4 - Good Questions, Wrong Answers

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Thomas LAhern, dr/ -,' y / 5 / 0 ( I f :' : - :.z..rru'l An Intelligence M o n o ~ ~ ~ p h an February 2004

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d o I ICIA's Estimates dJ fArms IteititbroughSibanoukville, CafJ1Podia,_ --+t---+r-During thef 'Vf'6Jtnam W . , .....- r ~ - , . . . . .


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All statements of fact, Opinion, or analysisexpressed in this monograph are those of theauthor. They do not necessarily reflect officialpositions or views of the Central IntelligenceAgency or any other US Government ~ n t l t y , pastor present. Nothing In the contents should beconstrued as asserting or implying US Govern-ment endorsement of the study's factual state-ments and interpretations.


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Other works of Thomas L. Ahern, Jr. published by the Center for the Study of Intelligence include:CIA and the Generals: Covert Support to Military Government in South Vie tnam[ ](1999[ ...:=JCIA and the House o f J ~ l g o : "" Action in South Vietnam, 1954-63U(2000'L-I _CIA and Rural p a c i f i c ~ ' outh VietnamD(2001,1~ - - -

A forthcoming book will examine the undercover armies of Laos .U

The Center for the Study of Intelligence (CSI) was founded in 1974 in response to Directorof CentralIntelligence James Schlesinger's desire to create within CIA an organization that could "thinkthrough the functions of intelligence and bring the best intellects available to bear on intelligenceproblems." The Center, comprising both professional historians and experienced practitioners,attempts to document lessons learned from past operations, explore the needs and expectations ofintelligence consumers, and stimulate serious debate on current and future intelligencechallenges.DTosupport these activities, CSI publishes StUdies in Intelligence, aswell as books and monographsaddressing historical, operational, doctrinal, and theoretical aspects of the intelligence profession.It also administers the CIA Museum and maintains the Agency's Historical Intelligence Collection.CJ1--


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Good Questions, Wrong AnswersCIA Estimates ofArms TrafficThrough Sihanoukville, Cambodia,During the Vietnam W a IThomas L. Ahern, Jr.An Intelligence Monograph

~ ~ Center for theStudy of Intelligence

Washington, DCFebruary 2004


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To theMemory ofThomas Joseph Brennan, C.S.C.,

Who taught mewhatever I know about thinking about thinking


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Fo r ewo rdC=J

The effort to make sense out of ambiguous, inconsistent, even contradictory data is a fundamentalhuman impulse. Clarity, certitude, or just escape from the discomfort of not knowing-the urge istobring order out of chaos, to eliminate uncertainty. The order in things that this effort discovers-orimposes-is taken to be the truth] ICertitude has, of course, no necessary connection with truth. Partly responsible for this is whatmight be called the paradox of belief. That is, the level of emotional attachment to a giveninterpretation tends to vary inversely with the amountof empirical evidence supporting it. The morea hypothesis rests on a priori argument or circumstantial evidence, the more intensely itsproponents defend it. But the less the direct evidence, on an issue of empirical fact, the greater theprobability that it is flawed or simply falsel IIntelligence analysis approaches the trulyobjective only to the extentthat its practitioners recognizeand compensate for the subjective factors that so easily corrupt professional judgment. But eventhe most professional of analysts is vulnerable to the influence of unexamined preconceptions andvalues. Conscious attention to this risk may perhaps attenuate it, and the purpose of the presentstudy is to illuminate, by historical example, unconscious psychological influences on the analyticalprocess] JAs an objectfor the exploration of these influences, the Sihanoukville episode lies far enough in thepast to permit dispassionate examination. At the same time, it remains recent enough to allow theinterviews with key rarticil?ants t.hat are indispensable to understanding the defining subjectiveaspects of the case =:lA look at the Sihanoukville record does not, moreover, represent merely an ex post facto exercisein connecting the dots, with all the problems of fairness and use of hindsight that attend such aneffort. It thus differs from the examination of 11 September2001 and other cases in which the issueis alleged failure to recognize a pattern in a mass of information of widely varying degrees ofspecificity, reliability, and c o n s i s t e n c L ~True, Sihanoukville as an analytical problem arose in a welterof raw reports, some of them allegingan arms traffic that did not exist for a full two years after the first claims for it. As an analytical failure,however, it emerged only after the bulk of the empirical evidence, gradually increasing in volumeand improving in source authenticity, began contradicting Agency estimates. Understanding afailure to modify conventional wisdom, rather than assigning responsibility for not seeing the patternin a chaos of dots, is thus the main objectof this studyl IThis piece may be read as a case study that embodies and elaborates some of the insights forreaders of Richard J. Heuer's pioneering work, Psychology of Intelligence Analysis (Center for theStudy of Intelligence, 1999). Together, they represent an effort to illustrate the variety of possibleinfluences on analytical judg.ment and to do so in both generally conceptual and concretelyhistorical terms'L J


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Contents Page

Introduction xiPart One: The Deductive vs. the Empirical I ]

Chapter One: Mostly Cha f f [ ] 3Chapter Two: CIA on the DefensiveD 15

Part Two: A Rationalizing Animal0334151

Chapter Three: The Ambiguity of It AIID"",,--.l-- _Chapter Four: Relying on the M O d e l . ~ ' _ _

Source Note


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Introduction

The neutralist government of Prince Norodom Sihanouk fell to a cabal of Cambodian army officerson 18 March 1970. Driven by a combination of anticommunism and traditional Cambodian antipathyfor the Vietnamese, the new junta acted at once to cut the flow of Chinese munitions that, since late1966, had flowed through the port of Sihanoukville to communist forces in South Vietnam. One ofthe group soon gave CIA the documentation that detailed the Sihanoukville deliveries and theonward shipment of war materiel by road into the southern provincesl .1The documents supplied by Lt. Col. Les Kosem, an ethnic Cham officer in the Cambodian Army,

,""ntrndicted CIA'. estimates of the volume of the Sihanoukvllletraffiq_1rne out that an Agency analYtical process substantially more s O P h l s t l c a t e ~had had the perverse effect of obscuring the extent of Chinese arms deliveries

am-oCI fa l :=J .The resulting embarrassment produced more than loss of face. National Security Adviser HenryKissinger told President Nixon that this "failure of the intelligence community" resulted from"deficiencies in both intelligence collection and analysis." Kissinger went on to specify CIA's primeresponsibility, noting that he was working with DCI Richard Helms on "appropriate personnelchanges in the Agency."Nixon penned an ar ty note:J ve me a report on these changes-I wanta real shakeup in CIA, not just symbolism,"Helms managed to avoid the purge demanded of him. but thereafter, when CIA disa reed with thePenta on, the White House would ask him. " ...a=t a...b...,""u.t'-"S=i.,..h=an"'o... -::.kv=iII.:-:.e.:..?.l..- ...--,J

There were more immediately practical consequences of the failure to identify and monitor themunitions supply line to lower South Vietnam. A comprehensive, reasonably up-to-date picture ofthe Sihanoukville traffic would. for example. have afforded a much better understanding of enemycapabilities in the months leading up to the 1968 Tet offensive. More generally, the US campaignto interdictmunitions supplies could hardly succeed so long as it ignored the nearly exclusivesource for the most populous half of South Vietnam.[ ]As already suggested. Agency analysts displayed more rigorous techni ue both in the conce tualmodels they emploved an.d in their judgment of all-source raw reportingI . [ ... . . .JPeriodic internal reviews challenge e metnoaologies andconcluslonsOf previous analyses. but the gradual increase in credible reporting of a Sihanoukville


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t ra f f i L [ Induced only incremental changes in the CIAposition. Until late summer 1970, after the Phnom Penh Station acquired encyclopedicdocumentation, the Agency clung to the view that what it called t=r r imary route" for the supply oflower South Vietnam ran overland, down the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

An Analytical Conundrum I JThe clarity of hindsight can deceive even while it illuminates. This applies especially whenevaluating, in the light of a more comprehensive later record, conclusions drawn from fragmentaryinformation of uncertain accuracy. It is easy, after the fact, to see flaws in a line of reasoning thatenjoyed the support of compelling circumstantial a r g u m e n ~ IThere is also the problem of jUdging assumptions. Tobegin any argument, some things have to betaken as givens. These usually look, at the time, like common-sense, even self-evident,interpretations of the context in which the available empirical evidence is to be evaluated. Seeingthat one or several unexamined assumptions have turned out to be false, the historian may betempted to make one of his own, namely, that with proper care they can be entirely avoided. Oneproblem for the historian of an analytical failure-or of any failure-is thus the difficulty simply ofbeing fair. He must respect the inevitable influence on his actors' jUdgments of a host ofenvironmental factors. But he must do so without sinking into a pallid determinism that simplycredits them with having done the best they couldaccording to their lights, and in effect denies thepossibility of their having made other choicesj , .This study tries to find a productive middle course by adopting a chronological approach. Itdescribes the evolution of both the information base and the debate over the meaning of theavailable data. Having done that, it assesses the Agency's position on the arms traffic throughSihanoukville from a perspective within the historical context. To the extent that this succeeds, itavoids judging the past by the standards of the better-informed present, and the episode'sinstructive value is allowed to emergeC I


