FBI VVAW Files
CD1
100-HQ-448092
File: Sub A Section 01.pdf, p. 75-87
------------The Sunday Star (Washington)
Jun 6, 1971The Last Patrol
They had fought in the stinking jungles of "Nam," and now they expected a few minutes of time to describe a war to those who had sent them.
By Glenn A. McCurdy
Photographs by Ken Heinen(pdf page 79 - snip)
It was a orderly, nonviolent week in which Hollywood legends of superwarriors like John Wayne and Burt Lancaster dissolved into toyland as Massmind America faced the flesh-and-blood courage of men like former patrol boat Lieutenant John Forbes Kerry.
Kerry, after graduating from Yale University, enlisted in the U.S. Navy and volunteered for duty aboard one of the gun boats used to patrol the waterways of Vietnam.
"We established an American presence in most cases by showing the flag and firing at sampans and villages along the banks," said Kerry. "Those were our instructions, but they seemed so out of line that we finally began to go ashore, against our orders, and investigate the villages that were supposed to be our targets. We discovered we were butchering a lot of innocent people, and morale became so low among the officers on those 'swift boats' that we were called back to Saigon for special instructions from Gen. Abrams. He told us we were doing the right thing. He said our efforts would help win the war in the long run. That's when I realized I could never remain silent about the realities of the war in Vietnam.