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their own and quite another thing to go public on national TV. At first this skepticism seemed well founded, as Crile and I received a number of refusals. Eventually seven former intelligence officers whom I had already talked to (George Allen, George Hamscher, Gains Hawkins, Joseph Hovey, James Meacham,Richard McArthur and Joseph McChristian) agreed to appear. At the last minute Bernard Gattozzi—for reasons I fully sympathize with—declined to come on, and I had to search out a replacement to tell his story. The replacement was Russell Cooley. Crile, together with Mike Wallace, extended the list by interviewing two others, Daniel Graham and General William Westmoreland. The resulting documentary, called “The Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception,” appeared on 23 January 1982, a Saturday night. It ran against the “Steve Martin Comedy Hour” and received the lowest ratings of any national program for that week. A few days later Westmoreland held a press conference in rebuttal, there was a short flurry of newspaper articles about the show, and the story of American intelligence surrounding Tet seemed headed back into obscurity.
    But that May the issue was rekindled when TV Guide ran as its cover story an accusation that the documentary had “smeared” General Westmoreland. Although the story claimed to have no problems with the substance of the broadcast, it charged that CBS had made several mistakes in putting together the documentary. Whereupon, CBS shot itself in the foot by taking the article seriously and running an investigation which found that some of the charges were valid. The article apparently convinced General Westmoreland that CBS had defamed his honor, and he sued the network for $120 million. As consultant to the show, I became a named defendant in the case Westmoreland v. CBS Inc. and Mike Wallace, George Crile, Van Gordon Sauter, and Samuel Adams.
    My reaction to the lawsuit was profound surprise, rapidly followed by elation. Realizing that such a suit would involve the subpoena of documents and the sworn testimony of all the parties concerned, I felt that at last I could get to the bottom of what happened. Here, paradoxically, was my long sought board of inquiry. Since the suit was too big for inhouse CBS lawyers to handle, the network hired the famous Wall Street law firm of Cravath, Swaine and Moore.
    The discovery process of the lawsuit exceeded my most sanguine expectations. It was a researcher’s dream. Subpoenas were issued toevery conceivable government agency, dozens of archivists combed the files for relevant documents, and a number of intelligence officials were put under oath.
    Once again, as a consultant, I guided the document search, wrote out the questions to be asked, and attended most of the depositions. Among the depositions I attended were those of all the living principals of the war, including then Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, Head of the National Security Council Walt Rostow, CIA directors Richard Helms and William Colby, and of course General William C. Westmoreland. My role was to frame questions for the deposees. My position was virtually unique—a midlevel CIA researcher with a rank roughly equivalent to army major, guiding what became the only major investigation of the Vietnam War. The trial ended on 18 February 1985, when General Westmoreland withdrew his suit a week before the case was scheduled to go to the jury.
    The lawsuit brought to light the facts of the events around Tet but it left unanswered the main subject of the book I wanted to write: Who the hell were we fighting out there?
    Answers to this question were to be found at CIA headquarters in the form of captured enemy documents. Prior to my resignation, I discovered that the issue of actual enemy numbers was peripheral to the real strengths and weaknesses of the Vietcong. The main enemy strength lay not in the number of troops deployed but in other areas that U.S.