Posted on 06/19/2004 5:12:49 PM PDT by The Bandit
As most may already know by now, 19 of 23 officers who served with Sen. John F. Kerry in Vietnam during 1969 have signed a letter that says he is unfit to be commander-in-chief. I would add that we don't have to take Kerry's former commander's word for it because we have Kerry's own actions that tell us the same thing. Take for example February 28, 1969, which the events of that day lead to a Silver Star recommendation and approval faster than has ever been seen in the history of the award. Ironically, all three of Kerry's so-called Purple Heart's would take much longer for approval - some 4 months for his first Heart - yet only took days for his Silver Star to be approved and pinned on him for simply shooting a wounded teen running away from him (or so the story goes.)The swift boats operated under clear rules that said never to beach and leave a boat under any circumstances during combat operations. To make matters even worst would be for the boats officer-in-charge to leave the boat, leaving remaining crew any any other boats under his tactical command without leadership. This is exactly what Lt.(jg) Kerry did on February 28, 1969. Worst yet, is the fact this was all pre-planned by Kerry in advance that showed a total lack of foresight and consideration for the safety of the people under his command.
One of Kerry's crewmembers, Mike Medeiros, told the New Yorker in January of '04 that Kerry "had talked to me about trying something different. He said he was tired of just going up the river and getting shot at. He asked me what I thought about turning to attack the enemy positions if we took fire and no one was hurt. I said it might not be a bad idea."
As it turns out, Kerry gave a different explanation years earlier as to why he ordered his swift boat beached when he talked to CNN's Jonathan Karl in April of 2001: "On that particular day [February 28th, 1969], I heard the ambush, I heard the firepower, and I made the judgment. Besides, we were very heavily weighted down. We had troops on board. We couldn't reach maximum speed. I knew that to whatever degree we were in the ambush, we were going to get hurt, so I turned the aspect of us toward it, minimizing our exposure, surprising them, and we did win. I mean, we ran right over the ambush, and it felt good to win." Here Kerry is simply substituting his flawed pre-planned strategy with "I had no choice" explanation for his actions.
One of the problems here is that when swifts experienced ambushes on narrow canals like the one Kerry was operating on that Feb. 28th, is that it wasn't uncommon for a swift boat to receive fire from both sides of the banks during the ambush. Kerry had to know this, or at least should had known that any ambush on narrow canals would most likely involve weapons fire from both sides. Yet he goes ahead and decides it could be okay to beach his boat during an ambush leaving the stern and anyone in back of his boat open to enemy fire from less then 200 feet away (canals width could run from anywhere 30-100 feet in width.)
Of course this is exactly what happened on Feb. 28; his boat was taking fire from across the canal immediately after he had beached along the canals shore. Assistance form PCF-43 had to be ordered to surpress the fire since his .50 gunner was unable to train his guns towards the other side of the canal and was taking cover to avoid incoming fire from the opposite bank. The PCF-23 that followed Kerry's boat was ordered beached and was just as a useless sitting duck to any seriously armed enemy VC from the other side as Kerry's PCF-94. Kerry was very lucky that day that any VC on the other side did not have any RPG's or heavy machine guns or his swift boat would have been smoldering at the same spot be beached it 24 hours later along with anyone unlucky enough to have been aboard.
For Kerry and his supporters to suggest the only way to have prevented anyone from getting hurt was to turn and beach the swifts in front of an ambush is simply fooling the public and spewing disinformation. How this particular incident should have been handled was for both swifts Kerry was leading to have continued further up the narrow canal after the initial rocket was fired and missed and then beached to allow any troops that may have been aboard to disembark and walked back to the site of the ambush to investigate and engage the enemy with the swift boats providing additional firepower if needed. If being loaded with troops and speed was a concern, why was it not a issue with Kerry to pass the ambush, turn around and head back to beach his boat? Instead, Kerry's actions took a initial ambush and turned into something much more dangerous then it needed while violating standing operation orders.
The rules for swift boat engagements that stated no one leaves the boat and no beaching of the boats during ambushes were in place for very good reasons and there wasn't any regulations that left it to Lt.(jg) Kerry's discretion to disregard such rules to put his crew at unnecessary risks. Kerry exhibited all the signs of an officer unfit to command on Feb. 28, 1969.
btt
"Cause he could!!!"
Pardon the typo, "spot be beached it" should had came out as "spot he beached it."
