GENERAL'S SUIT AGAINST CBS ENDS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000605370011-2
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 8, 2012
• Sequence Number: 11
• Publication Date: February 19, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000605370011-2
r-'-, r !,??EA 41"D
kyenerai's
Suit
Against
CBS Ends
Victory Claimed
By Both Sides
In Long Libel Case
By_Eleanor_Randolphand Al Kamen
Washington Post Staff Writers
NEW YORK, .Feb. 18-Retired
Army general William ? C. West-,
moreland today dropped his $120
million. libel suit against CBS Inc., a
week before it was to go to a fed- j
eral jury, and both sides claimed
victory in the 41/2-month court bat-
tle:
U.S. District Court Judge Pierre
N. Leval received the agreement to:
+
end the case, which grew.out:of a
1982 CBS documentary,. "The--Un-
counted Enemy: A Vietnam Decep
tion," that Westmoreland charged
had falsely accused. him- of misrep-
resenting enemy-troop-..figures -to.-.!
superiors including President,.,
Lyndon B. Johnson. i
Westmoreland, 70,-. .commander
of U.S. ground forces in Vietnam'
from 1964 to 1968, said that the
network had issued, in a jointly. ap-
proved statement, the equivalent of
an apology. "I consider that I won,'
he said.
CBS issued its own : statement
supporting the- broadcast, which
aired on Jan. 23, 1982, and said the]
network has the option of showing]
it again.
"Nothing has surfaced [during
the bitter legal battle] that in any
way diminishes our conviction that
the broadcast was fair and accu-
rate,", Van Gordon Sauter, execu-
tive vice president of CBS Broad-
cast Group, said today. He also said
? he "personally - does not view the,
statement as an apology." ,
WASHINGTON POST
19 February 1985
.- The agreement involves no pay-
ment-- by CBS, and the network
agreed not to sue Westmoreland for.
court-costs
CBS lawyer David Boies asserted
that the joint- statement today was
what he said 18 weeks ago. in his
opening statement to the jury.
"If that's all they wanted; they
didn't have to file a $120 million
lawsuit. They didn't have to de-
mand an apology," Boies said.
The general and his lawyers fo-
cused on a segment of the joint.
statement that said, "CB& respects
Gen. Westmoreland's long- and ii
faithful service to his country and
never intended to assert, and does
not believe, that Gen. Westmore-
land was unpatriotic or disloyal in
performing his duties as he saw
"
them.
- "If that statement had been made
after the- CBS program had been
aired, it ' would have fully satisfied
-me," Westmoreland told reporters
at a news conference after Leval
received the agreement to dismiss
the case. The judge is scheduled to
release jurors today. ,
. Westmoreland filed suit against
CBS in September 1982, claiming
that he had been "rattlesnaked" in
-
his -interview with CBS narrator
Mike Wallace and defamed by a
broadcast that accused him of the
equivalent of a breach of duty.
"We came here to clear the name
of a general Westmoreland's law-
; = yer, Dan M. Burt,. told reporters.
"That is what I, in my heart, believe
we have done."
Burt acknowledged that-the law-
suit had been costly, With legal bills
of more than $2 million. for Capital
Legal Foundation, his conservative
public-interest law firm. He said the
foundation is in debt "several hun-
dreds of thousands of dollars."
At a separate news conference
shortly after Westmoreland's, CBS
attorney Boies maintained that
Westmoreland, not. CBS, had
changed its position. CBS officials
emphasized repeatedly today that
the joint statement says only that
Westmoreland was not unpatriotic
"in performing his duties as he saw
them," noting several times the
words "as he saw them."
"I said in my opening statement
to the-jury that we were not chat--,
lenging Gen. Westmoreland's - mo-
tive for engaging in the deception,"
Boies said. "I said, that when Gen.
Westmoreland engaged in the de-
ception it might very well be that he
felt ?it was it) the interests of his
country .... "
Boies also denied that the joint
statement was an -apology,,- from
-
CBS.
