Posted on 11/11/2006 6:09:04 AM PST by mware
ATLANTIC CITY — Mayor Bob Levy has knowingly misrepresented his military record to family, friends, reporters and the public for decades.
As an Atlantic City lifeguard and as a candidate for mayor last year, Levy claimed he had served during the Vietnam War with the U.S. Army’s elite Special Forces, more familiarly known as the Green Berets. In campaign literature distributed last year, he claimed he had won medals as a Green Beret.
None of that was true.
Levy — who has an otherwise distinguished military service record — was never a member of the Army’s Green Berets, he told The Press this week
(Excerpt) Read more at pressofatlanticcity.com ...
He needs to consider the Boorda Option.
He sounds like John F'n Kerry!
I agree with you. It is a shame that someone who truly served with distinction still feels a need to lie about their accomplishments. Who was that admiral who committed suicide for wearing ribbons he didn't earn?
The Special Forces Association (SFA) was notified, and the Association has a number of top notch retired investigators at their disposal right there in North Carolina. These investigators pulled Samms' freely available military records, traveled to Henderson County, presented the irrefutable evidence to the Sheriff proving Samms was a phony. Samms had never served with Special Forces, and had never served in Vietnam. The Sheriff is a Vietnam Veteran who served as a Huey Crew Chief with an Assault Helicopter Company in Vietnam, and he was as angry about Samms' claims as was the Special Forces Association. The Sheriff thanked them and said he would take care of the problem.
The Sheriff had a private meeting with Samms. After which, Samms quietly resigned and left town.
If you ever suspect a person of falsely claiming to have been a Special Forces soldier in Vietnam, the Special Forces Association will gladly check it out for you and provide the necessary evidence to either prove or disprove the person's claim. Here's the SFA web address http://www.sfahq.org/
That was a great finish.
Have you looked at this thread, this guy looks flaky.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1736862/posts
There are so many holes in that story, I don't know where to begin. The man appears to have evidence of severe trauma on his body, so something tore him up and probably mentally at the same time. It is highly unlikely that whatever it was tore him up happened in a North Vietnamese prison camp. Don't reporters for Newspapers check facts anymore? I guess not. Because the reporter who wrote that story swallowed the story hook line and sinker as did more than a few right here on FR.
I read somewhere the other day, and it might have been somewhere here on FR, that nine out of ten men who claim to be Vietnam Veterans really aren't. It's a phenomena that has psychiatrists scratching their heads.
I sent an email to the reporters
I have enjoyed the, busting the phony vet game for more than 30 years, but I have never done anything like you and that sheriff.
Here's a good read on the subject:
http://www.vva.org/TheVeteran/2003_01/wannabe.htm
Thanks. I like a story with a happy ending. It would have been nice to see the reporter exposed as a total idiot too. I really liked the part about protecting the nuclear missiles from the Cuban exiles so they couldn't capture them and then fire them at Castro.
I wanted to verify my memory with Gordon L. Rottman first, but I couldn't find a contact email address for him so I'm going to tell you an interesting piece of trivia related to this subject, and hope my memory is good.
I served with a Special Forces veteran of Vietnam in a Texas LRRP guard unit in the 80s, he had received his SF designation OJT, Rottman said he didn't believe it himself at first, but he had to do the verification for his security clearance and it was true, as far as I know that would surprise almost all "wannabe" hunters.
If any one has an email address for Gordon Rottman I would appreciate him giving it to me, so that I can get the guys name, and verify my memory.
What you remember is absolutely true. Up until 1985 Special Forces Qualification was so haphazardly controlled that almost any Adjutant with a mimeograph machine could cut orders awarding a soldier a “3” or an “S” qualification on his MOS indicating the soldier was Special Forces qualified. In reality, only those who graduated from the Special Forces Qualification Course at Fort Bragg, NC and then gained a total of three addition Special Forces MOSs were actually Special Forces Qualified, but unless you looked closely at a soldier’s records, you couldn’t tell who was really qualified and who wasn’t.
