Al Jazeera TV has interviewed key players

"In the end, we agreed on our own kind of self-censorship - basically we didn't want any dead bodies shown until their next of kin were informed - but that was about all."

The photographs and TV reports from Vietnam, which could be seen in the newspapers and on TV screens in the United States the next day, had a huge impact on public opinion there, and have been blamed for America's loss of willingness to fight the war.

Learning lessons

This experience taught Western governments not to take the same risks again.

"Governments learnt from Vietnam," said John Rettie, a veteran BBC foreign journalist who reported from Afghanistan in the early 1990s.

The Americans didn't impose censorship because they thought they were going to win, and quickly

Tim Page Vietnam War photographer

"In particular, the British Government turned the Falklands Campaign into a huge success, because they took all the journalists with them, and controlled what they sent back to Britain."

In the Gulf War too, reporters were instructed to accompany the military, and had few opportunities to get the Iraqi - as opposed to the Alliance - version of what was going on.

"This is what they tried to do in the Gulf War, but CNN and others were still in Baghdad, and could present an instant view of what was going on there," said John Rettie.

Expulsions

This is one of the problems of reporting what is going on now in Afghanistan.

The Taleban expelled all foreign journalists after the 11 September attacks on the US. Only the three Western news agencies - AP, AFP and Reuters - have correspondents still in Kabul.

The Taleban also ban television and the taking of photographs in Afghanistan, regarding them as being against the Sharia laws.

But now they are also trying to get their point of view across.

The Taleban ambassador in Pakistan is giving daily news conferences, and appears live on CNN TV.

The propaganda war is under way

The Taleban also escorted a group of Western TV reporters to view what they said were civilian casualites in the village of Kamar, although this was imemdiately dismissed as propaganda by the Bush administration.

Despite this control by the Taleban on one side and the military and political interests on the other, journalists are still trying to get their own view of what is going on.

Arrests

Two Western journalists have been arrested.

A British woman reporter from the Sunday Express was held for 10 days before being expelled.

A French journalist working with Paris Match is reported to be facing charges of spying, which carry the death penalty.

Despite these dangers, increasing numbers of journalists are flocking to get into Afghanistan.

"Of course, the immediacy makes it more exciting," says Tim Page.

"Journalists imagine they can send a scoop on their videophone, or via the satellite dish, and have it on TV at once back home."

As with the images of the 11 September attacks on the World Trade Center, which were seen live by millions on television all over the world, it is this immediacy which frightens governments more than in any previuos conflict.