Lords of Death Forums Lords of Death Forums LoD General Discussion The Real John Kerry

Was Cambodia "seared, seared" into his memory? I don't question his medals accept for the Silver star with Combat V. It has never existed. It is redundant. Alot of truly brav emen served their whole tours and went back recieving for more injury the Kerry ever did. He was there 4 months. He only enlisted in the Navy after his two attempts at deferments were turned down as to prevent himself from being drafted into the Army. The "volunteered" statement is a bit disengenuous. I have nbo doubt that he acted with valor at times in Vietnam. I have real problems with his anti sercurity stances since he was elected.The pacifist doesn't survive long in the real world. I am not willing to risk my kids futures on a guy who's world view is one of idealism and not realism.
Rahl

Can you show me a link where Bush asked the Swiftboat ads to be pulled? I am pretty confident he never did so. He says all 527 ads are a "problem" and we should get rid of them. Interesting that he is the guy that signed McCain Feingold with the 527 loophole intact. Maybe he got beat at his own game on this one? There have been several recent articles about how Republicans are looking to begin exploiting the loophole now. I think he is pretty disengenuous(sp?) on this one.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/04/politics/campaign/04money.html
Republican 527 committees are also starting to raise money, though they are still far behind the Democratic organizations that began their work last year.
"The buzz was 'which 527 are you going to work with?' " Mr. Steel said. "Folks who are passionate about the election are already making those connections."
One organization that made the most of the convention was the Club for Growth, a conservative group that runs a 527 committee. The group held two events, one featuring Republican governors like Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and Bill Owens of Colorado and the other involving Senator Zell Miller, a Democrat from Georgia who spoke at the convention.
The parties were designed to "woo donors" rather than to collect checks, said Stephen Moore, the president of the group. "We feel poised to raise several million in the next several weeks based on the contacts that we made. People are pumped up."

You said show you ANY articles that show that any of these articles contain lies. I think I have done so. Why is my shit propoganda and yours is not?

