WITH ARMSTRONG'S TRIAL dates and hearings approaching, hints of the tactics that will be deployed are beginning to emerge. It already seems clear that the lawyers lined up against Armstrong are going to subpoena witnesses in an attempt not just to defend existing reporting but to generate new evidence and testimony.

Up until the L'Équipe story was published, The Sunday Times' defense strategy was going to likely involve obtaining witness statements in support of Walsh and L.A. Confidentiel from O'Reilly and other sources—used on and off the record—as a way to prove that there were reasonable grounds to suspect Armstrong had doped. But in response to the new French allegations, the paper's solicitors have begun to reevaluate their strategy. According to Gillian Phillips, the paper's house solicitor, the L'Équipe story could help the paper win its case by showing that it was acting responsibly. "We don't have to show he did take drugs," she asserts, "but that there are a sufficient number of incidents to give rise to this suspicion."

Whether the Times can enter the L'Équipe allegations into the trial is not a given, and if the UCI's investigation drags on, the ultimate credibility of the L'Équipe exposé could remain in limbo. "It's a difficult [strategy], because to a large extent we are frozen at the time of [the Times story's] publication," says Phillips.

Court documents from the June 15, 2004, complaint suggest that Armstrong's solicitors will attack Walsh's "personal campaign" against Armstrong to insinuate that he has used performance-enhancing drugs without any evidence to support his accusations.

Armstrong's solicitors also accuse the paper of using the article to promote sales of L.A. Confidentiel and provide The Sunday Times with a scoop without providing adequate time for Armstrong to respond before the story was printed.

The French case against La Martinière differs from the Sunday Times trial because O'Reilly and Swart are also named as defendants. In addition, French libel law is more in line with U.S. law, with its stricter standard for what constitutes libel and the requirement that the plaintiff (Armstrong) and his chief lawyer, Nice-based Donald Manasse, prove that he was defamed.

La Martinière's defense lawyer, Paris-based Thibault de Montbrial, will try to prove "good faith." "This is defined as proving in court that the authors made a serious investigation," he says, "that they granted Mr. Armstrong the right to answer and that, before they went to print, the sum of all the papers, testimony, and documents of any kind would lead them with good faith to believe what they wrote is true, and that they wrote it in a prudent way."

However, de Montbrial has no interest in attempting to prove Armstrong doped. His job, he says, is only to show that the book and the defendants attached to it are not guilty of defamation.

Meanwhile, SCA's attorney in Dallas, John Bandy, says he plans to go beyond the allegations in L.A. Confidentiel and investigate anyone who might know anything connecting Armstrong to doping.

SCA had underwritten a policy for Tailwind Sports, the parent company of Armstrong's team, for back-to-back wins in the 2001 and 2002 Tours, which paid out $1.5 million, and for Armstrong's fifth win, in 2003, when the insurer paid $3 million. The disputed third payout, for $5 million, covered Armstrong's bonus for his sixth win.

Through Tailwind Sports, Armstrong sued to push the payment dispute into arbitration, as the policy specified. And although the case is in arbitration—meaning it will be handled outside of a courtroom, with no judge or jury—Texas law still applies, and witnesses could face perjury charges for false testimony. "We will be trying to get at what people really know—at the facts," Bandy says. "We'll subpoena sources for the book, but I wouldn't want to restrict it to people in the book. We may very well depose people who weren't in the book."

Though there will be plenty of testimony in the SCA case, don't expect to hear any of it. Earlier this year, Armstrong's lawyers obtained a protective order that prohibits those involved from discussing details of the case, possibly even after the verdict.

Greg LeMond and Betsy Andreu have both told Outside that they've been subpoenaed in the SCA case and asked to testify in the Sunday Times case. Another source for Walsh's book who acknowledges that he's been subpoenaed is Frankie Andreu. It's more than likely that he'll be questioned about allegations of any doping programs in place when he rode for Motorola and Postal.

As for calling on Armstrong to testify under oath about whether or not he used performance-enhancing drugs, defense lawyers in the defamation and libel suits doubt it will happen, saying that they'll probably rely only on Armstrong's testimony taken in external depositions. John Bandy, of SCA Promotions, says he's doesn't know yet whether he will question Armstrong.