Talk:Peter Arnett

The Iraqi interview controversy
This is not correct. The firestorm of controversy had to do with Arnett saying that his reports to the United States were helping to strengthen opposition to the war. -- Zoe


 * Source? -- Branden


 * http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/71883p-66599c.html: Arnett, who had been freelancing for MSNBC, set off a firestorm Sunday when he told an Iraqi interviewer that the U.S. war plan had failed and that reports of casualties are used in the U.S. to fuel anti-war protests
 * http://www.aljazeerah.info/News%20archives/2003%20News%20archives/April%202003%20News/1%20news/Arnett%20fired%20over%20Iraq%20remarks%20aljazeerah.info.htm: "So our reports about civilian casualties here, about the resistance of the Iraqi forces are going back to the United States. It helps those who oppose the war and who challenge the policy, to develop their arguments," Arnett said.

-- Zoe


 * Cool, thanks! -- Branden

Wikipedia is not a newspaper
Is Wikipedia a newspaper, a magazine of current affairs, a soapbox, or is it an encyclopedia? The current article on Peter Arnett looks entirely like a Sunday supplement article in an American newspaper. The single interview held recently is devoted a majority of the space, whereas the reason Peter Arnett became a household name by reporting directly from Baghdad during the first Gulf War is not mentioned at all? Please stop this nonsense, and cut the interview bit down to a couple of sentences. -- Egil 06:43 Apr 3, 2003 (UTC)


 * If you have some elaborations to add about Arnett's career, the Wikipedia would be the richer for it. Please add to the article. -- Branden
 * I tend to agree; it may be the familiar case that the real problem is not too much information about one aspect but not enough info about other aspects. -- Infrogmation 08:51 Apr 3, 2003 (UTC)

move to operation tailwind
This ought to be moved to operation tailwind since it doesn't have to do with Peter Arnett. Also this paragraph makes this sound rather conspiratorial.


 * When seven of the veterans whose testimony had been used in the report were tracked down, six said they had been misrepresented. The seventh had recently developed health problems which were a result of exposure to organo-phosphates, of which Sarin is a type.

Operation Tailwind
It seems to me that Operation Tailwind is underemphasized in this article, considering the pivotal effect it had on his career. -Joseph 17:07, 2004 Sep 10 (UTC)
 * Indeed it is. It also minimizes the fact that the report was completely false, and seems to spin it to April Oliver's POV. Dr. B. R. Lang (talk) 22:23, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Strong POV
The article as it stands is very strong POV, The "The Baby Milk Factory Controversy" and other criticisms constitutes 80 to 90% of the article. That is certainly not WP:NPOV. I'll try to find a good tag that describes the situation. -- Egil 19:44, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * many articles are overboard on the criticism section. I did the best that I could to sumarize, what was at the time, a pretty big deal. TDC 20:21, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Hi I've just read the article and I think that when the matter of censorship is in question no censorship should be exercised. I cant see any opinionation, point of view or bias here. -barf

There's a clear point-of-view being expressed in the caption to the reconnaissance images of the disputed factory. It's labelled "The Iraqi baby milk factory, camouflaged on the right" - either I don't understand what is meant by camouflage in this instance, or they're claiming the speckle on the roof in the later shot is camouflage, whereas it's blatantly vegetation - weeds (you can see it's started to grow in the earlier shot, and it decreases in density along the length of one roof in the later shot. I would suggest that this needs to be re-labelled - if the US Military claimed it to be camouflage, attribute it as such.  I would do it myself, but have no knowledge of where the camouflage claim came from and wouldn't want to mis-attribute - have instead added 'citation needed' tags.  AndyI 13:53, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Tag Cleanup
This is about tag cleanup. As all of the tags are more than a year old, there is no current discussion relating to them, and there is a great deal of editing done since the tags were placed, or perhaps there is a consensus on the discussion page, they will be removed. This is not a judgement of content. If there is cause to re-tag, then that of course may be done, with the necessary posting of a discussion as to why, and what improvements could be made. This is only an effort to clean out old tags, and permit them to be updated with current issues if warranted.Jjdon (talk) 22:16, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

"Destroy the village in order to save it" quote
Does anyone have a source for the exact phrasing of this quote? In Vietnam War (as well as Opposition to U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War) it's written "it was necessary to destroy the village in order to save it", and in this article it's written "We had to destroy the village in order to save it." Not by itself a very important point, but it highlight the lack of good references and looks rather unprofessional if one (as I did) read the articles one after the other. MMad 23:27, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

MMad,

His own reference to the quote can be found here (http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/page.cfm?objectid=12795678&method=full), in an article which he wrote for the Daily Mirror on 1 April 2003, "This War is Not Working".

[During the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, I entered a US-held town which had been totally destroyed. The Viet Cong had taken over and were threatening the commander's building so he called down an artillery strike which killed many of his own men. The Major with us asked: "How could this happen?" A soldier replied: "Sir, we had to destroy the town to save it."]

