Posted on 08/09/2004 6:35:18 PM PDT by mass55th
I was doing a search on Google to see when Ron Kovic had been in Vietnam, and discovered that he had enlisted in the Marines in 1964 and did two tours of duty in Vietnam. I saw the movie "Fourth of July" when it first came out, and I'd like some help from fellow Freepers, to try to ascertain the facts behind his disability.
If I recall correctly, the movie portrays him as having been shot in the back and paralyzed. However, I found this on a website about him:
"After these experiences, Ron wanted to go home. He began stepping on booby traps so that he might get injured enough to be sent back home. When a trap blew off his heel and then it shattered his spinal chord, Kovic realized that he would never walk again."
This is the link to the whole page: Ron Kovic
Is this another Max Cleland situation? I know that Kovic protested against the war upon his return, but he was also very critical about the VA hospitals and the treatment afforded the wounded vets. If he did in fact, deliberately step on a booby trap to get home, then he basically had nobody but himself to blame for his condition, yet chose to blame the government for his plight.
There are some mysteries that are best left mysterious.
I believe that the movie was mostly BS, but I cannot prove it because I never heard of Kovic until after I saw that flick.
I appreciate his service, but I also find the entire matter to be heart wrenching!
A 10ft. pole isn't long enough for this one.
Yes, you're correct, that's exactly what his web site says. That's certainly a discrepancy.
HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Not that clever. John Kerry is hardly a Ron Kovic.
I doubt that Ron Kovic would ever run for the Presidency on the glory of his Nam days. Kovic maintains that Nam was a bad war-- he isn't airbrushing it into the Revolutionary War and recanting most of his antiwar activities to get elected.
Kovic actually got injured. Kerry lied to get medals. It's night and day.
We respect people who serve. I have no problem with Kovic, but I have a lot of problems with Kerry.
Oliver Stone directed it, so we know it was BS.
Unless he runs for President of the United States on his War Record, presents his disability as being caused by enemy fire which is contradicted by over 250 fellow soldiers, I do not care.
Until then , it does not affect my life & I do not care. I have more important things to worry about.
The press is still despised whether they know it or not. I don't know a single vet who'd want his sister or daughter out with a "newsie".
So, the question is "did Kovic" suffer a self-inflicted wound or not?
I know a couple of guys who think they blew themselves up with grenades on their third tour ~ not a mark on them! Then there's my cousin who split up something like 4 or 5 tours in the Marines with a year out of the service just hanging around a hospital trying to find his head.
He's much better now!
It's just my opinion but I think the government under the leadership of the Democratic party decided to punish my generation by wasting it's best people. Some of us figured it out sooner than others. Bill Clinton, for instance, will never figure it out. He wanted to be one of the folks doing the wasting.
Kovic has a better grasp of his demons now than he did 30+ years ago ~ frankly I didn't think he'd survive this long. His wound is horrifying.
Agreed. At this point it just doesn't matter.
I am loathe to challenge the combat record of *any* veteran, and if Kerry hadn't made such an issue of his own record it would apply to him too.
I realize that Kovic's medals were justified, but if he did in fact, step on booby traps to get sent home, well, isn't that an extreme measure to take? I mean, there were plenty of other things he could have done to get out of there. He obviously was having some emotional problems and perhaps even mental problems over some of the things he'd done in Vietnam, ie., shooting a fellow solidier by accident, etc. Couldn't he have just bugged out and gotten shipped home?
I'd heard of soldiers self-inflicting wounds in other wars, just so they'd be sent home. In the Civil War, soldiers used to shoot their thumbs off to get a medical discharge. I just think someone has to be pretty desperate to do something like that.
That seems deeply improbable. Me thinks he would have risked death rather than pursue certain maiming.
At this point in time..."It don't mean nothin'"
Ron Kovic is cut from the same bolt of cloth as Kerry. Kovic's story is tragic, only in the sense of the poor treatment of vets in the VA hospitals. However, it was his shameless self-promotion (resulting in a movie directed by Oliver Stone and starring Tom Cruise) that made me very leary of him. Also, the scene in the movie where he tells the grieving parents of the kids he killed in Vietnam (friendly fire) that he, not the enemy, killed their son; he didn't give a fudge about the parent's feelings, only how much better he felt after confessing. What a jerk!
Kovic is about as sincere as Rudy. Remember the movie with Sean Astin about the kid who badgers everyone until he actually gets to play in a Notre Dame game? Well, the flip side of that story is that Rudy was a shameless self promoter who took his creepy life story and hustled a book and movie out of it. Gee, it sounds like Ron Kovic!
Now, this is Kerry all over again. Kerry takes a film camera to Vietnam with him to film his personal heroism (I can safely say that I know of no other person who has ever done that). He then films reenactments of battle scenes (dressed in Army gear - you saw some of it in the film about Kerry at the Demonic Convention). He then "discovers" that the war is bad and ends up running for Congress in a liberal, anti-war district. Common theme? Shameless self-promotion. Kerry, Kovic and Rudy should be in the cabinet together!
What's next, My Dog Skip?
My brother was a grunt in the Army in Vietnam (66-67). He didn't have an 8mm camera to record his heroics. All he had was a lousy Kodak camera. And up until Kerry's, I'd never heard of or seen any home-made movies of 'Nam.
Kerry was against the war before he even joined the Navy. He'd railed against military involvement there in his graduation speech at Yale. When he got married in '69, he told a New York Times Reporter that he'd gone to Vietnam to study first-hand, the policies of the U.S. government. He probably considered himself an observer. John Kerry is one of the biggest political opportunists walking, perhaps even worse than Bill Clinton...if that is even possible.
I think he make some valid points that Vietnam vets were not shown the proper respect and appreciation for their sacrifices when they came home.
However, he seems to have become a total pacifist who is unwilling to use military force, even when our survival is at stake.
Several of his teammates have been ripping Rudy for years.
They feel like what he has done is cheap, and that he has been cashing in on what they were doing simply because they thought it was the right thing to do.
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