numbers game: Vietnam & intel

"Body Of Secrets"
by James Bamford
(C) 2001 Doubleday
p. 330-32

By January 1968 NSA had placed Vietnam under a massive electronic
microscope. Sigint specialists even scanned every North Vietnamese
newspaper for pictures of communications equipment. Hardly a signal could
escape capture by one of the agency's antennas, whether in a mud-covered
jeep slogging through the Mekong Delta or in the belly of a [Air Force
SR-71] Blackbird flying sixteen miles over Hanoi at three times the speed
of sound. Yet the signals were useless without adequate analysis, and
analysis was useless if military commanders ignored it.

A few years earlier the Joint Chiefs of Staff had calmly approved
committing acts of terrorism against Americans in order to trick them into
supporting a war they [JCS] wanted against Cuba. [Typist's note: they got
away with 9/11, they almost got away with Operation
Northwoods--http://cndyorks.gn.apc.org/yspace/articles/bamford.htm] Now
that they finally had a war, the senior military leadership once again
resorted to deceit--this time to keep that war going. Somehow they had to
convince the public that they were winning when they were really losing.

"If SD and SSD [author's note: both were Vietcong Self Defense
forces--militia] are included in the overall enemy strength, the figure
will total 420,000 to 431,000," General Creighton Abrams, the deputy U.S.
commander in Vietnam, secretly cabled the chairman of the JCS in August
1967. "This is in sharp contrast to the current overall strength figure of
about 299,000 given to the press here. . . . We have been projecting an
image of success over the recent months. . . . Now, when we release the
figure of 420,000-431,000, the newsmen will . . . [draw] an erroneous and
gloomy conclusion as to the meaning of the increase. . . . In our view the
strength figures for the SD and SSD should be omitted entirely from the
enemy strength figures in the forthcoming NIE [CIA National Intelligence
Estimate]."

As intercept operators trolled for enemy communications, the results
flowed back to NSA, where analysts deciphered, translated, and
traffic-analyzed the massive amounts of data. Reports then went to the CIA
and other consumers, including General Westmoreland's headquarters, the
Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV). Westmoreland's staff included
NSA's Sigint reports in the command's highly classified publications,
including the Weekly Intelligence Estimate Updates and the Daily
Intelligence Summaries, both read by Westmoreland. Nevertheless, MACV
refused to include any NSA data in its order-of-battle summaries, claiming
that the information was too highly classified.

There may have been another reason. NSA's Sigint was making it
increasingly clear that enemy strength was far greater than the military
commanders in Vietnam and the Pentagon were letting on, either publicly or
in secret. CIA Director Richard Helms saw the difference between the
estimates and told his top Vietnam adviser, George Carver, that "the
Vietnam numbers game" would be played "with ever increasing heat and
political overtones" during the year. To help resolve the problem, he
asked analysts from the CIA, NSA, and the Defense Intelligence Agency to
travel to Saigon and meet with General Westmoreland's staff to resolve the
differences in numbers.

The meeting took place in Saigon in September at the U.S. embassy. Over a
conference table strewn with intercepts and secret reports, the Washington
analysts attempted to make their case, but it was useless. Rather than
rely on NSA's Sigint for enemy strength figures, the military instead
relied on questionable prisoner interrogations. "MACV used mainly
Confidential-level documents and prisoner interrogation reports," said a
recent CIA study. "and, in contrast with CIA's practice, did not generally
use data derived from intercepted enemy radio signals, or Sigint."

George Carver, the lead CIA analyst at the meeting, expressed his anger in
an "eyes-only" cable to Helms, characterizing the mission as
"frustratingly unproductive since MACV stonewalling, obviously under
orders." Despite the evidence, he said, Westmoreland's officers refused to
accept any estimates of enemy forces larger than 298,000, and "the
inescapable conclusion" must be drawn that Westmoreland "has given
instructions tantamount to direct order that VC strength total will not
exceed 300,000 ceiling." He added that he was planning to see Westmoreland
the next day and would "endeavor to loosen this strait-jacket. Unless I
can, we are wasting our time."

In the end, the military refused to budge. Westmoreland's top military
intelligence officer, Major General Phillip Davidson, told Carver to buzz
off. "I was frequently and sometimes tendentiously interrupted by
Davidson," Carver cabled Helms. "[who] angrily accused me of impugning his
integrity," and who stated that the figures MACV had tabled were its
"final offer, not subject to discussion. We should take or leave it."
Eventually, caving in to the pressure, Carver and the CIA took it, greatly
angering many of the other analysts.