Posted on 02/17/2004 9:46:04 AM PST by truthandlife
These days former Vietnam war POW Sen. John McCain has nothing but praise for his fellow Vietnam veteran, Sen. John Kerry, the Democrats' current presidential front-runner.
But after he was released from the Hanoi Hilton in 1973, Sen. McCain publicly complained that testimony by Kerry and others before J. William Fullbright's Senate Foreign Relations Committee was "the most effective propaganda [my North Vietnamese captors] had to use against us."
"They used Senator Fullbright a great deal," McCain wrote in the May 14, 1973 issue of U.S. News & World Report. While he was languishing in a North Vietnamese prison cell, Kerry was telling the Fullbright Committee that U.S. soldiers were committing war crimes in Vietnam as a matter of course.
Sen. Ted Kennedy, a key Kerry presidential backer, was "quoted again and again" by jailers at the Hanoi Hilton, McCain said.
"Clark Clifford was another [North Vietnamese] favorite," the ex-POW told U.S. News, "right after he had been Secretary of Defense under President Johnson."
"When Ramsey Clark came over [my jailers] thought that was a great coup for their cause," McCain recalled. Months earlier Sen. Kerry had appeared with Clark at the April 1971 Washington, D.C. anti-war protest that showcased his testimony before the Fullbright Committee.
"All through this period," wrote McCain, his captors were "bombarding us with anti-war quotes from people in high places back in Washington. This was the most effective propaganda they had to use against us."
McCain biographer Paul Alexander chronicled the Arizona Republican's anger toward Kerry during their early careers in the Senate together.
"For many years McCain held Kerry's actions against him because, while McCain was a POW in the Hanoi Hilton, Kerry was organizing veterans back home in the U.S. to protest the war."
In his 2002 book, "Man of the People: the Life of John McCain," Alexander says that the two Vietnam vets finally reconciled in the early 1990s after having "a long - and at times emotional - conversation about Vietnam" during a mutual trip to Kuwait.
Later, Kerry sought to minimize the rift, telling Alexander, "Our differences occurred when we were kids, or at least close to being kids. It was a long time ago, and we both came back and realized that there were a lot of difficulties in the prosecution of that war."
NewsMax gratefully acknowledges the help of U.S. Veteran's Dispatch editor Ted Sampley for supplying McCain's revealing 1973 account in U.S. News.
This is powerful stuff because it tarnishes his "war hero" image.
Somehow I doubt whether Bush's popularity as commander in chief will be challenged by Kerry as much as McAwful and the Dems think. This could in fact back-fire on Kerry.
Yeah, Kerry, and you were one of the major difficulties.
One time was too many. We were in a war.
Was she like Tokoyo Rose?
No. Tokyo Rose broadcast for an extended period of time, but from Japan. There was Hanoi Hannah, but she was a Vietnamese woman who was only good for a few laughs. Jane Fonda did most of her PR work back in the United States with the other anti-war organizers, including Kerry (Clinton was in England doing his part there, by the way).
Did you see any of her FTA shows?
I'm not sure what an "FTA show" is. In any case, Jane Fonda was looked at with nearly universal derision in the military as was the anti-war movement. In the years since, I have seen Fonda's picture prominently featured at strategic locations inside numerous urinals in nearly every major men's rest room in the US military. Her presence is ubiquitous - or was until I got out in 1998. And thoroughly enjoyed, I might add.
Now, the anti-war movement was the genuine Fifth Column in the USA and was a lot nastier than you would think by reading today's fawning press reports of their activities. I myself attended one huge anti-war demonstration in the Bay Area a few days after I got back in 1969. From personal experience I observed two types of people: 1. the dedicated minority who were the organizers and agitators and 2. the majority saps who were mostly bubble-headed college kids looking for a break from classes and some drugs plus street people. The students didn't have a clue how they were being exploited, nor did they seem to care. They were out for a good time, but some of them were serious as they didn't want to get drafted. The street people were more into it as they were in rebellion against everything, and besides there was sex, drugs, babes and rock 'n roll. Oh, plus they could trash things and usually get away with it.
A neighbor said he's voting for Kerry and he is a Vietnam Vet. He thinks Kerry was looking out for his fellow Veterans.
Your neighbor is in the distinct minority of vets although there are some. John Kerry was looking out for John Kerry.
He thought Kerry did the right thing after he got out of the Navy and became a anti-war protestor. He felt Kerry was protecting our troops lives by speaking up.
Put your neighbor in line with the sappy students, or maybe with Kerry. If he really thinks this way he is either a fool or a scoundrel. The anti-war people are the reason the war went on so long after 1969 and why our side ended up losing. Period.
The anti-war demonstations and organizations were part and parcel of Communist Liberation Front and KGB operations, funded by them and directed in large part by them (check out the KGB "Venona Intercepts" as well as numerous Congressional investigations at the time). Their purpose was to undermine domestic support for the war and get us out of Vietnam so the NVA could take over. We did get out but it was the political destruction of Richard Nixon followed by Congress cutting off military aid to the South Vietnamese that were the proximate causes of the horrendous defeat which followed. The anti-war movement did it's job by coopting the Liberals and Democrats in Congress and destroying Nixon so I guess they were eminently successful. Kerry was a key part of that movement in VVAW.
Someone had to do it because the war in Vietnam was mismanagement by our government and the war was going on too long.
The war was won on the battlefield until we left and Congress pulled the rug out from under the Vietnamese. With no bullets it was impossible to defeat the North Vietnamese Army, which was one tough and well equiped nut. It could have been won much earlier by America if MacNamara and Johnson (remember those Democrats?) hadn't completely f*cked it up in the years before Nixon.
He really admires this man's leadership.
I fear your friend doesn't know much about either "leadership" or character and doesn't care - unless he admires the Communist, anti-war kind.
It was the only way out and the American citizens needed to know what was really happening.
American citizens did know what was happening. Support for the war was strong throughout. Nixon won re-election in a landslide, mostly on the war issue, by 62-38% over George McGovern. It was the Left that eventually prevailed by getting Nixon removed from office and collapsing the war effort in a lopsided Democrat Congress.
Did Kerry save lives with anti-war protest?
No.
IMHO he cost a lot of American lives by prolonging the war. The NVA and NLF would have quit years earlier without our anti-war effort. They got the snot kicked out of them on every major battlefield in every theater. They were militarily, but not politically, beaten.
It's pretty hard talking reason to my neighbor. Why would a Vietnam Veteran support Kerry?.
Beats me, unless your neighbor is a fool. Even the military has it's share of these. In my humble opinion, your neighbor qualifies for that unfortunate description.
Like the silly stretch that it is?
Example: “When Ramsey Clark came over [my jailers] thought that was a great coup for their cause," end of McCain Quote McCain recalled. Begin NewsMax leap Months earlier, Sen. Kerry had appeared with Clark at the April 1971 Washington, D.C., anti-war protest that showcased his testimony before the Fulbright Committee.
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