So this is an article by a guy who was in Korea who claims that in his opinion what the official military records say about John Kerry's service don't seem possible? I'm not sure what use this article is as it is pure specuation.
One interesting part that has been proven to be false is section 3 where it talks about how Kerry violated SOP when he beached his swift boat. In reality this was a strategy that the Swift Boat Cmdrs had agreed on before hand and was cited as the type of agressive patroling that would be rewarded.
The following article is from the second of 3 swift boat commanders that were there that day when Kerry received the silver star. I highlighted the part where it discusses the plan to go into the attackers as it completely contradicts the Korean Vet's assertion.
By William B. Rood
Chicago Tribune
Published August 22, 2004
There were three swift boats on the river that day in Vietnam more than 35 years ago--three officers and 15 crew members. Only two of those officers remain to talk about what happened on February 28, 1969.
One is John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate who won a Silver Star for what happened on that date. I am the other.
For years, no one asked about those events. But now they are the focus of skirmishing in a presidential election with a group of swift boat veterans and others contending that Kerry didn't deserve the Silver Star for what he did on that day, or the Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts he was awarded for other actions.
Many of us wanted to put it all behind us--the rivers, the ambushes, the killing. Ever since that time, I have refused all requests for interviews about Kerry's service--even those from reporters at the Chicago Tribune, where I work.
But Kerry's critics, armed with stories I know to be untrue, have charged that the accounts of what happened were overblown. The critics have taken pains to say they're not trying to cast doubts on the merit of what others did, but their version of events has splashed doubt on all of us. It's gotten harder and harder for those of us who were there to listen to accounts we know to be untrue, especially when they come from people who were not there.
Even though Kerry's own crew members have backed him, the attacks have continued, and in recent days Kerry has called me and others who were with him in those days, asking that we go public with our accounts.
I can't pretend those calls had no effect on me, but that is not why I am writing this. What matters most to me is that this is hurting crewmen who are not public figures and who deserved to be honored for what they did. My intent is to tell the story here and to never again talk publicly about it.
I was part of the operation that led to Kerry's Silver Star. I have no firsthand knowledge of the events that resulted in his winning the Purple Hearts or the Bronze Star.
But on Feb. 28, 1969, I was officer in charge of PCF-23, one of three swift boats--including Kerry's PCF-94 and Lt. j.g. Donald Droz's PCF-43--that carried Vietnamese regional and Popular Force troops and a Navy demolition team up the Dong Cung, a narrow tributary of the Bay Hap River, to conduct a sweep in the area.
The approach of the noisy 50-foot aluminum boats, each driven by two huge 12-cylinder diesels and loaded down with six crew members, troops and gear, was no secret.
Ambushes were a virtual certainty, and that day was no exception.
Instructions from Kerry
The difference was that Kerry, who had tactical command of that particular operation, had talked to Droz and me beforehand about not responding the way the boats usually did to an ambush.
We agreed that if we were not crippled by the initial volley and had a clear fix on the location of the ambush, we would turn directly into it, focusing the boats' twin .50-caliber machine guns on the attackers and beaching the boats. We told our crews about the plan.
The Viet Cong in the area had come to expect that the heavily loaded boats would lumber on past an ambush, firing at the entrenched attackers, beaching upstream and putting troops ashore to sweep back down on the ambush site. Often, they were long gone by the time the troops got there.
The first time we took fire--the usual rockets and automatic weapons--Kerry ordered a "turn 90" and the three boats roared in on the ambush. It worked. We routed the ambush, killing three of the attackers. The troops, led by an Army adviser, jumped off the boats and began a sweep, which killed another half dozen VC, wounded or captured others and found weapons, blast masks and other supplies used to stage ambushes.
Meanwhile, Kerry ordered our boat to head upstream with his, leaving Droz's boat at the first site.
It happened again, another ambush. And again, Kerry ordered the turn maneuver, and again it worked. As we headed for the riverbank, I remember seeing a loaded B-40 launcher pointed at the boats. It wasn't fired as two men jumped up from their spider holes.
We called Droz's boat up to assist us, and Kerry, followed by one member of his crew, jumped ashore and chased a VC behind a hooch--a thatched hut--maybe 15 yards inland from the ambush site. Some who were there that day recall the man being wounded as he ran. Neither I nor Jerry Leeds, our boat's leading petty officer with whom I've checked my recollection of all these events, recalls that, which is no surprise. Recollections of those who go through experiences like that frequently differ.
With our troops involved in the sweep of the first ambush site, Richard Lamberson, a member of my crew, and I also went ashore to search the area. I was checking out the inside of the hooch when I heard gunfire nearby.
Not long after that, Kerry returned, reporting that he had killed the man he chased behind the hooch. He also had picked up a loaded B-40 rocket launcher, which we took back to our base in An Thoi after the operation.
John O'Neill, author of a highly critical account of Kerry's Vietnam service, describes the man Kerry chased as a "teenager" in a "loincloth." I have no idea how old the gunner Kerry chased that day was, but both Leeds and I recall that he was a grown man, dressed in the kind of garb the VC usually wore.
The man Kerry chased was not the "lone" attacker at that site, as O'Neill suggests. There were others who fled. There was also firing from the tree line well behind the spider holes and at one point, from the opposite riverbank as well. It was not the work of just one attacker.
Our initial reports of the day's action caused an immediate response from our task force headquarters in Cam Ranh Bay.
Congratulatory message
Known over radio circuits by the call sign "Latch," then-Capt. and now retired Rear Adm. Roy Hoffmann, the task force commander, fired off a message congratulating the three swift boats, saying at one point that the tactic of charging the ambushes was a "shining example of completely overwhelming the enemy" and that it "may be the most efficacious method of dealing with small numbers of ambushers."
Hoffmann has become a leading critic of Kerry's and now says that what the boats did on that day demonstrated Kerry's inclination to be impulsive to a fault.
Our decision to use that tactic under the right circumstances was not impulsive but was the result of discussions well beforehand and a mutual agreement of all three boat officers.
It was also well within the aggressive tradition that was embraced by the late Adm. Elmo Zumwalt, then commander of U.S. Naval Forces, Vietnam. Months before that day in February, a fellow boat officer, Michael Bernique, was summoned to Saigon to explain to top Navy commanders why he had made an unauthorized run up the Giang Thanh River, which runs along the Vietnam-Cambodia border. Bernique, who speaks French fluently, had been told by a source in Ha Tien at the mouth of the river that a VC tax collector was operating upstream.
Ignoring the prohibition against it, Bernique and his crew went upstream and routed the VC, pursuing and killing several.
Instead of facing disciplinary action as he had expected, Bernique was given the Silver Star, and Zumwalt ordered other swifts, which had largely patrolled coastal waters, into the rivers.
The decision sent a clear message, underscored repeatedly by Hoffmann's congratulatory messages, that aggressive patrolling was expected and that well-timed, if unconventional, tactics like Bernique's were encouraged.
What we did on Feb. 28, 1969, was well in line with the tone set by our top commanders.
Zumwalt made that clear when he flew down to our base at An Thoi off the southern tip of Vietnam to pin the Silver Star on Kerry and assorted Bronze Stars and commendation medals on the rest of us.