I found a web page that made the following claim: "...the story was first printed in The New York Times on 8th February 1968. The wording was 'To save the town, it became necessary to destroy it' and, yes, it was an unnamed major who was credited..." I haven't verified this information, but I'm familiar with the alternate wording used here. I found it  here at snopes.com -- MiguelMunoz 21:59, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I question the neutrality of the accusation that this quote was fabricated. First of all, the two people who call it a fabrication, Victor Davis Hanson and Mona Charen, are both hawks who disagree with the quote's sentiment. Also, I believe the quote came out of the Tet offensive, and while I don't have a reliable source yet, my understanding is that the village in question, Ben Tre, was caught between Viet Cong forces and US forces, and probably received damage from both sides. The claim that it was destroyed by the Viet Cong ("hostile Vietnamese forces") is highly suspect. They were unlikely to destroy a village of their own people. They were also far more popular in South Vietnam than the US Military. Even the phrase "hostile Vietnamese forces" is biased. -- MiguelMunoz 22:14, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

The article also doesn't mention the fact that many people feel that Peter Arnett is a leftist subversive traitor.70.216.193.49 06:03, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
 * "We had to destroy Ben Tre in order to save it” " - that's original phrase, and it's not Arnett fabrication. See here about the story behind it. 195.248.189.182 07:33, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

The article is also wrong in calling Arnett a "journalist" several times. He was really an ideologue, like many others, who pretended to practice journalism. How many veterans, who were in SE Asia, considered him a journalist? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.49.20.187 (talk) 22:20, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Osama Bin Ladin Interview
Article incorrectly states that "In March 1997, Arnett was able to interview Osama bin Laden, as the first Western journalist to do so." The British Journalist Robert Fisk interviewed him in 1993, so clearly Arnett was not the first. He might have been the first do so on TV (Fisk is a newspaperman). I will delete "as the first Western journalist to do so." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Fisk#9.2F11.2C_Osama_bin_Laden.2C_and_the_war_in_Afghanistan Jalipa84.153.71.250 21:03, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Girlfriend
I can't believe Peter's girlfriend's name is in his infobox! First, is this notable? Second is it referenced? ThreeE 02:04, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

External links modified
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"Journalism Scandals" category
I've removed that category. His career has had its share of controversy, especially Operation Tailwind, for which he was reprimanded but not fired. This category is for people whose entire lives have been defined and overshadowed by major scandal, who are synonymous with scandal, like Stephen Glass and Sabrina Erdely. Note that the lead to this article, correctly, makes no reference to any scandals. Please don't revert this further, as per WP:BLP that category is contentious and there should be a clear consensus if it is to be in this article. Coretheapple (talk) 17:00, 17 November 2019 (UTC)
 * User:Coretheapple Where does it say that the "category is for people whose entire lives have been defined and overshadowed by major scandal, who are synonymous with scandal"? Tailwind was a big scandal and Arnett resigned as result of it, while others were fired. Mztourist (talk) 02:49, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * What tells us is our eyes by looking at the pages in the category. WP:BLPCAT requires us to exercise caution when using categories for living people when the category imputes a poor reputation. It's a requirement. It's not a suggestion.Coretheapple (talk) 14:04, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * The category issue is a symptom of an even greater disease afflicting this article, which is material not consistent with WP:BLP and WP:UNDUE, which is particularly problematic in the Tailwind section. World Socialist Website as a source for an inaccurate statement that he was fired? Uh, no. Coretheapple (talk) 15:31, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
 * "our eyes looking at the pages in the category" is a poor justification as anyone can decide to add the category or arbitrarily remove it as you have done. I am asking you where is the policy that the category only applies to "people whose entire lives have been defined and overshadowed by major scandal, who are synonymous with scandal"? I am well aware of WP:BLPCAT, but no-one would deny that Tailwind was a journalistic scandal.Mztourist (talk) 03:05, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Tailwood was a journalism scandal but this is the article on Arnett, not Tailwood. You may feel that Arnett's name is synonymous with scandal and that he was generally stinko just as, say Glass is due to serial plagiarism, but there's no basis for that whatsoever in the reliable sources. Indeed, he was not even fired because of Taiwind. It was a factor in his resignation, and that is in the article, reliably sourced to Variety. Until I removed it, this article falsely stated, footnoted ridiculously to the "World Socialist" website, that he was fired from CNN when that was not so. To me the category is clear, and there doesn't have to be a category description, one just has to look at the pages in the category to make it quite obvious that this category is for far worse persons than Arnett. Coretheapple (talk) 17:14, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't agree with you. Tailwind was a journalistic scandal in which Arnett was intimately involved and therefore the category applies, it didn't define his career but it certainly affected it, just like the Matt Lauer sexual misconduct allegations affected Lauer's. You have asserted without any basis in policy that the "category is for people whose entire lives have been defined and overshadowed by major scandal, who are synonymous with scandal." I don't believe that the category is intended to be anywhere near so restrictive; based on the category there have only been 26 journalistic scandals in world history, which is clearly ridiculous. I have not commented on the "World Socialist" website because it is completely irrelevant to the issue that we are discussing here.Mztourist (talk) 02:58, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

