Saigon war correspondents gather for last hurrah

HO CHI MINH CITY – The men and women who waded into the Big Muddy of the Vietnam War, pen in hand, cameras on the shoulder, lenses on the up and up, will gather in Saigon this April, perhaps for the last time, to observe the 35th anniversary of the conflict’s conclusion and bid adieu to a place that defined a generation of journalists.

The dozens of self-styled Old Hacks congregating at the Caravelle Hotel for this last hurrah include a who’s who of the wartime press corps:

Peter Arnett, Associated Press (AP), Pulitzer Prize 1965, International Reporting

Horst Faas, AP, Pulitzer Prize 1965 – Photography; Pulitzer Prize 1972 – Spot News Photography

Neal Ulevich, AP, Pulitzer Prize 1977 – Spot News Photography
Barry Hillenbrand,Time

Tim Page, Time

Don North, ABC

Ken Wagner, CBS

Jim Laurie, NBC

Carl Robinson, AP

Dirck Halstead, UPI, Time

Russell Burrows, son of Larry Burrows, one of the 20th Century’s legendary war photographers

In Saigon, the group will mount a photography exhibit and hold a memorial dinner at the Caravelle Hotel, where CBS and NBC based its bureaus during the war and where, on a rooftop bar, many wartime journalists retreated at the end of the day.

“We thought our last reunion five years ago was the last hurrah,” said Carl Robinson, an AP correspondent in Saigon from 1968 to 1975, who is organizing the reunion.

“But when Hubert Van Es (who took the photo of the precariously balanced helicopter on a downtown penthouse elevator shaft during the U.S. evacuation of Saigon] died last spring, our virtual reunion in an email list of some 300 inspired a desire for one more look at this city.”

Today, Ho Chi Minh City is positioned to grow faster than any other city in the developing world except for Hanoi, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers report issued in November.

The city’s dynamic appeal will be on full throttle during the country’s annual celebration of war’s end. But for the Old Hacks, the appeal is far more about yesterday than today.

“Nostalgia is a huge driver for lots of our guests,” said John Gardner, general manager of the Caravelle Hotel.

“I see them all the time up here on the rooftop terrace, standing on the edge of a city they once knew so well, a drink in hand, lost to more than a few memories.”

Saigon, a still commonly used and not politically inappropriate name for Ho Chi Minh City’s first district, has done a fair job of preserving a city once known as the Pearl of the Orient.

The Gia Long Palace, from which the former president of South Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem, fled during a 1963 coup d’etat, is now the Museum of Ho Chi Minh City.

The Eden Building, where the AP once located its Saigon bureau, is still home to the Girval Café where Graham Greene’s Phuong took her “elevenses” in The Quiet American.

The Caravelle Hotel celebrated its 50-year history with publication of a book last year: Caravelle – Saigon: A History.

But there have been changes, and the Old Hacks are likely to be more surprised by one transformation than any other: Where the American military once held a daily briefing derisively known as the Five O’Clock Follies, Louis Vuitton now sells luxury leather goods and fashion.

About the Caravelle

Opened in 1959, the Caravelle won enduring fame during the American War (known as the Vietnam War in the West) as the city’s most upscale hotel and a perch from which to watch the war erupt on the city’s fringe.

In 1998, the original 10-story building on Lam Son Square was completely refurbished and complemented by a 24-story tower.

Story by Jim Sullivan