A RARE GLIMPSE AT THE WORKINGS OF MILITARY INTELLIGENC IN VIETNAM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000707160087-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 12, 2010
• Sequence Number: 87
• Publication Date: November 11, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2010/08/12 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000707160087-7
PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
11 November 1984
A rare glimpse at. the
workings of military
vmow4 -, 1TTT!
1 By David Zucchino
Inquirer Sean Wrier
NEW YORK - First came full
"bird" colonels and two- and three-
star generals and presidential advis-
ers. They gave what the military
calls the "big picture look" at the
numbers war being fought by intelli-
gence types during the Vietnam War.
Then, last week, came lowly John
Stewart and Michael Hankins. The
two men were junior intelligence
officers in 1967, but they offered the
jury in the CBS libel trial something
the big shots could not: A nuts-and-
bolts look at military intelligence.
By doing so, the two officers
brought into focus a festering de-
bate-within-a-debate in 1967. Not only
was the CIA haggling with Gen. Wil-
liam C. Westmoreland's command
over enemy troop numbers, they re-
vealed, but two intelligence shops
within the general's own command
also were fighting it out.
At issue in both intelligence de-
bates was the drastically different
estimates of enemy strength pro-
duced by different intelligence-in-
terpreting methods. The methods fo-
cused on Communist infiltration
into South Vietnam, and the contro-
versial role of South Vietnamese vil-
lage irregulars sympathetic to the
enemy.
A 1982 CBS documentary accused
Westmoreland's command of report-
ing lower enemy estimates in an ef-
fort to deceive higher-ups and make
it appear that the U.S. was winning
its ."war of attrition." The program
said the alleged deception was part
of a "conspiracy."
The lower-level debate revealed by
Hankins and Stewart - hinted at by.
previous witnesses in the five-week-
old trial in federal court here but.
never fully explained - adds new
complexity to two questions facing
the jury as it decides whether CBS
libeled Westmoreland in its docu.
mentary The Uncounted Enemy: A
Vietnam Deception. Those questions
are central to how the jury evaluates
CBS's presentation of the intelli-
gence debates.
First, did CBS ignore any evidence
that discrepancies in enemy esti-
mates resulted from an honest de-
bate over methodology, as Westmore.
land's witnesses have indicated? Did
the network present one methodolo-
gy and one set of numbers as abso-
lute truths suppressed by Westmore-
land's command?
Second, was CBS faithful to the
truth when it attributed Westmore-
land's reporting of lower estimates to
improper or unethical motives? Did
the network ignore any evidence
that Westmoreland's motives were
soundly based on professional judg-
ments? If the jury believes that the
answers to these questions indicate
that CBS exhibited a "reckless disre-
gard" for the truth, it will have taken
one step in reaching a verdict for
libel.
Under libel law, public officials
such as Westmoreland must prove
that information published about
them was false and that those who
published it either knew it was false
or showed "reckless disregard" for
whether it was false.
Westmoreland's intelligence oper-
ation was divided in 1967 between
"real-time" and "historical" shops.
The Current Intelligence Indica-
tions and Estimates Division (CUED)
cranked out daily (real-time) esti- .
mates of enemy strength. The Com-
bined Intelligence Center-Vietnam
(CICV) provided a longer-range (his-
torical) look at the enemy that was
updated as time went on.
In its broadcast, which said that
Westmoreland's command sup-
pressed estimates of a much larger
enemy than was being reported, CBS
relied primarily on interviews with
CICV men. But CICV eventually
"lost" the debate, just as the CIA
analysts who also gave CBS fodder
for its allegations "lost" the larger
intelligence dispute.
Westmoreland's lawyers have pa-
raded the CIIED "winners" before
the jury. They have testified that
Westmoreland's command rejected
the higher estimates of enemy
strength reported by CICV not to
deceive higher-ups, but because they
believed that CICV's methodology
was flawed. The network's case is not
helped by the fact that few of the
"winners" from CIIED were inter-
viewed for the documentary. Most of
the rebuttal on the broadcast was left
to Westmoreland himself and to Gen.
Daniel O. Graham, the CIIED chief in
1967.
