The War Beat, Pacific: The American Media at War Against Japan

by Steven Casey

Overview

The definitive history of American war reporting in the Pacific theater of World War II, from the attack on Pearl Harbor to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.


After almost two years slogging with infantrymen through North Africa, Italy, and France, Ernie Pyle immediately realized he was ill-prepared for covering the Pacific War. As Pyle and other war correspondents discovered, the climate, the logistics, and the sheer scope of the Pacific theater had no parallel in the war America was fighting in Europe.

From Pearl Harbor to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, The War Beat, Pacific provides the first comprehensive account of how a group of highly courageous correspondents covered America's war against Japan, what they witnessed, what they were allowed to publish, and how their reports shaped the home front's perception of some of the most pivotal battles in American military history. In a dramatic and fast-paced narrative based on a wealth of previously untapped primary sources, Casey takes us from MacArthur's doomed defense on the Philippines and the navy's overly strict censorship policy at the time of Midway, through the bloody battles on Guadalcanal, New Guinea, Tarawa, Saipan, Leyte and Luzon, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, detailing the cooperation, as well as conflict, between the media and the military, as they grappled with the enduring problem of limiting a free press during a period of extreme crisis.

The War Beat, Pacific shows how foreign correspondents ran up against practical challenges and risked their lives to get stories in a theater that was far more challenging than the war against Nazi Germany, while the US government blocked news of the war against Japan and tried to focus the home front on Hitler and his atrocities.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780190053635
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	05/03/2021
Pages:	408
Product dimensions:	9.30(w) x 6.20(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

Steven Casey is Professor in International History at the London School of Economics. He is the author of Cautious Crusade: Franklin Roosevelt, American Public Opinion and the War against Nazi Germany (OUP, 2001); Selling the Korean War: Propaganda, Politics and Public Opinion (OUP, 2008); When Soldiers Fall: How Americans have Confronted Combat Casualties (OUP, 2014); and The War Beat Europe: The American Media at War against Nazi Germany (OUP, 2017).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part One: The Shrouded War
Chapter 1. The Paradox of Pearl Harbor
Chapter 2. Fiasco in the Philippines
Chapter 3. Censorship at Sea
Chapter 4. The New Guinea Gang
Chapter 5. The Shroud Slips: Guadalcanal
Part Two: Lifting the Veil
Chapter 6. Atrocities
Chapter 7. Dress Rehearsal in New Guinea
Chapter 8. Bloody Battles in the Central Pacific
Chapter 9. The Burma Backwater
Part Three: Vengeance
Chapter 10. The Return
Chapter 11. Death in the Pacific
Chapter 12. Endgame
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

"A nuanced and engaging narrative of the Pacific war in World War II....Steven Casey...untangles the complex challenges that reporters experienced from the moment they arrived on the vast front....The reporters were not sideline observers or members of a pool simply repurposing what they were told from official sources. They often put themselves at great risk and, along with the soldiers they accompanied, endured malnourishment, blistering heat and humidity, disease, endless insects, and enemy bullets and shells....With everything seemingly against them—a public distracted by the European war; military officials who viewed them with suspicion; or publishers who wanted something other than graphic or demoralizing coverage—the Pacific reporters did their jobs nonetheless....A timely reminder of what a democracy needs from an independent press in times of crisis." — Tracy Campbell, Journal of American History

"[A] brilliant book on American reporters covering World War II in the Pacific....Casey's powerful and readable account offers an important addition to the historiography of the Pacific theater.... Casey concludes that despite the difficulties that reporters faced in the Pacific, they played an invaluable role in bridging the gap between what was occurring on the battlefield and what was understood on the home front. Reporters developed working relationships with different military commanders and public relations officers while overcoming harsh environmental conditions, dangerous and sometimes deadly combat situations, and unreliable transportation." — David L. Snead, Journal of Military History

"Casey has produced a highly useful companion volume to his earlier book The War Beat, Europe (2017), deserving of a place in any collection focusing on WWII or journalism." — J.P. Sanson, CHOICE Connect, Vol. 59 No. 8

"Shrewd and comprehensive.... The War Beat, Pacific is an impressive achievement. Media-military relations in the Pacific were, it shows us, a world of paradoxes and conundrums reflecting the competing agendas and institutional frictions within the military and between it and the media. Casey composes a lucid narrative out of disparate archival materials and secondary sources. While he captures the terror, misery, and frustration reporters felt in the Pacific, his eyes are on the bigger picture, the forces in both media and military that determined what the American public knew of the war and what it did not. Now the definitive account of US war reporting in the Pacific, The War Beat, Pacific promises to have a long shelf life." — Richard Fine, Michigan War Studies Review

"Reporters assigned to cover the Pacific theater of WW II faced obstacles that were difficult to overcome. The Pacific War covered thousands of square miles, and much of it was fought by the navy. Reporters might be on a ship dozens or even a hundred miles from major battles trying to make sense of the progress by listening to comments and reports from pilots without seeing one moment of action. Moreover, they struggled with wording dispatches to their home offices in order to make it past military censors....Pacific theater reporters also had to contend with the unique personalities of those who were in charge of operations....Casey...has produced a highly useful companion volume to his earlier book The War Beat, Europe (2017), deserving of a place in any collection focusing on WW II or journalism....Recommended. General readers, advanced undergraduates through faculty, and professionals." — Choice

