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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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10098900.013
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1990-09-18
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VIDEO, Page 98Truth and Consequences
Re-enactment of past events is troubling enough, but CBS and
anchorman Dan Rather last week faced charges that chill every
newsman's heart: airing faked footage. The allegation, denied by
CBS and so far unconfirmed, is that Rather's CBS Evening News
unwittingly broadcast footage of war scenes in Afghanistan restaged
or simulated for the cameras.
During the mid-1980s, Rather showed gripping scenes of battling
troops and suffering civilians, most photographed by freelance
cameraman Mike Hoover, 45. The images won CBS an award for news
coverage. But the New York Post, citing sources in the U.S., Europe
and Asia, said some scenes were fabricated. CBS officials said they
believed the film was authentic but were looking into the charges.
Among the Post's allegations:
In broadcasts in November 1984, Rather introduced videotape
purporting to show mujahedin rebels blowing up electric-power
pylons in the "largest sabotage operation of the war." According
to the Post, a former Afghan rebel named Etabari, who was Hoover's
translator, said the photographer arrived twelve days after the
event and persuaded rebels to restage the incident.
Again in 1984, Rather narrated a segment claiming to depict
4,000 Afghans fleeing their villages near Kabul out of fear of
Soviet attacks. Etabari told the Post that the film was shot miles
away at the Afghan-Pakistani border.
Another segment supposedly showed rebels stalking government
guards and blowing up a mine. The Post says Etabari claims the
footage was faked by Hoover at a camp in Pakistan. The Post adds
that CBS in 1987 aired a tape of an exploding red toy and described
it as a bomb planted by Soviet soldiers. An unidentified BBC
producer called the "bomb" a phony device made for Hoover. Whatever
the truth of these allegations, they are a reminder that skepticism
is an editor's best -- and perhaps most reliable -- friend.