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Part One:The Deductive V5. the EmpiricalL_ I


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Chapter One: Mostly Chat[ J

To Prince Norodom Sihanouk, Cambodia'scharismatic head of state, his country'sorientation in the Cold War struggle had to bedetermined by the brute realities of power. Forhim, as for other leaderson the Pacific Rim, theaDO-pound goril la was and would always beChina. No communist sympathizer himself, thePrince sought to preserve his country'ssovereignty as much as possible, as long aspossible. His strategy was as conceptuallysimple as it was tortuous in practice:accommodate both sides in the Cold War inorder to avoid being absorbed into the orbit ofeither 'L__=Sihanouk had no inhibitions about revealing tohis public his pessimisticvision of the future. InAugust 1962, for example, he predicted in anarticle for the magazine ReaJites that"Cambodia wil l one day become a 'Peoples'Republic':' The alleged Sino-Soviet rivalry wasnothing but a "Western i llusion"; i f such a thingever emerged, it would fol low the "el iminationof the 'Free World; especially the US: By thattime, Cambodia would have been absorbedinto the communist b l o c . ~ ISo often described as "mercurial" thatthe wordseemed part of his name, Sihanoukalternated,over the years, between highly qualifiedoptimism and apocalyptic pessimism. But hisunderstanding of Cambodia's position as apawn of the great powers endured; thesurprises came in the means that he chose totry to keep them at bay. Meanwhi le, ifCambodia were to "go Marxist," better i t beattached to China or the Soviet Union than tolose its "national identity" by absorption into theDemocratic Republic of Vietnam. 3 1 __J

In the early 1960s, Sihanouk's immediateconcerns involved quarrels with neighboringThailand and South Vietnam. Both countrieshad intermittently supported variousCambodian dissidents, and Sihanouk blamedWashington for not bringing its Saigon andBangkok clients to heel. During these sameyears, the sclerotic regime of Ngo Dinh Diemtottered toward the mil itary coup in which heand his brother Nhu perished on 1 November1963. Sihanouk apparently suspectedAmerican complicity in that eventand moved toavert a similar fate for himself by shrinking theUS presence in Cambodia. On the 19th, hecanceled all US aid ~ f O W 8 " l s and expelledtheir American staff. ~ . At this point, CIA's Office of National Estimates(ONE) judged that, "Sihanouk still considershimself a true neutralist:' Despite his having,"for the moment at least," veered "severalnotches further in the direction of communistChina;' ONE was "conf ident that he does notwish to abandon Cambodia's neutrality. . . . "The danger, from the US point of view, lay inthe possibility that Sihanoukmight now see thecommunists' prospects as improving toLO in tthat required further accornmodatlon.e _=Early Allegations of Chinese Munitions toSlhanoukvi l leD

I David P.Chandler,The Tragedy ofCambodian His/my (New Haven:YaleUniversityPress, 1991),Chapter4C=I ~ : n D - - - - - - - - - - ~


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the first of a series of reports, alsofrom casual sources and nearly alwaysuncorroborated, of convoys moving by nighteastward from the port toward Phnom Penh. AMay 1965 CIA report originating in Saigondescribed convoys of 40 to 50 trucks moving"at intervals of two or three daysfor threemonths prior to 20 April. On that date source,himself, observed crates being loaded from anunusual number of freighters . . . onto . . .trucks with Chinese markings. Several of thefreighters flew the Soviet flag.1I7D


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' - - - - - - - - . . - ~ ~ ~ ~ _ - _:==rhiS last statementreflected the decay of Saigon's position duringa year and a half of mili tary rule. By the end of1964, collapse had looked imminent, and thefirst American combat units arrived in March1965 to bolster the South Vietnamese.gOTwo months later, Prince Sihanouk, stillpersuaded of American complicity with allegedsubversion by his Thai and South Vietnameseneighbors, cut diplomatic relations withWashinaton1

With US Troops on the GrOundCJBy mid-1965, US troops were committed tooffensive ground operations against the VietCong and the North VietnameseArmy. As theyfought to gain at least the tactical initiative, thequestion of communist sources of supplyacquired new urgency. The Agency addressedthe issue in a paper for the United StatesIntelligence Board and concluded that most ofthe communists' logistic requirements werebeing met inside South Vietnam. Somerequirements, for weapons, ammunition,medical supplies, and certain technical gear,had to be met by outside sources, but thesewere being satisfied primarily via the "principalroute," the Ho Chi Minh ~ r a i l . 110The extent of communist exploitation ofCambodian territory remained indeterminate."Some supplies" had entered South Vietnam,either through uncontrolled border areas or-

with local Cambodian collusion. [ [; ~ - - -----------------------------


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A Deficitof EvidenceDthe


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AClA mood c a r n e ~ L J---1 to look for munitions shipments. The DO saw"no reason to doubt the accuracy" ofinformation from this infrequent reporter that,on this occasion, concerned March 1966 visitsby two freighters. One Soviet and the otherChinese, they delivered "military goods" theagent did not-presumably could not-describe.c=

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IIn this conceptual climate, a trickle of DOreports in the first half of 1967-just two havebeen found-plausibly described surreptitiousshipments of munitions to the Vietnamesecommunists in eastern and northeasternCambodia. The trucks of one convoy had beenloaded at the Kompong Speu depot of theCambodian Army (known by its Frenchacronym as FARK), just off the main road fromSihanoukville to Phnom P e n h . 2 ~ ~ - - ~

It would later become clear that the KompongSpeu depot served to store Chinese munitionsuntil their dispatch to communist base areasalong the South Vietnamese border. At thetime, however, thereportinq at hand hadestablished no recognizable pattern. Onereport described a consensus among seniorLao and South Vietnamese militarycommanders about the growing importance ofSihanoukville, but did not specify the evidencefor their conclLl""si""'o'-'n.'lI ----I

Whatever the skepticism in Washington, theCIA Station in Saigon concurred in anEmbassy report in late July 1967 of a "sharpincrease in reliable information on arms andammunition shipments to Cambodia.I -l


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An Unpersuasive easel IThemodestflow of well-sourced, plausibleinformation tendedtobeobscuredbya floodofless credible materlall

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This substantial but still fragmentary reportingwas supplemented in late November. A DOsource claimed that Sihanouk had privatelyacknowledged allowing an arms traffic fromSihanoukville to South Vietnam, "despite the1--

risk of provoking American reprisals." Thecollective significance of these reports,individually inconclusive, may have beenobscured by a US effort, at just that point, totest Sihanouk's vehement public denialsof anycommunist use of Cambodian territory.Washington sent him intelligence informationcnded todemons'ale that u s e ~Sihanouk also complained in the press aboutViet Cong transgressions and asked for an ICCinvestigation. He later withdrew that request,but in early 1968 Washington still thought himgenuinely outraged by indications ofVietnamese support to indigenous communistrebels-the Khmer Rouge-in northeasternCambodia. The net effect was to encouragethose observers who saw him as consistenrt"-Jly,--------,acting on his vested interest in neutrality. 3 Whatever the effect of Sihanouk's behavior onOER's deliberations, most analysts found inthe reporting of the period no sufficient basiseven to qualify, let alone reverse, their positionon the role of Sihanoukville. The size of the ricesh ipmentsL . lexceeded both Cambodian capabilities andcommunist requirements, aSJhesewere thenunderstood] ... I

I - I


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n . ' . - . - . - -... -Chinese freighter~ YIat Sihanoukville dateunknowr t L J - JThe Decay of c o n s e n s uNevertheless, the CIA's consistent position nolonger represented, if it ever had , consensusamong Agency observers. The l

for Sihanouk-endorsed transhipment andc :J defended the circumstantial caseagainst it.36CD

ad been a Camboclla-watcher since 1"964 andhad, at first, accepted the conventional wisdomabout Sihanouk's vital equity in preserving aneutral stance. But the gradual increase incredible Dol pgent reportingeventually convinced him that a governmentsanctioned traffic was, in fact, taking place .35oNo one c ~ l c i a U a n t i f y j i J a t traffic, but the merefact of it, in IView, erased anyCambodian claim to neutrality. Once neutralityhad been abandoned, the communists had noreason not to exploit a marit ime route for all itwas worth. This perception launched a runningargument between[ n JOER's top analyst on Hie problem, who wasnamed deputy director of the office in August1967.1 iadvanced the empirical case

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' --_--' e g a ~ not later than 1967.0

UNCLASSIFIED


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Meanwhile, the bulk of such reporting as theDO could provide continued to allegeCambodian complicity. A new source in Les

Kosem's Cham tribal entourage came on linein June with a detailed description of the. transfer depot at Kompong Speu and of themechanics of both the arms traffic and the riceshipments into South Vietnam. In Jut 1968I

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The memorandum credited Sihanouk withmoving to restrict smuggling to the Viet Congand found "no convincing evidence thatofficials at the highest levels of government areinvolved" in the traffic. Two :n d a halfyearslater, . l"wenow know" of SlhanouR'sin entlcn to control,not eliminate, the traffic. But a clandestinereport of 1April 1968 had already attributed toSihanouk exactly such an intention. Notenough by itself to establish this as a fact, thedissemination didoleast, invite attention to itas a possibllity." .While the analysts continued to hold theirposition, allegations of a munitions trafficthrough Sihanoukville to the VC/NVAcontinued to t r i c - ~ ~ i n J-'------------\

-.---JBut in mid-October, a French port advisertold a clandestine source that 20,000 tons ofmunitions had transited Sihanoukville sinceearly July.1~ - - - - - _ .


