posted on May 3, 2004 10:34:56 AM new
From the people who knew Kerry best during his Glory daze.
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Kerry 'Unfit to be Commander-in-Chief', Say Former Military Colleagues
By Marc Morano
CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer
May 03, 2004
(CNSNews.com) - Hundreds of former commanders and military colleagues of presumptive Democratic nominee John Kerry are set to declare in a signed letter that he is "unfit to be commander-in-chief." They will do so at a press conference in Washington on Tuesday.
"What is going to happen on Tuesday is an event that is really historical in dimension," John O'Neill, a Vietnam veteran who served in the Navy as a PCF (Patrol Craft Fast) boat commander, told CNSNews.com . The event, which is expected to draw about 25 of the letter-signers, is being organized by a newly formed group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.
"We have 19 of 23 officers who served with [Kerry]. We have every commanding officer he ever had in Vietnam. They all signed a letter that says he is unfit to be commander-in-chief," O'Neill said.
O'Neill, currently a Houston, Texas, based attorney, is no stranger to Kerry. O'Neill served in the same naval unit as Kerry and commanded Kerry's swift boat after Kerry returned to the United States. Kerry's command of the PCF boat lasted four months and ended shortly after he received his third Purple Heart. According to naval regulations at the time, any sailor who received three Purple Hearts could request a transfer out of the combat zone.
Kerry and O'Neill engaged in a nationally televised debate in 1971 on The Dick Cavett Show over Kerry's allegations that many Vietnam soldiers had routinely engaged in atrocities such as raping and cutting off ears and heads of Vietnamese soldiers and citizens. Kerry was the then spokesman for the anti-war group Vietnam Veterans Against the War.
"We are going to be presenting a letter that deals with Kerry's unfitness to be commander and chief that has been signed by hundreds of swift boat sailors, including most of those who served with Kerry," O'Neill explained.
"The ranks of the people signing [the letter] range from admiral down to seaman, and they run across the entire spectrum of politics, specialties, and political feelings about the Vietnam War," he added.
Among those scheduled to attend the event at the National Press Club and declare Kerry unfit for the role of commander-in-chief are retired Naval Rear Admiral Roy Hoffman, who was the commander of the Navy Coastal Surveillance Force, which included the swift boats on which Kerry served.
Also scheduled to be present at the event is Kerry's former commanding officer, Lt. Commander Grant Hibbard. Hibbard recently questioned whether Kerry deserved the first of his three Purple Hearts that he received in Vietnam. Hibbard doubted both the severity of the wound and whether it resulted from enemy fire.
"I've had thorns from a rose that were worse" than Kerry's wound for which he received a Purple Heart, Hibbard told the Boston Globe in April.
Organizers are confident that Tuesday's event and the letter with hundreds of signatures will educate people about Kerry.
"It is one of the largest outpourings of concern about him being commander-in-chief that anybody could have in a presidential campaign and it is by the people who know him best," O'Neill said.
'Unfit Commander-in-Chief'
Swift Boat Veterans For Truth maintains that Kerry's fellow Vietnam veterans are almost uniform in their disdain for his military service and anti-war protests.
"Not only a majority of the people who served with him feel that way, but a vast and overwhelming majority," O'Neill said. He added that more than "ninety percent of the people contacted by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth responded to the request to sign their name, with only 12 declining to sign.
"Comrades who actually served with him, almost all of them, are opposed to him, and believe he would be an unfit commander in chief and intend to bring the truth of his actual record to the attention of the American people," O'Neill said.
O'Neill hopes the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth can reveal to the American people what he sees as Kerry's flawed character.
"In the military, loyalty between commanders and the troops serving them is a two-way street. We have here a guy (Kerry) that with all of us in the field [in Vietnam] -- actually fighting the North Vietnamese -- came home and then falsely accused all of us of war crimes at a time when the people in uniform couldn't even respond," O'Neill said.
"And he did that knowing that was a lie," he added.
'Real John Kerry'
B. G. Burkett, author of the book Stolen Valor and a military researcher, believes that Tuesday's event will not be dismissed easily by Kerry's campaign as a "partisan" attack.
"There are probably just as many Democrats amongst sailors who sailed swift boats as there are Republicans. What Kerry fails to realize is this has nothing to do with politics -- this has to with Vietnam Veterans who served, who have a beef with John Kerry's service, both during and after the war," Burkett told CNSNews.com.
"The American people do not know John Kerry and hopefully the swift boat crews and other Vietnam veterans will make sure that the American public knows the real John Kerry," he added.
