PING
Isn't that against the standard operational orders for Swift Boat Patrols?
Try as he may,this is NOT "1984" and Kerry can't have the damning PROOF eliminated. :-)
Great Find! Especially in light of the fact that the NYT presumably couldn't find it (wink wink). Gosh, you think that the "Grey Lady" - that bastion of journalistic ethics - would have done a search on their own archives for the name of a Presidential Candidate.
This doesn't surprise me. Great post.
Someone needs to send this to the Swiftvets.
Can someone get a get a link here. nwrep, how and where did you find this?
Link on aisle nine!!
A bit more ...
http://www.boston.com/globe/nation/packages/kerry/061603.shtml
... Kerry served two tours. For a relatively uneventful six months, from December 1967 to June 1968, he served in the electrical department aboard the USS Gridley, a guided-missile frigate that supported aircraft carriers in the Gulf of Tonkin and was far removed from combat.
"I didn't have any real feel for what the heck was going on [in the war]," Kerry has recalled. His ship returned to its Long Beach, Calif., port on June 6, 1968, the day that Robert F. Kennedy died from a gunshot wound he received on the previous night at a Los Angeles hotel. The antiwar protests were growing. But within five months Kerry was heading back to Vietnam, seeking to fulfill his officer commitment despite his growing misgivings about the war.
Kerry initially hoped to continue his service at a relatively safe distance from most fighting, securing an assignment as "swift boat" skipper. While the 50-foot swift boats cruised the Vietnamese coast a little closer to the action than the Gridley had come, they were still considered relatively safe.
"I didn't really want to get involved in the war," Kerry said in a little-noticed contribution to a book of Vietnam reminiscences published in 1986. "When I signed up for the swift boats, they had very little to do with the war. They were engaged in coastal patrolling and that's what I thought I was going to be doing." ...
Nice work. Good to see you got an applause.
INTERVIEWER: We've had these battle of the ads, from Moveon.org, and the Swift vets Mr. Democratic spokesman, Which do you think is more likely, That George W. Bush is Hitler, or John Kerry exaggerated about his Vietnam experience?
or:
INTERVIWER: Mr. Davis, (or insert name of demonRATS lackey here) you say these 527 ads are terrible, negative campaign tactics that cloud the issues. I don't remember you calling into this network to go on the air to denounce the Moveon.org ads that said Bush was Hitler, yet you called us today to come on and complain about the Swiftboat vets ads. Please tell us why you you waited.
First of all the mission wasn't to "shoot at sampans and huts," at least not according to the unit tactictian. It was to make friends with the people living along the river and convince them to trust the US and reveal the movements of the Viet Cong among their midst. I heard this guy on the radio, explaining the mission and explaining why Kerry was considered a loose cannon who was jeopardizing the mission, shooting at anything that moved and endangering the men. Kerry was reprimanded for his actions several times, each time he had some excuse, like we saw something move, or they opened fire. The excuses never seemed to be substantiated.
http://www.boston.com/globe/nation/packages/kerry/061603.shtml
Kranish story 2003:"I didn't really want to get involved in the war," Kerry said in a little-noticed contribution to a book of Vietnam reminiscences published in 1986. "When I signed up for the swift boats, they had very little to do with the war. They were engaged in coastal patrolling and that's what I thought I was going to be doing."
Can you send this to Hugh Hewitt and Instapundit. CaptainsQuarters and Powerline have also been following this and they might appreciate it.
It takes many people to do this research.
Thank you for doing this.
Is this when Kerry turned into an infantry man with his movie camera ??
It would be nice but this appears nowhere that I can find - not those words anyway.
The closest I could find was:
Kerry said to the New York Times when he was an angry war veteran: "I'm not radical in any sense of the word. I guess I'm just an angry young man."
We need an accurate link please otherwise it isn't useful.
Not only that, but Kerry was active against the Vietnam War BEFORE he enlisted. AND he only enlisted, because the Draft Board turned down his request for a deferment to study in Paris for a year.
He volunteered, because otherwise he was going to be drafted!
It's in the 1970 Harvard Crimson article, which is an interview with Kerry.
Published on Wednesday, February 18, 1970
John Kerry: A Navy Dove Runs for Congress
http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=352185
"At Yale, Kerry was chairman of the Political Union and later, as Commencement speaker, urged the United States to withdraw from Vietnam and to scale down foreign military operations. And this was way back in 1966.
When he approached his draft board for permission to study for a year in Paris, the draft board refused and Kerry decided to enlist in the Navy. "