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Meanwhile, controlled CIAsources in the capital werereporting similar convoys."D1---------------II

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OER briefing notes of 13 October 1968 reflectthe struggle to reconcile the argument foroverland transport with a body of evidencethat, however substantial, still lacked thesmoking gun the analysts were demanding."That important quantities of arms andammunition" go from Cambodia to the VC/NVAin lower South Vietnam "is no longer inquestion:' But their origin was still, for OER, an


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seems to have represented the dommananalytical perspective. 48D

In the uncertainty about both the reliability andthe significance of clandestine reportingconcerning Chinese arms transitingCambodia, at least one analyst found hisskepticism reinforced byhis own disdain for theDOproduct. I Ihadserved in Saigonin the mid-1960s, where he recalledencountering a case officerwho took seriouslyan agent's claim that the VC were tunnelingunder Bien Hoa Airbase with a machineprovided by the Soviets. What were they doingwith the massive quantity of soil beingremoved? No satisfactorr answer. Back atHeadquarters, analyzing J

1 I [dealt with agent reporting inthe conviction that "you had to look at it veryhard:' 47D . .

~ u d g m e n t of the evidence onSihanoukville was shaped also by his own"working hypothesis" that the Cambodianswould be deterred by the risk of US bombingfrom letting their country be used as a supplychannel formunitionsdestined for the VC/NVA.The overland route, furthermore, avoided theneed for Cambodian a u ~ o r i z a t i o n , 1 I IIi__ Onthese two oints

This thesis had to contend with newinformation that su ested even if it didJ'lot

open question. - = - = ~ = - I I

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Chapter Two: CIA on the Defensiven

At a preparatorymeeting devoted to reviewingthe available reporting, Far East Division deskoff icer[ Inoticedhow little interestOER seemed to take in agent reports.Accordingly, he assembled all the relevant DOmaterial and took it to Jim Graham. Grahamread it, and said heagreed that itmeritedmoreconsideration than it had been getting, but Back in Washington, Graham produced a==:JthoughtOER was still unif!lpressed by . report that m O d i ~ e d t ~ pQSition he had takenanything I in the study don ~ - l i n late October.- - - - - - The team now accep ea"fffe involvement ofelements of theCambodianArmy in somethingImore than 'small-scale' smuggling of arms tothe communists." Graham cautiously addedthat, "it is suggested that Sihanouk himself isprobably aware of this arms traffic." But theteam still sawmajor differences on issues suchas quantities going through Sihanoukville, therelationship between these and FARKneeds,and the extent to which interdiction andweather had reduced the overland traffic.sO


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Graham acknowledged the absence of"positive proof" that anyone route was carrying"the required arms and ammunition to IV, III,and southern IICorps." Nevertheless, all thingsconsidered, "we believe that the overland routeis the basic channel" for munitions supply to IIICorps and all of IICorps. "The communists willalmost certainly continue to make every effortto maintain and increase its capacity."6DThe weakness of this conclusion lay in thepaucity of positive evidence of a munitionstraffic running southward from the tri-borderarea joining Laos, Cambodia, and SouthVietnam. That a trail network there served toinfiltrate personnel was generally accepted,but there had been few, if any, reports ofweapons or ammunition. One team member,ONE's! Isaw more-if stillinconclusive-direct evidence forSihanoukville than for the Ho Chi Minh Trail:"where there's smoke there's fire."He urgedboth Jim Graham a n dC = __~ to treat thequestion as simply open until improvedcollection settled it. But neither was moved.Accordingly,C]dissented from the team'sconclusion about overland primacy.70

In a statement disseminated on 2November, a tested CIA source had describeda "covert Cambodian committee," withVietnamese communist representation,charged with directing the munitions trafficthrough Sihanoukville. In one of several otheragent reports, the Saigon Station detailed the

organization and activities of a Phnom Penhtrucking company called Hak Ly. This entitywas reported-though not yet proved-to bean instrumentality of Hanoi, used to organizeI the transport of mun;"onsfrom S;hanOUkvmeo\

In late 1968, the first reporting of two newsources did as much to confuse the issue as to~ : ~ % ~ ~ : ~ ~ ~ ~ m a = t e n h t r u c k i n g c o : p a n ~began describing the'size and cargo of truckconvoys leaving Sihanoukville. This reportingwas supplemented by apparently authenticshipping documents from an agent in PhnomPenh, a "purchasing agent" for the CambodianArmy. Well into 1969, their figures were oftenmutually inconsistent, for neither of them had,or claimed to h ~ ~ ( 3 , - acc;ess to all relevanti n f o r m ~ [ _ - - - _ - _

In addition to documentation and personalobservation, both these two agents and other,occasional, reporters were offeringinformation, often from untested subsources,that tended to confirm the movement ofordnance through Cambodia to the VC/NVA.But these reports were fragmentary and, on.occasion, clearly wrong. Moreover, severalcredible, if unconfirmed, agent reportssuggested that the Phnom Penh governmentwas positively hostile to communist smuggling

IL


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across its borders.1

UNCLASSIFIED

L- - - - - - ,c-.,.----;....--__ ---;-;__ ---;;-;;,-JJVhatremained at issue were the quantities beingtransported over both the Sihanoukville andoverland routes. '0 IUncertain Facts and Unprovable TheoriesD IOne circumstance that argued for the Ho ChiMinh Trail as the principal supply route wasthe volume of materiel It was carrying tosouthern Laos. According to CIA estimates,this greatly exceeded the externalrequirements of communisUorces in lowerSouth Vietnam. There was also the scale ofroadbuilding in southern Laos. The networkthere had been essentially out of serviceduring the rainy season, but, at the end of1968, the communists were restoring it "at anunprecedented rate." Trafficwas moving all theway to the Cambodian border, an activity thatsharply contrasted with late 1967, when.southward movement ended at Tche oneover 200 kilometers to the north.

At the same time, DO reporting-some fromagents and some from deserters andprisoners-fleshed out to some degree thefunctioning of the Sihanoukville supplymechan ism] Idetailed aJanuary 1969 calroy a Chinese freighter, andnumerous agent reports described Hak Lyconvoys moving ordnance to the SouthVietnamese border. Higher-level reports

I *-# " " " ' Chinese freighter U w ng ; t"Sihanoukville. January 1969.

affirmed Sihanouk's endorsement of the traffic,and agents described another Chinesedelivery-altogether, the ninth-in April. lo==:JA 16-page report from the young Chinese inearly May detailed the arrival of 4,500 tons ofmunitions in April. He claimed a total of 9,300tons discharged during the Janua and A rilort calls. This uanti that,'--;;;-;.-_ --,-_ _ ---..---.-c" contrasted S arplywith the version supplied by the purchasing. agent, who reported only about half thatvolume. The lower figure, while not acceptedas definitive, had the r;neriloLconsistellC'LWit. u:ns.tantial factorsl

='F-EC 1UNCLASSIFIED


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N ~ \ l e r t h e l e s s , reporting f r omC - - - ]r- IWho se access was, by then, wellrtgbliShe w . ,

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These discoveries preserved the possibilitythat the new reporting was authentic, but theanalysts sawotherfactors that still uraed somereserve about bothf ~ n thepurchasing agent. Forone thing, reportingabout a Hak Ly branch office in the northerntown of Stung Treng"seemed to contradict theallegation of exclusiveVC orientation."And nopositive evidence had yet confirmedallegations thatmunitions did infact, com risethe re orted car oes.

Problems with the reporting o IIMmm_Jand the purchat: :=ent weremultiplied in the case of _JI land self-professed businesspartner of Cambodian Gen. Lon No!.