Jim Loftus of Kerry's press office referred questions about Swift Boat Veterans for Truth's event on Tuesday to spokesman David Wade. Wade did not return CNSNews.com's requests for comment.
"The Secret Service has announced it is doubling its protection for John Kerry. You can understand why — with two positions on every issue, he has twice as many people mad at him." —Jay Leno
[ edited by Bear1949 on May 3, 2004 10:35 AM ]
posted on May 3, 2004 10:57:45 AM new
Hey, Kerry did his time unlike Bush. McCain and now Bob Dole have defended him. I hope the cons keep it up, because it will backfire on them.
posted on May 3, 2004 11:32:07 AM new
Keep telling yourself that barewitch
"The Secret Service has announced it is doubling its protection for John Kerry. You can understand why — with two positions on every issue, he has twice as many people mad at him." —Jay Leno
posted on May 3, 2004 01:53:53 PM new
Being an independent I call it as I see it. In my opinion McCain and Dole are honorable men. There are many unanswered questions about bush's service that I would like to see answered.
posted on May 3, 2004 06:37:02 PM new
There's not too many unanswered questions about kerry's post-VietNam days.....his words are on tape.
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Yep, bear this VN issue isn't going to go away no matter how much the lefties wish it would.
Here's part of an article Linda Chavez wrote for Townhall.com at the end of last month.
"Kerry has since tried to backtrack on what he said three decades ago, last week telling NBC's Tim Russert that he probably shouldn't have used the words "war crimes" or "genocide" to describe U.S. action in Vietnam and claiming -- falsely, since his words belie him -- that he wasn't speaking of the actions of soldiers but rather of political leaders.
But he has never made any attempt to explain his defense of the communists we were fighting in Vietnam.
In his testimony, Kerry described the Vietnam War as a "civil war, an effort by a people who had for years been seeking their liberation from any colonial influence whatsoever."
That view -- which depicted Ho Chi Minh as a nationalist hero and totally ignored the Soviet Union's involvement in training and funding the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong -- was embraced by naïve romantics as well as communist propagandists and apologists in the anti-war movement.
The young Kerry seems to have fallen in the latter category, communist apologist. Under questioning from the Committee, Kerry referred to the democratically elected government of South Vietnam -- our allies -- as a "dictatorial regime, the Thieu-Ky-Khiem regime," while respectfully calling the North Vietnamese communist regime we were fighting by its oxymoronic official name, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, and the murderous Viet Cong's political arm by their preferred "Provisional Revolutionary Government."
He claimed the Vietnamese people "didn't even know the difference between communism and democracy," saying, "I think you will find they will respond to whatever government evolves, which answers their needs, and those needs quite simply are to be fed, to bury their dead in plots where their ancestors live, to be allowed to extend their culture, to try and exist as human beings."
In response to a follow-up question, Kerry said, "you can satisfy those needs with almost any kind of political structure, giving it one name or the other. In this name (sic) it is democratic; in others it is communism; in others it is benevolent dictatorship."
But communist victory in Vietnam did make a difference. The communist victors killed hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese after the fall of Saigon, forced more than 1.5 million into "re-education camps" and caused two million others to flee Vietnam altogether.
Kerry has never retracted his communist apologia, leading Stephen J. Morris, senior fellow at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at the Johns Hopkins University to charge this week that Kerry "sympathized with the communist cause."
Speaking on my syndicated radio program on Monday, Morris said, "John Kerry's life since 1971 with regard to Vietnam and Cambodia has been a policy of attempting to atone for ever fighting against them. ... He has bottled up a resolution from ever appearing in the U.S. Senate concerned with human rights in Vietnam today; he has never once expressed a public criticism of the government of Vietnam with respect to its human rights policy."
John Kerry deserves to make atonement to the Vietnamese people -- not for what he did as a young soldier but for what he has done ever since to justify communist tyranny in Vietnam and elsewhere.
posted on May 3, 2004 06:56:04 PM new
Sorry Bear - I realize that your world bgins and ends with the military but I like to look at what people have accomplished in at least the 3 most recent decades of their life.
Can you imagine what would happen if someone you had dealt with in your 20's woulld say about you now? Come on guys - it's the 21st century - can we get out of the 60's now please?
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If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
[ edited by fenix03 on May 3, 2004 06:57 PM ]
posted on May 3, 2004 07:26:58 PM new
His past statements about his country's actions, about communism and about our democracy....ARE important issues to us currently when making a decision whether he has the courage and will to defend this country.
