I also understand you're not meaning to question Lewy's honesty, but as I see it that would be a logical corollary of questioning the report's existence, because of what I pointed out about the format Lewy uses in his original footnote. I'm quite familiar with the format Lewy is using from my own training in citing government documents--I trained under two specialists in this area, one of whom wrote a style manual on the subject that I employed in a research project involving government archives. Contrary to what the later article prompted by the 2004 campaign suggests, what Lewy has in his original footnote does not really leave open a viable possibility of an oral briefing, which would have had its own distinct format. If you want to satisfy yourself on this you might compare the format Lewy is using and his general documentation style with the guidelines for citing unpublished public/government documents laid out in such style manuals as Turabian (12.19) and the Chicago Manual of Style (15.374), as well as other historical works besides Lewy's which cite government documents and specifically military documents. (Contrast with Turabian 9.102 and 11.50 and Chicago 15.262-269 on the format used to cite interviews and personal communications.) The documentation in Lewy's original book follows these guidelines, more or less--as the Chicago Manual notes, there is some flexibility allowed among specialists, with the main demand being consistency by an author. This is the relevant point as far as whether Lewy is intending to reference a written report or oral briefing, because the documentation at stake here--the primary source for our discussion, if you will--is Lewy's original footnote, not the commentary in the later article--in other words, the article has the same relation to Lewy's original book as a secondary source to a primary one. The fact Lewy does not remember the circumstances of his footnote decades later during a politically-motivated and probably impromptu interview is not a criterion for documentation--no academic is required to remember the circumstances of an obscure footnote when called upon for an interview decades later, the very purpose of footnoting is to preserve a record to outlast the writer's memory--and does not affect the validity of his original documentation. So this is not really a "gotcha", it's more of a rhetorical dodge employed in Kerry and the VVAW's defense by the article. The article did not really give Lewy any space to elaborate on the issue, the author/editor seemingly placed a question to him and then put his answer in a context that suited a political purpose, characterizing it as an "admission", which is the article's own term rather than a direct quotation from Lewy. In the rush to get the article out in time to defend Kerry, I wonder how much effort was actually made to locate the report, beyond calling and quoting O'Donnell, who is a spokesman rather than a research assistant for the authors of politically-motivated articles--a phone call to a busy spokesman is not a substitute for the years of archival research Lewy did and hardly refutes it, and O'Donnell does not imply otherwise in his quoted remark. You will note that O'Donnell's quoted statement raises the possibility that "such records could have been destroyed or misplaced", rather than suggesting that there was no report. I see the odds of the report being refiled and/or reclassified as the most likely possibility, while the possibility of Lewy quoting a nonexistent report, in as much detail as he gives and in the format he uses, seems too remote to entertain as viable.
I am currently in the process of determining where in the National Archives a report such as Lewy describes should have been filed. If I come up with any significant information I will post it.
Might this help? James J. Reilley LTC USA (RET) said:
The U.S. Navy Criminal Investigative Service was tasked with investigating Lt Kerry's allegations. They found them to be baseless. Privately Naval Investigators expressed outrage at the ridiculousness of the accusations. The origins of the charges were often from supposed veterans who were found to have never served in Vietnam. It was slander that demoralized our forces, eroded our resolve, and gave aid and comfort to our enemy.
http://www.wintersoldier.com/staticpages/index.php?page=Reilley1
Did NCIS investigators speak to Reilley, and can he remember their names? Perhaps they can help find the report.
The fact Lewy does not remember the circumstances of his footnote decades later during a politically-motivated and probably impromptu interview is not a criterion for documentation--no academic is required to remember the circumstances of an obscure footnote when called upon for an interview decades later, the very purpose of footnoting is to preserve a record to outlast the writer's memory--and does not affect the validity of his original documentation. So this is not really a "gotcha", it's more of a rhetorical dodge employed in Kerry and the VVAW's defense by the article.
By "gotcha", I meant not so much Lewy's later memory but rather the embarrassment of WSI skeptics not being able to produce the NCIS report, heretofore trumpeted as proof of fraudulence, especially after assuming that it could be accessed if desired.
The article did not really give Lewy any space to elaborate on the issue, the author/editor seemingly placed a question to him and then put his answer in a context that suited a political purpose, characterizing it as an "admission", which is the article's own term rather than a direct quotation from Lewy.
He has many sympathetic forums, including here, within which to expand his remarks, his health permitting. He might be the go-to guy for finding the NCIS report.