Reportedly both a founder of the Hak Lycompany and a major smuggler to the VCINVA,I ~ a expelled fromCambodia in 1967, probably after a tiff withCambodian officials over the size of the bribesthat bought their cooperation. He settled inHong Kongand acquired a shipping company,which itself became the subject of reports oftransporting Chinese arms to Sihanoukville."DFrom one perspective,Clooked like theanswerto an analyst's prayer. Even the best ofthe reporting, up to the spring of 1969,was lowlevel and incomplete. If Lon Nol-later theinstigator of the coup against Sihanouk-wasas deeply involved in the traffic as oftenalleged, and was his artner andconfidant hould bea rich source, at east on Its lstoricalbackoround.l

The coercive aspect of ,the recruitment meantthac=Jgood faith could never be taken forgranted. FEDivision desk officer[_. m....... ]thought him an "enigma," and saw no basis forurging the analysts to accept his bona fides.Like other sourcesCfurnished plausible.information but also made claims that theanalysts found implausible-indeed, in hiscase, simply "preoosterous," And l i le theobservations ofl Ireports regarding the size ofthe traffic could


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not be reconciledl -I ~ i t h C - - e ~ s t ' " i m - a ~ t c - e - - - ' d - e - n - e - m - y - - ; - l o - g - - ; - i s - ; t - ; - i c -needs. He Insisted that, between late 1966 andspring 1969, Beijing had delivered between26,000 and 2aAQO tons of munitions through

~ a n o u k v i l l e . 1 _ _ _ ~L JThe "preposterous" claims i nc iudedc=Jassertion in July 1969 that an incipient riceshortage in Cambodia had led him to proposeimporting 80,000 tons of Burmese rice.Cambodia was a traditional exporter and,according to the ana lYc jad just harvestedits best crop in years." account of themoney being made by a Phnom Penh casinoseemed almost as improbable, for he claimedthat the government's cut amounted tofully 10percent of its total revenues. These tales madeit hard to credit his inherently more plausibledescriptions of his dealingswith Lon Nol on thearms traffic. Then, in October, three monthsafter his report, Cambodia found itselfcompelled to import rice. Some months later,new information also confirmedc::=:Jaccountof casino activity. Meanwhile, however, doubtsabout his bona fides persisted. 190Contending with these doubts was informationf r om iPn his smuggling activitywith Lon Noland Les Kosem that accorded with reportinggoing as far back as 1966. And itwas clear thathe still had high-level access in Phnom Penh,for he was aware of Lon Nol's May 1969suspension of distribution to the Vietnamesefrom the depot at Kompong Speu. But even ifthe policy information was authentic, thequestion remained whetherc::=:Jnumbers on

munitions deliveries were-perhapsdeliberately, perhaps inadvertently-wrong. 2o.:An Equivocal Report to Kiss lngernWhatever the factors inhibiting its acceptance,credible reporting on arms shipments throughSihanoukville greatly exceeded, by late spring1969, coverage of overland transport-iftherewas an -southward from the triborder area.

~ _ The Agency maintained its equivocal stance ina memorandum for National Security AdviserHenry Kissinger in mid-June 1969. Afterdescribing the contending positions on the twosupply routes, it concluded only, ~ n CIA . . . believe that the overland route throughLaos plays a much more important role in


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enemyresupplyactivitiesthan[---------JI 1"As faras CIAwasconcerned;the flow overeitherof thetwo routes"cannotbe quantified." The now-standard conclusion,that theoverland route remained "primary,"restedon an implicit redefinition of that term.

The criterionwasno longerthe quantitiesactuallycarried-whether observedor onlyestimated-but ratherwhat theAgencybelieved to be "Hanoi'sview" of the route'simportance."D


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OER recognized that, whatever thecircumstantial argument for useofthe overlandroute, there existed, in mid-1969, far moreempirical evidrnce of shipments throuah[haDOOK.mo, . .

= - - ~ _ ~ _ ~ - - c c - _ _ - c - - ~ ~ I T h einformation at hand indicated substantialenemy troop concentrations on the segmentbordering South Vietnamese II Corps, and theuse of the trail for large-scale infiltration ofpersonnel. True, there was no reporting of anyconcomitant supply operation running from thetriborder area into lower South Vietnam.Nevertheless, it seemed to the analysts that aroute used for personnel could reasonably beinferred also to carry supplies. 2t _JThe Board of National Estimates summarizedthe Agency's position in Special NationalIntelligence Estimate 14.3-69 of 17 July 1969.It "went as far as any communitywideintelligence" product had gone when itstipulated FARK management of a significantflow of munitions to the communists that hadgrown over the previous two years. Precisequantities could not be estimated; indeed, theSNIE explicitly acknowledged that neitherroute could be proved to carry more ordnancethan the other. Like the OER memorandum amonth earlier, it rested its claim for the primacyof the overland route on its perceivedimportance to Hanoi as a route firmly undercommunist control and, therefore, not subjectto the vagaries of Sihanouk's politicalbalancing act.20

Against this background, the purchasing agentbegan in July to supply additional cargomanifests for earlier deliveries, which hesupplemented with information elicited fromCambodian officials in the Ministry of Defense.The analysts, accepting the fact of theseshipments, worked to extrapolate totals fromthe documentsnow at hand. No firm estimates[ r ~ f ~ m t ~ JThese uncertainties had earlier produced anunusual c o n v e r g e n c e - t h ~ h not ameeting-of CIJI! -.ftstimates ofdeliveries to Sihanoukville between DecemberI 1966 and August 1968\ \

t h ~ C I A figure was 9,654[ IC ]But the gap soon widened.In July 1969C - ]1_. [buttheAgency's number declined even farther, to16'159100' [ =:J

No one expected that exchanges of numberswould settle the issue, and in early September19691 Ideveloped an elaborate new analytical modelbased on estimated t n : ~ ~ s delivered both toSihanoukville (using Igure of 21 ,000tons) and down the 0 I Minh Trail to thetriborder area. He compared quantitiesdelivered with estimated requirements in thetwo sectorsC=---

___ 1


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C05260526~ Going Back to the B e g i n n i n g L ~With the issue still far from resolution in lateSeptember 1969, OER undertook acomprehensive review, not only of theevidence but also of its own analyticalmethodology. Pmceeding from primaryreporting, the new effort would ignore allpublished analyses. Its objectivity would beassured by having it conducted by an officerwithout previous exposure to Cambodiananalysi . a second teamanal ze __

Charged with making the new shippingestimate wast [-=======]I -

Cambodian imports from'-=-.-..- - China" as a test of the new shipping estimate;I I

Having factored in the numerous variables-estimated consumption and losses en routethrough Laos, etc'-1 Jnalysis founda major discrepancy, between north and south,in the ratio of availability to requirement.Between 2.6 and 3.5 to one in the "North,"supply was only 1.5 times the total requirementin the "South:1 assumed that theenemy would maintain the same ratio for all ofSouth Vietnam. If that were the case, asubstantial portion of the South'srequirements-between 30 and 43 percent->was being met via the overland route.2lLJAnalystl ~ p r a i s e d what he calleda "truly sophisticated analysis," but took issuewithl Icareful conclusion. It was notjust the uncertainty of the global figures onsupply and demand, he argued, that dictatedcaution about accepting the Laotian corridor asan important source of supplies for the South.For one thing, there were indeed indications ofstockpiling on a "squirrel-like" basis that defiedrational analysis. More importantly, there justwasn't any positive intelligence on use of thecorridor to 5uool1 the SOUth,l-=:JII __ __L IOn the contrary, what littleinformation had come to hand suggested thereverse, that "enemy forces in the South getvery little via the overland route throughLaos: 29n

-I~ ~ - - ~ _ . ~

S X1


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24~ i 1 2 ~

Irevealed aclose c o r = r e : : T l a c : - i t " - : i o C C : n C C : w ~ i ' T I t h = - t n : h ~ e - - : q = u C - : : a = n t " ' i t i e s reportedby the purchasing agent. Accordingly, the newstudy confirmed the arrival, through the springof 1969, of 5,700 tons of ordnance. Anadditional 4,100 tons of military supplies wasclassified as probable, with both total quantityand composition-munitions or nonlethalitems-undetermined. The report did notaddress the argument over route primacy, for itwas designed only, in the words of the postmortem, to "establish a benchmark for oneinput into a model of the communist logisticalsystem . . . in Carnbodia.t ln effect, however, itreinforcedthe argument for overland supply,accepting less than halfof the 21,000 tonsassumed in the' lstudy to have comethrough S i h a n o U k V l i f e ~ 3 GAnd, in fact, [ [estimateswere accordedconsiderably more than the authority ofsomething actually regarded as merely "oneinput." Less than a year later, the post-mortemsaw OERas having "accepted t h e e - - =unloading rate . . . where[ever] there wasconflicting evidence. It was the basic factorunderlying the substantially low estimates ofChinese deliveries of military cargo toSihanoukville." 370T h e c = J e x e r c i s e was intended tocompensate for the gaps and inconsistenciesin the positive reporting. Despite the recentspurt of clandestine coverage, these stillaggravated the analytical problem when hebegan work on the new shipping es t im at es DI___- w -

I .

