of the documentary, Morris distills McNamara's philosophy of war into eleven basic tenets: Lesson #1: Empathize with your enemy. McNamara repeats this sentence several times throughout the documentary. He discusses a moment during the Cuban Missile Crisis when he and Kennedy were trying to keep the United States out of war, but General Curtis LeMay wanted to invade Cuba. Kennedy received two messages from Nikita Khrushchev during the Crisis, which McNamara refers to as the "soft message" and the "hard message." He says the first message sounded like it came from a "drunk man or one under a lot of stress" and stated that, if the United States guaranteed it would not invade Cuba, the missiles would be removed, while the second stated that, if the United States attacked Cuba, "we're prepared to confront you with masses of military power." Llewellyn Thompson, a former US ambassador to Moscow who knew Khrushchev personally, urged Kennedy to respond to the soft message, as he believed Khrushchev would be willing to remove the missiles if, afterward, he could draw attention away from the fact that he had failed to establish nuclear weapons in Cuba by taking credit for saving Cuba from being invaded by the US. Kennedy eventually agreed with Thompson and the situation was resolved without further escalation. Lesson #2: Rationality alone will not save us. McNamara emphasizes that it was luck that prevented nuclear war—rational individuals like Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro came close to destroying themselves and each other. He states that the possibility of nuclear destruction still exists today. Lesson #3: There's something beyond one's self. This lesson refers to McNamara's private life. He states that "there's something beyond one's self and a responsibility to society" while discussing when he started to court his wife, Margaret Craig McNamara, and had a child. Around this time, WWII began and McNamara became the youngest assistant professor at Harvard. Lesson #4: Maximize efficiency. McNamara was brought back from the Eighth Air Force and assigned to the 58th Bomb Wing. He flew in some of the first B-29s, which, it was hoped, would be able to destroy targets much more efficiently and effectively than earlier bombers, and was responsible for analyzing bombing operations and making recommendations for improvements. Lesson #5: Proportionality should be a guideline in war. McNamara talks about the proportions of cities destroyed in Japan by the US before the dropping of