Huỳnh Công Út (a.k.a. Nick Ut) – The Consequences of Violence and Not Questioning Authority. Alan Downes & Joe McNally. The Cranberries – Zombie
Photo by Huỳnh Công Út (a.k.a. Nick Ut).
(Click on the images if you wish to view them individually.)
” . . . an editor at the AP rejected the photo of Kim Phuc running down the road without clothing because it showed frontal nudity. Pictures of nudes of all ages and sexes, and especially frontal views were an absolute no-no at the Associated Press in 1972 . . . Horst argued by telex with the New York head-office that an exception must be made, with the compromise that no close-up of the girl Kim Phuc alone would be transmitted. The New York photo editor, Hal Buell, agreed that the news value of the photograph overrode any reservations about nudity. ” - Nick Ut
The above photo won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for Spot Photography. It is a photo that can be admired and evaluated on many levels:
On one level, it is a photo of Vietnamese children running, burned and injured from the recent napalm attack in the background. Kim Phuc, the girl most strikingly running naked in the street has been burned severely on her back and left arm.
The photo is known by at least 3 well known titles: “Terror of War,” “Vietnam Napalm,” and “Children Fleeing an American Napalm Strike.” All the titles invite multiple, different, and worthwhile interpretations of the image.
I want to emphasize I have shown the photo in its original composition. Often the photo is shown in a detail cropping that more centers on Kim Phuc (Phan Thi Kim Phúc). I think it’s valuable to notice that Nick Ut did not bulls-eye focus his composition on the young girl. Instead, compositionally the image is focused on ALL the children moving away from the destruction, both the Vietnamese children and the young soldiers.
The US soldiers appear somewhat haphazard and numb to the normality of violence. Compared to modern military body armor and gear, they also appear comparatively naked (less garmented and less protected).
I think when the US population studied this photo, they saw it not so much as one more horrific photo of the cruelty of the Vietnam War – I think they also saw it as a symbol of many people on both sides of the conflict moving away from the destructive actions. It didn’t matter what side of the ideological debates you were on, the photo suggested that things were going on that were wrong from any point of view.
The young Vietnamese children in the photo reveal their fears honestly. It’s interesting to me, the older soldiers in the photo appear to have become conditioned and jaded. Some have described the soldiers as indifferent, but I think that is inaccurate. Many US citizens, learning how severely Kim Phuc was burned, may have looked at the photo and thought, “Why are the soldiers not moving toward her to attend to her?” But as the pictures below show, that inference would have been incorrect.
Also at this scene was British cameraman Alan Downes, who recorded American soldiers immediately thereafter attending to Kim Phuc’s wounds and giving her water:
A video clip of the Alan Downes’ ITN footage can be found on YouTube here. I caution that the below video also sadly and tragically shows a more severely burned infant being carried away from the same napalm attack.
Here is a photo of Kim Phuc with her son many years later:
© Joe McNally.
I created this post to remind everyone of the realities of war that most of us do not have to regularly face. There is usually compassion and cruelty on both sides of almost every military action.
I want to remind people of the horrors that young soldiers are asked to endure incessantly both during their tours of duty and to carry with them in their unforgetting memories for the rest of their lives.
It did not surprise me when it was recently reported that 1 in 4 homeless people in the United States are Veterans. At a time when young men and women should be learning advanced critical thinking skills and methods of evaluating sources of authority, they are instead conditioned to focus on being proud, being an army of one, and being strong. When young men and women should be learning social negotiation skills, they are instead given more consistent positive feedback for following orders without questioning them. Soldiers are sometimes taught that to be loyal and subservient to a commanding soldier is a better ethical and moral position than to evaluate the quality of the orders or to notoriously question the orders they are given. I have trouble with militant priorities.
And I am empathetic to Veterans because many of them should have received better social training during that crucial formative time in their cognitive development. I don’t think we, as human beings, are mentally able to effectively handle the irreconcilable contradictions too many soldiers must face and live with the rest of their lives. My praise to all the mental health professionals working with Veterans of all nations to cope with these issues that no one, regardless of their level of education and training, could capably or easily reconcile.
