Not everybody loved Mr. Krisher. He could be obstinate, demanding and confrontational.
“He could be unrelenting against personal enemies and those who he felt had crossed him,” Mr. Doyle said. “So there existed a quite polarized view of Bernie. I spent many years working with Bernie, and I saw both sides.”
Ker Munthit, a former reporter for The Associated Press in its Cambodia bureau, said in an email that Mr. Krisher “was pushy and insisting in whatever he had in mind that he wanted to advance or be done, and that could be a bit annoying.”
“However,” Mr. Munthit added, “regardless of the misgivings one might have about him — me included — it is undeniable that he has done some great things for the good of the country.”
Bernard Krisher was born on Aug. 9, 1931, in Frankfurt. His father, a Polish Jew, owned a fur shop. The family fled Nazi Germany in 1937 and passed through France, Spain and Portugal before heading for the United States and settling in New York City, in Queens.
His daughter said his humanitarian work was inspired by the help that he and his family had received from strangers when they were fleeing persecution. He believed, she said, “that a true humanitarian act is to help a stranger, not one of your own.”
Mr. Krisher attended Queens College and was drafted into the Army in 1953. He spent two years in Germany as a reporter for Stars and Stripes, the Army newspaper. He then worked for The New York World-Telegram and The Sun in New York and studied journalism at Columbia University.
He joined Newsweek in 1962 after moving to Japan, where he became its Tokyo bureau chief in 1967. He later left Newsweek for Fortune magazine.
In Japan, he met his future wife, Akiko, who survives. In addition to his daughter, he is survived by a son, Joseph, and two grandsons.
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/20/obituaries/bernard-krisher-dead.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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