RfC on 'Journalism Scandals' category

 * The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Should this article be in the "Journalism scandals" category? Coretheapple (talk) 21:49, 24 November 2019 (UTC)

Survey

 * No per WP:BLPCAT and WP:CATV. Peter Arnett is not a scandal, nor was his long and generally distinguished career defined or dominated by scandal such as to put him in that category. In the preceding section discussing this category there are references to Operation Tailwind. To even call his involvement in the CNN coverage of that as a "journalism scandal" on the par of a Jayson Blair is absurd.  Arnett narrated a CNN report written by others. The way this is being bandied about you'd think that he made up the whole thing. Come on. This is a BLP, and WP:BLPCAT requires us to exercise caution when using categories for living people when the category imputes a poor reputation.  Please note also   WP:CATV: "A central concept used in categorizing articles is that of the defining characteristics of a subject of the article." Coretheapple (talk) 21:49, 24 November 2019 (UTC) References to WP:CATV added in response to comment immediately below. Coretheapple (talk) 16:12, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes Tailwind was a journalistic scandal in which Arnett was intimately involved. Coretheapple asserts, without any basis in policy, that the "category is for people whose entire lives have been defined and overshadowed by major scandal, who are synonymous with scandal". Being involved in a journalistic scandal does not necessarily "impute a poor reputation", rather that all depends on the role the person played, with regard to Tailwind it does not equate Arnett with Jayson Blair. I would also note that the category has been there since July 2010 diff here:, apparently without any detriment to Mr. Arnett Mztourist (talk) 03:18, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
 * No we don't clear enough proof that even he was responsible for the report and not just made into a scapegoat to protect CNN. Adding him to the Scandals list would add further insult to injury. Quenreerer (talk) 04:07, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
 * No per WP:BLPCAT; at least based on the current article, none of the referenced scandals are significant enough to his notability to justify categories for them - being mentioned in the lead would be a bare minimum requirement for a WP:BLP-sensitive category (and currently there's not enough in the body to justify putting it in the lead.) If you think it's WP:DUE so much weight, expand it in the body, then in the lead, then (once the article has proper context and sourcing to justify that degree of weight) in a category, assuming you can reach consensus on the body expansion and addition to the lead first.  Putting it straight in a category is putting the cart before the horse. --Aquillion (talk) 17:39, 25 November 2019 (UTC)
 * No Tailwind may be a scandal. Peter Arnett is not. BLP applies. --Pete (talk) 09:10, 26 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Lean no. As others have indirectly noted, this is essentially a WP:BLPCAT issue examined through a WP:WEIGHT lens. I will note that the "he only narrated and thus cannot be said to be a fully fledged person of relevance to the scandal, that is a flawed argument in at least two respects (one much more relevant to our purposes here than the other: First, presumably under CNN's internal standards, Mr. Arnett's involvement with the piece was sufficient enough that he was meant to have exercised some editorial/journalistic discretion, or else he would not have been censured for his part.  However, to be blunt any argument advanced by our editors themselves for how he "wasn't really to blame"/"was to blame" are both just bright line indulgences WP:Original research.  In other words, whatever his role, and whatever our subjective, idiosyncratic take as individuals as to whether he bore any responsibility in the matter, we would certainly allow the category here if a certain threshold of WP:Reliable sources treated the scandal as a significant enough aspect of his notability. Likewise, even if every editor here were convinced the subject was the person responsible for the scandal, if sources don't evaluate him in the same light, we can't include content (or for that matter categories) presenting him in that light.  WP:NPOV requires that we present what RS say on the matter in the aggregate, not what we think is the most rational take.  In that light, it seems to me that the sourcing does not support the inclusion of the category--and even if it were, Aquillon is correct that there is process to be followed for gaining consensus for that within the article first, before we consider categorization.  Al factors considered, I agree with what seems to be the merging consensus so far: the category would appear to be WP:UNDUE under the BLPCAT test. Snow let's rap 06:04, 30 November 2019 (UTC)
 * No Thete isn’t evidence that he is responsible for the report. In addition, Arnett’s notability isn’t defined by his involvement in the report. The inclusion of the report in the category is sufficient, Arnett’s would be an issue without more evidence that he is culpable for it. TastyPoutine  talk (if you dare) 13:11, 15 December 2019 (UTC)

Discussion

 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Editing
IMDb is not an RS per Wiki MOS - use only as External link.Parkwells (talk) 16:50, 30 November 2019 (UTC)