguished war correspondents, Dan de Luce, head of Associated Press, Russel Spurr of the Daily Express and countless others. US General Dean called a chapter of his memoirs “My friend Wilfred Burchett”.

What defined Wilfred Burchett was his ability to defy ideological barriers and be on good terms with luminaries and simple folk of all persuasions and denominations, from Ho Chi Minh to Henry Kissinger  — and, above all, to remain true to himself and his beliefs.

To reduce him to a monstrous Cold War caricature says more about the mindset of his detractors  — frozen in some morbid ideological ice age  — then about the man himself.

And now, it is perhaps fitting to let Wilfred Burchett speak for himself:

It so happened that step by step and almost accidentally, I had achieved a sort of journalistic Nirvana, free of any built-in loyalties to governments, parties, or any organizations whatsoever. My loyalty was to my own convictions and my readers. This demanded freedom from any discipline except that of getting the facts on important issues back to the sort of people likely to act — often at great self-sacrifice — on the information they received. This was particularly so during my reporting from Vietnam, the most important of my career, far too important to be swayed by dictates from outside or above. Over the years, and in many countries, I had a circle of readers who did not buy papers for the stock market reports or strip cartoons, but for facts on vital issues affecting their lives and their consciences. In keeping both eyes and both ears open during my forty years’ reporting from the world’s hot spots, I had become more and more conscious of my responsibilities to my readers. The point of departure is a great faith in ordinary human beings and the sane and decent way they behave when they have the true facts of the case.

(Wilfred Burchett, At The Barricades, 1981)

I am very proud to be his son.