[Chris A]

Yea another cut amd paste job but in all honesty Kerry should open them up for review.


This was written by a retired admiral and Annapolis graduate. The item
offers no direct testimony about Kerry, but it does provide informed
background useful in assessing what Kerry seems to have claimed for himself.
It confirms information I have received from other sources.

Our media should be demanding that Senator Kerry open his service records in
the same way they demanded that of President Bush regarding his NG service.

*****************

I was in the Delta shortly after he [Kerry] left. I know that area well. I
know the operations he was involved in well. I know the tactics and the
doctrine used. I know the equipment. Although I was attached to CTF-116
(PBRs) I spent a fair amount of time with CTF-115 (swift boats), Kerry's
command.

Here are my problems and suspicions:

(1) Kerry was in-country less than four months and collected, a Bronze Star,
a Silver Star and three purple hearts. I never heard of anybody with any
outfit I worked with (including SEAL One, the Sea Wolves, Riverines and the
River Patrol Force) collecting that much hardware so fast, and for such
pedestrian actions. The Swifts did a commendable job. But that duty wasn't
the worst you could draw. They operated only along the coast and in the
major rivers (Bassac and Mekong). The rough stuff in the hot areas was
mainly handled by the smaller, faster PBRs.

(2) Three Purple Hearts, but no limp. All injuries so minor that no time
lost from duty. Amazing luck. Or he was putting himself in for medals
every time he bumped his head on the wheel house hatch? Combat on the boats
was almost always at close range. You didn't have minor wounds. At least
not often. Not three times in a row. Then he used the three purple hearts
to request a trip home eight months before the end of his tour. Fishy.

(3) The details of the event for which he was given the Silver Star make no
sense at all. Supposedly, a B-40 was fired at the boat and missed. Charlie
jumps up with the launcher in his hand, the bow gunner knocks him down with
the twin .50, Kerry beaches the boat, jumps off, shoots Charlie, and
retreives the launcher. If true, he did everything wrong.
(a) Standard procedure when you took rocket fire was to put your stern
to the action and go balls to the wall. A B-40 has the ballistic integrity
of a frisbie after about 25 yards, so you put 50 yards or so between you and
the beach and begin raking it with your .50's.
(b) Did you ever see anybody get knocked down with a .50 caliber round and
get up? The guy was dead or dying. The rocket launcher was empty. There
was no reason to go after him (except if you knew he was no danger to you
just flopping around in the dust during his last few seconds on earth, and
you wanted some derring do in your after-action report). And we didn't shoot
wounded people. We had rules against that, too.
(c) Kerry got off the boat. This was a major breach of standing
procedures. Nobody on a boat crew ever got off a boat in a hot area.EVER!
The reason was simple. If you had somebody on the beach your boat was
defenseless. It coudn't run and it couldn' t return fire. It was stupid and
it put his crew in danger. He should have been relieved and reprimanded. I
never heard of any boat crewman ever leaving a boat during or after a
firefight.

Something is fishy.

Here we have a JFK wannabe (the guy Halsey wanted to court martial for
carelessly losing his boat and getting a couple people killed by running
across the bow of a Jap destroyer) who is hardly in Vietnam long enough to
get good tan, collects medals faster than Audie Murphy in a job where lots
of medals weren't common, gets sent home eight months early, requests
separation from active duty a few months after that so he can run for
Congress, finds out war heros don't sell well in Massachsetts in1970 so
reinvents himself as Jane Fonda, throws his ribbons in the dirt with the
cameras running to jump start his political career, gets Stillborn Pell to
invite him to address Congress and Bobby Kennedy's speechwriter to do the
heavy lifting, winds up in the Senate himself a few years later, votes
against every major defense bill, says the CIA is irrelevant after the Wall
came down, votes against the Gulf War, a big mistake since that turned out
well, decides not to make the same mistake twice so votes for invading Iraq,
but oops, that didn't turn out so well so he now says he really didn't mean
for Bush to go to war when he voted to allow him to go to war.

I'm real glad you or I never had this guy covering our flanks in Vietnam. I
sure don't want him as Commander in Chief. I hope that somebody from
CTF-115 shows up with some facts challenging Kerry's Vietnam record. I know
in my gut it's wildy inflated. And fishy .

