08/2004 – David Ensor

David Ensor

PGF Honors David Ensor, CNN national security correspondent.

Mr. Ensor recently completed a feature documentary on the CNN Presents program regarding the Warsaw Uprising. This special, a historical account of the Polish Home Army’s uprising against Nazi Germany and Soviet hegemony in August 1944, provided an expose on the little known Warsaw Uprising of August, 1944 where over 200,000 Poles were killed by Nazi Germany. This report gave CNN viewers a new dimension regarding what the people of Poland endured during the German occupation. The story Warsaw Rising: The Forgotten Soldiers of WWII was broadcast on Sunday, June 6, 2004. This August marks the Sixtieth Anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising. We salute Mr. Ensor for his work, his commitment to journalism, and his dedication to the unknown, unheard of aspects of history that might otherwise be overlooked, but which bear of events occurring in the world today.

About David Ensor:

David Ensor is CNN’s national security correspondent. Based in Washington, D.C., he reports on the U.S. intelligence community and on national security issues such as international terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the national missile defense debate.

In 1982, then working for ABC News, Mr. Ensor was sent to Poland to cover martial law which had been imposed by Communist leader Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski in an attempt to crush the Solidarity movement. Solidarity eventually went on to topple the Communist government in Poland, leading to the collapse of the entire Soviet block and the dissolution of the Soviet Union itself. Ensor’s wife is Polish. His marriage ceremony was performed by Fr. Jerzy Popieluszko, a chaplain of the opposition movement who was subsequently murdered by the Communist secret police.

Mr. Ensor has played a pivotal reporting role during the 2002 buildup of tensions between the United States and Iraq then during the 2003 war with Iraq. In 2001, Mr. Ensor broke the story on the specific language of the Sept. 11 warnings and how those warnings were intercepted Sept. 10 by the US National Security Agency (NSA) but not translated until after the attacks. He also was the first to report that the CIA had notified the FBI in January 2000 that two men who later were among the Sept. 11 hijackers, Nawaf Al-Hazmi and Khalid Al-Midhar, attended a terrorists meeting in Malaysia that month.

Earlier, Mr. Ensor had broken the story of the family connection between a suspect in the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole and one of the suicide bombers in the U.S. Embassy bombing in Nairobi, Kenya. Osama bin Laden and other Al Qaeda members were indicted for the latter. Mr. Ensor was also the first to report on the “deafness” threat posed by new technologies to the NSA’s signals intelligence-gathering capabilities, as well as the NSA’s “drowning in data” problem. He has also profiled a spy interrogator, a Chechen warlord and a U.S. double agent.

Before joining CNN in August 1999, Ensor served as a diplomatic correspondent for ABC News based at the U.S. State Department where he covered Middle East diplomacy, U.S. troops in Bosnia and other major international stories. From 1992-1995, Ensor reported from Moscow for ABC, covering two coup attempts, the collapse of Communism and the war in Chechnya. He was based in Rome in the late 1980s and reported on terrorism and the travels of Pope John Paul II.

Mr. Ensor has also reported from El Salvador, the Soviet Union and Argentina during the Falklands War.

Mr. Ensor joined ABC news as White House correspondent in 1980, reporting on the presidency of Jimmy Carter. From 1975-1980, he was a reporter in Washington, D.C., for National Public Radio. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

He was among the recipients of the 2002 National Headliner Award presented to CNN for investigative reporting on the Sept. 11 attacks and their aftermath.

Mr. Ensor earned a bachelor’s degree with honors in European history from the University of California, Berkeley.

CNN, a division of Turner Broadcasting System, Inc., a Time Warner Company, is one of the world’s most respected and trusted sources for news and information. Its reach extends to 15 cable and satellite television networks; two private place-based networks; two radio networks; wireless devices around the world; eight Web sites, including CNN.com, the first major news and information Web site; and CNN Newsource, the world’s most extensively syndicated news service.

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