But then Vera took him aside for a confidential assessment.

Last fall, NATO determined in a confidential assessment that it would take 200,000 troops to invade and occupy Kosovo, and several weeks to muster them.

"Many members of the research community and Congress would interpret this as an attempt to disband N.I.H." and would "thus opppose it initially," according to a confidential assessment by the budget office.

This confidential assessment is conducted annually and draws on expertise from a wide range of departments and agencies of government.

Last fall, NATO conducted a confidential assessment that determined it would take 100,000 to 200,000 allied troops to invade and secure Kosovo.

Less than a month before the London attacks, Britain's top intelligence and law enforcement officials said in a confidential assessment that the threat from Al Qaeda's "leadership-directed plots has not gone away."

While some senior Administration officials lavishly praised Mexico's record, the confidential assessment, by the Drug Enforcement Administration, painted a much darker picture.

According to a confidential assessment by the United States Central Command, the laboratory was intended to produce anthrax.

When two American satellite makers shared certain technical information with Chinese rocket scientists, they committed three major security breaches, according to a confidential assessment by the Pentagon.

These confidential scholarly assessments of a tenure candidate's work form the basis for the decision to grant a permanent position on the faculty.