The turn to and attack is a Marine Corps tactic. They Navy has no such training and kerry has not the cojones to act like a Marine.
For that matter, it is an insult to the Marine Corps that he usurped one of our tactics to lie and cover up his own stupidity.
I will give Kerry points for getting his butt out there for as long as he did (much more than algore) but he never should have been 'bragging' about it - a sure sign of a lie!
In this article, we see more evidence of why his commanders had his records notated "requires constant supervision".
Sounds like you know what you're talking about.
Bandit,
Special Forces were charging into ambushes and teaching the tactic long before when ground forces were deployed in Nam.
Welcome to Free Republic.
:>) Hurrah!!
But kerry was NO SF!
Kerry faked the documents and then, in effect, shot himself in the foot in order to desert and bug out on his unit in the face on enemy action. The ultra-left wing media never, never mentions the fact that he had a one year tour but flaked out early. A "hero" would have stayed to the end and served out his term. Kerry is a deserter and a coward.
...yet only took days for his Silver Star to be approved and pinned on him for simply shooting a wounded teen running away from him (or so the story goes.) Does anyone have a good link to this story?Not at my finger tips, but Boston Globe has covered it and statements from those who were on the LST where Zumwalt pinned the medal on Kerry has said it was either March 4 or 6...less then a week after Feb. 28.
3 1/2 mos I think.
Interesting. Thanks for the post.
I will not vote for a person who served and subsequently betrayed his country by meeting and collaborating with our then enemies the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong in his Paris visit, throwing his awards away also while he was improperly wearing his uniform, also improperly wearing his uniform while he lied about our troops conduct during his testimony before a congressional comitee, his giving aid, abetting and giving comfort to our enemies in time of war, his continual showing of his true feelings about this country by his continual negative voting for the defenses of this country, his continual neglect for his senatorial voting duties currently as a sentor, his continual bashing of our present war effort in time of war instead of doing what he should do to help our war effort against our enemies to ensure our victory.
No mr. kerry, there's no way in hell you will ever get my support for your effort to be Commander in Chief!!!!
Defender2
D2
:-(
The book that Kerry wishes would just go away. |
HanoiJohnKerry.com is a blog with a primary purpose. That purpose is to counter the preposterous claims of Sen. John Forbes Kerry (D-MA) that he has any legitimate claim to any sort of "brotherhood" among combat veterans of the War in Vietnam. While it is generally supposed that his service as a Naval officer on a "Swift Boat" in that theater was adequate and honorable, there is much to question regarding his readiness to allow the accolade "war hero" to be applied to him. Likewise, it is not at all uncommon for more senior Naval officers to raise an eyebrow at the swiftness and relative comfort by which Lt. JG Kerry attained those medals, and who is available to vouch for the efficacy of his being awarded them (since, as boat commander, it would be his own task to make recommendation for awards for all personnel, including himself, on the Swift Boat). But most egregious was his conduct, words and associations upon his early-out (from SEA) return to the USA and discharge from the US Navy. His leadership role with the radical pro-Communist (inaccurate to deem this group "anti-war") group called "Vietnam Veterans Against the [Vietnam] War" (hereafter VVAW). |
It was while climbing the social and political ladder of the pro-Soviet Left as a principle of VVAW that John Kerry found his political soul-mate in Hanoi Jane Fonda. Granted, these politically formative years for Kerry were prior to the more outlandish acts of Fonda that earned her that name, but it is easily documentable that Fonda did not under go any radical transformation in belief or character from the time she and Kerry were working the same side of the street to the time she traveled to Hanoi, NVN and entered US history as the most overt traitor to ever NOT be charged, tried and executed. John Kerry went to his own overt extremes to demonstrate that, politically, socially and in lowness of character, there wasn't a nickel's worth of difference between he and Fonda. Thus, in the spirit of fairness and accuracy, we are reasonably certain that he will be agreeably flattered by calling him Hanoi John Kerry. |
Here, testifying before the Fulbright Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is where John Kerry, spokesman for Vietnam Veterans Against the War, cemented his position and moniker as "Hanoi John" Kerry. This was the occasion where US troops still in the field in Vietnam learned from one of their FORMER brothers-in-arms that they were heinous murderers and war criminals. HJK would now like to call on them for support in his bid to be the new Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. Perhaps the most preposterous hypocrisy of all. |
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