The Source Of "Swift Boat" Anger???

[Gimpy]

The Source of Swift Boat Anger

August 26, 2004

A GUEST CONTRIBUTION

by Mark Levine

In verifying the accuracy of the ads of the now notorious "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth," the media has quite rightly focused on the details of their accounts: how their attacks on John Kerry contradict their own prior statements, official Navy records, and the accounts of Kerry?s crew.

But lost in the media hoopla is the motivation of these men. For those who funded and produced the ad, the motivation is simple: they are close associates of George W. Bush and his chief political strategist Karl Rove, and they want to see Bush win the election. Having financed and directed the John McCain smears, these Bush money-men certainly won?t pass up the chance to vilify John Kerry.

For those who star in the ads -- the actual swift boat veterans who began this process and wrote the anti-Kerry book "Unfit for Command" -- the evidence points to a darker motivation: revenge on John Kerry for revealing in 1971 some of their indiscriminate killing of Vietnamese civilians.

Thirty-three years ago, Kerry told the world about the American policy of establishing "free-fire zones," where a solider was ordered to shoot anything that moved, combatant and non-combatant alike. Kerry discovered upon his return to the United States that such zones and other inhumane tactics routinely practiced in Vietnam violated the Geneva Conventions regulating the laws of war.

While free-fire zones are not "war crimes" in the classic sense of Nazi death camps, they do raise an important question as to America?s understanding of its moral character. Are there limits to conduct in war? If so, should violations of these limits be reported or covered up? The fury directed at Kerry, both in 1971 and today, is largely fueled by the knowledge of many of these vets that they ?- like the Abu Gharib prison guards ?- were ordered to act outside international norms of humanity.

As these soldiers were "just following orders," John Kerry?s intention was not to publicly lambaste them. In fact, Kerry even labeled himself a "war criminal," to show solidarity with his fellow vets rather than point the finger at them, so as to focus his criticism on then-President Richard Nixon and the other policymakers who issued the questionable orders.

This distinction was unfortunately lost on the otherwise intelligent and articulate John O?Neil, the current co-author of "Unfit for Command," who was hired by Nixon in 1971 to take on John Kerry. (The other co-author, Jerome Corsi, notorious for calling Kerry a Communist and for slurring Catholics, Jews, Muslims, and gays, has been wisely kept hidden from the talk show circuit by the anti-Kerry crew.) Debating Kerry in 1971, O?Neil conceded that he, like Kerry, participated in "free-fire zones," but he insisted the problem was not the policy itself; it was the person who revealed it publicly: John Kerry.

But Kerry was not after O?Neil. Kerry was out to change the policy. In Vietnam, Kerry and his crewmen complained to superiors so much that Kerry?s supportive commanding officer was transferred from the unit. Returning home, Kerry went before the Senate and publicly read veterans? accounts of even more serious atrocities. (The second Swift Boat ad quotes Kerry?s descriptions of these atrocities -- "raping, cutting off ears ? heads" ? without disclosing that Kerry was, in fact, reading from other veterans? statements, not his own.)

Thirty-three years later, it is Kerry?s exposure of systematic inhumanity in Vietnam that continues to fuel the anger of these vets, not the faux-controversy as to how Kerry earned his medals during the war. From 1971 to 2003, none of these veterans -- not even John O?Neil -- challenged the Navy?s well-documented account of Kerry?s heroism and courage.

All but one of Kerry?s many shipmates have fiercely defended his "grace under fire," swapping stories of how he risked his life to rescue Jim Rassmann, how he bravely faced down and killed a Viet Cong sniper, how he once saved forty-two Vietnamese civilians from starvation, etc. The exception, Steven Gardner, proves the rule with his reported "hair-trigger penchant for firing M-60s into the mangrove thickets and sampans" and Kerry?s purported threats to court-martial him if he did not curb his aggression.

Even a leading force behind the anti-Kerry vets, former admiral Roy Hoffman, praised Kerry?s service as a "shining example" until he found out Kerry had disclosed to author Douglas Brinkley Hoffman?s fulsome praise of a soldier who killed thirty unarmed Vietnamese fisherman in a free-fire zone. Reported by fellow vets as "hotheaded," "bloodthirsty," and "egotistical," Hoffman was "the classic body-count guy" who "had a genuine taste for the unsavory aspects of warfare."

