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Hijacked Honor ("The Wall Within" 1988 CBS/Dan Rather fraudulent documentary on vets)
The new American ^ | August 14, 2000 | William F. Jasper

Posted on 09/11/2004 1:28:55 PM PDT by idkfa

Stolen Valor: How the Vietnam Generation Was Robbed of its Heroes and its History, by B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley, Dallas, TX: Verity Press, 1998, 692 pages, hardback

<snip>

One of the most ingrained stereotypes that plague the 3.3 million Americans who served in Vietnam is the tainted image of the Vietnam vet as scruffy, jobless, homeless, mentally unstable, addicted, suicidal, and stranded on the fringes of society. It is an image that has been reinforced by innumerable TV dramas, movies, and newscasts. It is also usually tied to stories about the horrors of war, atrocities, and other dark deeds that, allegedly, have caused these personal problems for the tragic vet.

The highly hyped 1988 CBS program, "The Wall Within," purporting to tackle the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), is a perfect example of the lies and distortions about Vietnam that have been fed to three generations of Americans. The program profiled six pathetic victims who it claimed were "representative" of those who served in Vietnam. It claimed that the symptoms suffered by these men were shared by hundreds of thousands of other veterans. The Dan Rather "documentary" became part of the CBS video history series on Vietnam and is graced with a formal introduction by liberal-left one-worlder Walter Cronkite.

This is how Dan Rather introduced his TV audience to one of his prize victims: "At age 16, Steve was a Navy SEAL, trained to assassinate. For almost two years, he operated behind enemy lines, then he broke. He came home in a straightjacket, addicted to alcohol and drugs."

According to the CBS propaganda piece, "Steve" had been trained to massacre and mutilate Vietnamese civilians and then blame the atrocities on the Communists. "You’re telling me that you went into the village, killed people, burned part of the village, then made it appear that the other side had done this?" Rather asked. "Yeah," Steve responded. "For propaganda purposes at home," Rather added. "That’s correct," Steve confirmed.

Terry Bradley, another supposed Vietnam vet suffering from PTSD, told a grisly tale of having, on one occasion, skinned alive up to 50 Vietnamese men, women and children. He told of cutting out hearts and eyeballs, of mangling and stacking their bloody bodies. The CBS program showed the mentally tormented vet at night in a dark forest howling at the sky.

Another PTSD victim, George Greul, told the CBS team that he had been traumatized by witnessing his friend’s gruesome death on the flight deck of an aircraft carrier while the ship was on a "secret mission" off the coast of Vietnam. He had seen his buddy accidentally walk into a spinning propeller blade and had been spattered with his blood.

The critically acclaimed "Wall Within" was a colossal fraud. The man identified as "Steve" turned out to be one Steve Southards, and through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, Burkett obtained his military records. The truth, he found, was that "Southards was not a SEAL, nor had he taken any SEAL training.... In reality, Southards was an ‘internal communications repairman,’ assigned to rear area bases and had no combat decorations. His only special training was a ‘motion picture operation course (16mm),’ at Subic Bay in the Philippines." What’s more, he had spent time in the brig for going AWOL six times. According to Burkett’s research, "Little that Southards had told Rather was true except that he had been in the Navy, and that his first name was Steve."

Terry Bradley was not a "fighting sergeant," as Dan Rather had described him, but another storytelling misfit who had spent 300 days either AWOL or in the stockade. No evidence was provided by CBS, and Burkett could find none either, from official sources or otherwise, to verify Bradley’s tales of mass atrocities.

George Greul’s carrier, the Ticonderoga, was deployed on a training mission off the coast of California, not a "secret mission" off the coast of Vietnam, when the fatal propeller accident he referred to took place. But Greul was not present when the accident happened; he was merely repeating what he had heard. However, his story had convinced the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that he had been sufficiently traumatized to receive a couple thousand dollars a month in compensation.

<snip>


TOPICS: Extended News
KEYWORDS: bgburkett; jbs; johnbirchsociety; rathergate; stolenvalor
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1 posted on 09/11/2004 1:28:56 PM PDT by idkfa
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To: idkfa

"the 3.3 million Americans who served in Vietnam is the tainted image of the Vietnam vet as scruffy, jobless, homeless, mentally unstable, addicted, suicidal, and stranded on the fringes of society. It is an image that has been reinforced by innumerable TV dramas, movies, and newscasts."

A study in the 1990s showed that the VietNam veteran was more likely to be employed, happy, stable and successful...than those who did not serve.

I will try to get a citation.


2 posted on 09/11/2004 1:34:39 PM PDT by edwin hubble
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To: edwin hubble

I think he was referring to John Kerry.


3 posted on 09/11/2004 1:37:01 PM PDT by Redcoat LI ("I am the great and powerful Kerry! Look at my medals!")
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To: edwin hubble

I see Dan did alot of exhaustive research on this story, as well.


