WASHINGTON,
March 31 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Award-winning news
correspondent Peter Arnett, famed for his coverage of the Vietnam
War and the first Gulf war, has been sacked Monday, March 31, by NBC
after he suggested on Iraqi television that the U.S. war plan had
failed.
On
its "Today's Show" morning news broadcast, NBC read a
statement from network officials announcing that the New Zealand-born
Arnett had been canned.
"It
was wrong for Mr. Arnett to grant an interview to state-controlled Iraqi
television, especially at a time of war," the NBC statement said,
reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
"And
it was wrong for him to discuss personal observations and opinions in
that interview.
"Therefore,"
the statement concluded, "Peter Arnett will no longer
be reporting for NBC News and MSNBC."
Early
in the scandal, NBC stood by Arnett, saying in a press release that
"his remarks were analytical in nature and were not intended to be
anything more."
In
his comments broadcast this past weekend by Iraqi television, Arnett
said "the first war plan has just failed because of Iraqi
resistance."
"Clearly
the American war planners misjudged the determination of the Iraqi
forces," Arnett told Iraqi journalists.
On
the broadcast Monday, Arnett offered his apologies to NBC and to the
U.S. public, saying he was "embarrassed" by the controversy
that had erupted following his comments.
"Clearly,
by giving that interview to Iraqi television, I created a firestorm in
the United States, and for that I am truly sorry," he said, adding
that it had been "an impromptu interview."
"I
gave some personal observations - some analytical observations - which I
don't think are out of line with what experts think," Arnett said.
"But
clearly I misjudged the firestorm," said Arnett, 68, who is a
naturalized American.
"I
am not anti-war ... I am not anti-military," he told viewers on NBC
Monday.
Condemnation
for the comments came from around the United States. Former New York
Senator Alfonse D'Amato, interviewed on Fox News Sunday, said Arnett's
comments gave "aid and comfort to the enemy."
"He's
buttering them up," D'Amato said.
Arnett,
in Baghdad for NBC and National Geographic Explorer, was one of the few
Western correspondents in the Iraqi capital. He became a household name
by reporting for CNN from Baghdad during the first Gulf War in 1991.
Arnett
was also involved in CNN's darkest moment - a 1998 report called
"Tailwind," which contended that American forces in Vietnam
had used the lethal nerve agent sarin.
The
report could not be unsupported by the facts in a subsequent in-house
investigation, and CNN was forced into a retraction and public apology.
Arnett left the following year.
Arnett
said Monday that he has no immediate plans.
"There's
a small island in the South Pacific, uninhabited, which I will try to
swim to," he said.
