War of Numbers

January 2, 1995
Adams, an intelligence analyst with the CIA, discovered evidence in 1966 that the number of Vietnamese communist soldiers in Vietnam was closer to 600,000 than the 280,000 count made by the Pentagon. Unable to persuade CIA director Richard Helms to convene a board of inquiry, he unsuccessfully took his appeal to Congress and the White House, then resigned from the agency in '73 to write this account of the affair. His central argument is that General William Westmoreland, commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam, had deliberately overlooked some 300,000 Vietcong militiamen in order to buttress the government line that the U.S. was winning the war. In 1980 Adams was hired as a consultant for the CBS documentary The Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception , based largely on the evidence he had uncovered; the film caused Westmoreland to file a much-publicized libel suit against the network, with Adams a co-defendant. Westmoreland dropped the suit before it went to jury. Adams died in 1988, leaving the memoir unfinished, but far enough along to explain how the CIA and top military brass--with White House encouragement--misled the Congress and the American people about enemy strength before the 1968 Tet Offensive. The expose offers a convincing inside look at CIA analytical techniques during the Vietnam war.

April 15, 1994
Adams was the CIA analyst whose persistence led to the making of the controversial CBS documentary, ""The Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception,"" the program that landed CBS in an equally famous lawsuit with Gen. William Westmoreland. In this memoir, he takes us behind the scenes to see what might be called ""The Making of a Deception: The Inside Story."" Initially, Adams charged that the CIA had underestimated Vietcong military strength. Quitting the agency in 1973, he undertook his own investigation, a lengthy labor cut short by his death in 1988. Though not completed, his book is more than a rehash of yesteryear's bureaucratic battles-and more even than delicious inside gossip. Adams paints a fascinating and personalized picture of the back-room, political wartime CIA. While experts and ex-spooks will debate the reliability of Adams's story, readers will find it fascinating. Some of his tales are worth the price of the book alone. Recommended for informed readers.-Henry Steck, SUNY Coll. at Cortland