Veteran CNN Reporter Breaks Down On The Air After Being Touched by the Quality of American Marines-Unproven!
Summary of eRumor:
The eRumor says CNN’s Martin Savidge offered to let some Marines call home from the Iraq war on his video phone. One of them, a 19-year-old Marine asked if his platoon sergeant could go first because he had not been able to talk with his pregnant wife for three months. Savidge was moved by this and turned to interview some other Marines. They wanted to call the family of a buddy who had been killed in battle. Savidge broke down, unable to speak, and said, “Where do they get young men like this?”
The Truth:
We’ve found no evidence that this story is true.
Only a handful of sites have the account and each of them is getting it from the forwarded email.
There is no reference to it on the CNN site.
The story has been quoted in several publications, but without attribution.
The Weekly Standard published it early in April, but removed it on April 4, 2003 saying it was a hoax.
Daniel Henninger of the Wall Street Journal mentioned the story on April 7, 2003.
This is a small thing, but the “video phone” itself would probably not have been used for the phone calls.
The video phone technology is not a phone but a method of sending video and audio over a satellite phone.