“I think it is fair to say that all war photographers hide behind their cameras. I hid behind mine for years. I think that a photographer in combat has a greater protection than the soldier who has a rifle in his hand.”

Things change so fast! When Carl Mydans made the statement above, in his office in the Time Life building in New York back in 1992, he was probably correct. But based his comment on most conflicts up to the Iraq War – 36 photographers and camera operators were abducted or killed during that conflict.

Journalists and photographers are protected by international conventions of armed warfare, but history shows that war photography has become much more dangerous since the spread of terrorism, because terrorists target journalists and photographers. 

On the 9th January 1945, Carl Mydans made this image for Life Magazine of General McArthur striding ashore on the island of Luzon in the Philippines, perhaps demonstrating his seminal utterance of ‘I Shall Return’ – although McArthur actually returned to the Philippines two months prior. McArthur had a huge personality and a barbed relationship with the press, but understood the PR value of a good photograph. 

Mydans was in France when his office sent him a coded message that McArthur was returning to the Philippines.

“By the time I got there the landing at Leyte was over, although the last of the battle was still being fought. McArthur’s public information officer called us together and said, “MacArthur will go on the Luzon assault on the USS Boise. Six of you will go with him. You’ll draw lots out of a helmet.” A captain tore up paper, and everybody put his hand in and took out a piece. The slip of paper I found in my hand had the one word, “Stills.” I was loaded into the same landing craft with MacArthur, and I went ashore with him.

“The story of what happened there has been told and retold many times. Incorrectly. People always ask ‘How many times did he do that for you, Mr. Mydans?’ And the answer is always the same: ‘He did it once.’ But I now realize that the question will go on forever!”

Time/Life magazine was a different organisation back in 1992. In the adjoining office Alfred Eisenstaedt was still employed at the age of 91. Carl Mydans was 86 and still shooting for the magazine. A great testimony to both the photographers and the publisher. I doubt that twenty years later that Google Images, who now manage the Time-Life archives, would entertain employing two photographers with the combined age of 177 years!