-------------------------
When later asked about the severity of the wounds, Kerry said that one of them cost him about two days of service, and that the other two did not interrupt his duty. "Walking wounded," as Kerry put it.

[prospect]

Here's a link to a story on the Washington Times Chris.
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20...5623-9539r.htm

It gives us a pretty good run down on Karry's war time record. In Nam and back home. Quite disturbing. I enlisted in the USMC in 1970. I have no use for him, or Hanoi Jane.

Thanks for your service to our (the U.S.) country Chris.

[LANMaster]

Jeez, Chris, You have to post this over at brand X!

[LANMaster]

Link

by Ken Sherman
US Naval Reserve (Retired)
Not too long ago, Senator John Kerry made a remarkable demand in an early political season for remarkable statements: Senator Kerry Challenges President Bush to Debate on Vietnam Service.

Flashback: Thirty-three years ago, in April, 1971, John Kerry and I had important months. In April, 1971, I was in the first month of my second deployment to Vietnam with the US Navy. That month my logbook shows 69.7 flight hours. That month my crew and I flew ten missions in support of Operation Market Time. On these flights we flew our unarmed P-3B airplane on "tracks" - flight paths during which we descended to within 200 feet of the water and, after fixing the contact's position, speed, and course, took multiple photo runs to record a ship's on-deck cargo, electronics, and weaponry. Sometimes the contacts turned out to be neutral freighters or US warships. Sometimes they turned out to be Soviet bloc ships or our primary targets, Chinese or North Vietnamese ships trying to sneak weapons into South Vietnam with which to arm the enemy. When we came across such a ship, sometimes they tried to shoot us down. We had nothing with which to shoot back since Secretary of Defense McNamara had prohibited us from carrying any weapons of self-defense (even pistols for our survival vests) in an attempt to appease the enemy and "facilitate the peace talks."

April, 1971, was also a big month for Former-Lieutenant John Kerry, who had recently resigned his commission so as to be able to brand my shipmates and me monsters. During the so-called "Winter Soldier Investigation" hearings before Congress, Kerry said:
"I would like to talk, representing all those veterans, and say that several months ago in Detroit, we had an investigation at which over 150 honorably discharged and many very highly decorated veterans testified to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command....

"They told the stories at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.

"We call this investigation the "Winter Soldier Investigation." The term "Winter Soldier" is a play on words of Thomas Paine in 1776 when he spoke of the Sunshine Patriot and summertime soldiers who deserted at Valley Forge because the going was rough.

"We who have come here to Washington have come here because we f eel we have to be winter soldiers now. We could come back to this country; we could be quiet; we could hold our silence; we could not tell what went on in Vietnam, but we feel because of what threatens this country, the fact that the crimes threaten it, not reds, and not redcoats but the crimes which we are committing that threaten it, that we have to speak out?"
Congress, to its everlasting shame, demanded no proof of these allegations, but let them fester in the then-political atmosphere of running as fast as we could to abandon our allies in Vietnam and the rest of Southeast Asia. Subsequent writings, by high-ranking communist officials and generals, forthrightly thank Mr. Kerry for helping them achieve their subsequent military victory in Vietnam and realize the deaths of at least two-and-a-half million of their own people who were deemed "unnecessary" for the future (not to mention the later repudiation of these allegations by many respected historical researchers).

Fast Forward to the Present: Today, to add further insult to injury, Sen. Kerry harps upon his curiously brief service in Vietnam while assiduously censoring any mention of his activities afterwards in which he blood-libeled my shipmates.

Further, every day, Michael Moore and Kerry's other surrogates screech that President Bush "dodged the draft" by joining the National Guard and that he "deserted" from the Guard because 30+-year-old Guard records are incomplete (thereby demonstrating their ongoing total ignorance of the military and the vicissitudes of military paperwork).

Sen. Kerry has also demonstrated an utter lack of shame in scolding George W. Bush for bring up the subject of Viet Nam, when the President was questioned by reporters about his military service. Mr. Kerry dragged Vietnam into this campaign and now whines that somehow George W. Bush is at fault for bringing up the subject and trying to defend himself.

