Posted on 02/15/2004 9:29:47 AM PST by areafiftyone
Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley revealed Sunday that Democratic presidential front-runner John Kerry personally met with "Hanoi Jane" Fonda at least twice during the days when the two played leading roles in the group Vietnam Veterans Against the War, including a never before detailed 1971 meeting in Detroit.
"The Jane Fonda incidents occurred in two places; one on a march from Morristown to Valley Forge when they shared a platform at Valley Forge," Brinkley told WABC Radio's Steve Malzberg.
"Then he met her in the more troubling Detroit Howard Johnson's Comfort Center [event], where there was this thing called the Winter Soldier Investigation."
It had been known that Fonda and Kerry had both helped organize the Winter Soldier protest at a time when he served as the VVAW's National Coordinator and she held the title Honorary National Coordinator.
But Brinkley, who wrote the definitive chronicle of Kerry's war years, "Tour of Duty," is the first authoritative source to suggest that Kerry and Fonda had a face-to-face meeting while organizing the event.
Brinkley's account of Kerry's contacts with Fonda suggests they had a much more extensive relationship than either of them are now willing to admit.
The activist and the top Democrat both offered accounts last week that minimized their contact during the 1970s, with Fonda describing efforts to link her to Kerry as part of a "big lie" campaign to discredit the presidential front-runner.
Of the Valley Forge protest, Fonda told CNN, "I don't know if we even shook hands."
For his part Kerry said through a spokeswoman, "John Kerry and Jane Fonda were just acquaintances."
During Winter Soldier Fonda and Kerry solicited testimony from alleged combat veterans detailing U.S. atrocities, though many of the accounts were later completely discredited.
The Kerry campaign has refused to return multiple phone calls from NewsMax requesting details of the Senator's interaction with Fonda during the Feb. 1971 Winter Soldier event.
On a related subject, Brinkley said that Kerry's Vietnam war wounds, for which he received three Purple Hearts, were not particularly serious.
Asked about the severity of Kerry's injuries, Brinkley told Malzberg, "They were minor wounds."
I agree. But no Chris Matthews or O'Reilly or Hannity or Russert has ever confronted Kerry with Burkett's and others discoveries about the Winter Soldier Investigations. No one has confronted him along these lines:
"Senator Kerry, Burkett, author of "Stolen Valor", has investigated the claims made in the Winter Soldier Investigation, and found them completely without merit. Moreover, several of the "witnesses" lied about their service in the military and in Vietnam. Al Hubbard, a supposed Vietnam veteran, who appeared with you on Meet the Press in 1971, emerges as another fraud.
The foundation of your claims your 1971 Senate testimony appears without merit, and hence your claims of American arocities as the norm appear without merit. Please comment."
But no one has put this to Kerry. Kerry has never explained his error or defended his incredible 1971 testimony.
This means he may still believe, today, the atrocity claims he made in 1971. This makes it a current issue.
Seeing how Kerry deals with the issue of fraud in the Winter Soldier Investigation will tell us a lot about his character.
Yes, and he did so a few days prior to the time you posted that comment. (I know it's difficult, but please do try to keep up.)
I was in a Ranger battalion in Nam. I once heard a new man ask the LT what the 'Old Man' (Battalion Commander) thought about putting a GI in for a decoration. The LT (a big ole' slow talkin' boy from the University of Alabama) said, "If ya get a big enough hole in ya, or got somthin' missin' ya might get a (purple) Heart. Kill General Tete, or 'uncle' Ho and he'd put ya in fur a (silver) Star. They way the Ole' Man figures it, everything else is expected of ya, you're a Ranger". That was the way it was where I was, and rightfully so. That's why this story about Kerry is a little uncomfortable for me. I was 'doc', we put minor injuries back on the line, we had to. They had 2 to 3 weeks of convalescence at a MASH, Saigon, or in Da Nang but back out they came, and they were always ready to get back to the job.
It's hard for me to buy that he got hit 3 times in four months and was decorated for all of them. In the early days of Nam it was WWII or Korea mindset. We had a hellofa lot to do and we didn't have time to decorate every brave man that got a scratch. We (I as 'doc') fixed it and we went on. If the wound was bad they were evacuated. That's the way you play in war.
I won't vote for the man, and I don't respect him, but I can't rag his record unless I have proof. I respect service, and I sure as hell respect metals, if they were earned. His decorations leave a huge question.
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