BURCHETT, Wilfrid. Famous Australian journalist: "To be able to speak to Russians, Chinese, Vietnamese, Koreans, Cambodians as a friend but completely independent, enables me to do and say things others may not"

Wilfred Graham Burchett (16 September 1911 – 27 September 1983) was an Australian journalist famous for his reporting of conflicts in Asia and his Communist sympathies. He was the first foreign correspondent to enter Hiroshima after the atomic bomb was dropped, and he attracted hostiliyy for his reportage of “the other side” during the Korean and Vietnam Wars (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilfred_Burchett ).

Wilfrid Burchett (an outstanding Australian journalist who was severely persecuted for reporting World War 2, and the Korean and Indo-China Wars from the Communist side) writing to his brother on 12 October 1969: “ Thank goodness I have been able to maintain my independence throughout all these years, awfully difficult from all viewpoints though it was. To be able to speak to Russians, Chinese, Vietnamese, Koreans, Cambodians as a friend but completely independent, enables me to do and say things others may not. But now and again this yields positive results.” [1].

[1]. Wilfrid Burchett quoted in Ben Kiernan, editor, “Burchett. Reporting the other side of the world 1939- 1983”, Quartet Books, 1987.