The song below is on my iPod.
“Zombie” lyrics by The Cranberries:
Another head hangs lowly
Child is slowly taken
And the violence cause such silence
Who are we mistaken?
Then you see
It’s not me
It’s not my family
In your head
In your head
They are fightin’
With their tanks
And their bombs
And their bombs
And their guns
In your head
In your head
They are crying
In your head
In your head
Zombie, zombie, zombie eh eh
What’s in your head?
In your head
Zombie, zombie, zombie? eh eh eh oh,
Dou, dou, dou, dou, dou…
Another mother’s breakin’
Heart is taking over
When the violence causes silence
We must be mistaken
It’s the same old theme
Since nineteen-sixteen
In your head
In your head
They’re still fightin’
With their tanks
And their bombs
And their bombs
And their guns
In your head
In your head
They are dying
In your head
In your head
Zombie, zombie, zombie
What’s in your head?
In your head
Zombie, zombie, zombie eh eh eh
Oh oh oh ehehoh ahah
© The Cranberries
© All rights reserved by Huỳnh Công Út (Nick Ut)/ Associated Press, Joe McNally, Alan Downes, ITN and The Cranberries.
Pulitzer Prizes for Spot News Photography on Wikipedia
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Related Posts:
Katherine Cathey and 2nd Lt. James J. Cathey:
(Click on the images, if you wish to read the posts.)
© All rights reserved by the respective artists.
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Most Recent Artworks All the Artists’ Artworks Index my43things
The story above was interesting, but was incorrect in one major fact. It was not an American Napalm attack. It was a South Vietnamese Air Force attack. They dropped their ordnance in th wrong place. No US aircraft was in the vicinity.
Bob Wood
SVN 1971
Well Bob…The U.S. was still responsible!!!== for supplying South Vietnam with Billions of dollars,and for sending US soldiers to a war that was not our war.Passing the buck still…..
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OneMoreOption: Bob and Jay, I appreciate you both adding to the complexity of the discussion.
First, Bob, I see your good intent in not wanting to place any undeserved culpability on the US Military for the damages caused by this specific event. If what you are saying is true, then I believe you are trying to highlight that: a) US air forces did not deliver this specific load of bomb ordinance, b) the South Vietnamese who delivered it, did so in error, and c) neither of those two military forces intended to inflict great harm on civilians in this specific event.
Second, Jay, I also respect your position that the US supplied the bombs, financial support, policy support, etc. (all “but for” conditions without which this specific event would not likely have occurred) that led to this type of terrible tragedy occurring often in Vietnam.
This blog is not intent on being “pro-war” or “anti-war” in all cases. This blog tends to be anti-violence. I believe there are almost always better methods to resolve conflicts other than using violent methods. But our world has violent actors. I believe all of us as communities must be able to acknowledge and capably disarm violent actions.
My messages are rarely simple. I don’t show people harmed by violence to make a simple conclusion that “no one should be violent.” I show the harm to remind everyone of the real and often unhealable damage violent methods often unnecessarily exact on all the parties involved, soldiers and civilians alike.
A news story this week was: A memo from a Veterans’ Affairs executive internally reported (and to my knowledge was not later discounted or denied by the same Veterans’ Affairs executive who wrote it) that as many as 1,000 US Iraq War Veterans a month were suicidal, considering suicide, or making suicide attempts. I’m going to make an educated guess that (if that statistic is true) a higher percentage of Veterans than the general population are dealing with suicidal issues.
I don’t know the causal effects for that remarkable statistic. But it is possible that:
a) training soldiers in violent cycles of behavior, and
b) possibly not training them sufficiently in methods to balance those cycles (if that is possible), and
c) not training them sufficiently in many other fields of education and the social sciences, and
d) not training them sufficiently in cooperative real world working skills, and
e) shifting some of their focus away from developing strong social bonds when most people are developing those highly sensitive and complex social skills between the ages of 18-30
may all be contributing factors, that when combined, cause Veterans to have higher rates of 1) mental dysfunction (similar dramatic statistics have also been reported in this area) and 2) cognitive cycles of self-harming or suicidal behaviors.