I ~ e s c r i b e d the history of theChinese arms traffic to which, he said, PrinceSihanouk had agreed in principle during a visitto Beijing in November 1965. The q u a n t i t y ~20,000 tons-was specified in an agreementwith Z h o u , E n J a ~ i n mid-1966. As usual, theimpact o f ~ r e p o r t i n g was dampened bymore of his habitual revisions, when it came toquantities delivered, and his continuing failureto provide any documentation.3sD .T r ue, c =] lat es t numbers aenerally accordedwith those o .____1 But thatagent's figures diverged sharply, as we haveseen from those ofthe urchasin a e n t . ~

IEscape from reliance on shipping estimatesmight have been offered by comprehensivereporting on the truck convoys leavingSihanoukville for the South Vietnameseborder. Information on some of these did comefrom a variety of sources, in addit ion to thethree principals, but such data were far fromcomplete. And the analysts still lackeddefinitive information on other factors thatwould help determine the quantities actually


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transferredto the VC/NVAI

"Team B" and the Burden of proofUWhile [ worked on the new shippingest imatesC gave the revisionistschool an opportunity to make its case. Hemandated a kind of "Team B" exercise, invitingskeptics of the overland thesis to rebut it. On16 October, these analysts concluded that"since 1967, munitions delivered toSihanoukville had satisfied the bulk of therequirements for communist forces in [theSouth]." The skeptics offered no new facts,only a reinterpretation that, however plausibleas anexercise in deduction, did not, in the viewo f ~ J refute the overlandt h ~ - -With the burden of proof on the dissenters, theimpact of their effort was further diluted by thesimultaneous appearance of an early draft ofthe==discharge numbers, whichacknowledged only insignificant deliveries wellinto 1968. In implicit contrast to both thecircumstantial arguments and the positiveevidence for Sihanoukville as themain supplier

, --- '

to the South, these "were thought [presumablyby OER management] to have a high order ofreliability."42DAccepted in the study of covert reporting as"perhaps [the] most important [clandestine]source" on Sihanoukville,1nevertheless continued to provoke questionsthat sometimes took on an adversarial tone.Analysts objected that no vessel carried thename HangChow, as reportedly given band they denied the authenticit, - - - - - - - ' - -L . - _

C = ~ h e had given foRebutting these objections1 _ pointed out the existence of the freighter HangZhou-the same name in the newromanization-and[U .- roted that theanalysts had "had to retract" also in the case of= Ifor which precedent wassoon found. These e ~ ~ e s consumedweeks, during which[ ._ jbona fides andaccuracy remained, as always, at i s s u e . 4 ~


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OER believed that, as of January 1970, therate of supply through the trail network hadrisen 30 percent in the last 12months.1=:]The CIA, less in thrall t h a ~ Ito anestimative methodology, was equally insistenton its own bottom line. The samememorandum that noted growing traffic on theHo Chi Minh Trail acknowledged, with respectto Sihanoukville, that "we remain unable toquantify with assurance the volume of VCarms." Even so, "Laos continues to be thepredominant s u p ~ h a n n e l for militaryordnance . . . ."45UMore clandestine reporting-some from thecore trio of informants but also from other wellplaced and reliable sources-described theearly 1970 resumption of deliveries from theKompong Speu depot to the SouthVietnamese border. In February, thepurchasing agent supplemented his reportingof late 1969with documents on deliveries notearlier described. In early March,C___ ~ a i d the Chinese h a d j u s t a - s ~ k - e ~ d ~ P ~ r i - n - c e -Sihanouk to authorize another 20,000 tons ofmunitions to transit Sihanoukville. 461 -lReports like these reinforced the growingrecognition inOER that theempirical evidence,however inconclusive with respect toquantities, did not favor the overland thesis.Indeed, OER's contribution to an ONE updateof the Graham report acknowledged the arrivalat Sihanoukville, by late February, ofsomewhere between 9,300 and 13,400 tons of"military supplies." (The term presumably

including items other than ordnance.) But theirallocation between FARK and the VC/NVAremained uncertain. 470OER used two methods to estimate the sharetransferred to the communists. One of thesewas based on shipments to Sihanoukville, on arecent, clandestinely acquired FARK inventory,and on estimated FARK consumption.Subtraction of consumption and new inventoryfrom deliveries yielded a figure of 4,500 tonsavailable for delivery to the communists sinceOctober 1968. The other formula simply addedup the numbers obtained from clandestinereporting of deliveries to the border caches; atabout 2,000 tons, they nearly matchedestimated total communist requirements. OERacknowledged that agent reporting on thereduced amounts of communist ordnance heldby FARKafter the May 1969 suspensionsuggested additional transfers making for a"substantially" greater total quantity, but therewas no direct evidence of these movements. inthe absence of such information, estimates ofenemy requirements made the 2 , 0 0 0 - t ~figure more plausible to the analysts." i

'----

OER concluded that, if no more than 2,000tons had actually been put in the hands of thecommunists, the July 1969 SNIE hadoverstated the volume of supplies movedthrough Laos by only about ten percent. Giventhe "large number of uncertainties andvariables," this was "hardly sufficient to changethe general validity of the 1969 estimates." Theupdate for ONE, therefore, also leftunchallenged I Is ~ i n g estimatesdone in December 1969.49U


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-

I .]By early March1970 DCI Special Assistant for VietnameseAffairs George Carver was circulating the draftof an "elaborate study" for augmentedcollection efforts just as Washington wasbecoming aware of Sihanouk's precariousposition. When Lon Nol overthrew him on 18March and solicited Western support for hisnew anticommunist regime, unilateralclandestine collection became irrelevant ascollection managersfocused on contacting theFARK principals. 5DAlso overtaken by events was a final nationalintelligence estimate. It would, apparently,have broken no new ground, as OER'scontribution to a draft in mid-March acceptedt h eCy t ud y of port capacity. CIA had notyet established actual deliveries to the frontthat exceeded 2,000 tons; known militaryshipments to Sihanoukville since 1965 totaled6,800 tons, with 4,100 tons more consideredprobable. With so litt le new to offer, and withthe prospectof an intelligencewindfall aftertheoverthrow of Sihanouk, ONE gave up furtherwork on the estimate. 51D

An End to the ArgumentDWith the estimative process on hold, the DOscrambled to set up a new station in PhnomPenh. Meanwhile, the Saigon Station did itsbest to contact Lt. Col. Kosem and anassociate named Oum Savouth, who hadpersonally supervised many of the convoys tothe border. After an indirect overture fromKosem through tribal contacts in SouthVietnam, Saigon had earlier tried toorchestrate a clandestine meeting with him inSingapore. Now,the pressures on him asa keyaide to I on Nol orevented even the short trio toS ' I JI a,gon!

I __ . ER's upper estimate, calculated in lateFebruary, of 13,400 tons. But it left open whatand how much had actually made its way to thecommunists, and how much of that stillreposed in cache sites on Cambodian soil.President Nixon had just launched the USground incursion into Cambodia in search ofVC/NVA base areas, and the White Housewaspressing for estimates on the "impactof currentoperations on enemy capabilities andintentions.',s3DOnly Kosem could "tell us things we urgentlyneed to know" about Cambodian stockpiles,andl rent through George Carver


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to press FEDivisionChiefBill Nelsontoarrangedirect accessto himfor theanalysts.Nelsonstifled his first reaction, that "Carverwas once again trying to muscleinto ourbusiness,"andauthorizeda queryto Saigononthematter.Respondingto this, RobertBrown.acting chiefof Vietnamoperations, observedthat, "not toowe . n inOER's e n t h u s . l ~ s mto et at Kosem I

There mattersstood for almost a month. Inearly July, PhnomPenhStationsubmittedbycable the results of a debriefingof Kosem andLonNol's brotheC'L0l'l Non. It raisedtheItotallQrlnagef lO iI

An FEDivisioncable spokefor OERwhen itadvisedthat, if the higher figurewere"dissemedand acceptedwithout qualificationby readers, [numerous] importantandcriticalintelligencejudgmentswould be called intoquestion:' These includedthe effectiveness of

the allied incursioninto Cambodia,the size ofenemystockpilesstill there.and the role ofLaosas a supply route.56DThe sameFE cable pointed out specificanomalies, such as thedate of a reported shiparrival at Sihanoukville.The stationdulyqueriedKosem,with incomplete results thatdid, at least,resolvethedate discrepancyasatypographical error.Meanwhile, the scrambleto get full details from Kosemandhissubordinate,OumSavouth,wa i .c..o.m...p. IiCa=te""d=------.by a running squabblebetweenandSaigonStationover proprietary access tothesesource - - - ,

Substantiveprogressaccompanied thebureaucraticmaneuvering, and, in late July,I IdealingwithKosem.respondedto an exhaustive list ofIhistorical questions.'


