Reese Erlich (July 5, 1947 – April 6, 2021) was an American author and freelance journalist who wrote for CBS Radio, Australian Broadcasting Corp., and National Public Radio. He also contributed to Foreign Policy and VICE News. He wrote the nationally distributed Foreign Correspondent column. Erlich won numerous journalism awards including a Peabody.

Biography

Erlich was born and raised in Los Angeles. In 1965 he enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley, and later became active in the Anti-Vietnam War movement. In October 1967 Erlich and others organized Stop the Draft Week. They were arrested and became known as the "Oakland Seven". In their trial they were acquitted of all charges, being successfully represented by Charles Garry. In 1968 he visited Cuba for the first time, which led to a continuing interest in that country that would eventually lead to a book called Dateline Havana (2009). In 1968-9 Erlich worked as a staff writer and research editor for Ramparts, a national investigative reporting magazine published in San Francisco. His magazine articles have appeared in Vanity Fair online, San Francisco Magazine, California Monthly, Mother Jones, The Progressive, The Nation, and AARP's Segunda Juventud. He writes a nationally distributed column Foreign Correspondent. Erlich's book Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You, co-authored with Norman Solomon, became a best seller in 2003. His book The Iran Agenda: the Real Story of U.S. Policy and the Middle East Crisis was published in October 2007 with a foreword by Robert Scheer. In a San Francisco Chronicle book review, Ruth Rosen wrote, "Some people are treated as pariahs when they tell the truth; later, history lauds them for their courage and convictions. Reese Erlich is one of those truth tellers." Erlich's book Dateline Havana: The Real Story of US Policy and the Future of Cuba came out in January 2009. Erlich's fifth book, Inside Syria: the Backstory of Their Civil War and What the World Can Expect (Prometheus Books, foreword by Noam Chomsky), was published in 2014. In a starred review of Inside Syria, Publishers Weekly wrote, Erlich's "insights and conclusions are objective and valuable. The book is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding the current turmoil in the Middle East." The Iran Agenda Today: the Real Story from Inside Iran and What's Wrong with U.S. Policy, was published in September 2018. Erlich worked with Walter Cronkite on four public radio documentaries. Cronkite has written, "Reese Erlich is a great radio producer and a great friend." Since 1995, Erlich has produced Jazz Perspectives for public radio stations and online through Jazz Corner. Jazz Perspectives are produced features profiling jazz, blues and Latin musicians. From 2015 to 2017 he wrote an arts and culture column for The East Bay Monthly magazine. Erlich died in April 2021 at the age of 73 after a short battle with cancer.

Books

Major radio documentaries

Journalism awards and grants