John Kerry and Vietnam

Great Debates
381

Name them. Who are they? Is one of them O’Neil, who wasn’t there?

Is one of them Thurlow, who was there but has offered dubious accounts?

Is one of them the doctor who remembers treating a minor wound on an officer he met exactly once? What a phenomenal memory this man has, remembering minor wounds thirty years after the fact! Pity he didn’t sign anything.

Is one of them Hibbard, who later claims not to have known much about Kerry?

Is one of them Zumwalt, who approved Kerry’s awards, and said of him:

“Lt. Kerry’s calmness, professionalism and great personal courage under fire were in keeping with the highest traditions of the US Naval Service.”

Would it be Steve Gardner? The one man on Kerry’s boat that disagrees with the rest of Kerry’s crew? This Steve Gardner?

http://urbanlegends.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0%2C8599%2C599034%2C00.html

"…But PCF-44 Gunner’s Mate Stephen M. Gardner—in a long telephone interview from his home in Clover, South Carolina—has a starkly different memory. “Kerry was chickenshit,” he insists. “Whenever a firefight started he always pulled up stakes and got the hell out of Dodge.” …

“…So it was with a sense of genuine relief when PCF-44’s Jim Wasser telephoned me last week with the news that Gardner had “rung him up out-of-the-blue” to discuss their shared days together in Vietnam. “It was great” Wasser told me. “You know he fought bravely in Vietnam. He is still a brother. I miss him. I would like to see him.” He then hesitated and went on. “But he has developed a strange, negative assessment of Lieutenant Kerry. It shocked me. His memory is dead wrong. He remembers things so differently.… He has some kind of weird grudge against Lieutenant Kerry.”…”

That Steve Gardner?

382

Name them. Who are they? Is one of them O’Neil, who wasn’t there?

Is one of them Thurlow, who was there but has offered dubious accounts?

Is one of them the doctor who remembers treating a minor wound on an officer he met exactly once? What a phenomenal memory this man has, remembering minor wounds thirty years after the fact! Pity he didn’t sign anything.

Is one of them Grant Hibbard, who later claims not to have known much about Kerry?

Is one of them Zumwalt, who approved Kerry’s awards, and said of him:

“Lt. Kerry’s calmness, professionalism and great personal courage under fire were in keeping with the highest traditions of the US Naval Service.”

Would it be Steve Gardner? The one man on Kerry’s boat that disagrees with the rest of Kerry’s crew? This Steve Gardner?

http://urbanlegends.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0%2C8599%2C599034%2C00.html

"…But PCF-44 Gunner’s Mate Stephen M. Gardner—in a long telephone interview from his home in Clover, South Carolina—has a starkly different memory. “Kerry was chickenshit,” he insists. “Whenever a firefight started he always pulled up stakes and got the hell out of Dodge.” …

“…So it was with a sense of genuine relief when PCF-44’s Jim Wasser telephoned me last week with the news that Gardner had “rung him up out-of-the-blue” to discuss their shared days together in Vietnam. “It was great” Wasser told me. “You know he fought bravely in Vietnam. He is still a brother. I miss him. I would like to see him.” He then hesitated and went on. “But he has developed a strange, negative assessment of Lieutenant Kerry. It shocked me. His memory is dead wrong. He remembers things so differently.… He has some kind of weird grudge against Lieutenant Kerry.”…”

That Steve Gardner?

“…Then there is Gardner’s bold claim that Kerry use to take PCF-44 four or five miles from shore every night so not to get shot at. When pressed how this could be so, since oftentimes they were 25 miles upriver, he backed down. “Okay, when we were in the rivers we didn’t go to sea,” he averred. “But he always tried to park it away from the action and hide.” The other members of PCF-44 were incredulous when they heard Gardner’s claim. To Wasser it was “erroneous to his memory,” to Zaladonis “just not true,” to Whitlow “false” and to Hatch “a falsehood.”…”

Is this the one you mean?