Sauter said CBS considered the
statement "equitable," .adding that
Westmoreland "may read into that
statement whatever he wishes to
read into the statement." -
At issue in the case was whether
..:'the broadcast libeled the general
when it portrayed him.as the head
of a "conspiracy" in 1967 to sup-
press higher enemy-troop numbers.
-from the public, Congress and the
- president to maintain. support for
the war.
Boies said, "CBS states that-as
the broadcast did-that Gen. West-
moreland misled the country, the
public, the Congress and the pres-
ident, and CBS stands by that re-
port as fair and accurate."
'Boies said Burt and Westmore-
land "tried to get CBS to retract
that,. and CBS refused. CBS said
"-that if that was a condition of drop-
::ping the lawsuit we would not agree
to it."
Burt and Westmoreland por-
trayed the settlement as a mutual
agreement that served both sides.
"Nobody held- a gun to their head
and made them sign this," Burt said.
Burt had faced what he called
today "a very tough standard" of
proof in the courtroom. Late last
week Leval informed lawyers of a
crucial point in his proposed
"charge" to the jury-the guidelines
a judge gives the jury before it con-
siders its verdict.
Leval had proposed that on the
two major issues Burt would have
to prove with "clear and convincing
evidence" that the broadcast was
false and that the network had
"reckless disregard" for whether it
was false. -
In addition, two key witnesses,
retired colonel Gains B. Hawkins
and retired major general Joseph A.
McChristian, had given strong tes-
timony supporting the CBS broad-
cast. Burt, in an interview today,
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000605370011-2
 Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000605370011-2
-__' dismissed as "ridiculous" any con=
nectioh between the end of the law-
Suit and that testimony. .
The negotiations that ended the
-battle between Westmoreland and
CBS evolved, according to inter-
views with participants, in the fol-
lowing way.
They began Wednesday after-
noon when Burt called CBS general
counsel George Vradenburg.
Burt said today that his call was
ti "nothing new," that both sides had
been in discussions constantlydur-
ing the entire 21/2-year litigation.
Vradenburg recalled that Burt
said that if there was "any chance of
this case ending up before it goes to
the jury, I'd like to talk about it."
Earlier discussions along the
same lines had been fruitless. Burt,
- according to Boies, had insisted on
an apology from CBS or' a payment
to Westmoreland or both. CBS of-
ficials said they had always refused
to provide either.
At a breakfast. meeting Friday,
Burt asked Vradenburg if there was
any way to resolve the case.
Vradenburg said the only state-
ment that CBS would agree to make
would be similar to one it would
make if the jury returned a verdict
in the network's favor.
Burt said that on Friday there
was "a material change in CBS's
position." He, indicated that -CBS
appeared willing to agree to Ian-
guage that it had rejected before..
"At. no point was a statement of-
fered anything like "what we have
here offered [by CBS]," Burt said.
He said he offered a "new twist."
Later that day, Vradenburg said
Burt produced a one-page draft of a
joint statement in which he sug-
gested that CBS, in effect, 'say. it
had learned a great deal during the
trial and that it would have done its
documentary differently now.
Vradenburg said he called Burt
the next day, Saturday, and told him
he' would try to draft a 'statement
more acceptable to CBS. He sent it
to Burt, who said it "looked inter-
esting" and suggested changes that
seemed mostly stylistic, Vraden-
Burt said today he was "quite sur-
prised when they.said, 'We'll give
you this language.'
Vradenburg said he "was aston-
ished at the course it was taking."
Up to then he had not thought the
negotiations were really serious.
Late Sunday morning, Burt re-
ceived a go-ahead from Westmore-
land and both sides met at Burt's
hotel to.hammer out an agreement,
Vradenburg, said. Early that eve-
ning, they called Leval's clerk to
say agreement had been reached..
Special correspondents John
Kennedy and Dody Tsiantar
contributed to this. report.
I? r
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/05/08: CIA-RDP90-00965R000605370011-2