4 posted on 09/11/2004 1:40:39 PM PDT by somemoreequalthanothers
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To: idkfa

Youngsters...... Make no mistake about this.... this is your war.... and these basterds did it to me and mine 30 yrs ago..... do you want the same outcome ..... well then get every body up and running monday morning .... pick rather .... take him out .... i have out lined how in other posts..... make no mistake ..... this is about the soul of this country.....


5 posted on 09/11/2004 1:40:52 PM PDT by Gibtx
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To: idkfa

bump


6 posted on 09/11/2004 1:41:29 PM PDT by VOA
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To: edwin hubble
I will try to get a citation.

Use Kerry's plan....just frag yourself.

7 posted on 09/11/2004 1:45:31 PM PDT by xzins (Retired Army and Proudly Supporting BUSH/CHENEY 2004!)
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To: idkfa
nice find

Dan Rather should be shamed off the air

The Rightwing Partisan Media should trumpet this story high and loud.

8 posted on 09/11/2004 1:47:16 PM PDT by TeleStraightShooter (Sorry Kerry, you're 3 decimal places adrift: 3,000,000 not 3,000 "displaced"/murdered SE Asians)
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To: 68-69TonkinGulfYatchClub; SAMWolf

Ping


9 posted on 09/11/2004 1:49:24 PM PDT by Fiddlstix (This Tagline for sale. (Presented by TagLines R US))
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To: idkfa
Thanks to the candidacy of John "Winter Soldier" Kerry, skeptical eyes are being cast on the myths about America in Vietnam. Of course, Kerry himself was a prime proponent and inventor of those myths, assisted by a number of ne'er-do-wells who took out their distaste for the military life, and by a media loving sensationalism, hating America, and embracing the aggressive anti-tradition movement of the 1960s.

It would be doubly sweet if Kerry's failed candidacy brought enough notice to the old myths, in the age of a more aggressive, skeptical new media, to smash them forever.

10 posted on 09/11/2004 2:10:04 PM PDT by atomicpossum (If there are two Americas, John Edwards isn't qualified to lead either of them.©)
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To: idkfa

Look for Rathers name in the index of the book "Stolen Valor" and read about his own military "service". He was medically unfit to serve in the Marine Corps in 1954 and he's been mentally unfit to serve as a reporter since the day he was born.


11 posted on 09/11/2004 2:10:24 PM PDT by A.A. Cunningham
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To: A.A. Cunningham

16 yearold SEAL???WTF,there's gullible,and then there's COMPLICIT.


12 posted on 09/11/2004 3:18:46 PM PDT by gripper ("Does this mean we can hit back ,now?")
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To: somemoreequalthanothers

http://www.vwam.com/vets/suicide.html

I googled "the wall within" and this is what a vets site linked to after a short reference to the Rather program..This exhaustive article's author died in Iraq covering the war...He was a great loss to journalism in America.


13 posted on 09/11/2004 5:55:28 PM PDT by MEG33 (John Kerry has been AWOL for two decades on issues of National Security)
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To: MEG33


The principal difference between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.
- Mark Twain


14 posted on 09/11/2004 6:00:33 PM PDT by MEG33 (John Kerry has been AWOL for two decades on issues of National Security)
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To: Fiddlstix

The MSM has been making up stories about Vietnam and Vietnam vets!!! I'm shocked!!


15 posted on 09/11/2004 6:18:06 PM PDT by SAMWolf (There is absolutely no substitute for a genuine lack of preparation.)
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To: SAMWolf
The MSM has been making up stories about Vietnam and Vietnam vets!!! I'm shocked!!

Yes. I understand. I'm shocked too.

(Btw, you forgot to add the proper tag to the post)
</sarcasm>

16 posted on 09/11/2004 6:29:05 PM PDT by Fiddlstix (This Tagline for sale. (Presented by TagLines R US))
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To: gripper
16 yearold SEAL?????

My thought exactly. This killer must have gone straight from Wueblo to SEAL.

17 posted on 09/11/2004 6:31:45 PM PDT by wtc911 (I have half a Snickers...it was given to me by a CIA guy as we went into Cambodia)
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To: Fiddlstix
< /sarcasm>

Oops, I was in a hurry?

18 posted on 09/11/2004 10:58:17 PM PDT by SAMWolf (There is absolutely no substitute for a genuine lack of preparation.)
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To: idkfa

Someone should post Dan Rather's photo which is on page 336 of "Stolen Valor." The photo would make a good mug shot if Rather were arrested for his involvment in "memogate."
http://www.stolenvalor.com/

Rather continues now with "memogate", his pattern of spreading lies and false information about men who served in our military honorably.

I have read Mr. Burkett's book and it is a great resource to counter all of the phony veterans that the media allways drag out to claim that they were baby killers.

Stolen Valor
http://www.stolenvalor.com/


19 posted on 09/15/2004 7:28:31 AM PDT by KeyLargo
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To: KeyLargo

20 posted on 09/15/2004 8:00:34 AM PDT by idkfa
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