23 June
Vietnamese photographer Nick Ut’s Pullitzer prize-winning photograph of nine-year-old Kim Phuc fleeing a US napalm attack on her village appeared in Life magazine on this day in 1972. The picture had previously been rejected by some news agencies because it showed a naked girl.
’The picture shows Kim, when her skin is burned so badly. Behind Kim, you see all the South Vietnamese armies running with her, together. And next to Kim, her older brother and one young brother looking back to the black smoke, and another two [members of] her family.
She looked ever so bad - I thought that she would die.
You know, I had been outside the village that morning and I took a lot of pictures. I was almost leaving the village when I saw two aeroplanes. The first dropped four bombs and the second aeroplane dropped another four napalm [bombs]. And five minutes later, I saw people running, calling "Help! Please help!"’
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365 days is co-authored by Steve Platt and Fiona Osler
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Also on Vietnam:
- The Tet Offensive 40 years on by Mike Marqusee (February 2008)
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