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The Viet Nam war, in particular, has exposed the weaknesses of the briefing ritual. The requirement of brevity means that briefers must rely heavily on hard facts and statistics, even when dealing with subjects that defy quantification. Time and again, military briefers in Viet Nam have "proved" that the war was being won with the help of impressive "body counts" of enemy dead that were impossible to verify, let alone dispute. With the aid of computers, U.S. officials were equally sanguine about stating to the decimal point how many villages were "secure" in Viet Nam. Such was the faith in the quantity of weaponry unloaded on the Communists that military briefers would confidently announce in detail the damage that had been done, when in fact they had no way of knowing for sure. Passed on to higher headquarters, summaries of misleading summaries contributed to the deepening U.S. military involvement in Viet Nam. As described in the current issue of the Atlantic by former Under Secretary of the Air Force Townsend Hoopes, Dean Acheson told Lyndon Johnson to his face that he had been consistently misinformed by "canned briefings" from the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
No Departure
A saying in Viet Nam is that there are only two ways to make general: by fighting or by briefing. It is no secret that General Earle Wheeler owed his elevation to Army Chief of Staff partly to the fact that he impressed President Kennedy with his skill as a briefer. Without exception, an officer is briefed before he goes on a mission and debriefed after it. Base commanders take great pride in showing off their briefing rooms and their graphics departments, which turn out an unending stream of impressive audio-visual aids. "When we briefed General Westmoreland," recalls one officer in Viet Nam, "we knew that we must fill at least 30 minutes even if the information did not require it. So we made our charts more complicated, our graphs more detailed. It all took up time." But it has impressed the South Vietnamese, who have become as adept as their allies at briefing. On this front, at least, the U.S. can be confident of withdrawing without a South Vietnamese collapse.
As in any ritual, the military briefer is not supposed to depart from traditional practice. His performance is frequently inspected as closely as his uniform for flaws. He must speak in a neutral, colorless voice that nonetheless conveys enthusiasm. He must not stumble in his grammar or pronunciation; ambitious junior officers understandably devote many idle hours to perfecting their delivery. A briefing may begin with a comment intended to jolt the audience into paying attention, or at least staying awake. It might, for example, start with the statement: "We have won the war in Viet Nam." Or, depending on the audience and the need for additions to the military budget: "We are losing the war in Viet Nam." If the briefer is in the Air Force, he makes three points—no more, no less. If he has only two, then he must contrive a third.