Still, the jury could choose not to
believe the testimony of the CIIED
supporters because they are implicat-
ed in CBS's alleged conspiracy. In-
deed, CBS accused Graham of order-
ing computer records erased as part
of an attempt to cover up the conspir-
acy.
The CICV officers interviewed on
the broadcast seemed to be confess-
ing that they had been unwilling
participants in the debate. They indi-
cated that they stopped reporting
their own higher estimates because
Westmoreland had ordered a "ceil-
ing" on the number of enemy troops
they could report.
?
A key element of the trial will be
how persuasive these men are on the
witness stand when CBS presents its
defense several weeks from now. So
far, there is no lack of conflicting
viewpoints. As federal. Judge Pierre
N. Leval told the opposing lawyers in
a conference Tuesday "For every
witness who testifies in any impor-
tant subject in this trial, the other
side is going to have six or seven
witnesses who disagree.... "
For now, the CUED men have con-
trol of the witness stand. CBS attor-
ney David Boies has raised inconsis-
tencies in elements of testimony by
all of them, but Col. Stewart proved
particularly tough to crack. Stewart,
an active Army colonel with close-
cropped hair and a rigid demeanor,
bristled under Boies' vigorous ques-
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 Approved For Release 2010/08/12 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000707160087-7
tinning. His long, pedantic answers Adding a twist to'the intelligence
deflected many points Boies tried to debates was George A. Carver Jr., the
raise. CIA's top Vietnam specialist in 1967.
Boies' chief victory was using Carver proved to be a CIA man who
Stewart's own figures to show that agreed with Westmoreland's position
Westmoreland's command claimed on the village irregulars. He also said
to have killed or wounded more ene- the general's command was so dili-
my during the Communist Tet offen- gent in providing data to the CIA
sive than the command itself esti- that its analysts got "more in their
mated existed in all of South in-box than they'could handle."
Vietnam. Even so, Stewart accused Carver's most telling comment on
Boies of counting some casualties the intelligence debates was that
twice and ignoring enemy reinforce- CIA's figures on irregulars were
ments. .,spongy."
Stewart bolstered Westmoreland's That comment from a CIA =moan
case by saying that CICV's higher buttressed the argument by CIIED
estimates of enemy strength were officers that the irregulars could not
rejected because the methods that be accurately counted because they
produced them were considered were, in Stewart's words, "a motley
flawed by CUED. He added that CICV crew" of old men and "mama-sans."
officers did not have access to highly Carver did not appear on the CBS
classified data available to Stewart program. He was interviewed by tele-
and others in the CIIED. phone 12 days before the program
The higher estimates were pro- was aired, after it was "locked up," or
duced in CICV by Lt. Hankins, who completed.
proved to be something of a swing Testifying for Westmoreland last
witness. Hankins refused to testify week, Carver at one point turned the
for either side; his 1983 sworn deposi- CBS thesis on its head by suggesting
tion was read to the jury. that Westmoreland's command
CBS scored a major point when feared being accused of arbitrarily
Hankins became the first witness to raising enemy estimates. Carver
say that estimates of higher enemy made the suggestion as he explained
infiltration had indeed been blocked
by Westmoreland's command. But his reference in a secret 1967 cable to
the impact of his statement was dilut- the "political and presentational
ed when Hankins added that he had problems" -of "coming out with a
come up with the estimates by "play- brand-new set of figures showing
ing around" with an untested meth- much larger communist force at
od -that was not a part of his official time when press knew" Westmore-
duties. land's command sought more U.S.
Hankins also said he had no reason troops from Washington.
to believe that the CIIED officers Carver said the higher figures
who blocked the report had done so might be interpreted as a ploy to get
"in bad faith." more US. troops. Later, a report
Carver ordered written by his depu-
ty seemed to support CBS's version of
the intelligence debate. The report
spoke of "disguising" higher esti-
mates from "the inquisitive probings
of the press" and of "the need to
remain within the 290,000 ballpark"
- the estimates of enemy strength
that Westmoreland's command had
released to the press. Other refer-
ences to the intelligence process last
week were less weighty, but perhaps
equally illuminating.
Intelligence officer Hankins, for
instance, remarked that he was chas-
ing a woman and "drinking and ca-
rousing" the night the Tet offensive
began.
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