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The absence of any further record suggeststhat Helms succeeded in calming the waters,at least for the moment. Meanwhile, in earlyAugust, ONE's Indochina expert'LI _andl larrived in Phnom Penh. Theytoured Sihanoukville (now once againKompong Som) with the p o r t m a s t e ~ r _ a _ n _ d__reported back to Jim Graham anol

But t h i s ~ approximating the maximum. Iready describedI ~ - - , - - - - - . - - - by was only 25 percent more thanalloweCloyhis model. Questions, therefore, stillremained. 59[JDuring the rest ofAugust ,C=Jcontinued to debrief Lt. Col. Kosem onc=c:==Jrequirements. In addition to morehistorical background, he got details of the

documents stored in Kosem's home. Kosem,treating this hoard likea 'small boy with [a]prized collection [of] bubble gum cards,"acceded to the Station's argument about theirhistorical value and agreei::l to let them beshipped to Headquarters for safekeeping; aftera quick trip to Algeria and the United ArabRepublic (Egypt and Syria), he would visitWashington for a thorough debriefing. 61U~ f t e r rsecond photographXl3ession thenextnight,I _ J ]reported that about half the Kosem files werenow on film. They anticipated little morephotography before the Station shipped thefiles to Headquarters, but thought the mostinteresting material already done. There werestill unanswered questions: had the Chinesemade 12 deliveries, or only nine? Also, cachesites were not precise_ly s p e c i f i e ~= ]expressed some'---do-u-b-t-t-h-a-t-even the files not yet photographed wouldclarify all these points; in any case, it appearedthat further s t u d ~ ~ l d await their shipment toHeadquarters. 62u .The two analysts and the Station allunderestimated the sense of ur ency drivingthe efforta t Headquarters reported that,having copied allhe had done o n l y ; - ' a ~ s a " " m = p " ' e ~ o . . - - - - - - - ithere was "nothing to be gained" bydoing themall. Headquarters disagreed: 'Our need [to]obtain copies [of] all documents cannot beoverstressed:' The analysts n e e d e d L C ~ _ ~ __ --.Jin order to conduct a thorough study of theentire question and having photographs nowwas more important than getting the sourcedocuments later.630

OER wanted more than summaries, and on 6Se t e r T l Q ~ , , - , r , ' L C _~ I'---__ .fpent 12hours photographing 11,000frames of th1 __ ---'

- - EC 1


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Despite the evidence adduced by agentreporting and by Phnom Penh station'ssummaries of the Kosem documents, OERfound the scale of the Chinese shipmentsdifficult to credit. Itstill doubted the capacity ofSihanoukville to handle the reported volume,and one analyst suggested that the records betreated "with reserve." A total of 26,000 tons ofsupplies, just over 21 ,000 tons of it ordnance,C: rexceeded earli,er:st:Js that theuggested00 In!ifor other deliveries a had gone

-".unttected by the Intelligence Community."64

Surveying the Wreckage=:]No such deliveries were found. The knownvisits by Beijing-chartered freighters hadindeed brought munitions in an amount "muchhigher than the one we held. Worse," as thenDOl Jack Smith put it, " it was almost the samea C = ~ n a t c h e d - f r o m - t h i n - a i r figure."Smith reported this humbling fact at the DCl'sregular morning meeting. There, "cool asusual," Helms took the news "without flinching."He reproached no one for the failure, instead

==::Jind outwhat had gone wrong.651 r -The White House, less forgiving, "interpretedthe mistake as further evidence of CIA bias,"and Jack Smith was hearing it "murmured that

wewere advocates of the 'McNamara position,'whatever that was." The President ordered aninquiry by his Foreign Intelligence AdvisoryBoard, none of whose members "seemed tofind our account convincing."Perhaps they expected us to apologizeand confess. We did neither. We hadmade the best judgment we could withthe evidence we had at the time. Whenbetter evidence came along, weimmediately accepted it. No intelligenceservice can be asked to do more.660

30

I

"" ,Ri,I.1 North Ann, , .", , , ." 11., ...... '''' "'" I" ' , . . ., . , 21,400 m_ Ri , "" IofSihanoukville andpaidthe governmentmorethan50millionUSdollarsin portfeesand transportationcharges."Gen.DoanKhue,etal.,Reviewof theResistanceWarAgainsttheAmericansto SavetheNation:Victories andLessons(Hanoi:NationalPoliticalPublishingHouse, 1995),p. 221 .CssR. Jack Smith TheUnknownCIA:MyThreeDecadeswiththe Agency.(Pergamon-Brassey'sInternationalDefensePublishers,Inc.,1989),p. 210.. Ibid.,p. 21167


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Part Two:A Rationalizing Animaln


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Chapter Three: The Ambiguity of It A I I L ~ ~


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I

- ~ - . ~ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -


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1_ ~ __


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I - - ~ - - - - - - - - - - - - -


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+t.1


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Chapter Four: Relying on the M O d e l ~ _ " _._ ..

Notmerely the prevailing substantiveassumptions but the very formulation of theissue militated against valid analysis.Throughout the debate, OER insisted ondefendinga categorical position that classifiedthe overland route as "primary" or "basic," Thispractice persisted despite opposition from atleast three analysts.I Irecalledhisunsuccessful attemPts, after 1 9 6 ~ 0persuadeC=.J.and laterL== : l - -a tleast to treat the issue as open and to abstainfr0f!! taking a categorical posi t ion.C]C rememberedhisownsimilar efforts.A n d ~ _ ~ w a s doing the same thing,at the same time, with the same result.Whatever the reasons for the attachment tothe overland thesis, they did not include in-house consensus.3-- ==

The very scarcity of clandestine reporting,whatever its quality, hadjustified the prevailingskepticism well into 1967. Thereafter,confidence in the explanatory power of thevarious conceptual models-Cambodian andNorth Vietnamese interests and intentions,and the 1969 Cambodian shipping estimates,for example-increasingly distorted theanalytical process. In this connect ionJ"-- ' -- iThe Sihanoukville traffic, by contrast, required himself long inclined to the conventionalinterpretation of each report: source interpretation, remembered OER's protractedauthenticity and reliabil ity, the access of both reluctance to credit the purchasing agent'sprimary and subsources, and the inherent reporting. Considerations like trailcapacity andplausibility of the content. This surely the potential of boats, smuggling, and localincreased the perceived risk to the analysts of acquisition to fi ll the communists' needsaccepting agent r jPortin.9 that challenged the dominated the analysts' thinking andreceived wisdom. 1 discouraged an evenhanded evaluation ofinformation tha. t challenged receivedwisdom.2r--- ." " - ~ _ J

The record of the Sihanoukville episodesuggests that some analysts positivelypreferred a process that favored deductionsfrom an academic model over inferences fromincomplete and inconsistent clandestinereporting. The factual bases for the modelsthat governed the measurement of things, likeTrail traffic and attrition, were themselves alsoincomplete. But they aggregated masses ofdata, obviating the need for judgment aboutthe accuracy or authenticity of individualreports. I ._- ,

This mentality helps explain both OER'senduring confidence in[ !shippingestimates and its initial reluctance to acceptt h implied by the Kosemdocuments. Oneanonymous draftaccepted as"theoretically attainable" the:. Jfor the four largest deliveries that thedocuments described. But it questioned theauthenticity of the documents, demanding alevel of supporting empirical evidence fromwhich the overland thesis had always beenexempt. Thus, no agent reporting hadsuggested any of the prerequisites for such aI - - papacity:, - - -1~ - - - . - JL== ,And there werenegative factors:"Most sources" hadindicatednL - -

1

m . ~ . _ ~ -


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Dand the other dissenters had at least acommon understanding ofthe terminology. Butas used in OER publications, the "primary" or"basic" classification had another weakness,its mushy semantics. It might refer to actualquantities carried, or to the relative security ofthe two routes, or even, as we have seen, to asubjective judgmentof the relative importanceassigned to them by the North Vietnamese. Asemerges i n ]testimony, the term"primary" o ~ c " could be and wasredefined to suit the requirements of theoverland thesis. As the quantity issue becameincreasingly contentious, the reliance onnotions like security, control, and imRprtance ..grew proportionately.]This semantic carelessness abetted what maywell have been an entirely unconsciousresponse to demands-both self-imposed andfrom management-for a categorical answerto a question that, in fact, defied such ananswer. Having taken refuge in the imprecisionof "basic" and "primary:' the overland schoolavoided engaging the argument of theskeptics, who were always concerned solelywith quantities. IA reluctance, rooted in professional pride, toadmit that the evidence allowed more than oneinterpretation may account in part for OER'srigidity. But managerial expectations, whetherreal or perceived, also played a role in OER'sinsistence, if not on the overland interpretationitself, at least on havlnq a thesis to defend.More than 30 years later, t h C _ .==:Jb:: Jesentative on the Grahammission,still thought it "weaselly" o f c= ]to ave abstained from taking a position,even in categorical dissent.1 view, thepurpose of the mission w a s ~ ~ u p with adefinitive answer, and ~ a m b i v a l e n c eseemed to indulge his perceived "loner"proclivities at the expense of contributing ijudgment. To the extent thatC==

understanding of the team's charter reflectedthe prevailing mentality in OER, it may be saidthat bureaucratic pressure affected theobjectivity of the process.' [-Another analytical crutch took the form of aprevailing assumption that, even at the time,begged to be challenged. Applying therational-actor model, OERcontinuallyassertedthat, by opening a route through Sihanoukville,the North Vietnamese would subject thesecurity of their logistics to the whims of amercurial Sihanouk. But the argumentwasinvalid on its face. Security would not beabdicated, for Hanoi could, at any time, revertto full reliance on the overland route that OERhad always maintained could supply all ofSouth Vietnam. And this is what the NorthVietnamese promptly did, when Lon Nol cuttheir access to Sihanoukville in early 1970:they compensated by sending everythingdown the trail in Pieparation for the Easteroffensive of 1972.Still another procedural flaw is to be found inthe consistent failure to recognize the doublestandard applied to the empirical evidence foreach of the competing interpretations. Eventhe best agent reporting on quantities ofmunitions through Sihanoukville hadinconsistencies and gaps that the orthodoxschool invoked to justify skepticism about themaritime route. Whatever the validity of whatI ]called this "purism"-it was "certainly appropriatewell into 1967- the samerigor was never applied to quantities assertedto be coming south from the triborder area,about which there was little, if any, reporting. 5L .=:JBy late 1968, dissentinganalysts were buildinga countercase for Sihanoukville. They based itboth on clandestine reporting and oncircumstantial arguments like! ... i"in-for-a-dime-in-for-a-dollar" insight about