“…claims that Kerry once threatened him with a court martial. The incident happened when Gardner, who told me he had “no trouble shooting gooks,” saw a Viet Cong guerilla with an AK-47 in a boat and started firing. “I lay the hammer down on him,” Gardner explains. “I just put a finger on the gun: boom, boom, boom, boom. He’s done. He got flipped out of the boat, he went straight down. That’s when Kerry came running out of the guntub screaming ‘ceasefire, ceasefire, ceasefire.’ Then he turned to me and said, ‘I ought to have you court-martialed for shooting.’ I said, ‘Hmmph…sorry big boy. When somebody brings a gun up on me I’m gonna shoot and I’ll ask questions later ‘cause I ain’t goin’ back in a body bag.’” …”

383

Name them. Who are they? Is one of them O’Neil, who wasn’t there?

Is one of them Thurlow, who was there but has offered dubious accounts?

Is one of them the doctor who remembers treating a minor wound on an officer he met exactly once? What a phenomenal memory this man has, remembering minor wounds thirty years after the fact! Pity he didn’t sign anything.

Is one of them Grant Hibbard, who later claims not to have known much about Kerry?

Is one of them Zumwalt, who approved Kerry’s awards, and said of him:

“Lt. Kerry’s calmness, professionalism and great personal courage under fire were in keeping with the highest traditions of the US Naval Service.”

Would it be Steve Gardner? The one man on Kerry’s boat that disagrees with the rest of Kerry’s crew? This Steve Gardner?

http://urbanlegends.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0%2C8599%2C599034%2C00.html

"…But PCF-44 Gunner’s Mate Stephen M. Gardner—in a long telephone interview from his home in Clover, South Carolina—has a starkly different memory. “Kerry was chickenshit,” he insists. “Whenever a firefight started he always pulled up stakes and got the hell out of Dodge.” …

“…So it was with a sense of genuine relief when PCF-44’s Jim Wasser telephoned me last week with the news that Gardner had “rung him up out-of-the-blue” to discuss their shared days together in Vietnam. “It was great” Wasser told me. “You know he fought bravely in Vietnam. He is still a brother. I miss him. I would like to see him.” He then hesitated and went on. “But he has developed a strange, negative assessment of Lieutenant Kerry. It shocked me. His memory is dead wrong. He remembers things so differently.… He has some kind of weird grudge against Lieutenant Kerry.”…”

That Steve Gardner?

“…Then there is Gardner’s bold claim that Kerry use to take PCF-44 four or five miles from shore every night so not to get shot at. When pressed how this could be so, since oftentimes they were 25 miles upriver, he backed down. “Okay, when we were in the rivers we didn’t go to sea,” he averred. “But he always tried to park it away from the action and hide.” The other members of PCF-44 were incredulous when they heard Gardner’s claim. To Wasser it was “erroneous to his memory,” to Zaladonis “just not true,” to Whitlow “false” and to Hatch “a falsehood.”…”

Is this the one you mean?

“…claims that Kerry once threatened him with a court martial. The incident happened when Gardner, who told me he had “no trouble shooting gooks,” saw a Viet Cong guerilla with an AK-47 in a boat and started firing. “I lay the hammer down on him,” Gardner explains. “I just put a finger on the gun: boom, boom, boom, boom. He’s done. He got flipped out of the boat, he went straight down. That’s when Kerry came running out of the guntub screaming ‘ceasefire, ceasefire, ceasefire.’ Then he turned to me and said, ‘I ought to have you court-martialed for shooting.’ I said, ‘Hmmph…sorry big boy. When somebody brings a gun up on me I’m gonna shoot and I’ll ask questions later ‘cause I ain’t goin’ back in a body bag.’” …”
Joe Ponder, maybe?

"…"My daughters and my wife have read portions of the book ‘Tour of Duty.’ They wanted to know if I took part in the atrocities described. I do not believe the things that are described happened.

Let me give you an example. In Brinkley’s book, on pages 170 to 171, about something called the ‘Bo De massacre’ on November 24th of 1968… In Kerry’s description of the engagement, first he claimed there were 17 servicemen that were wounded. Three of us were wounded. I was the first…"

Seems Mr. Ponder belongs in a category all his own…

Bob Hildreth?

From Bob Novaks column: "…Typical is the quote by Bob Hildreth, commanding an accompanying boat: “I would never want Kerry behind me. I wouldn’t want him in front of me, either. And I sure wouldn’t want him commanding our kids in Iraq and Afghanistan.”…

He doesn’t like John Kerry. That is the sum total of his testimony.