"Meticulous, authoritative research informs a vivid narrative." — Kirkus Starred Review

"Steven Casey's 'The War Beat, Pacific' recounts the toils of the Americans behind the dispatches on the long road from Pearl Harbor to Tokyo Bay." —Wall Street Journal

"Brimming with anecdotes, it sheds light on just what it takes to be a war correspondent. For those seeking new perspectives on America's war with Japan this is a thoroughly illuminating book." — History of War

"... a highly useful companion volume to his earlier book The War Beat, Europe (2017), deserving of a place in any collection focusing on WW II or journalism." — , CHOICE

"Steven Casey has made an important, original contribution to our knowledge of American war reporting, an eternally relevant topic, especially for a society that values both free speech and operational security. In Casey's exploration of war reporting in the Pacific theater, we see the struggles of reporters against military censorship, appalling conditions, an almost nonexistent communications infrastructure, and often their fellow correspondents in the endless competition for breaking stories. Casey weaves naturally from relating the experiences of individual reporters to larger context on the customs and practices of war reporting as a whole." — John C. McManus, author of Fire and Fortitude: The U.S. Army in the Pacific War, 1941-1943

"Steven Casey has produced another superbly researched and beautifully written study of US media coverage of World War II, this time in the Pacific theater. It will serve as a worthy companion to his previous study of media coverage in the European theater. As with that previous volume, this one should lead to reconsideration of many standard beliefs regarding the relationship within and between the media, the armed forces, and the government during the conflict, as well as the numerous individuals whose reporting and photographs helped shape the public image of the war." — Mark A. Stoler, editor of the George C. Marshall Papers

"Steven Casey offers a fresh and absorbing account of the Pacific War told through the harrowing experiences of battle-hardened reporters. Correspondents on 'the war beat' risked everything to tell its story, but the fog of that war was thick. Americans knew shockingly little about what actually transpired in such places as Bataan and Okinawa, Tokyo and Hiroshima. Casey's brilliant and fast-paced narrative opens up that world, providing a behind-the-scenes picture of the war unlike any other." — Kenneth Osgood, author of Total Cold War: Eisenhower's Secret Propaganda Battle at Home and Abroad

"In this masterful and often gripping work, Steven Casey narrates the history of World War II in the Pacific from the perspective of the reporters who covered it. News coverage of American fighting in the Pacific was hampered by censorship and by the difficulty of simply getting to the front, leading to a largely 'shrouded war,' undermining public engagement and understanding. Through exhaustive research, Casey reveals the way journalists risked their lives to keep Americans informed." — Mary L. Dudziak, author of War Time: An Idea, Its History, Its Consequences

"Students of military-news media relations have long decried the lack of a wide-ranging history of the role of the press in World War II's Pacific theater. Steven Casey's thoroughly researched War Beat, Pacific, fills that gap. Balanced, concise, superbly written, it will be a must-read along with Casey's War Beat, Europe, for anyone hoping to comprehend World War II in all its breadth and complexity." — William M. Hammond, author of Reporting Vietnam: Media and Military at War

"Steven Casey has written an exceptional book." — Stephen C. Murray, Journal of Pacific History

"Being an American journalist in the Pacific theater during World War II was dangerous, daunting work. Snakes, snipers, tropical diseases, and plane crashes were all part of the beat. So were military censors, manipulative officers, and unreliable communication links. As one reads in Steven Casey's engaging and lively narrative, a question emerges: Which was a greater obstacle to filing copy: malaria or MacArthur?" — David Krugler, American Historical Review

From the Publisher

★ 2021-02-04
A satisfying follow-up to the author’s The War Beat, Europe (2017).

Drawing on a prodigious number of sources, including extensive media, government, and military archives; oral histories; newspapers and magazines; and published histories, memoirs, and biographies, Casey, a professor of international history at the London School of Economics, offers a cleareyed look at the experiences of war correspondents reporting on the Pacific front. Faced with tropical weather, insects, and disease, the correspondents confronted conditions very different from those in the European theater. “The jungle breaks everything down,” complained one reporter after a long stint in New Guinea, “typewriter, camera, papers. My glasses gave way this morning.” Most egregiously, reporters confronted censorship from military authorities, who insisted on vetting stories. Military regulations could be “suffocating, encompassing almost every aspect of the reporters’ daily lives, from what to wear at mealtimes to where to throw their cigarette butts.” Correspondents assigned to the Navy, whose oversight was especially strict, grew rebellious; those assigned to the Army soon realized that they would be rewarded by burnishing the reputation of the self-aggrandizing Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who believed that news of his challenges and triumphs would shift Franklin Roosevelt’s focus from Europe to the Pacific. Casey recounts in detail correspondents’ efforts to publish stories that the government wanted to suppress—of the Bataan Death March, for example, testimonies of atrocities from prisoners of war, and the destruction wrought by kamikaze raids. He creates deft portraits of a burgeoning population of correspondents as well as the editors and publishers who competed for—and helped to shaped—the news. Besides examining military engagements, he recounts reporters’ dangerous exploits as they sailed through treacherous waters, parachuted out of planes, and made their ways across forbidding terrain. Although most of these correspondents are little remembered today, Casey casts a well-deserved light on their commitment to truth and on the hardships they endured to convey the reality of war.

Meticulous, authoritative research informs a vivid narrative.

Kirkus Reviews