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The Westmoreland Case: The General & The Veteran

By Danny Friedman

My wife called up to me last Sunday afternoon: "Put on the TV—it's about the Westmoreland trial." I was astounded by what I saw and heard. General William Westmoreland had withdrawn his libel suit against CBS and declared victory. He had not received one penny of the $120 million he had sued for, nor had he gotten a retraction or an apology, but he declared victory. Amazing! Then it struck me; this trial had ended just like the Vietnam War. Dan Burt was flying the helicopter with Westy hanging from the skid screaming, "We won!" I had a little more of a stake in this than the average Vietnam vet. I had been the only former enlisted man to testify in the eighteen weeks that the trial lasted, up until Westy's self-proclaimed victory just three days before the case was to go to the jury.

It was at a Brooklyn Chapter meeting of Vietnam Veterans of America last summer that I first heard that CBS attorneys were looking to talk to Vietnam vets who were in country before and during Tet. I thought, what the heck—there were only about 500,000 of us; I'd better give them a call. Besides, I didn't want them talking to Saigon Cowboys.

I spoke to one of CBS's lawyers, Randy Mastro, who asked me some questions about my experiences in Vietnam and we agreed to meet for lunch (his treat, of course).

It had to be Westmoreland's statement that I had read in the newspaper, about the reason why he eliminated the Self Defense and Secret Self-Defense Forces from the order of battle being because they were just old men, woman and children and that they constituted no military threat. I was infuriated. It was especially insulting to my brothers whose names were freshly etched into a wall of black stone less than two years ago. It was the mines, booby traps and sniper fire from these forces that accounted for more than 59% of our casualties with D Troop, 17th Armored Cavalry, 199th Light Infantry and with many units according to just about every other Vietnam vet I spoke to.

This trial was becoming inundated with statistics and semantics. Someone had to tell the story of what it was like to be there. Of this was to be the only accounting of the war that changed so many of our lives, then the ground soldier had to be heard from. Circumstances dictated that it was to be me. I hope I did a good job, guys; it was for all of you.

"I just think to have a witness just at some length as to buddies of his that were injured by mines and booby traps is inflammatory and essentially irrelevant and distorts the war, much less the case."

The judge ruled: "....It had been a substantial area of controversy in the case as to how dangerous the SD and SSD were. Indeed, it's one of the most important areas in the case."

Someone, a rear echelon intelligence type, testified for Westmorland that the booby traps in 'Nam were sophisticated devices, too complicated for none but hardened cadre to set. My God, how hard is it to tie a piece of fishing line around the loosened pin of a grenade and then across a trail of dyke. Besides, you don't have to be hard core cadre to be hardened by centuries of war. These people had been fighting for longer than must of us have been alive.

After my testimony, Westmoreland came up to me outside the courtroom. He said hello, shook my hand, introduced his wife to me and put his hand on my shoulder.

"Now that you're finished in there we can just talk as veterans."

I thought that was very democratic of him. Not too long ago I couldn't even shit in the same building. He said that he was travelling around the country and had spoken to Vietnam veterans in 23 different states and felt that we were doing better and standing taller since the dedication of the memorial in Washington, DC. He had heard that I was a veteran's counselor and was hoping that I was doing right by the Vietnam vets.

He's got a lot of nerve I thought, hoping that I was doing right by the Vietnam vets. How many of my brothers were on that wall that he was so proud of because of his turning his back on us while playing his numbers game. It wouldn't have done any good to tell him that. He was in his own world traveling around the country shaking hands with Vietnam veterans. Maybe he was trying to say, "I'm sorry."

In the end, Westmoreland cut and ran, again. We can rest easy, my fellow vets, for now we know for sure that it wasn't us who lost that war. The deck was stacked against us from the get and our leaders were to busy playing word games to see what was really going on.

PS:

If someone would have told me way back when that I would be hugging a CIA man at a victory party for a cooperate giant at "Regines," I'd have thought him crazy. If war and politics make strange bedfellows, then truth makes even stranger ones. And if in war truth is the first casualty, then in peace it must be a first resurrection.

I thank Sam Adams and Gaines Hawkins for their courage and their truth.

—Danny Friedman
VVAW New York