Kerry was a commissioned officer and therefore eligible for 3 types of discharges.
Honorable
General under conditions other than honorable.
Dishonorable.
Enlisted personnel are eligible for 5 types:
Honorable
General under honorable conditions
General under conditions other than honorable.
Bad Conduct Discharge
Dishonorable.
Since Kerry was eligible for the three above - let's take a look at what it take. Kerry would have received 3 dishcharges. One from the USNR to accept a commission. One when when he went off active duty and the final one from the reserves.
The vast majority of officers and enlisted men receive honorable discharges. You almost have to try and get something lower. The "Other than Honorable Discharge" for an officer has to be predicated on the action of a board of officers and something akin to an investigation. The Dishonorable can only come as a result of a General Court Martial. We would have definitely heard of that one and Kerry could have never run for public office.
This leaves the possibility of the "Other than Honorable". I have serious doubts this could have happened. The Navy would have had to convene a special board and Kerry would have had the right to appear. Given Kerry's notoriety at the time, I doubt this would not appeared in the print or broadcast media at the time.
I really think pursuing the status of M. Kerry's discharge is basically a dry hole. This is from someone who thinks he is basically the scum of the earth.
What I do think an SF 180 would reveal is that the After Action reports that predicated his Bronze & Silver stars were indeed "puffed" as well as the Purple Heart citations.
The swifties do an excellent analysis of John Kerry's Fitreps. These are the fitreps he has authorized for release. Most people that would be familiar with Officer evaluations and promotion boards could reasonably conclude that Lt. j.g. Kerry would never reach 04 on active duty and possibly not 03. Kerry's combat fitreps are the most damaging to his prospects of having a long Navy career. The fitreps also show there is probably a lot more info out there.
JOHN KERRY .............SIGN THE RELEASE FORM 180, as President Bush has done or EXPLAIN WHY YOU WILL NOT SIGN THE FORM!
You want to be our President!
And we will NEVER AGAIN allow the network press to LIE to the American public via refusing to BALANCE the information they dole out regarding candidates running for President.
We are going to STOP the propaganda like EDITING of INFORMATION done by CBS, ABC and NBC.
> I really think pursuing the status of M. Kerry's
> discharge is basically a dry hole.
I'm not the one you need to address that to. Although
I'm suspicious of Kerry's 1978 discharge (being years
late, and during the Carter Admin), I'm not seeing a
smoking M-79 that points to any other discharge issues.
And unless the 4 cartons of stuff the Swifties got
recently from the USN Archives contain any clues, I
suspect nothing will turn up before the election.
There's more than enough to sink Kerry swiftly, and
no need overreach speculation.