The well-known New York Times correspondent narrates his experiences reporting on some of major events and conflicts of the years following World War II and discusses his interviews with such political figures as Mao Tse Tung and Fidel Castro.

Peking : covering the Civil War -- Yenan : At Mao Zedong's headquarters -- Battle for Manchuria -- Fall of Manchuria -- Nanking -- Battle of the Huai-Hai -- The Jesuits -- Crossing of the Yangtze -- The fall of Nanking -- Communist occupation -- Huang Hua and J. Leighton Stuart -- The purge of my China deputies -- The last battle : Hainan Island -- Saigon -- The China frontier -- Burma : the CIA operation -- The Kennedy brothers in Saigon -- Hanoi -- On the diplomatic beat and the Korean war -- Geneva accords : partition of Vietnam -- Berlin : cold war -- Moscow : the Sino-Soviet split and the Cuban missile crisis -- An evening with Fidel Castro -- President Kennedy -- Operation rolling thunder -- Smallbridge : mission to Hanoi -- Cambodia -- Sihanouk besieged -- The B-52 bombings -- The Indonesian holocaust and the downfall of Sukarno -- China watching : the cultural revolution -- Foreign editor -- The Pentagon papers -- Maoist purge of the party and government -- Zhou Enlai and the future of Taiwan -- Battle of the Pentagon papers -- The trial -- Fall of Indochina : America in retreat -- Epilogue : lessons of the Asian wars.