Posted on 08/14/2004 7:15:31 AM PDT by stayout
For those of you who have not been fully following the Swift Vet's story, one of Kerry's traveling entourage (David Alston) claimed he was under Kerry's command on a PBF and found Kerry to be a great leader. He even gave a speech to that effect at the Democratic National Convention, where he said the following:
I know him from a small boat in Vietnam, where we fought and bled together, serving our country. There were six of us aboard PCF-94, a 50-foot, twin-engine craft known as a "Swift Boat." We all came from different walks of life, but all of us-including our skipper, John Kerry-volunteered for combat duty. And combat is what we got.However, one intrepid blogger now has proven that to be a lie, Alston never served under Kerry because Alston was wounded and out of action before Kerry took command of Alston's boat. Here is the final bit of proof (published early this morning), I suggest you go to Captain's Quarters to find all the previous analysis leading up to this astonishing coup de gras (pass the word):
Alston Never Served Under Kerry
Thanks to reader Lori in Texas, I think we've just about pieced the record together on David Alston and his supposed service under John Kerry's command. Lori points out a sympathetic article on Dale Sandusky, one of the few Swift boat veterans supporting Kerry and one that served on his boat, specifically gives the timing on Kerry's command of PCF-94:
In January 1969, Sandusky's boat, PCF-94, came under attack during one such ambush. Lt. Ted Peck, the officer in charge, and another crewman were seriously wounded. Sandusky had to take command. The boat was sinking and on fire, but Sandusky steered it back to safety. They counted 155 bullet holes in the boat and found a live enemy rocket in the main cabin. It had come to rest in a sack of potatoes.Bingo! Yachtzee! Alston received his serious wounds in that same exact battle that took Peck out of service. On January 29th, Alston was medevaced out to a hospital with head wounds and no records indicate that he ever returned to the unit. Kerry took command of PCF-94 the next day. Alston never served a day under Kerry's command. In fact, Kerry received a replacement, Fred Short, on 28 February as a replacement for Alston.For his actions, Sandusky would receive the Bronze Star.
With their officer headed home, the crew of PCF-94 needed a leader. And Lt. j.g. John Kerry, whose crew on PCF-44 had rotated back home, needed men to lead.
"I was sure glad he came along," Sandusky said, "because to be honest, I didn't want to take command."
From Jan. 30 to March 13, 1969, Kerry and the crew of the PCF-94 would conduct 18 missions in the Mekong Delta river system. In that time, Kerry would earn a Silver Star, a Bronze Star and add two Purple Hearts to the one he received earlier.
Now what does that tell us about Kerry and his Viet Nam narrative?
1. He and Alston conspired to deceive people about Alston's service under Kerry. That conspiracy was intended to give John Kerry cover against exactly the kind of campaign he faces from the other Swiftvets.
2. The "end of January" language on Kerry's website was intentionally vague in order to fuzzy up the timeline and keep Alston's true status a secret. Obviously, Sandusky remembers the dates well enough, and Kerry could easily have gotten them from him if he wanted to be as specific as his other dates on the timeline.
3. The DNC either were saps or actively participated in the conspiracy in order to assist Kerry in his Viet Nam mythology. Otherwise, why would they have allowed David Alston to speak at the convention about his experiences serving with John Kerry on the boat?
4. Kerry's band of brothers have some complicity in this cover-up as well. Those who served on PCF-94 surely remember that Alston never served under Kerry; Sandusky specifically recalls Peck being wounded and removed from command, but he wouldn't remember that Alston left at the same time?
5. One could argue that they served on the same boat, of course, and I look forward to that Clintonian parsing used in Kerry's defense. After holding Alston up as an expert on his leadership, he'll be hard pressed to explain how that expertise came to Alston from a hospital bed miles away from Kerry and his old PCF.
If this gets out to the mainstream media, this story kills Kerry's campaign. This isn't just a guy embellishing his war record -- this is a deliberate and longstanding attempt to mislead and defraud people by creating his own witnesses after the fact. That he could have done such a clumsy job should disqualify him for higher office on that basis alone.
Posted by Captain Ed at August 14, 2004 01:25 AM
Good point.
After getting side-lined with the doctored-photo thing, I began to wonder why Kerry, would be re-assigned to a heavily damaged boat the day after it was "sinking and on fire ... They counted 155 bullet holes in the boat and found a live enemy rocket in the main cabin."
Was he considered 'unfit to command' even then? Did his superiors intentionally assign him to a repair job? And if so, why?
Uh, no. That is not his job, nor would that be wise.
It's actually worse than that.
"He's a boor and will always be a boor." (PS: I heard it. I heard "boor" in his pronunciation.
I believe Kerry is not lying about this. I think he flat out doesn't recall some of the guys he served with becuase he's an effete tool who from the get go only cared about one thing, trying to become JFK so he could be a hero and run for President some day.
So Alston says he served under Kerry and Kerry says, "gee really? That's great shipmate. Here's your lines for the campaign trail."
Campaigning is his job.
I would say he has that in common with Kerry's wife.
