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Cameras, Combat and Courage: The Vietnam War by the Military's Own Photographers
Never before published photos of the Vietnam War, including intense firsthand accounts of the combat.
What was it like to be a military combat photographer in the most photographed war in history — the Vietnam War? Cameras, Combat, and Courage , a companion volume to Shooting Vietnam , takes you there as you read the firsthand accounts and view the hundreds of photographs by men who lived the war through the lens of a camera. They documented everything from the horror of combat to the people and culture of a land they suddenly found themselves immersed in. Some even juggled cameras with rifles and grenade launchers as they fought to survive while carrying out their assignments to record the war. Cameras, Combat, and Courage also finally brings recognition to these unheralded military combat photographers in Vietnam that documented the brutal, unpopular, and futile war.
Firsthand accounts and photographs by military photographers in Vietnam from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s, Cameras, Combat, and Courage puts the reader right alongside these men as they struggle to document the war and stay alive while doing it — although some didn’t survive. The cameras around their necks often shared space with a rifle or grenade launcher that enabled them to stay alive while performing their assigned military duties, killing, if necessary, to survive.
Often, during a brief respite from trudging through swamps and rice paddies or jumping from a chopper into a hot landing zone, they would wander the streets of villages or even downtown Saigon, curiously photographing a people and a culture so strange and different to them. It is these photographs, of a kinder, more personal nature, removed from the horror and death of war that they also share with the reader.
The accounts in this book come from young men thrust into a conflict half way around the world, and all who had their own unique perspective on the war. Some were seasoned photographers before the military, others had only recently held a camera for the first time.
What was it like to be a military combat photographer in the most photographed war in history — the Vietnam War? Cameras, Combat, and Courage , a companion volume to Shooting Vietnam , takes you there as you read the firsthand accounts and view the hundreds of photographs by men who lived the war through the lens of a camera. They documented everything from the horror of combat to the people and culture of a land they suddenly found themselves immersed in. Some even juggled cameras with rifles and grenade launchers as they fought to survive while carrying out their assignments to record the war. Cameras, Combat, and Courage also finally brings recognition to these unheralded military combat photographers in Vietnam that documented the brutal, unpopular, and futile war.
Firsthand accounts and photographs by military photographers in Vietnam from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s, Cameras, Combat, and Courage puts the reader right alongside these men as they struggle to document the war and stay alive while doing it — although some didn’t survive. The cameras around their necks often shared space with a rifle or grenade launcher that enabled them to stay alive while performing their assigned military duties, killing, if necessary, to survive.
Often, during a brief respite from trudging through swamps and rice paddies or jumping from a chopper into a hot landing zone, they would wander the streets of villages or even downtown Saigon, curiously photographing a people and a culture so strange and different to them. It is these photographs, of a kinder, more personal nature, removed from the horror and death of war that they also share with the reader.
The accounts in this book come from young men thrust into a conflict half way around the world, and all who had their own unique perspective on the war. Some were seasoned photographers before the military, others had only recently held a camera for the first time.
208 pages, Hardcover
Published July 19, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 14, 2023
The book I am presenting to you today represents a "return". A return to the author Dan Brookes who with his "Shooting Vietnam" (Reviewed here: https://oldbarbedwire.blogspot.com/........) brought us in the world of military photographers in Vietnam. One of the most massively covered by media wars and "known" day by day through images on TV and photos, but at the same time a victim of this overexposure. It is no mystery that the images of Hue and Walter Cronkite strongly influenced public opinion after the Tet Offensive in 1968.
In this case, however, Dan Brookes manages to collect more testimonies from those who were the brave military photographers. Attention, these are not the good civilian photographers of the great newspapers,who often at the cost of their lives (like Larry Burrows or Henri Huet) traveled in search of images and stories in the depths of that misunderstood war. In this case the photographers, as in the first volume in which Dan Brookes, author and veteran photographer, and Bob Hillerby, were soldiers assigned to special photojournalist units. It's more or less what you see in the movie "Full Metal Jacket" when Pvt. Joker (Matthew Modine) is assigned to one of these units.
In this second volume we listen to the voices of others of these photographers, eight in all, plus the story of the death of Bill Perkins, a Marine photographer who sacrificed himself by throwing himself on a grenade to save his companions and thus posthumously obtaining the only Medal of Honor ever awarded to a military reporter. At the same time, the death of 5 military reporters in the crash of their Ghostriders 079 helicopter during Operation Medina in 1970 is narrated.
As in the previous volume, the balance between photo and story is perfect. Each of the 8 photographers tells "his" Vietnam, often very similar in approach but with various experiences depending on the assignment and the actions in which they were involved. A routine that saw them almost always operating, in various functions, from "official" to the harshest ones such as advancing in the jungles and rice fields together with soldiers of units they did not know or even aggregated to the South Vietnamese or Korean forces.
The book is therefore a fitting tribute to these men who challenged their greatest fears to document that conflict. William Muchler, Roy McClellan, Curtis D. Hicks (Rose), William Mondjack, Tom Wong, Christoher Jensen, James Saller, Marvin J. Wolf lived a Vietnam War behind photo lens and not fighting. But often they too, and perhaps more than the ordinary "Grunt" have seen their dose of horror. But at the same time the book is also a rediscovery of Vietnam, a country that undoubtedly exercised at the time and for the rest of their lives, an enormous fascination that we can meet in their "private" shots that testify to everyday life of the Vietnamese people. This adds a touch of extreme humanity that joins that contained in the stories. A book that cannot fail to move anyone who reads it.