He's been quoted recently as saying Iraq doesn't have to be a democracy. Kind of ties into his long ago beliefs [then]....and current lack of support belief in a democracy.
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"John Kerry, the presumed Democratic nominee for president, was quoted by a student newspaper at West Virginia's Bethany College in 1971 as saying, "Our democracy is a farce; it is not the best in the world."
Kerry made the remarks on Nov. 2, 1971, according to the Bethany College student newspaper, The Tower . CNSNews.com has obtained a copy of the article written by John Majors, which details Kerry's visit to the college and appeared in the Nov. 11, 1971 issue of the newspaper. At the time, Kerry was still a leader of the anti-war group, Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW).
"There is a disbelief in the American Dream," Kerry was quoted as saying. "People are questioning if it is really a dream or if the dream still exists," Kerry reportedly told the students gathered in the school's Weimer Lecture Hall.
Two weeks after his appearance at Bethany College, Kerry resigned as a leader of the VVAW during the group's meeting in Kansas City.
That's the same meeting, in which VVAW members allegedly discussed the possibility of assassinating U.S. senators still committed to the American war effort in Vietnam.
During his speech to Bethany College students, Kerry was quoted as saying that communism did not pose any kind of threat to the United States.
posted on May 3, 2004 07:36:07 PM new
Our President has vowed to hunt down terrorists, undermine nations that support terrorism and foster Democracy in totalitarian nations. John Kerry sees little value in democracy.
In 1971, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Kerry said, "I think that politically, historically, the one thing that people try to do, that society is structured on as a whole, is an attempt to satisfy their felt needs, and you can satisfy those needs with almost any kind of political structure, giving it one name or the other. In this name it is democratic; in others it is communism; in others it is benevolent dictatorship. As long as those needs are satisfied, that structure will exist."
And April 14, 2004, "I have always said from day one that the goal here ... is a stable Iraq, not whether or not that's a full democracy. I can't tell you what it's going to be, but a stable Iraq. And that stability can take several different forms." - (LA Times)
The Democrat Party has changed since the time of Jackson, Roosevelt, Truman and even JFK, but shouldn't a Democrat at least believe in Democracy? Even Bill Clinton, a man deserving of no respect or credit, realized the value of our system of governance, "From our birth, America has always been more than just a place. America has embodied an idea that has become the ideal for billions of people throughout the world. Our founders said it best: America is about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." - Bill Clinton (1995 speech on Bosnia)
An American President should acknowledge the value of our system, given that America is the most free and prosperous nation on earth. To imply that it is no better than totalitarianism, communism, fascism or monarchy is incongruent with the philosophy and spirit of America.
Would Kerry have made the sacrifices necessary to break from England and win our independence? Would he have fought Hitler or engaged in the Cold War? His statements lead me to believe otherwise.
A final quote:
"It is in the interest of both parties not to give a chance to those who shed the blood of nations for their limited personal interest and obedience to the gang of the White House ... This war earns millions of dollars for big companies, whether those who manufacture weapons or those involved in reconstruction, such as Halliburton and its sisters and daughters .... Rational people do not risk their security, money and sons to appease the White House liar."
Who said that - was it Senator Kerry or another Democrat? No, it was Osama Bin Laden. It is odd that Senator Kerry's statements and sentiments are more closely in line with America's enemies than with the great Democrat leaders of the past.
However, I am not questioning Kerry's patriotism, only his judgment.
Thanks to James Taranto's "Wall Street Journal Best Of The Web" for providing inspiration and resource.
posted on May 3, 2004 08:24:21 PM new
Linda - I aam actually shocked that you want demcracy in Iraq. Considering that you believe they were all raised to hate us it surprises me that you want any type of government where all muslims can can run the show.
~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~ • ~~~
If it's really "common" sense, why do so few people actually have it?
posted on May 3, 2004 08:50:56 PM newSorry Bear - I realize that your world begins and ends with the military but I like to look at what people have accomplished in at least the 3 most recent decades of their life.
Fenix, I understand what you are saying. The point is, that Kerry himself has based his campaign on his war record. I doubt he would ever shut up about it. And as such any flack he draws about it is deserved.
"The Secret Service has announced it is doubling its protection for John Kerry. You can understand why — with two positions on every issue, he has twice as many people mad at him." —Jay Leno
posted on May 3, 2004 09:13:04 PM new
"Yep, bear this VN issue isn't going to go away no matter how much the lefties wish it would."
Kerry and those that support him had best get ready. It has nothing to do with politics. It has everything to do with Truth & Honer of those that served in Vietnam. Kerry made his bed with Stolen Valor.
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