I am empathetic to Veterans’ struggles. I think it is unfair these young men and women, who chose to show the highest levels of altruism, service, duty, and courage should more often than average be dealing with these cognitive and lack-of-higher-education disorders. They also often face disproportionate financial burdens resulting from their significant physical injuries.
I care a great deal about these topics. Almost always, violence is not a good problem-solving method on private or national levels. So I work to advocate potentialy less harmful conflict resolution methods. ~ oMo.
What in the world are you censoring here? For one thing, it is a part of Kim Phuc’s anatomy that is clearly visible in the original picture, and for another it is no more verboten at this point (if ever) than her elbows are. I’d have sooner blacked out the burns, but maybe we don’t share the same issues.
This is a very sensible and balanced view.
Not negating problems (pacifism, and/or impact of violence) is often a good first step
I’d like to know what hapened to Kim Phuc after these photos were taken .
I don’t see any adults . So , were here parenst killed? Was she and orphan who grew up in a shelter?
I was happy to see her all grown up with a child of her own. I have never seen more than that one picture of here running through the street.
Kim Phuc now lives in Toronto.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phan_Thị_Kim_Phúc
Her life is described in this article: what an amazing thing a google search can be.
Prelude to June 8, 1972
SOMEONE thought it was a good idea
SOMEONE gave the go ahead to study it
SOMEONE paid for research and development
SOMEONE perfected the mixture
SOMEONE manufactured the product
SOMEONE approved of its use
SOMEONE sold it and made a profit
SOMEONE bought it
SOMEONE paid for it with the sweat of their brow
SOMEONE transported it over 12 time zones
SOMEONE approved the plan
SOMEONE loaded the plane
SOMEONE flew over the village
SOMEONE pulled the lever
SOMEONE never thought of Kim Phuc
SOMEONE never imaged the 9 year old running for her life
SOMEONE never felt the burning napalm clinging to her flesh
SOMEONE could have said no
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OneMoreOption: Wow. Thank you David for your poetic and well-expressed thoughts.
Amazing…I was preparing a simple presentation for my A-level photography group on 1 famous photo. You have enlightened me.
Thank you
“I don’t think violence is a good problem-solving method on private or national levels.”
You live in a world of facile solutions and hollow sanctimony, while the rest of us must survive in the real one. Morality without survival is a dead end. Pragmatic morality, however, eventually understands and embraces the appropriate application of violence. Because without violence or the threat of it:
1. There would be two nations between Canada and Mexico and one of them might still permit slavery.
2. The Nazi’s would have survived into the nuclear era and would still occupy Europe, and would have succeeded in exterminating the Jews.
3. Imperial Japan would still be enslaving and raping (literally and figuratively) the peoples of China, Korea, the Philippines, etc
4. Marxist Leninism, the only political system to murder more people than Hitler, would still hold sway over Eastern Europe and would have expanded westward.
I could go on, but I think you get the point. It’s all well and good to naively aspire to a world where the lion will lay down with the lamb. In the real world however, lamb will always be on the menu.
PS
Rather than pitying veterans, why don’t you talk with a few and see what they think?
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OneMoreOption: Roger, thank you for expressing your dissent. However, if you were to read the contents of this blog more closely, you’d probably be able to more accurately portray its positions. You and I agree possibly more than you know.
This is not a pacifist website. However, this is a website that promotes non-violent means of conflict resolution.
Just as I don’t think African Americans should have followed Malcolm X’s calls to use violence if necessary, and I prefer Martin Luther King Jr.’s more sophisticated, informed, and non-violent means to achieve the same crucial Civil Rights objectives, I also advocate similar non-violent means of conflict resolution to achieve similarly vital objectives.
It’s interesting you did not list the U.S. military actions in Vietnam or Iraq as examples of morally justified state-sponsored violence campaigns.