My shipmates and I served honorably in Vietnam and returned home, almost to a man, to resume normal lives, start families and businesses, get civilian jobs, pursue further education...all the normal stuff that veterans have been doing since after the Revolutionary War. That Mr. Kerry, a former naval officer and fellow Vietnam veteran, would say such things about us remains an indelible stain upon his name and honor.

Mr. Kerry has disgraced himself, by action and word, showing the whole world that he is foremost a career minded, self-centered opportunist, abetted by situational morality and driven by a lust for personal fortune at any cost. If he had any sense of honor, he would not attack President. Bush, but instead apologize to my shipmates, the rest of the US armed forces, and then to the American public, for they deserve far better than anything this stained, pitiful man has to offer.

Our thanks to Ken Sherman, US Naval Reserve (Retired), for this first-person perspective on the shameful anti-war activities of John Kerry. For more writings on this subject, please check out Viet Nam Vets Against Kerry and Kerry Country.

[EarthTech]

He does not need to be in office either.

[flyeater]

prospect I wouldn't take Ted Sampley, often quoted in the article, as a stable person.

"John Kerry gave aid and comfort to the enemy," said Mr. Sampley. "These guys he ran with after he left Vietnam, they were pretty radical."

He accused McCain of being a "Manchurian candidate" in 2000.
Sampley is probably nothing more then a publicity seeker.

[bassetman]

Poor Lan!

[LANMaster]

[bassetman]

One paragraph from flyeater
s link (thanks fly).

...When I told Sampley he had risked people's lives with the stunt, he accused me of being a spoilsport. He also said he was dismayed at missing the chance for newspaper coverage. It was a rare lost opportunity. Over the next couple of years, Sampley would succeed in attracting considerable press coverage of antics designed for that specific purpose. His favorite trick was to chain himself and others — preferably attractive MIA daughters — to the gates of the White House and throw fake blood at police, onto the White House lawn, or at Secret Service agents. ...

Another "reliable" NeoCon source!

I'll start worrying about the upcoming election when Lan gets enough confidence to stop posting all of these flimsy, clutching at straws accusations.

[LANMaster]

You just keep on reading Molly Ivins and Bill Moyers, Basset.
They bash Bush and Republicans, just the way you like it.

[flyeater]

In all fairness bassetman the writer of that piece may be off as well. I just don't understand why some writers don't assay their sources better. Sampley just doesn't sound like the kind of guy you would want speaking on your behalf.

[bassetman]

I think that happens all to often these days.

[LANMaster]

group hug.

[LANMaster]

Kerry Won't Release Vietnam Medical File

Former Sen. Max Cleland said Sunday there was no reason for Democratic presidential front-runner John Kerry to release his full medical file - including records documenting the injuries that won him three Purple Hearts in Vietnam - calling requests for the Vietnam records "the height of hypocrisy."

"That might be the height of hypocrisy, for people who never went to Vietnam [to ask for Kerry's wartime medical file]," Cleland, a leading Kerry backer, told WABC Radio's Steve Malzberg.

"I mean - I felt a wound. John Kerry felt a wound," he added.

Sen. Cleland, who lost three limbs in Vietnam but never received a Purple Heart, said Kerry's physical sacrifice had been just as great as his own, telling Malzberg, "I don't see any difference."

When pressed on why he thought Kerry didn't need to release his full medical file, Cleland shot back: "You read the book 'Tour of Duty.' I'm not going to get into an argument with you here. Let's just say we have a clear choice in America."

However, when asked two weeks ago about the severity of Kerry's wounds, "Tour of Duty's" author Douglas Brinkley explained, "They were minor."

The issue of whether Sen. Kerry should release his medical files could become a prickly one for the candidate, especially since he has been less than forthright about personal medical issues in the past.

In February 2003, Kerry underwent an operation for prostate cancer. But he had declined to reveal the condition for months, even when reporters asked about his health. When he finally went public with the news, Kerry claimed that the cover-up had been necessary because his doctors "had not settled on a course of treatment."

When he ran for president in 2000, George Bush released his full medical file, a disclosure so complete that it came to include Bush's 1970s dental files this year.

The exchange between Cleland and Malzberg went like this:

MALZBERG: There's been criticism, fair or unfair, that within the first 24 hours [John Kerry] had his first purple heart. He got three in four months without even a day of duty lost from wounds, according to his training officer. But he will not release his Purple Heart medical treatment reports. ... And he is the only person keeping them from being released. Would you call on him to release all of his records, sir?

