Kerry's Anti-war Book Riles Former Green Beret

Kerry's Anti-war Book Riles Former Green Beret
Marc Morano, CNSNews.com
Thursday, Feb. 19, 2004
John Kerry downplayed any threat posed by the communist government of
North Vietnam in his 1971 book, "The New Soldier," and instead charged
that American soldiers "were killing women and children" and helping
to create "a nation of refugees, bomb craters, amputees, orphans,
widows, and prostitutes" in Vietnam.
The book, a copy of which CNSNews.com has obtained, is very difficult
to find 33 years after it was written. Single copies of the book
reportedly are selling for as high as $849.95 on the Internet.

The cover of the book displays long-haired, bearded men carrying an
upside-down American flag in an apparent mockery of the famous
planting of the American flag on Iwo Jima during World War II.

The book might not mean much if Kerry weren't the front-runner in the
race for the Democrats' presidential nomination and fresh off another
win this week in the Wisconsin primary.

'Benedict Arnold'

But Kerry's anti-war activism of three decades ago is being attacked
by among others, a retired Green Beret, who labels the U.S. senator's
behavior upon returning from Vietnam "a Benedict Arnold type of
betrayal."

In the book's epilogue, which begins on page 158, Kerry sums up his
views on the war by writing: "We were sent to Vietnam to kill
Communism. But we found instead that we were killing women and
children." Kerry served in Vietnam, receiving three Purple Hearts, a
Silver Star and a Bronze Star.

The book is a compilation of testimonies from members of the group
Vietnam Veterans Against the War. It alleges abuses and crimes
committed by U.S. soldiers while on duty in Vietnam.

Kerry is listed as the author. His former brother-in-law and current
campaign adviser, David Thorne, and documentary maker George Butler
were credited with editing the book.

Ted Sampley, a retired Green Beret and founder of the Web site
VietnamVeteransAgainstJohnKerry.com, told CNSNews.com that Kerry's
book and his anti-war activism during the early 1970s represented
nothing less than "a Benedict Arnold type of betrayal."

Sampley, a Vietnam veteran and publisher of the U.S. Veteran Dispatch,
said "the communists used [Kerry's and his group's allegations] and
gained great propaganda value out of that."

In the book, Kerry states that Vietnamese citizens "didn't even know
the difference between communism and democracy," and he instead blamed
the United States for causing chaos in Vietnam.

"In the process we created a nation of refugees, bomb craters,
amputees, orphans, widows, and prostitutes, and we gave new meaning to
the words of the Roman historian Tacitus: 'Where they made a desert
they called it peace,'" Kerry explained.

Kerry said he "saw Vietnam ravaged equally by American bombs and
search-and-destroy missions, as well as by Viet Cong terrorism ..."

'Lie'

But Sampley refutes Kerry's charges of widespread atrocities. "Many of
the people who made those [atrocity] allegations were not even Vietnam
veterans," Sampley said.

"From my experience of two combat tours in Vietnam, I never witnessed
anything like [Kerry] described anywhere, and if I had, I would not
have allowed it to happen," Sampley said. "Most American soldiers are
really offended [by Kerry's allegations], because everyone would not
have behaved like that, and it was a lie."

Kerry predicted that as a result of their experiences during the war,
veterans such as himself "will not readily join the American Legion
and the Veterans of Foreign Wars ..."

"We will not uphold traditions which decorously memorialize that which
was base and grim," he wrote.

Long before Kerry's Democrat rival Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina
complained of there being "two Americas," one for the rich and
powerful, the other for the poor, Kerry was using the phrase in his
1971 book.

"I think that more than anything, the New Soldier is trying to point
out how there are two Americas - the one the speeches are about and
the one we really are," Kerry wrote.

'Fabricated Foreign Threats'

"We are asking America to turn from false glory, hollow victory,
fabricated foreign threats, fear which threatens us as a nation,
shallow pride which feeds off fear, and mostly from the promises which
have proven so deceiving these past ten years," Kerry added.

Kerry wrote that his tours of duty in Vietnam irrevocably transformed
his outlook on the military.

"Because of all that I saw in Vietnam, the treatment of civilians, the
ravaging of their countryside, the needless, useless deaths, the
deception and duplicity of our policy, I changed," Kerry wrote.

'Crime'

While Kerry maintained on page 166 that he was "still willing to pick
up arms and defend it [America] - die for it if necessary," the book
left the impression that the nature of war needed to be classified as
criminal activity.

One page after Kerry's epilogue concludes the book quotes Ernest
Hemingway calling all war "a crime."

"Never think that war no matter how necessary nor how justified is not
a crime. Ask the infantry and ask the dead," reads the Hemingway quote
on page 167 of Kerry's book.

While Kerry's anti-war activism has created controversy with many
Vietnam veterans, others defend the would-be president.

Former Democrat U.S. senator and decorated Vietnam veteran Max Cleland
from Georgia said Kerry "was articulating what so many of us felt deep
in our gut."

Blame Nixon for the Democrat War

"I wouldn't have joined an anti-war parade, but John came back and
began to see that the greatest service to his veterans was to fight
Nixon and to stop the war," Cleland said, according to wire reports.

Kerry defended his anti-war activism last week, calling his protests
"a measurement of character."

"I didn't love coming back from the war I fought in and having to tell
people, 'This is wrong; this is screwed up.' But it was," Kerry said,
according to wire reports.

But Sampley said he and many other Vietnam veterans believe Kerry
betrayed and dishonored the soldiers who fought the war.

"In order to get to where he is today, to run for president, John
Kerry had to wade through the blood of American servicemen still on
the battlefield in 1971," Sampley said.


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