A primary implication you use above may be in part that violence, in some historical cases, was necessary (or at least used) to stop some armies and their nationalized violent campaigns. But a flaw in that kind of reasoning would be to assume that violence is always necessary to meet those kinds of objectives. Most countries that abolished slavery (like the United Kingdom) did not require a Civil War, killing millions of people, to achieve abolition of slavery. My point is, it is not always necessary, and it might often be better to avoid, using violent means to achieve important humanitarian objectives. Non-violent means should be extensively vetted first.
facile – adj. – describes a remark or theory which is too simple and has not been thought about enough.
There is nothing facile, hollow, or naive about using non-violent means of conflict resolution. However, the U.S. military forays into Vietnam and Iraq have been ill-conceived, slow to adapt, poorly led, and naive, leading to horrific unnecessary harm and violent atrocities (Agent Orange, carpet bombings, massacres, etc.) on each side of the violent conflicts.
“Pity” is somewhat synonymous with sympathy, but it tends to add either negative connotations or a sense of disapproval. “Pity” is an incorrect characterization of those of us who provide sympathetic assistance, care, and moral support to Veterans. I am compassionate to soldiers who are asked to put their lives, their families’ well-being, and their futures at unnecessary risk for unwarranted reasons. I am sympathetic to anyone who puts themself at a disadvantage for the benefit of others.
As to your suggestion to speak with Veterans. Here are a few Veterans’ websites providing intelligent and diverse perspectives:
Iraq Veterans Against the War
Veterans for Peace
Veterans for Peace on Wikipedia
Iraq Veterans for Progress
There are many other similar state and regional organizations. I don’t know if these organizations represent the majority positions of Veterans in general. But since your P.S. comment may have been intended to imply Veterans may not want sympathy, dissent, or pro-peace advocacy, I have supplied some Veterans’ points of view that might differ from your presumptions.
There is nothing facile on either side of these important issues. I agree in general with your statement: “Pragmatic morality, however, eventually understands and embraces the appropriate application of violence.” However, defining the “appropriate application of violence” is usually not where the debates end, it is usually where the debates begin.
These issues effecting Veterans do not appear to be dramatically diminishing. And so we don’t forget the importance of being sympathetic and providing consistent aid, conversation, and companionship to Veterans in need, here are just a few of the recent Veterans news stories (I found doing a simple and quick search) from this month of September 2008:
NBC’s “Today” show spotlights Veterans Treatment Court in Buffalo
Experts Help to Prevent Veteran Suicide
Army Observes National Suicide Prevention Week: Reinforces Theme of “Shoulder to Shoulder – No Soldier Stands Alone”
New Veterans’ suicide numbers released
Daily News: Veterans’ Suicide Hotline Assists 55,000 Callers
Army suicide rate could top nation’s this year
Veterans Groups Aim To Prevent Suicides
Roger, I admire your fight and your drive. I admire you speaking up. I see in your words a good intent to advocate pragmatic morality, a pragmatic morality that believes violence must sometimes be used to confront and disable other violent actors.
But don’t presume that people who use non-violent means to address violent problems have any less courage, fight, drive, or moral pragmatism than you. In most cases, it is good to aggressively first pursue non-violent problem-solving methods to solve problems on private or national levels.
How absurd, that someone felt the need to censor the chest of a 9 year old girl. What an unhealthy, perverse attitude to the human body.
The censoring of these pictures must be the most ridiculous I’ve ever seen. It fits well inside the sick world the author is writing about.
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OneMoreOption: I hear you. I’m not sure why you perceive the obscuring of the adolescent’s breasts to be ridiculous or sick. It may be ironic to criticize this as “censoring,” as my interest is to bring more attention to the images and related issues. Further, if you feel somehow shorted, you can simply click on the video link I’ve provided to everyone if you feel it would be better to see more of the full monty in context.
As far as the other criticisms or implications you may be inferring, I’m unsure your intent, but you’re welcome to further articulate your ideas herein – if you have anything intelligent to add to the discussions of the issues.