| Good morning,
I’d like to tell you a short story about a hero you’ve probably never heard of—a seasoned war correspondent during WWII who spoke fluent French, exhibited bravery under fire, and chafed at government censorship.
As the Paris bureau chief for the Associated Press, Edward Kennedy was one of 17 American reporters allowed to witness the German surrender at a little red schoolhouse in Reims, a city 80 miles northeast of Paris. It happened at 2:41 a.m., French time, but the news didn't get out for another 12 hours—and it wasn't supposed to go out even then.
On the way to Reims, the reporters were told that there would be a news embargo. They were told that it would last 36 hours—until 3 p.m. the next day. To Kennedy, this was an absurdity.
Can you imagine sitting on a story like that? Ed Kennedy couldn't. So, he slipped off to a phone not monitored by censors and called the AP’s London office. An editor named Lewis Hawkins answered the phone.
“This is Ed Kennedy, Lew. Germany has surrendered unconditionally,” the war correspondent said. “That’s surrendered unconditionally. That’s official. Make the date[line] Reims and get it out.”
He didn't tell his bosses that he was breaking an embargo, and they didn't ask. So, the AP "flash," as it was called, went out to the world: ALLIES OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCED GERMANS SURRENDERED UNCONDITIONALLY.
Kennedy's scoop generated wild and impromptu celebrations around the globe. But his competitors in the press were incensed. So were the censors and the U.S. generals, including Supreme Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower. However, there had been no valid military justification for withholding the news. The reason, it turned out, was political. Harry Truman and Winston Churchill had acceded to Joseph Stalin's request to delay the announcement until Red Army officials could get to Berlin. The announcement was supposed to be a joint one.
To Kennedy, political considerations were not legitimate reasons for censorship. This wasn't a universal view. Kennedy's bosses at AP apologized for their actions, apparently as a condition for being allowed access to covering the war's aftermath, and then quietly fired Ed Kennedy. Despite his experience, knowledge, and language skills, Ed Kennedy was never given another assignment as a foreign correspondent.
Sixty-seven years later, the AP formally issued a posthumous apology to its long deceased onetime Paris bureau chief, who was killed in a 1963 car accident. In 2012, his daughter helped publish his memoir, a riveting account of his wartime experiences. A movement arose, briefly, to award him a Pulitzer Prize. That didn't happen, but there is a fitting tribute to Ed Kennedy in the picturesque California town of Seaside. It's on a small plaque in a city park and it reads: "He gave the world an extra day of happiness."
Since you’re a savvy RealClear reader, I’m guessing that you, like Ed Kennedy, understand the dangers of politically motivated censorship. Several of my colleagues have reached out to you in recent days, letting you know that RealClearPolitics has itself been targeted for censorship, in the form of an ideologically motivated, behind-the-scenes campaign to discourage advertising on our site. I won’t repeat my colleagues’ prior messages here in full, except to say that the news aggregation and reporting you find on our pages are difficult to support on advertising alone. As a result, this vital work increasingly depends on our readers’ support through the RealClear Media Fund.
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Carl M. Cannon
Washington Bureau Chief
RealClearPolitics | 