EXCLUSIVE Explosive twist in claims about who took iconic Vietnam War 'Napalm Girl' picture
By James Reinl
Daily Mail
Feb 1, 2025
After 50 years of silence, a freelance photographer from Vietnam has claimed he took the iconic 'Napalm Girl' image (above) showing a naked child fleeing from a bomb in 1972
A photographer credited with taking an iconic image of the Vietnam War claims he will sue the filmmakers who say he basked in the glory of another man's work for decades, DailyMail.com can reveal.
LA-based photographer Nick Ut has long been praised for capturing the picture of a naked girl fleeing a napalm attack in South Vietnam as a staffer for The Associated Press in 1972.
But a new documentary called 'The Stringer,' which premiered on Saturday, claims that Ut has lived a lie all these years as the 'napalm girl' photo was really taken by Nguyen Thanh Nghe, an NBC News driver.
Now, Ut's lawyer, Jim Hornstein, says these dueling claims will be tested in court, as he will in the coming weeks file a defamation lawsuit against The VII Foundation and others involved in the movie.
Hornstein says the film's claims are 'absolute bunk' and based on a '50-year vendetta' of an AP photo editor in Saigon who was jealous of Ut, and the glittering career he has had once the war ended.
The lawyer shared with DailyMail.com documents from the case file, including a letter from Kim Phuc, the girl in the photo, now a 61-year-old living in Canada, who says she has 'no doubt' that Ut took the photo.
He also shared a letter from a 1989 edition of the Los Angeles Times, in which an NBC News director who witnessed the horrors at the town of Trang Bang praised Ut for his work, but made no reference to Nghe.
'A defamation action will soon be filed against the filmmakers to correct this outrageous decision by VII Foundation' to release the movie, Hornstein told DailyMail.com.
Titled The Terror of War, it became one of the most haunting images of the 20th century. Nick Ut (pictured), now 73, was 21 when he took the photo, which won a Pulitzer Prize
The 'napalm girl' photo was taken on 8 June 1972. It shows Kim Phuc as a naked nine-year-old girl and several other burned and crying children fleeing a napalm attack on their village of Trang Bang.
Officially titled The Terror of War, it became one of the most haunting images of the 20th century.
A billion people are estimated to have seen the photo within 24 hours of its publication, with billions more viewing it since.
It was so influential in hammering home the horrors of the Vietnam War that President Richard Nixon even questioned if it had been doctored.
The AP and Ut have long maintained that Ut, then aged 21, took the photo, which won him a Pulitzer Prize, photojournalist fame and a distinguished career until his retirement from the AP in 2017.
More than half a century later, The Stringer flips the script on this, claiming that the image was actually taken by Nghe, who was in Trang Bang that day as a driver for an NBC News crew.
Nghe says he captured the image of Phuc running down the street with arms outstretched and sold it to the AP for $20, and that they gave him a print of the photo that his wife later destroyed.
Investigations into his claim by teams for The Stringer were led by husband-and-wife team Gary Knight and founder of the VII Foundation, and producer Fiona Turner.
It was directed by Vietnamese-American filmmaker Bao Nguyen.
The movie sent shockwaves through the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, where it premiered on Saturday.
A key source in the film is Carl Robinson, a former AP photo editor in Saigon, who was overruled in his judgment not to use the picture by Horst Faas, AP's Saigon chief of photos, it is claimed.
Pictured: Vietnam war survivor Kim Phuc, left, and AP photographer Nick Ut, greet each other before a talk in 2007
Nguyen Thanh Nghe has said the monochrome photograph, which has long been credited to AP staffer photographer Nick Ut, was actually taken by him. (Pictured: Director Bao Nguyen and Nguyen Than Nghe)
AP bosses have said there is 'no reason to conclude that anyone other than the long-credited photographer, Ut, made the picture'. (Pictured: Ut (center) flanked by the girl pictured, Kim Phuc, on his left)
The letters page from a 1989 edition of the LA Times is set to feature in the upcoming lawsuit
Robinson says in the film that Faas instructed him to 'make it staff' and credit Ut for the photo.
Both Faas and Yuichi 'Jackson' Ishizaki, who developed the film, are dead.
Robinson was dismissed by the AP in 1978. The 81-year-old says he 'didn't want to die before this story came out.'
The Stringer gives several theories about why Nghe did not get credit for what was allegedly his photograph.
One is that it was common practice at the time to credit staff over local stringers.
Another is that Fass felt loyalty to Ut, whose brother, also a photographer, died on a job in a war zone.
Faas also wrote a memo hinting that it was commonplace not to credit the local Vietnamese stringers because of their 'weird' names.
Researchers enlisted a French forensics team, INDEX, to help determine the likelihood of whether Ut had been in a position to take the photo.
They concluded that it was highly unlikely that Ut could have been at the scene, given the other shots he captured that day.
The AP conducted its own investigation into the controversy and concluded it had 'no reason to believe anyone other than Ut took the photo.'
Pictured: Phan Thi Kim Phuc, left, is visited by AP photographer Nick Ut in 1973
Pictured: Phan Thi Kim Phuc stands with photographer Nick Ut, at an exhibition in New York in 2001
Gary Knight attends the 'The Stringer' premiere during the 2025 Sundance Film Festival
The agency urged the documentary makers to release their contributors from non-disclosure agreements for the film, including Nghe.
Hornstein shared with DailyMail.com documents that support Ut's assertion that he took the photo.
They include a statement from Kim Phuc, the girl from the photo.
She has 'only flitting' memories of the fateful day, but family members have since told her that Ut took the photo and then helped her to hospital.
'I have no doubt in my mind and heart that it was Nick who ran towards me to capture the famous photo,' she writes, calling the film an 'outrageous and false attack' on the photographer.
Ut's case also features a letter written by NBC News director Arthur Lord to the LA Times in October 1989, 13 years before his death.
Lord describes being an eyewitness to the children streaming out of the bombed-out village.
He wrote that only Ut and NBC News cameraman Le Phuc Dinh captured the harrowing scene.
AP was the only outlet to publish an image of the children, amid concerns over the nudity and graphic content, and 'Nick Ut won a well-deserved Pulitzer Prize' for his work, wrote Lord.
According to Hornstein, this letter discredits Nghe's account, as Lord would have known if his own driver had also taken photos of the screaming kids.
Eyewitnesses to the event 'uniformly credit Nick Ut, not just for his skill in capturing the photo, but also for his bravery and his humanity that day in putting down his camera and taking the injured children to the closest hospital,' says the lawyer.
He slammed the filmmakers for amplifying Robinson's claims, who he says harbors a '50-year-vendetta' against AP and Ut.
DailyMail.com reached out to Knight and his VII Foundation for comment.
The Stringer does not yet have distribution plans.
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