Shelton White? Testifies entirely about Kerry’s Senate testimony and the “lies” he avers therein. Has no futher expertise to offer.

Would any of these be the “17”? Men whose opinions directly contradict the men who served directly and immediately with Kerry?

Tell me why, exactly, you think we should give great creedence to these men?

384

(groan)

I beseech and implore the Compassionate Ones, who sit at the right hand of The Cecil, that they make the partial posts go away.

385

Oh, and his ex-girlfriend still likes him…and how many of us can say that!

http://www.hedgefundmistress.com/JohnKerryScrapbook.html

386

There is an editorial in today’s New York Times about the Swiftboat Veterans:

The Link.

Summary: Just how stupid do they think people are?

The NY Times editors believe that the campaign is pitched beyond the admittedly high level of credulity the American public shows these days.

This new toughness by the newspapers is nail in the coffin stuff for the current Administration. Probably a product of contrition for the soft ride they have given George W Bush thus far. Penitence.

Forget it Sam. When the news leaders come out with commetary like this:-

It is over.

I can’t wait to go see the meltdown at the S’Vets website, I do confess.

387

Pat Buchanan on John Kerry’s veracity with regards to Viet Nam and Cambodia.

Buchanan writes:

“Kerry had told this dramatic story before, in the Boston Herald, Oct. 14, 1979, with a different twist as to who had fired on the young Navy lieutenant on that unforgettable Christmas Eve.”

Buchanan continues:

Just how “very real,” how “seared” in Kerry’s memory that raid into Cambodia was – with Nixon lying about our not being there as Lt. John Kerry took fire – is now open to question.

First, because Richard Nixon was not president on Christmas Eve, 1968. Lyndon Johnson was.

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=39985

Now, ya gotta admit, that’s funny.

388

Back from the S’Vets website. Suffer they do.

In a most entertaining manner though. They post in a very curious argot, replete with brisk troops-under-fire attitude. One can nearly hear the incoming:

  • That’s affirmative!

Let’s Roll!

Outstanding!

This needs to be fisked fast!

Close all watertight doors and hatches, it looks like rough seas ahead!
*

And LOTS of BOLD TYPE, Ex!clamation! Po!ints! & Punchy Abbreviations (P-A).

Go S-Vs!

389

Razorsharp you are missing the point a little here. However you are in company with Pat Buchanan so don’t fret overly.

It would be utterly droll if Kerry had said those were his thoughts at the time, in 1968. Alas no such comedy is there to be found.

Kerry made the comment in 1979. The absurdity he points to is the contrast between his 1968 experiences and the subsequent claims of President Nixon.

Indeed it was a very real absurdity. Merely one not apparent to Kerry until some time after 1968.

390

Hi Sam.

Loathe as I am to bring up an earlier point of discussion and dominate the posting in this sequence. I note that you never answered my question on whether Kerry’s biography was an autobiography.

From the previous link I note that it wasn’t. Doubtless you knew this. Given the generally sucessful tone of this thread I hope you did not avoid answering my question because you were cognizant of the consequences for the argument you were making.

If I may summarise: Sam’s point was that Kerry had lied via his biography because there were omissions and possible errors in the detail. The general tone of rejoinders was that an error of recollection was just as likely.

Now that we know Kerry wasn’t the author, that rather takes the heat off him, does it not. The contents of the biography can only be evidence of the honesty and diligence of the author. But I rather too much suspect you knew that Sam.

Anyway that was in another country and besides the wench is dead. Bye now.

391

Sam, didn’t you say you were trying to withdraw from this subject (understandably)? Or that you were “trying to reserve judgement {yeah, right}until you’d read the book”? The book, and the affidavits in whose veracity you have absolute confidence on the basis of some bloggers’ sayso but which remarkably haven’t appeared, will be out right after David Kay’s report validating your belief in Saddam’s WMD’s.

392

You know, I just can’t help but marvel at the Republican double-standard when it comes to the importance of truthfulness in evaluating someone’s character.

