MCNAMARA ADDS SALT TO VIETNAM WOUNDS WITH HIS CONFESSION

Imagine if the Gulf War and Operation Desert Storm had turned suddenly sour and the United States had found itself mired in a desert war with a tenacious, well-armed enemy with impregnable defenses. Now imagine if, at that time, then-U.S. Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney had decided it would be wrong to escalate the Gulf War, send in additional U.S. troops and risk widespread loss of life.

But instead of saying so, instead of telling President Bush that he thought a protracted war in the Gulf would be a grave mistake, imagine Cheney had kept his convictions private and had gone about the business of waging war, while the numbers of American casualties swelled into the thousands and tens of thousands before U.S. forces finally pulled out of the Gulf beaten and demoralized for decades to come.

Now imagine Cheney writing a book to tell the American people that he knew the protracted war was wrong and that the very actions he directed in the Gulf he didn't support and believed would lead to unnecessary and excessive loss of American lives.

Of course the American people, the family members of the thousands killed, would be outraged. They would see Cheney as someone who was in a position to keep our boys out of a war we couldn't win, and they would rightfully resent him for not doing so.

Thank God, the Gulf War never got to that point. Saddam Hussein's vaunted army was no match for the overwhelming superiority of U.S. and allied forces, which assured a brief war with limited casualties.

But that can't be said about Vietnam, where the imaginary scenario laid out above really happened. Former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara is traveling around the country hawking his book, "In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam." It would have been better if Mr. McNamara would have taken his confession of betrayal -- betrayal of those who served under him and betrayal of the American people -- to the grave with him.

It is worth noting that the vast majority of the more than 58,000 names etched in the Vietnam Memorial are those who died after McNamara started to have second thoughts about the war -- second thoughts he waited until 20 years after the fall of Saigon to share with Americans. McNamara's book may assuage his conscience. It may settle the nightmare of Vietnam in his mind. But for those who served their country and lost friends and family in the war, his book and his shameless promotional tour to ensure it is a best-seller only add to their private hell -- a torment that would have been avoided had he abandoned what was later dubbed "McNamara's War."