There were quite a few of these “Paper Qualifications” in the Special Forces community when BG Joe Lutz pushed the Special Forces Branch through Department of the Army in 1985, and Special Forces, for the first time, had its own branch with it’s own MOSs. With the now activated Special Forces Branch, Special Forces MOSs converted as follows: 11B became 18B, 11C became 18C, 12B became 18C, 91B became 18D, 05B became 18B, and 11F became 18F.
It was show and tell time. Now, no matter how long a soldier had been in Special Forces, for him to be awarded an 18, he had to produce his training records. Paper qualifications weren’t accepted.
During this “Show and Tell” transition to the 18 Career Field, it was discovered, to no one’s surprise, Special Forces Reserve and National Guard units were predominately “Paper” qualified, very few had ever been formally trained in a Special Forces MOS. They were, for the most part, conventional 11B, 12B, 91B, etc who had been accepted into Reserve/Guard Special Forces units and then OJT’d their Special Forces Qualification. After they had participated in three Special Forces operations, their Adjutants cut their orders for a 3 or and S, and just like magic, they were Special Forces Qualified in the eyes of the Army.
That all ended with the 18 MOS Special Forces Career Field. Now, to be considered Special Forces Qualified and receive an 18 MOS, a soldier had to prove he had been formally trained at Fort Bragg. There were some exceptions to this, and one was if a soldier had served with a Special Forces unit in Vietnam and had OJT’d his Special Forces Qualification in combat. If he had done that, his “Paper” Qualification was accepted and he was awarded an 18.
It’s a strange twist of fate that I happen to know of several of these combat OJT Special Forces Qualifications and one of them, like Levy, was assigned as a base station radio operator at a Special Forces Training Camp near Long Binh in 1970. But that’s where the similarity ends. He had orders assigning him to a Special Forces unit in Vietnam, and he had orders awarding him an S, and apparently Levy has neither.
As for the man you knew in the Texas Guard with a “Paper Qualification,” (actually we referred to them as “Paper Flashes” as the Flash they wore on their berets was only paper.) I’m sure he got his SF Qualification the same thousands did before 1985, he got it the easy way.
DJ Taylor
11B/11C became 18B, 12B became 18C, 91B became 18D, 05B became 18E, and 11F became 18F.
As for the man you knew in the Texas Guard with a “Paper Qualification,”
Like I said he earned it in combat in Vietnam and wore the patch, he was a very good guy and Rottman seemed to have a lot of respect for him.
There were about 7 more SF in the company and the Captain was SF, some of them like Rottman were active duty.
Your information was excellent and I appreciate it much, that is stuff I had never read about, yet it is commonly known that many Rangers weren't tabbed.
"I served with a Special Forces veteran of Vietnam in a Texas LRRP guard unit in the 80s..."
If he was an SF LRRP in Vietnam, you might find him on this web site: http://www.projectdelta.net/
ping
This guy is one of two political phonies exposed this year -- the other was Rep. William Delahunt, D-MA. (Delahunt won reelection. Most people in Mass. hate vets and his opponent, Jeff Beatty, was a real one).
The POW Network has a page on phony Levy here:
http://www.pownetwork.org/phonies/phonies296.htm
A left-wing talk show host from Atlantic City, Virginia McCabe, defends him (albeit incoherently) here:
http://www.gallowaynews.com/
http://www.gallowaynews.com/HurleyAbusesLevy.htm
http://www.gallowaynews.com/why.htm
As recently as October 18 Levy was still making his false claims.
**** him.
**** McCabe.
You know, we could sure use some of these Democrat war heroes, er, in the war. But I guess I'm just doing Karl Rove's bidding by saying that. (Karl... have your people call my people... you apparently don't have my direct deposit information).
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
I personally make a slight distinction between someone who never served and someone who served and then lies and exaggerates his service. The former is a "wannabee" and the latter a "blowfish."
But they're both "phonies" and "scumbags."
The phenomenon is not new. Shakespeare referred to it, Civil War vets knew it, and WWI doughboys called them "four-flushers."
Levy's defence seems to be, "I only lied about this, I didn't lie about that." Whatever... four-flusher.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
Well, his big brother Virginia McCabe has been defending him with that very claim! See the links I posted above, including:
http://www.gallowaynews.com/why.htm
Hey, fair enough. "Swift-Boating" as I define it is exposing the false claims of a four-flushing politician.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
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