A Change of Guard

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Friday 2 April 2010

Bob Kerr: Down the road on a motorcycle to get the story

By Bo Kerr
projo.com
Friday, April 2, 2010

It is not a big story at the moment. It is moving mostly among the people who shared Sean Flynn’s uncommon attraction to the dangers of war reporting.

Flynn and his friend Dana Stone have not been seen by friends or family since the day in 1970 when they rode motorcycles into Cambodia to cover the expanding war in Southeast Asia. They took the cowboy approach, heading into territory they knew little about in a way that invited attention and probably capture. Their plan was to cover the Cambodian invasion from the other side, then return after their release. It clearly didn’t work.

There is no escaping the family line here. Sean Flynn’s ride into war on a motorcycle seemed so Errol Flynn. The swashbuckler’s son was doing some swashbuckling of his own. The major difference, of course, was that Sean Flynn confronted real danger. Errol Flynn confronted danger until the director yelled “cut!” He was the classic movie star. He often had a sword in his hand.

Sean Flynn tried his hand at his father’s trade. One of his movies was “The Son of Captain Blood.” Rent it if you can and you’ll know why he moved to photojournalism.

Actually, word was, Sean could get a tad prickly at the mention of his father. “Hey, man, I really dug your Dad in ‘Dawn Patrol,’ ” was not the ideal icebreaker.

Flynn and Stone passed through Quang Tri province in Vietnam while I was there in 1968 and 1969. Part of our job as Marine combat correspondents was to escort civilian reporters, even though many of them knew their way around as well as we did.

It was a time when reporters and photographers could be guided by their own instincts. There was no embedding, no strict control of movement. It was perhaps the last great era of American war reporting. It was so good that there are people, even today, who blame the press for the war’s disastrous end.

Now with news that Flynn’s remains might have been found in Cambodia, we are reminded of that time when reporters and photographers insisted on going where the story was. They took crazy chances. Some of them developed clearly unhealthy attractions to the unmatched rush of combat.

Many of them spent years in Vietnam — going home but repeatedly coming back to the only story that mattered. Some had Vietnamese wives or girlfriends. Saigon’s downtown hotel bars became their extended newsrooms.

Now, one of them might have been found in what appears to be a mass burial site in Cambodia. Two men who claim they were working with Flynn’s sister Rory Flynn recovered the remains and turned them over to the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh. While preliminary examination indicates they could be the remains of Sean Flynn, they will be examined much more thoroughly at the Joint Prisoners of War, Missing In Action Accounting Command in Hawaii.

Flynn was just 28 years old when he headed down the road with Stone. In his jungle utilities, bush hat, scarf and Nikons, he was one of those who decided the best way to get the best story was to head straight for it. He sure didn’t ask for an escort.

Whether the remains turn out to be his or not, the discovery reminds us of a time when war was covered by people who were allowed to go where they needed to be.

It was better that way. It gave us a daily helping of what was actually going on.

bkerr@projo.com

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