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Sihanouk's abdication of neutrality. In this newsituation, a more rigorous analytical process,one more open to self-questioning, would haveacknowledged the significance of the sparseevidence for overland shipment below thetriborder area.sl---Compromised Objectivity,---[ ---lSeveral participantsin the debate later came tosee individual and institutional bias asencouraging resistance to seriousconsideration of Sihanoukville as a majortransit point for a r m s . ~ = = : p e l i e v e d thatservice in Cambodia tended to generatesympathy for Sihanouk's position, as thePrince struggled to save his country with aneutralist balancing a c t . = = ~remembered his own stance as open toSihanouk's complicity in the armstraffic, but heagreed t.hatpro-Sihanouk feeling wascommod C - - - ~But the phenomenon existed also atCIA .C ]I Iremembered having absorbed thesentiment in OCI in the mid-1960s. He alsorecalled a visit to 001 Ray Cline's office,sometime in 1964, where Cline advised him to"take it easy on the Cambodians."L ]interpreted this crypticguidance as suggestinghe "cut Sihanouk some slack" wheninterpreting allegations of collusion with theVC/NVA that were already circulating. 80

..__ .... . .. ~ . I


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overlandthesis. In doing so, he asserted, hewasdriven byconviction,not by pressure fromabove.131L. _

TheintellectualbiasesthathelpeddistortCIA'slogistical estimateswere reinforcedby theintrusionof policypreferences. Oneparticipantin the Grahamn i i ss io r r - - - -made itexplicit that he saw hisr o r e - o n ~ 9 6 8Grahamteamas one of helping defendthe

Policy Preference as the ElJglne of AnalysisI

OERanalysts indulged a similar, if lessemotionally charged, biasagainstclandestinereporting from the CIA's DirectorateofOperations.To someextent, it probablyresultedfroma tendencyto lumpDOreporting ~ t a r t e d with the belief-he thought otherI J.Butaswe civilian observers shared it-that the US'nave seen, one a n a l y ~ ~ ~ I military's perceived lust to attackCambodiaacknowledgedtheenduring biasgeneratedby stemmed morefrom frustration withexperiencewith a credulousDOcaseofficer in inconclusivecombat in South Vietnam thanSaigon.TheDO'sperennialfailureto achievea fromany rigorouscost-benefit analysis of amajor penetrationof the VC reinforcedthis broadened w a r ~ ~ ~ ~ 'skepticism.The result forCJwas that he ~ ~ ~ ~ -was "too skeptical,too long"of theclandestinereporting on Sihanoukville.11L . ~ ~ : = J I ~ d i t i o n . L . ' .accepted as fact Hanoi's reliance on theAna lys t r - - - - - ' ~ a s amongthosewho overland route, and he believedthat Sihanoukrecalledan atmosphereof "generalskepticism" was too cagey to fmn bed with Hanoi.of DO reporting, an atmospherethat derived With this mindset,1 . ~ e r c e i v e d desire toonly partly from the fact t h ~ t someof it w a s ~ ~ expand the conflict looked politically anddemonstrably i - militarily ill-founded,a recipe fordisaster.14C]I C ~ r e g a r d e d himself as havingi a "mandate" to help support the overlandI ==:Jrnnrs view,only those analysts t more attuned to the political dimensionpaidserious attention to human re orting.These' IHe consideredincludedl and himself totally free to consider new evidence! were more and received no guidance or instructions orattunedto the potential aswellas the pitfallsof indications as to what hewould conclude. Atagent reporting.12 ! = the same time, he assumed that his superiorsknewwhat hewould conclude. But he saw noinconsistencyhere, as he fully shared-indeed, had helped form]- - Iconsensus.The fact remains that he did notconsider the new informationacquired duringthevisit toSouthVietnam tobeworth inclUdingin the subsequent report. Whether or not, byobjective criteria, it merited such ..~ .. _consideration, it doesappearC= Jobjectivitywas compromised to somematerial[ ___ . . . . . __ ~ --.J


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degree byhiscommitment to a policyoutcome.And it is unlikely that hewas the only observerwhose judgmentwas affected in this way.150The evidence for the impact of a similar policycommitment at CIA is less direct, but goes tothe highest level of the Agency's analyticalactivity on the arms issue. Over a period oftime, O N E ' ~ lacquired theimpression t h a C = . ~ a t t a c h m e n t to theoverland thesis derived, at least in part, from a"subliminal reluctance" to see the war expandinto Cambodia.C]emphasized t C ; -"subliminal" aspect: he did not see ~ having consciously sought to have t eintelligence product serve this view, but ashaving been i n f l u e n c e < : l ~ it. Tothe extent thatthis was the c a s e ~ o i n e d ~ n dpossibly others in the same distortion of theanalytical process of which many of them hadlong accused MACV: they too used analysis( - - - base quite consciously-to advancea p01iCV8genda.16==.: : : : :J

The Perils of Argument From A u t h o r i t Y L ~No one concerned with ensuring the integrityof an analytical process would supportargument from authority as a legitimateinstrument of persuasion. Indeed, it appearsthat the managers involved in CIA'sSihanoukville analysis recognized theimportance of intellectual independence and,in periodic reviews of the evidence, activelytried to guarantee it. Nevertheless, it alsoappears that individual reputations forexpertise, buttressed by hierarchicalrelationships, frequently operated toundermine it.L - - - - . J

At the center of this issue is I [ Hadhe been only a working-level analyst, he wouldhave had to compete on an equal basis withother interpretations and other personalities.Even then, working in something more like afree market of ideas, his expertise and force ofpersonality would likely have materiallyinfluenced the Agency's position onSihanoukville. As itwas, his position]"---I _ combined with hisprofessional reputation and acknowledgedmastery of the "numbers;' came to dominatethe debate in a way that stacked the deckagainst dissent. I .---JOn Sihanoukville, turned out to besimply wrong. But, aSL pointedout, he had served with real distinction as aleader in Indochina analysis. He would speaktruth to power,as in his insistence onthe futilityof bombing the North inorder to break Hanoi'swill. Unfortunately for the discussion of thearms traffic, the aura of authority created bythis record of accomplishment and the force ofhis conviction on the subject only made itharder to get a hearing for a revisionist point ofview.17 i-' --------------------'Having set the CIA positionc=::flpparentlytook for granted his analysts' adherence to it. Inlate 1968, aswe have s e e n L . ...Jchallenged him to accept the burden of prooffor theoverland t hesis] reactionwas tocommission a piece to "support ourcontention"about the overland route. This formulationperhaps b y C - ~ if not byc:::=J-implieda unanimity of view that=_ Ithought owed something to bureaucraticpressure. Asl Irecalled it, he had notbeen urgingacceptance of anyspecific volumeof traffic, only that well-sourced clandestinereporting be recognized as a credible

II


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X1

challenge to the overland model. But L "didn't want to buckc:=J" This reluctancemotivated, at least partly, i .Yiew,by deference to authority, ultimately causedsome estrangement between him and== a personal friend who had broughthim along to t h whenboth left Soviet analysis. 18 ! ]By 1968r--ibelieved thatc o n f i r m a f i o n o r ~ a t any leveldestroyed two arguments: 1) that Sihanoukintended to preserve his neutrality; and 2) thatthere was reason to doubt that the communistswould fully exploit any access throughCambodia. And OER now accepted that someweapons were, indeed, transiting the country.But ... -_ ]continued to "bUildOZeffis Idea" p a s ~C- ~ i s s e n t . 1 9 [ . Somebody's view had to prevail, and theheterodox were as subject to error as theiradversaries. But it seems that, by 1968,subjective considerations had a c q u i r e d ~ a _ n _ - ,unhealthy forceC_==:f!escribedC=.Jas so emotionally committed to the overlandthesis that "he went around the bend . . .wouldn't talk to me,"But ifthe rigidity -position reflected "arrogance and - - stubbornness,'j Iconcluded also thathe had allowed the discussion to r e a c ~ h _stalemate when he failed to challenge!? - - - - -numbers about ships and cargoes,20! ~ - - - ~

The point is reinforced byl serviceon the Graham mission. Atthe end, listening tothe discussion of the draft report, he foundhimself sympathizing Withl . _ Idissentfrom the overland thesis. Butc=J hadregarded himself, on the trip, more as DO"watchdog" than as substantive participant,and he hesitated even to participate in thediscussion. Disclaiming any unique expertise,he decided to cast his layman's vote with thepreeminent-and supremely confident-authority on the subject] .--.1Accordingly, he signed the report, andc=Jremained the only dissenting vOice. 22 !