Hmmm, so now it's revealed that Kerry was unfit to lead then, and still unfit today, allowing someone to falsify their report from the podium at the convention.
Oh this guy's a real gem.
Details, details! How silly to insist on little things like facts. Boring! Of course, there is the 31st of January, you know. It all happened then.
No, you're right! You're absolutely right! I should have proofed better.
It was definitely boor, not bore.
Thanks for catching that, "bore" is going too easy on the jerk.
It is not the President's job to criticize what John Kerry did or did not do 30 years ago. Leave that to others. If President Bush tries to attack Kerry on Vietnam, it will backfire. No good can come of it.
Bush's attempts to avoid criticizing democrats haven't helped a whole hell of a lot so far. No matter what he does, he's going to be accused of running a dirty campaign, and if Kerry is currently running around with a guy who is falsely claiming to have served with him, it will do more good than harm to tell it to people. 'others' will be ignored by the media.
I'll be interested to see if this makes the talking head shows in the morning. And how it's treated.
From what I've read Kerry has stopped talking to the national press since the Christmas in Cambodia story came out.
From Hugh Hewitts site
http://www.hughhewitt.com/
WHAT WILL GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS ASK?
Even the folks at The New Republic are beginning to notice that Kerry won't talk to reporters. Kerry's been in the cocoon ever since his Christmas-Eve-in-Cambodia story collapsed, annd the press pool doesn't like it:
"GRUMBLING FROM THE KERRY PRESS CORPS: This is from a Kerry pool report about the candidate's departure from Springfield, Oregon that was just e-mailed to reporters. It about sums up how the national press traveling with Kerry feels these days.
kerry walked through the crowd, tickling babies and talking to folks. But traveling pool was not allowed nearer than a telephoto lens, so we don't really know what was said. Local press however seemed to be allowed to wander freely. So, why are we paying all this $$$ again?
In many ways, Kerry's press aides are extremely attentive to the needs of the media horde traveling with them. But there is a creeping feeling among reporters that despite all the Democratic criticism of the Bush White House for making the president so inaccessible, that Kerry and his staff are not yet proving that things would be much better in a Kerry administration."
Ryan Lizza might usefully ask why Kerry is ducking the media. After all, the campaign has already retracted Kerry's "defining moment" of his life, so how hard could other walk-backs be? If they have been reading CaptainsQuarters, where the research on one of Kerry's crewmates isn't lining up with his stories. I suppose it is just a matter of time until CaptainsQuarters is accused of smearing the good name of a brave vet, and this man does indeed seem to have beeen quite brave and is a minister, but the press has never before simply refused to ask obvious questions about the key plares in the central drama of Kerry's life, the four months on which he has staked his claim to be president. The candidate had to retract a key portion of that account this week, and instead of swarming over all the other details, the elite media is silent, embarassed for him perhaps, but laso hopeful that it will blow over and they can return to carrying Terry McAuliffe's water on the Bush AWOL story.
Kerry's handlers might be keeping him away from reporters to wait and see what other holes might develop in the "band of brothers" story, but they also can't take him out of circulation completely, which means an appointment with the safest interview for Kerry in America. Kerry will appear with George StephanopoUlos tomorrow as there isn't any danger whatsoever that George will ask an unfomfortable question about the magic hat or the dates on which he went cross-border with the SEALs and the CIA.
The story of Kerry's backtrack made the RockyMountainNews (hat tip to Instapundit), and columnist Dave Kopel was kind enought to include a mention of my efforts to stay on top of the story. AmericanThinker believes the press indifference to such a major stumble may undermine what's left of press credibility. In the unlikely event that anyone from ABC looks up and wonders what all the scribbling is about, here's a readable scan of Kerry's 1979 movie review in which he asserts he took his patrol boat into Cambodia on "more than one occasion," including Christmas Eve 1968, and here's the blow-up of his Congressional Record testimony. But I am guessing that George offers a softball on the motives of the Swifties and avoids the obvious questions: "When were you in Cambodia and who was with you? Who sent you? How many men did you take? And tell us about the magic hat, please?" Watch that space tomorrow. Not only is Kerry on the spot, so is George. Can you imagine having an interview with Kerry and not asking the hard questions only to then see the story go to high alert on Monday? Every paper in America would be full of accounts of how George S. had let the big on go away.
A very interesting Sunday morning ahead.
We'll have to agree to disagree on this one. And my guess is Bush will play it safe. You won't hear him personally attack Kerry's Vietnam record. You will hear him assail Kerry's pathetic Senate voting record, as he should.
tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock.....
Sorry, I missed seeing your post earlier.
I watch Fox News every day and wondered why they weren't getting them on. As always, the Dems keep repeating the same lies over and over. Thanks for the reply.
Just knowing your Yankee Stadium history has made me feel like the luckiest man on the face of the earth. BATTER UP!!
Yet another example of Kerry's highly deceptive behavior. You know, Kerry is just like Clinton without a southern accent.
the guy never said he served UNDER kerry.... he served WITH him
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