[QUOTE=minty green]
For those who, unlike certain people, think that context matters, the photo in question was taken in 1993, when Senator Kerry and that other well-known commie traitor, Senator McCain, visited Vietnam in an effort to locate American servicemen listed as missing in action from the Vietnam war.
[QUOTE]
Yes. I beleive that’s stated in my cite. It’s stated in the Swiftvet book as well. What you are neglecting to mention is that it hangs in the war remnants museum, “honoring heroes who had helped the Vietnamese Communists win the war against the United States.”
More Freeper cites! Scylla, I have to remind you that I already reported in “one of the past consecutive threads” that one of the authors of *Unfit for command * is also a contributor of free Republic, I am getting tired of this circular cite behavior!
“We would like to thank the communist parties and working class of the countries of the world, National Liberation movements, nationalist countries, peace-loving countries, international democratic organizations, and progressive human beings for their wholehearted support, and strong encouragement to our people’s patriotic resistance against the US for national salvation.”
Now, I’m sure John McCain would contradict that last sentence at great length and great volume, but everything else this Diem Quynh has to say is right on the money. What’s so “amazing”?
Did Senator Kerry write that inscription? Approve its language? Even fucking know about it before the right-wing whack jobs started masturbating over it?
Sweat it not, minty. I’m sure they have a picture of Kerry accepting the honor with gratitude, just like they’ve been able to come up with all that evidence about all the other charges levelled against Kerry by the Swift Vets.
I know. All those happy fun-loving POWs being treated so well!
from the cite:
"Candidate in this year’s American presidential elections, John Kerry, who fought in the war, went further in his criticism. In a statement to the US’ Senate Committee on Foreign Relations in 1971, he said the war crimes committed by US soldiers in Southeast Asia “were not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command.”
Do you really think that’s true? He says that every officer over there was involved and it was a day to day thing. He says the Swiftees did it too. He confesses to being a war criminal!
If it is true and he is this war criminal, blowing people up with his .50 caliber machine guns, burning villages and sampans, killing innocents, women and children… like he says he did how could you possibly vote for the sonovabitch who could do such things.
If it’s true, he’s a fucking war criminal. “They told me to do it” didn’t work at Nuremburg. If he was out there killing innocents with full knowledge he’s no better than the guy throwing jews in the oven at Aushwitz.
If it’s not true, he slandered everyone who served over there.
BTW, just to be clear about Kerry’s own alleged participation in “war crimes,” he was talking about the US policy of free fire zones, a policy that he was ordered to enforce. You may feign horror at this, if you believe it will help your own war criminal win an election, but don’t forget to spread your outrage around to all those Swift Boat vets you love so much who also participated in free fire zones.
Is it your position that everyone who enforced the FFZ policies in Vietnam are the “scum of the earth,” or is it just Kerry?
If your answer is yes, have you ever spoken up about this policy before or did you suddenly find your conscience over the summer?
No, only that it was done “on a day-to-day basis” and “with the full awareness of officers at all level of command” – not by “every officer.” And as he stated it, I am fully prepared to believe it. Given what we know about that war now, you’d be insane to doubt it.
Like in those silly discussions were it was being pondered who Bin Laden should want as president, the answer for both the current threat and the Vietcom guys is the same:
We don’t give a shit if you congratulate Americans for ending the war, the realization that the war was stupid doesn’t mean we are making you any favors even if you believe so. The biggest reason to end the war was for us to be ready when a real necessary war appeared in our mist (still waiting for this one though). War was not the only solution or the only way to have our victory, you should ponder that in the end, you guys still ended up working for Nike.
Since I haven’t seen it brought up in the discussion, here is the link to the 2004 Pulitzer-prize-winning series on some of the U.S. atrocities in Vietnam.
“There are all kinds of atrocities, and I would have to say that, yes, yes, I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other soldiers have committed in that I took part in shootings in free fire zones. I conducted harassment and interdiction fire. I used 50 calibre machine guns, which we were granted and ordered to use, which were our only weapon against people. I took part in search and destroy missions, in the burning of villages. All of this is contrary to the laws of warfare, all of this is contrary to the Geneva Conventions and all of this is ordered as a matter of written established policy by the government of the United States from the top down. And I believe that the men who designed these, the men who designed the free fire zone, the men who ordered us, the men who signed off the air raid strike areas, I think these men, by the letter of the law, the same letter of the law that tried Lieutenant Calley, are war criminals.”
and here’s another:
“We established an American presence in most cases by showing the flag and firing at sampans and villages along the banks. Those were our instructions, but they seemed so out of line that we finally began to go ashore, against our orders, and investigate the villages that were supposed to be our targets. We discovered we were butchering a lot of innocent people, and morale became so low among the officers on those ‘swift boats’ that we were called back to Saigon for special instructions from Gen. Abrams. He told us we were doing the right thing. He said our efforts would help win the war in the long run. That’s when I realized I could never remain silent about the realities of the war in Vietnam.”
And actually no, I have no problem with free-fire zones. They actually put more responsibility on the commander in the field, and simply state that there are areas where a commander may fire first on encountering the enemy, and not have to wait either for permission or to be shot at.
The fact that Kerry misrepresents this is yet another lie.
Sam has misinterpreted the words. For example one could ask:
does “the full awareness of officers at all levels of command” really mean “every officer over there was involved”?
One might form a different view of these words to sam’s, and ultimately come to different conclusions.
Sam is indifferent to truth and has instead made an undertaking to oppose Kerry, using any rhetorical device or trick that comes to hand, including deliberately misinterpreting the words.