Compartmentation and its DiscontentsDO participation in the Graham team-even ifintended as no more than a matter ofbureaucratic turf protection at overseasstations-had the salutary effect of generatingsome communication between operational andanalytical e l e m e n t s . ~ ~ c a m e to thinkthat, until late 1968,tI1eentire episode servedas a paradigm of failed communicationbetween the two directorates. Only when theGraham team was formed did the DO find outabout the analytical model being used inthe 01nd learned to help OER levy precisequirements. Similar regrets were to be foundIso on the analytical s ide : [= - -== :J ateast, later deplored the lack of communicationith the DO that prevailed during theihanoukville debate.> I ----,


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It does seem that better communication wouldhave encouraged a more sophisticatedinterpretation of significant aspects of theproblem. Upon joining the team,noted that analysts were still using= =:Jas guies__ ..i JHe saw this as anexample of academic isolation from real-worldpractice-in this case the Southeast Asianhabit of ignoring official load l imits-that theapplication of operational experience wouldhave m i t i g a t e d . 2 4 ~ . __--'I. . thought that the operational perspectivewould have helped the analysts to avoid anassumption that partially justified rejectingHakLy as a North Vietnamese instrumentality.Contrary to the OER interpretation, theexistence of a branch office at Stung Trengmight have represented nothing more than acover, designedto give Hak Lythe appearanceof a legitimate commercial concern. Ignoringthat possibilityserved the prevailing skepticismabout reported truck convoys carryingmunitions to the border with lower SouthVietnam.25C = - -- - I ]who replaced c = J o n the DOdesk, had a similar perspective oncollaboration between analysts and operators.By late 1968, as he recalled it, he and otherdesk officers saw Sihanouk as havingabandoned neutrality by his wholesaleaccommodation of the VC/NVA, including themilitary hospital at Kompong Cham. Thisperspective was never conveyed to OER,

l, - - - _ . _ - - - - - - - ~ - - - - - - - ~

Wrong But Rational!'--------------

The record thus reveals substantial flaws inCIA analysis of the Cambodian armscontroversy. However, it does not establishthat, even in early 1970, the 01 should haveassigned to Sihanoukville-andwith the samedegree of confidence-the importance that ithad earlier attributed to the overland route.There were, after all, powerful circumstantialarguments against it. And if agent reportinghad now proved a substantial flow of armsthrough Sihanoukville, exact quantification stilleluded the analysts.LI _

i __ IL-.A N O r t l i ~ e s e Army history says that the Lao Dong Party'sCentral Office for South VIetnam set up Rear Services Group17 In July 1966 "in the friendly nation of Cambodia." Under the name "Hac [sic) LyCompany," it "established purchasing offices in anumber of differentareas inCambodia."Nguyen DuyTuong,ChiefEditor, His/o 0 IheAnnami/e Mountain Troops of/heHo Chi MinhT!.iJiI, (Hanoi, People's Army Publishing House, 1994), p. 139. :r.-"ra.......la...i....on"'L. -'---


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Given the persuasiveness of the circumstantialcase, it was certainly reasonable to require asubstantial body of reliable evidence toestablish a competing interpretation, and thiswas a long time coming. Fanciful earlyallegations of deliveries through Sihanoukvilleinevitably and, to a point, legitimatelydiscredited agent reporting. Whenknowledgeable CIA sources began producingbetter information, some of it as early as 1967,it was at first fragmentary and always subjectto inconsistencies and even contradictions.. ~ _ lFrom a procedural point of view, the problemarose primarily in the treatment of evidence forand against the opposing arguments. Hadequal rigor been applied to both, attachmenttothe overland route would have given waysooner to a more balanced interpretation. Twoexamples illustrate this. First, the skepticismthat always, and often properly, greeted agentreporting was not applied to information fromother sources. ThUS, OER analysisconsistently qUestione.d the a u t h e n t i ~ the.l,arg.rd.'iv.n.s d.""ib.d b _ f-

' - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ~The treatment of empirical evidence is equallyasymmetrical in the second example.Regarding Sihanoukville, the analysts wantedassurance that agent reporting was authentic

and accurate. Indeed, as we have seen, theirskepticism led to rejection of whatturned out tobe the most authoritative coverage. But nosuch rigor was applied to interpreting the neartotal absence of reporting, from any source, onoverland deliveries. Factors such as thepaucity of human sources below the tri-borderarea certainly allowed, up to a point, continuingfaith in the overland thesis. But faith is what itwas. When the overland intelligence vacuumpersisted as the evidence for Sihanoukvillegrew, faith required rationalization in order tosurvive., - More generally, at least two of the participantslater concluded that there was what one ofthem called too little "bottom up;' inductivethinking and too much from the top down.I ]said he meant bythat a propensity,which he shared, to begin with a conclusionrather than to build one from factual evidence.Like other proponents of the overland theory,he began with the conventional wisdom aboutSihanouk's equities, the Ho Chi Minh Trailc ~ ~ - ~ !Thus, I ,'proceeded down the ladder tolook at the evidence, I was met by [OER]intelligence and analysis coming up from thebottom which fit my prejudices per fect ly . "28] -I - ]made essentially the samepoint in even more categorical terms.Reflecting on the Sihanoukville failure, hethought it pointed to the necessity, in anyconflict between empirical fact and an a priorianalytical model, for the analyst to rely on thereporting. Impossible to apply in an absolutesense-individual points of fact acquiremeaning only when integrated into ahypothesis, however tentative-this

E

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prescription does, nevertheless, encapsulatethe weakness of the Sihanoukville analysis. 29I - ~ A Modicum ofObjectivity!No one with any self-knowledge thinks ofperfect objectivity as an achievable goal. Themost that can be done is to try to quest ionassumptions in hopesof identifying beliefs andvalues that may interfere with disinterestedjudgment. Such influences being more visiblein others than in oneself, i t fol lows that avigorous adverrrial pr()cess is ~ s s e n t i a l : . - - : t o = - - _identifying bias. ]

Even then, subjective factors may persist. If theSihanoukville episode teaches anything, it isthat the assumptions and biases most stronglyheld are those most in need of examination.Accepting as a general principle the danger ofunexamined premises may open the analyst, ifnot always to proactive self-criticism, at leasttorespectful attention to divergent views. Absentthat openness, the universal human desire forthe comfort of certitude may overwhelm thespirit of neutral inquiry that remains the ideal ofprofessional analysis.IL . _

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Source Note

The author is indebted to Richards J. Heuer, Jr.'s,discussion of analytical strategies in Psychologyof IntelligenceAnalysis (Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1999). Merle Pribbenow's translationsof off icial North Vietnamese Army histories give Hanoi's version of Hak Ly and the size of theSihanoukville traffic.C __ !Source material for this study has come almost exclusively from the official record and from therecollections of what is hoped is a representative sample of surviving participants in theSihanoukville controversy. The small amount of open literature on the subject is restricted evenfurther by its overlapping authorship. It is written from the perspective of senior management,whose role in the Sihanoukville analysis was limited largely to interpreting to the working level theterms and sense of urgency with which the policymakers were pressing for a resolution. The wayin which this guidance actually influenced the analysts ultimately depended, of course, on thelatter's understanding of what management wanted. Accordingly, this study relies on workingdocuments and participant recollections to establish the_psychological climate in which the debateClacC=-=r----, ' ----- ' - The literature is of interest, nevertheless, for its revelation of various perspectives and purposes atthe management and policy levels., IBundy, William P.,A Tangled Web: TheMaking ofForeign Policy in the Nixon Presidency (NewYork: Hill and Wang, 1998). With respect to Cambodia, Bundy is concerned mainly to discreditNixon's ground incursion in the spring of 1970. Despite his presumptive access to the definitiveintelligence that proved the contrary, he relies on the findings of an outside academic to justify hisconclusion that the Sihanoukville traffic was "insignificant."c=JHathaway, Robert M., and Russell Jack Smith, Richard Helms as Director of Central Intelligence,1966-1973 (Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1993). Smith's portion of this survey of the Helmsincumbency vividly describes the political atmosphere of the late Johnson and early Nixonadministrations. It relates the Sihanouk controversy to the even more ferocious battle over enemyorder of batt le in South Vietnam and to the controversial CIA estimates-validated by subsequentevents-of strategic bombing and North Vietnamese morale and will to fight. The CIA analyticalprocess itself, and the reasons for its failure on Sihanoukville, get only perfunctory treatment. L _ ~ !Helms, Richard, A Look over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency (New York:Random House, April 2003). Helms gives an account of the political context similar to the oneprovided by Jack Smith for the DCl's biography. The account of the collection effort that ultimately

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C05260526rled to the shipping documents is unreliable, even fanciful, in its assertion that a CIA-owned truckwas inserted into the convoy system for Chinese ssed.] B. eyon.!a rueful acknowledgment ofshortcomings, the analytical process is not discussed.Smith, Russell Jack, TheUnknown CIA:My Three Decadeswith theAgency (Washington, DC:Pergamon-Brassey's International Defense PUblishers, Inc., 1989). Smith's autobiography providessome of the material for the Helmsmemoir. It differs in emphasis in its preoccupation with collisionsbetween CIA and the Nixon White House. Regarding the analytical controversy itself, Smith defendsOERwhen he recounts an undated episode, perhaps in 1968, in which MACV analysts admitted tohim with embarrassment the "shoddy, low-grade reports" onwhich they werj relYi7Their tentativeconclusions were right, he acknowledges, but only for the wrong reasons. 1

4 - Good Questions, Wrong Answers

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