In this case, however, Dan Brookes manages to collect more testimonies from those who were the brave military photographers. Attention, these are not the good civilian photographers of the great newspapers,who often at the cost of their lives (like Larry Burrows or Henri Huet) traveled in search of images and stories in the depths of that misunderstood war. In this case the photographers, as in the first volume in which Dan Brookes, author and veteran photographer, and Bob Hillerby, were soldiers assigned to special photojournalist units. It's more or less what you see in the movie "Full Metal Jacket" when Pvt. Joker (Matthew Modine) is assigned to one of these units.
In this second volume we listen to the voices of others of these photographers, eight in all, plus the story of the death of Bill Perkins, a Marine photographer who sacrificed himself by throwing himself on a grenade to save his companions and thus posthumously obtaining the only Medal of Honor ever awarded to a military reporter. At the same time, the death of 5 military reporters in the crash of their Ghostriders 079 helicopter during Operation Medina in 1970 is narrated.
As in the previous volume, the balance between photo and story is perfect. Each of the 8 photographers tells "his" Vietnam, often very similar in approach but with various experiences depending on the assignment and the actions in which they were involved. A routine that saw them almost always operating, in various functions, from "official" to the harshest ones such as advancing in the jungles and rice fields together with soldiers of units they did not know or even aggregated to the South Vietnamese or Korean forces.
The book is therefore a fitting tribute to these men who challenged their greatest fears to document that conflict. William Muchler, Roy McClellan, Curtis D. Hicks (Rose), William Mondjack, Tom Wong, Christoher Jensen, James Saller, Marvin J. Wolf lived a Vietnam War behind photo lens and not fighting. But often they too, and perhaps more than the ordinary "Grunt" have seen their dose of horror. But at the same time the book is also a rediscovery of Vietnam, a country that undoubtedly exercised at the time and for the rest of their lives, an enormous fascination that we can meet in their "private" shots that testify to everyday life of the Vietnamese people. This adds a touch of extreme humanity that joins that contained in the stories. A book that cannot fail to move anyone who reads it.
October 1, 2020
How do we know what happened during the Vietnam War? The usual written sources, of course, but Vietnam was also the first televised war and it was heavily photographed by a cloud of cameramen from all walks of life – two of the most iconic photographs of the 20th Century were taken during Vietnam. Cameras, Combat and Courage describes the War as experienced by military photographers whose job it was to record the war, but also to fight when necessary. They took millions of pictures; some of them died in combat while doing so.
Cameras, Combat and Courage is episodic for the most part with different photographers taking a chapter to tell their story. And what tales they share: William Muchler spooked while walking through a deserted VC village; Roy McClellan under fire in a paddy field; Christopher Jensen dodging mortar shells at Firebase Ripcord; Marvin Wolf’s encounter with VC snipers. Those were men that survived. Bill Perkins did not; he gave his life saving his comrades from a grenade and was awarded the Medal of Honor. His story is movingly told by his friend. Five others died when their helicopter was shot down near Pleiku. Brooks ends his book with an essay on what photographs meant to the Vietnam War and a eulogy for the men that took them.
As you might expect, Cameras, Combat and Courage is seeded with dozens of photographs covering all aspects of the Vietnam War. Some of them are incredibly poignant like the GI with the classic thousand-yard stare who will die in combat, others seem mundane, pictures of everyday life, but all tell a little part of the remarkable story that casts a long shadow over American history. The pictures, stories, and the men make this a remarkable book worth reading.
Cameras, Combat and Courage is episodic for the most part with different photographers taking a chapter to tell their story. And what tales they share: William Muchler spooked while walking through a deserted VC village; Roy McClellan under fire in a paddy field; Christopher Jensen dodging mortar shells at Firebase Ripcord; Marvin Wolf’s encounter with VC snipers. Those were men that survived. Bill Perkins did not; he gave his life saving his comrades from a grenade and was awarded the Medal of Honor. His story is movingly told by his friend. Five others died when their helicopter was shot down near Pleiku. Brooks ends his book with an essay on what photographs meant to the Vietnam War and a eulogy for the men that took them.
As you might expect, Cameras, Combat and Courage is seeded with dozens of photographs covering all aspects of the Vietnam War. Some of them are incredibly poignant like the GI with the classic thousand-yard stare who will die in combat, others seem mundane, pictures of everyday life, but all tell a little part of the remarkable story that casts a long shadow over American history. The pictures, stories, and the men make this a remarkable book worth reading.
April 1, 2020
I cannot imagine being sent to a war zone to photograph what is going on. The photographers that were charged with photographing the Vietnam War were brave for not only going to do this, but for making it the most photographed war. They risked their lives to show those of us that weren't there and future generations what it was like in the battlefield, but also what it was like in the strange place they were sent to. The photographs of the local people and places show the contrast between the war and the everyday life that continued during it.
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February 28, 2022This book presents the war from the perspective of some of the actual military photographers of the Vietnam War. I really enjoyed reading of the photographer's unique perspective on the war and the descriptions of their job and covering the war in all its aspects. I now want to read the first book of this series.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews