John Kerry keen to be US' top diplomat

NEW YORK: John Kerry, who suffered defeat at the hands of President George Bush in last US elections, now harbours aspiration to become Secretary of State if presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama wins the race to the White House in November.

Kerry, who is the third ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, is keen to be nation's top diplomat but does not eye the bigger prize of vice-presidency, Newsweek on Sunday quoted an unidentified source close to him as saying.

That could also well be the case for Connecticut Senator Christopher Dodd, the committee's second-ranking Democrat and for Senator Joseph Biden, the committee's chairman, who is frequently mentioned by Democratic insiders as a potential Secretary of State though both might give the V-P post their first priority, the report said.

Kerry is a decorated Vietnam War veteran, but because his Senate experience is in foreign relations rather than military affairs, he's more intrigued by the State Department than the Pentagon, Newsweek said quoting the source. He also speaks fluent French.

Dodd, meanwhile, has recently been showcasing his expertise on Latin America. At an April conference at the US Naval Academy, he laid out a blueprint for a "new relationship" between the United States and the region, the report noted.

Dodd's plan would include efforts to "dramatically improve" relations with Raul Castro's Cuba by lifting a US trade embargo and travel ban.

John Kerry, from his book, The New Soldier:

"We will not quickly join those who march on Veterans' Day waving small [American] flags, calling to memory those thousands who died for the 'greater glory of the United States.'..."

"The John Kerry quote comes in the epilogue to "The New Soldier," the book put out by Vietnam Veterans Against the War [VVAW]. The book's cover features a group of not-particularly sober-looking anti-war protesters (vets, presumably) flying the American flag upside down [while mocking the historic flag raising event at Iwo Jima]":
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1203164/posts

Note John Kerry's name at top right of The New Soldier

John Kerry: "...if the United States were to set a date for withdrawal the prisoners of war would be returned."

"Under questioning from the Committee, Kerry referred to the democratically elected government of South Vietnam -- our allies -- as a "dictatorial regime, the Thieu-Ky-Khiem regime," while respectfully calling the North Vietnamese communist regime we were fighting by its oxymoronic official name, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, and the murderous Viet Cong's political arm by their preferred "Provisional Revolutionary Government.":
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/lindachavez/lc20040428.shtml

From Frontpagemag.com:
During the question and answer period following his April 22, 1971 televised testimony before the Armed Services Committee of the United States Senate, Kerry said:

"I have been to Paris. I have talked with both delegations at the peace talks, that is to say the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Provisional Revolutionary Government and of all eight of Madam Binh's points it has been stated time and time again, and was stated by Senator Vance Hartke when he returned from Paris, and it has been stated by many other officials of this Government, if the United States were to set a date for withdrawal the prisoners of war would be returned."

Even today, knowing what we know about the Vietnamese communists and about John Kerry, it is difficult to grasp the enormity of what he was confessing to. As an American citizen and a member of the United States Navy—while his former comrades and countless others were fighting and dying in Vietnam at the hands of Viet Cong guerillas and North Vietnamese regulars—Kerry consorted with the Viet Cong representative and discussed (“talked with,” he euphemized) her “plan.” That obscene plan included a trade: the return of our POWs for a withdrawal of American forces.

As John O’Neill expressed in his important bestselling book Unfit For Command, “. . . America could have its POWs back only if we agreed that we lost, then surrendered, and then set a date to leave.”

Kerry’s wartime trip to Paris was confirmed about six months ago by a campaign spokesman, who tossed it off as a mere “fact-finding” excursion.

Yet Kerry was apparently so impressed with the “facts” he found in company with the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese that a few months after his return from Paris he had the effrontery to urge the President of the United States to accept his communist hosts’ plan for 'peace' in Vietnam."
http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=15127

"We will not quickly join those who march on Veterans' Day waving small (American) flags, calling to memory those thousands who died for the 'greater glory of the United States.' "

So John Kerry would have a difficult time marching with those waving small American flags yet had NO problems marching with those waving HUGE VIETCONG FLAGS?

"Pictured above: VVAW-supported demonstration during the Washington Spring Offensive, April - May 1971. Notice the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong flags."

June, 1970 -- Kerry joins Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), a national veterans group that is part of the Peoples Coalition for Peace and Justice. The PCPJ is a broad coalition of local and national organizations, including the Communist Party, USA, "committed to conducting demonstrations aimed at ending the war in Indochina, and poverty, racism and injustice at home." The VVAW, CCI and PCPJ all have headquarters at 156 Fifth Avenue in New York City. VVAW Executive Secretary Al Hubbard, a former Black Panther, is also on the coordinating committee of the PCPJ. Hubbard soon appoints Kerry to the VVAW's Executive Committee, bypassing the normal election process.
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=Timeline

http://www.1stcavmedic.com/jane_fonda.htm

November 22, 1970 -- During a fund-raising tour for GI deserters, Vietnam Veterans Against the War and the Black Panthers, Jane Fonda is quoted in the Detroit Free Press as telling a University of Michigan audience:

"I would think that if you understood what communism was, you would hope, you would pray on your knees that we would someday become communist," and "The peace proposal of the Viet Cong is the only honorable, just, possible way to achieve peace in Vietnam."
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=Timeline

Fonda made the following statement at the University of Texas:
"We've got to establish a Socialist economic structure that will limit private profit-oriented businesses. Whether the transition is peaceful depends on the way our present governmental leaders react. We must commit our lives to this transition ...... We should be very proud of our new breed of soldier. It's not organized but it's mutiny, and they have every right." --Karen Elliott Dallas Morning News December 11, 1971

PHOTO: "Jane Fonda and John Kerry at an anti-war rally in Valley Forge, Pa. (Leif Skoogfors/Corbis)"
http://www.snopes.com/photos/politics/kerry.asp

John Kerry and the VVAW--Hanoi's American Puppets?
"Two recently discovered documents captured from the Vietnamese communists during the Vietnam War strongly support the contention that a close link existed between the Hanoi regime and the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) while John Kerry served as the group's leading national spokesman."
http://www.wintersoldier.com/staticpages/index.php?page=puppets

Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) Complete FBI files:
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=VVAWFBI

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.