CLELAND: Well, look here. I mean - ah, ah - I think - ah - that might be the height of hypocrisy, for people who never went to Vietnam - as Shakespeare said, "Those who jest at scars never felt a wound." I mean - I felt a wound. John Kerry felt a wound.

MALZBERG: But you never received a Purple Heart, sir.

CLELAND: May I just say, when he was the skipper of his boat with five enlisted men in that situation - going into the jaws of death every day - he had to rely on his instincts for survival. And he and his crew were one. They were a band of brothers. Now, under that situation they saved each others' lives. He also saved the life of a Special Forces officer out of the Mekong Delta River, Jim Rassmussen [sic]. And he is campaigning around America for Kerry even though he's a Republican.

The point being, we've been there, done that, gotten a few holes in our T-shirt and we've come back to America to say war is the last resort, not the first resort.

MALZBERG: I understand, sir. But you were a hero. You lost three limbs, sir, and you don't have a Purple Heart. He barely missed a day and he has three of them. And I'm just saying, why not end the controversy. ... Why not see what the injuries were, sir?

See the inconsistency?

CLELAND: May I just say to you and all your listeners, if you want know the full story of John Kerry and the Vietnam War, just go out and buy a book that's on the New York Times best-seller's list called "Tour of Duty." ... If we get bogged down in guerrilla wars in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in the Balkans and all around, we're going to see repeats of Vietnam. ...

Now that people are going after John Kerry for supposedly being weak on defense, especially by those who never went to war. I mean, you talk about a short term, George Bush had eight months dropped from his tour. He never even completed his tour of duty.

MALZBERG: Well sir, Kerry got out early, also - Kerry got out six months early as well.

CLELAND: Yeah, because he got wounded.

MALZBERG: But we don't know the extent of those wounds, sir.

CLELAND: I got out five weeks early because I got blown up.

MALZBERG: Yes, but don't you see the difference? You lost three limbs.

CLELAND: I don't see any difference.

MALZBERG: We don't know what happened to Kerry because he won't let us know.

CLELAND: That's not true. You read the book "Tour of Duty." I'm not going to get into an argument with you here. Let's just say we have a clear choice in America. And the great citizens of New York have a great choice on Tuesday. ... We don't have to repeat another Vietnam.


Link


Talk about inserting Vietnam into the election.
Bring it on!!!

[LANMaster]

Kerry's Krazy Klaims About Vietnam Vets

Americasvoice.org
Specialist E5 Bruce A. Seibert
March 2, 2004

Excerpt:

February 24th, was the thirty-fifth anniversary of my arrival, at the age of 19, in what was the free Republic of Vietnam. I was stationed at Can Tho Army Airfield in the Mekong Delta from February '69 to February '70. The first two months I was there overlapped with Monsieur Kerry's last two months "in country". During those two months he had to have motored his Swiftboat right past our base many times.

In the year I was there, I learned how to be an unofficial "ambassador" soldier in my off duty time. Contrary to the horrendous and utterly false picture eminating from the imagination of Swiftboat Commander Kerry about we soldiers who lived among the people, we were not feared by that country's citizens with whom I became acquainted. On the contrary, I made many close Vietnamese friends who welcomed me into their homes and businesses as a friend. I had a girlfriend, Lan Nuyen, in the village of Bien Xe Moi, whose sister had married a GI and was living in Watertown, Massachusetts -- ten miles from where I grew up in Wakefield. I visited her when I returned home before losing track of them both in 1971.

Ask any Vietnam refugee, "Who was the aggressor in that war?" Ask why they chose to come here to America. Was it because we were so brutal and cruel to them, or because they knew us Americans to be kind, generous, and willing to fight for THEIR freedom.

It was the Kerry hearings which gave the American soldier in Vietnam a false and disgraced reputation. His word is not to be believed. He can not deny that his public professions hurt our efforts to end the war with a positive result, otherwise known as victory.

Neither can he deny the smearing of my reputation as a patriotic American, along with my brothers, who sacrificed blood, sweat and tears in an effort to hold back the tide of totalitarianism and its slaughter of innocents for the Communist ideal.


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