Monday, February 16, 2016
Good morning,
Last week we learned that NBC News chief anchor Brian Williams appears to have been stretching the truth. His employer has confirmed that it is investigating Williams’ statement that he was in a helicopter in Iraq in 2003 that was hit by enemy fire and forced out of the air.
It seems that, much like a good fish story, Williams’ story about the helicopter ride in Iraq got better with each telling. He was indeed embedded with a U.S. military unit at the beginning of the Iraq War. While there, a Chinook helicopter was hit by an RPG. Williams was traveling in a different Chinook. At the time, Stars and Stripes reported that “the NBC anchor was nowhere near that aircraft or two other Chinooks flying in the formation that took fire.” It went on to say, “Williams arrived in the area about an hour later on another helicopter after the other three had made an emergency landing.”
A couple days later, on an NBC News program, Williams reported on the helicopter incident, saying, “On the ground, we learned the Chinook ahead of us was almost blown out of the sky.”
A couple of years later, in 2005, the story had improved. In this telling on CNBC, Williams said, “The helicopter in front of us was hit. A pickup truck stopped on the road, pulled a tarp back; a guy got up, fired an RPG, rocket-propelled grenade. These were farmers, or so they seemed. And it beautifully pierced the tail rotor of the Chinook in front of us.” There was no mention of learning about it while “on the ground” or that he “arrived in the area about an hour later.” This time it sounded like he was an eyewitness.
But it didn’t stop there. A couple more years passed, and Williams was still talking about the attack on the helicopters. And the story continued to evolve. In 2007, Williams told a student reporter from Fairfield University that he had “looked down the tube of an RPG that had been fired at us and had hit the chopper in front of ours.”
In 2013, 10 years after the attack on the helicopters, Williams was still talking about it. In a conversation with Alec Baldwin for his podcast Here’s the Thing, he told Baldwin about the attack. When asked if he thought he might die, Williams replied, “Briefly, sure.” How things have changed over the years.
Finally, the fish story turned into a real doozy when just a few weeks ago, Williams said, “The helicopter we were traveling in was forced down after being hit by an RPG.”
Some of the soldiers who were part of that convoy publicly questioned Williams’ account of the story. Last week, Williams recanted his story on air. “I said I was traveling in an aircraft that was hit by RPG fire. I was instead in a following aircraft. We all landed after the ground-fire incident and spent two harrowing nights in a sandstorm in the Iraq desert,” he said.
The problem is that when you tell a whopper like this, people start to question other stories you’ve told over the years. Now people are raising doubts about other stories Williams has recounted, including statements he made about seeing a body floating through the French Quarter after New Orleans was hit by Hurricane Katrina and how he contracted dysentery after he swallowed some floodwater there.
Williams should have heeded the words of Will Rogers, who once said, “It takes a lifetime to build a good reputation, but you can lose it in a minute.”
Williams has put his employer in quite a quandary. He has anchored NBC Nightly News since 2004. For much of that time, it has been the top-rated evening newscast, regularly besting its competition on the other two networks. NBC News President Deborah Turness said that an internal investigation had been launched after questions arose over Williams’ false on-air statements and last Wednesday she issued a statement saying Williams has been suspended without pay for 6 months.
In any business, trust with your customers is imperative.
If Williams was indeed less than honest in his recounting of the helicopter attack, it’s going to be really difficult for him to regain the trust of viewers. Some will say he deserves a 2nd chance. This story again reminds us how one mistake can call into question a person’s integrity and undo what it took a lifetime to build. We’d all be wise to heed the words of Will Rogers.