Error in citation
My Bronze Star citation, signed by Zumwalt, praised the charge tactic we used that day, saying the VC were "caught completely off guard."
There's at least one mistake in that citation. It incorrectly identifies the river where the main action occurred, a reminder that such documents were often done in haste and sometimes authored for their signers by staffers. It's a cautionary note for those trying to piece it all together. There's no final authority on something that happened so long ago--not the documents and not even the strained recollections of those of us who were there.
But I know that what some people are saying now is wrong. While they mean to hurt Kerry, what they're saying impugns others who are not in the public eye.
Men like Larry Lee, who was on our bow with an M-60 machine gun as we charged the riverbank, Kenneth Martin, who was in the .50-caliber gun tub atop our boat, and Benjamin Cueva, our engineman, who was at our aft gun mount suppressing the fire from the opposite bank.
Wayne Langhoffer and the other crewmen on Droz's boat went through even worse on April 12, 1969, when they saw Droz killed in a brutal ambush that left PCF-43 an abandoned pile of wreckage on the banks of the Duong Keo River. That was just a few months after the birth of his only child, Tracy.
The survivors of all these events are scattered across the country now.
Jerry Leeds lives in a tiny Kansas town where he built and sold a successful printing business. He owns a beautiful home with a lawn that sweeps to the edge of a small lake, which he also owns. Every year, flights of purple martins return to the stately birdhouses on the tall poles in his back yard.
Cueva, recently retired, has raised three daughters and is beloved by his neighbors for all the years he spent keeping their cars running. Lee is a senior computer programmer in Kentucky, and Lamberson finished a second military career in the Army.
With the debate over that long-ago day in February, they're all living that war another time.

"More extreme than Hillary and Kucinich: Among the White House wannabes, long-shot Rep. Dennis Kucinich has the reputation of holding the most left-wing congressional voting record. In fact, this ?honor? goes to Kerry.
According to American Conservative Union, Kerry has a lifetime rating of 6 percent, compared to 13 for the demolished Rep. Dick Gephardt, 14 for Sen. John Edwards, 15 for Kucinich and 19 for Sen. Joe Lieberman.
Sens. Hillary Clinton and Tom Daschle score 13 percent. Only the likes of Sens. Teddy Kennedy and Barbara Boxer have more left-wing records than Kerry. In contrast, Sen. John Breaux, one of the upper chamber?s few remaining moderate Democrats, has a 46."
According to the non-partisan ranking system Kerry is the 11th most liberal senator. His votes are more liberal than Hilary, but I didn't see anything on Kusinch since he is on the house.
Here is an interesting article that provides a more detailed explanation of the rating system and the thinking behind it.
http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2004/0830nj_liberalratings.htm

Unfortunately Dr. Leston did not sign the call sheet which records the treating doctor.
http://www.nationalreview.com/york/york200405041626.asp
Here is some other info about the lies http://swiftvets.eriposte.com/kerrypurpleheart1.htm
Here is some info that describes why people should get a purple heart. Note there is no rule about how serious the wound must be. http://www.slate.com/Default.aspx?id=2105532&
Finally, Republican truth teller Bob Dole in his own book said the following about how he received his first purple heart.
"As we approached the enemy, there was a brief exchange of gunfire. I took a grenade in hand, pulled the pin, and tossed it in the direction of the farmhouse. It wasn't a very good pitch?remember, I was used to catching passes, not throwing them. In the darkness, the grenade must have struck a tree and bounced off. It exploded nearby, sending a sliver of metal into my leg?the sort of injury the Army patched up with mercurochrome and a Purple Heart."
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0434/mondo5.php

John Kerry's First Purple Heart:
Purple Heart 1
The Doctor who treated him tells the story.
Over 200 veterans that served DIRECTLY with John Kerry signed a letter saying

http://swift1.he.net/~swiftvet/article.php?story=20040629220813790
I think he lied about certain incidents and he isnt releasing his medical records like he said during "Meet the Press".


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4 against over 200 that served with John Kerry.

Like I have said before, you can probably discredit 10% of these vets that have there name up there. They can renig, take back what they said, get paid off, it goes both ways. But keep in mind the majority by far says that Kerry was deceitful.

There is another falsehood in here as well worth noting.
A good case in point is John Kerry's fantastic claim of having spent Christmas in Cambodia in 1968, during the Nixon administration (Hello? LBJ was still in office at the time). Of course, Kerry's story is pure gobbledygook, and even more amazingly, he repeated it on number of occasions, including the floor of the Senate! According to John O'Neill and Jerome Corsi, authors of the new book Unfit for Command, "Kerry was never ordered into Cambodia by anyone and would have been court-marshaled had he gone there. During Christmas 1968, Kerry was stationed at Coastal Division 13 in Cat Lo. Coastal Division 13's patrol areas extended to Sa Dec, about fifty-five miles from the Cambodian border." One of the crewmen, Steve Gardner, explicitly stated during a television interview last week that he was always on the boat, and it never went into Cambodia.
O'neil actually told Pres. Nixon HE HIMSELF was in Cambodia.
Check this out.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200408250004
Also just for fun you should check out the debate from the dick cavett show between those two. There is a special on CNBC I saw last night that was really interesting.
Here is a link to the transcript, but seeing the video is much cooler.., http://www.seanrobins.com/kerry/kerry_1971_06_30_Dick_Cavett.htm

Kerry didn't say a word until the swift boaters started. He was perfectly happy to let his "allies" bash Bush. Problem with the Dems is they can't take a punch only dish em out.

The other guy isn't running for President of the United States so I don't care...