John Kerry may or may not have been in Cambodia. The point is murky. Surely it isn’t difficult to appreciate how a young man, set off on a mission as part of a generally horrific military adventure, might give himself premature credit for having entered another country to give him something to boast about. The mere fact that he got close enough to the border to make the story reasonably plausible tells us more about his character than any minor exaggeration would. I mean, Jeez. Anyone whose gotten shot up as much as he has on our country’s behalf ought to be allowed a little bravado — assuming it is that. And especially when you consider the obvious party to compare him to.

Speaking of which, do I really have to make a case that President Bush is a huge liar? Or should I, as Sam would undoubtably put it, “reserve judgment?” Kerry never told a Polish audience that we found WMDs in Iraq when we hadn’t. Nor has he tried to justify the war by saying that Saddam wouldn’t let inspectors back in when, in fact, he did. But, please, let us reserve judgment.

You all recall, I am sure, Ronald Reagan’s recent death. I kept hearing about what a strong, marvellous character he had. And, actually, I will admit that, although he wasn’t quite the second coming he’s been cracked up to be, the man made some good moves. But the man sure told some whoppers. My favorite was him telling the prime minister if Israel not once but TWICE that he had been there for the liberation of the concentration camps when, in fact, he had never left California during the war. Not only was that a lie, it was a spectacularly creepy lie. Compared to that, Kerry’s Christmas-in-Cambodia story seems even more like mere applesauce than it already is. And, by the way, strange as it may seem, I never saw conservatives lining up to tell us what a goshawful liar Reagan was. Quite the opposite in fact.

By further comparison, look at how hard Republicans have had to work to make Democrats out to be liars. They told us the Clintons were guilty of doing some really horrible stuff in Whitewater and that all their protestations of innocent were lies and it turned out to be a load of crap. They told us the Cliintons were lying about not killing Vincent Foster and that turned out to be a load of crap. They accused Al Gore of having claimed to have invented the Internet and that turned out to be a load of crap — he NEVER said that.

So why are certain parties here in such a sweat over Christmas in Cambodia?

393

If a Democrat had:

Outed an active duty CIA agent to journalists;

Leaked news of a successful mole inside Al Qaeda to justify the use of an orange alert, thus blowing the operation;

Been CEO of Haliburton;

Been appointed president by the Supreme Court vote that went along party lines;

They would have been hearings until the 22nd century. We call them on these acts and they say we’re crazed consipiracy theorists.

But to them, it is perfectly logical that in 1968, John Kerry used the United States Navy as a giant prop in an elaborate scheme to sieze the White House 36 years later.

394

braintree:

Because otherwise they have to try and uphold Bush fils.

And that’s becoming nigh near impossible to do.

But it’s certainly fun to watch people (Sam Stone particularly, and now Razorsharp too!) huff and puff mightily to make Kerry out to be the bogeyman.

395

Can you provide a cite that the President said this?

396

Is the White House official site itself good enough for ya?

397

Kel Varnsen, just Google this quote:

“You remember when [Secretary of State] Colin Powell stood up in front of the world, and he said Iraq has got laboratories – mobile labs – to build biological weapons,”

398

[Nelson Muntz voice]Ha, ha! I win![/NMv]

399

I commend your skepticism. Hope the Miami Herald will do:

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/special_packages/iraq/5980577.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp&1c

The money quote (cut and pasted by yours truly):

“We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories,” Bush told Polish television. “They’re illegal. They’re against the United Nations resolutions, and we’ve so far discovered two.”

Tsk tsk.

By the way, I did make a slight, inconsequential error. Bush told Polish television which is not exactly a live audience. But, hey, he did say it and it was for television.

Since I knew we hadn’t found any WMDs or labs, I don’t see that the freakin’ President of the United States has any excuse for not knowing it too. :dubious:

400

[hijack] What new toughness? The report of 3 soldiers killed in Iraq was on the inside pages of today’s (19 Aug) LA Times. The statements of the president are still on the front page, as they should be, and the followup corrections to all the misstatements are still on page 15 three days later, as they should not be.

Goddammit, the prez says we are in a war of survival against people who “hate freedom.” Take him at his word an put all the news of his idiocy right up front.
[/hijack]