Netflix Documentary Spotlights Seymour Hersh
Netflix's new documentary "Cover-Up" spotlights legendary investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, focusing on his exposure of the My Lai massacre in Vietnam and the enduring consequences for journalism and public accountability. The release is recommended for anyone interested in recent history, investigative reporting, or the role of the press in shaping society.
- Before Seymour Hersh's reporting in November 1969, the U.S. Army's official report on the My Lai incident claimed that about 20 civilians had been inadvertently killed, while publicly describing the event as a military victory over 128 enemy combatants. - Hersh's breakthrough story, which detailed the killing of 347 to 504 unarmed civilians by U.S. soldiers on March 16, 1968, was initially rejected by major publications like *Life* and *Look* magazine before being published by the small Dispatch News Service. - For exposing the massacre, Hersh won the 1970 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting. Of the 26 soldiers ultimately charged for the events at My Lai, only platoon leader Lt. William Calley Jr. was convicted. - The documentary's co-director, Laura Poitras, also directed the 2014 film "Citizenfour," which won an Academy Award for its documentation of NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. - Beyond My Lai, Hersh's career includes exposing the U.S. military's torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib in Iraq for *The New Yorker* in 2004 and reporting on the Watergate scandal for *The New York Times*. - Hersh first received a tip about the massacre from Ronald Ridenhour, a veteran who had served in the same brigade as the soldiers involved in My Lai and had gathered eyewitness accounts from his fellow soldiers.
