Brian Williams: NBC News Anchor Admits He Lied About Iraq War Story- ‘I Made a Mistake’

NBC's Brian Williams issued a public apology on Wednesday admitting that he fabricated certain parts of his Iraq war story. Williams told viewers on "NBC Nightly News" that he "misremembered" bits of information and was never on a helicopter he said was shot down over Iraq a dozen years ago.

His apology came after soldiers told Stars & Stripes that the veteran journalist was never near the helicopter that was hit by RPGs in March of 2003. Williams told the publication that he "would not have chosen to make this mistake."

"I don't know what screwed up in my mind that caused me to conflate one aircraft with another," Williams said.

According to Fox News, Williams first told the false story in 2013 during an interview with David Letterman. He was recalling the events of when he was reporting on the war in Iraq and told Letterman that he and his NBC News crew were on a place that was hit by enemy fire and they were forced to ground.

"We were in some helicopters. What we didn't know was we were north of the invasion. We were the northernmost Americans in Iraq. We were going to drop some bridge portions across the Euphrates so the Third Infantry could cross on them," he said. "Two of the four helicopters were hit, by ground fire, including the one I was in, RPG and AK-47."

Williams again told the same made-up story last week at a hockey game when NBC was honoring a retired soldier who provided ground security when the anchor was in Iraq. According to reports, he told the audience that after the plane was hit his NBC team was rescued by a U.S. platoon.

"The story actually started with a terrible moment a dozen years back during the invasion of Iraq when the helicopter we were traveling in was forced down after being hit by an RPG," he said. "Our traveling NBC News team was rescued, surrounded and kept alive by an armor mechanized platoon from the U.S. Army 3rd Infantry."

However, fed up members of the 159th Aviation Regiment who were aboard the Chinook that was hit told Star & Stripes that Williams and his crew didn't arrive to the area until an hour after the damaged aircraft had made an emergency landing.

Lance Reynolds, a flight engineer, told the publication that he clearly remembers Williams and his team arriving to the area separate from the helicopters that was shot at. He said Williams tried to take pictures of the damaged Chinook but Reynolds asked him not to because he wanted to alert his wife before she saw it on the news.

"It was something personal for us that was kind of life-changing for me. I know how lucky I was to survive it," Reynolds said. "It felt like a personal experience that someone else wanted to participate in and didn't deserve to participate in."

Sgt. 1st Class Joseph Miller, the flight engineer on Williams' helicopter, also backed Reynolds' story telling Stars & Stripes that the copter he and the NBC anchor was on "never came under direct enemy fire."

Following his public apology Williams took to Facebook to once again ask for forgiveness.

"I spent much of the weekend thinking I'd gone crazy. I feel terrible about making this mistake, especially since I found my OWN WRITING about the incident from back in '08, and I was indeed on the Chinook behind the bird that took the RPG in the tail housing just above the ramp," he wrote. "Because I have no desire to fictionalize my experience (we all saw it happened the first time) and no need to dramatize events as they actually happened, I think the constant viewing of the video showing us inspecting the impact area - and the fog of memory over 12 years - made me conflate the two, and I apologize."

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Brian Williams, NBC Nightly News
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