Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, March 30, 1991 TAG: 9103300400
SECTION: SPECTATOR PAGE: S-1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: JOHN J. O'CONNOR/ THE NEW YORK TIMES
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Barbara Walters got there first for ABC's "20/20." Sunday night on public television (7 p.m. on WBRA-Channel 15 in the Roanoke viewing area), the affable general sits for an hour as esteemed guest on " . . . Talking With David Frost."
Going into a history-professor mode with horn-rimmed glasses setting off his proper suit and tie, Frost sits directly opposite the general in the cellar of military headquarters in Saudi Arabia.
At the outset, Frost explains that "we had asked the general to share with us the story of the war as only he can tell it." Not surprisingly, the general's story of the war is not dramatically different, in broad outline, from the story of the war that was apparent as the war itself unfolded.
A number of intriguing details do emerge. At one point, for instance, explaining how he had briefed President Bush on defending Saudi Arabia right after the Iraqi takeover of Kuwait, the general mentions "our operations plan that we worked on for over a year and a half." A crisis, it seems, was hardly unexpected.
Later, discussing Israel, the general casually admits that "I think we all expected the Scud attack." Indeed, the Iraqis had earlier declared that war in the region would "certainly" bring an invasion of Israel. Yet when the Scuds fell, Bush quickly went on television expressing his shock and anger. The shaping of public opinion can be tricky.
Perhaps the most surprising portion of the interview is a brief exchange on the role of the press as perceived by the general.
Frost refers to Iraq's display of captured Amrican pilots, saying that "obviously most of them had been brutalized." That is not necessarily true. Their visible bruises, as was later pointed out by even the military, could have been suffered in being ejected from their planes. But Schwarzkopf says he "didn't like the idea that I was seeing it on CNN" and then accuses the Cable News Network of "aiding and abetting an enemy who was violating the Geneva conventions."
The general does concede: "Of course, I'm not in the news business and there's First Amendment rights and the public's right to know." But he adds, with more than an unsettling whiff of demagogy: "In the future, when people justify their actions based on the public's right to know, they'd better check the American public first."
He says he has received hundreds of thousands of letters supporting his stand. The unsettling inferences: First Amendment interpretations determined by opinion polls.
Frost tiptoes carefully, pointing out that "the public's right to know is sacred," but adding that "there are certain times it has to be delayed." He does not wonder why there is still no official estimate of deaths in the bombings of Iraq, bombings that the United Nations recently described as inflicting "apocalyptic" destruction. This is in no sense a confrontational interview.
Much of the rest of the hour consists of biographical nuggets, the kind essential to any portrait of a hero, complete with the usual football analogies.
"When the kickoff came, our team was there to play," says the general. "Our team came to play ball."
Was God on his side in this war? The general: "He had to be."
Does he have a favorite passage in the Bible that he keeps by his bedside? The general mentions a "prayer attributed to St. Francis": "Dear Lord, make us instruments of your peace."
The program ends with a list of Americans killed in the war, most of them in their late teens or early 20s.
Schwarzkopf says simply: "I grieve for every one of them." As do we all.
by CNB