The Battle For Facts Continues Amid War.

Officials have worked to limit reporters since Vietnam.

Facts hardly got off the ground during the first two weeks of the air war against the Serbian dictatorship. American expectations of substantial military openness with the press were lost in NATO's bureaucratic (and distinctly British) efforts to conceal even basic facts about the war and to use briefings mainly as propaganda sessions. The Pentagon did better, but it was strapped by a post-Vietnam policy of stiffing the press, worsened by an alliance with countries lacking a strong First Amendment tradition.