Last Updated: December 29, 2000
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ASNE
on the move
Stars & Stripes editor resigns over killed story
David Offer resigned as the civilian editor of Stars & Stripes on
Sept. 1 in the face of Pentagon pressure to kill a news story about an
anti-missile unit in Germany.
The Pentagon said the story contained classified information and publisher
Thomas Kelsch gave the order to kill the story.
Instead, the newspaper, which is owned by the government and published
for troops abroad, published a similar story that had appeared on the front
page of that morning’s Washington Post.
Offer had been at the newspaper for five months and had bought a new
house the night before he quit.
He came to Stars & Stripes from the Newport (R.I.) Daily News, where
he was the editor.
His resignation has prompted a Senate committee to review government
censorship policy.