Projection is powerful psychiatry. A man fearing damage to his own reputation will often lash out at his accuser rather than examine the truth of the accusation. And for those aggressive veterans who continued to support the war in 1971, the needless loss of American and Vietnamese life was not the only charge that could be laid at their feet. John Kerry?s famous rhetorical question: "How can you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" referred to American lives lost for all the wrong reasons.

When Kerry asked this question in 1971, fifty-five thousand Americans were already dead, Nixon was withdrawing troops, and even John O?Neil had to concede the war was lost. But Nixon, O?Neil, and others continued to argue for "Vietnamization," a continuation of the war so as to have "peace with honor." Unfortunately, this strategy led only to three thousand more Americans dead, ten thousand more wounded, and still did not save South Vietnam.

That three thousand more names are inscribed on the Vietnam Wall for no other purpose but to preserve America?s "honor" must weigh heavily on O?Neil, Hoffman, Gardner, and the other "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth," who so fervently believed in continuing the lost cause 33 years ago that they have turned their ire on Kerry today.

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[Arrow]

"When faced with the prospect that a Communist holocaust was going to happen in SEA, Kerry is reported to claim that such an eventuality was "ludicrous". Well, it happened and on the same scale and magnitude as happened in Russia, Korea and China, according to Amnesty International. But I suppose it's not PC to mention such misjudgments or deliberate misrepresentation of history and intention, especially if it worked to Kerry's advantage. At the end of the day there were about 4 million plus reasons why Kerry was dead wrong, but what the heck, lift rug and sweep, right? He be a hero and supposedly accomplished military leader, so that makes the boo-boo all better now I suppose. The problem with all that is that there are big home chips on the line now, and Kerry's now ya see it now ya don't big plan, non-plan, or plan to have a plan is veneer thin, not being presented or presented then withdrawn."

Scamp

[Arrow]

"And so, here we have it..........

If Sen. Kerry?s intention was to bitterly divide VN Vets then he has succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. He has sent out his emissary; Rep. Ford of Tennessee, to offer up a flag of truce and is trying to call of the DNC dogs of war. But too late as the Genie is out of the bottle now and he shall reap what he has sown. He wasn?t the only one in Navy Operation Market Time; RVN, that operated along the coast, estuaries and wider rivers. In the coming times we shall speak out and be heard and the saga will be significantly different from his. And for my part I never heard of anyone in the USN engaged in the butchery, rape and mayhem or cadaver desecration or POW murder, ever. But evidently Kerry was into wounded/defacto POW capping and whatever else he purports to have happened.

Need I paint a frigging picture, there were plenty of cadavers and all I ever saw was efforts to get them out of the water using a small cargo net and then transport the remains to an appropriate cemetery facility, and a few to US facilities. Regardless, the remains were covered by a blanket carrying the USN logo.

I truly hate to see us VN Vets walk this sorrowful ground and ply these dark waters again, but I have never shrunk from a fight yet and don?t plan to now. If Kerry is hell bent for election to give the USN in VN a bad name then he will stand alone, very alone. Two thousand USN names on our wall demand we set this wrong right."

Scamp,
Operation Market Time, RVN.
And proudly so.

__________________
Now then, show me the horizon. Let go the helm and run with the wind.

[Arrow]

We wish that a merciful God could wipe away our own memories of that service as easily as this administration has wiped away their memories of us. But all that they have done and all that they can do by this denial is to make more clear than ever our own determination to undertake one last mission - to search out and destroy the last vestige of this barbaric war, to pacify our own hearts, to conquer the hate and fear that have driven this country these last ten years and more. And more. And so when thirty years from now our brothers go down the street without a leg, without an arm, or a face, and small boys ask why, we will be able to say "Vietnam" and not mean a desert, not a filthy obscene memory, but mean instead where America finally turned and where soldiers like us helped it in the turning.

I don't appreciate John Kerry's arrogance in pretending to speak for my family with that ridiculous sob story at the end of his little speech.We were never ashamed ofbeing part of the US Military. My husband carried himself with dignityin his living and his dying in or out of uniform.On the daywe put him in the groundGod gave me the grace tostand up like a womanand recieve with pridethe folded flag that he servedunder.There were no sob stories on that day about how the government did us wrong and what vicitms we were. Every member ofour family was proud of my husbands service to this country on that day.

I don't knowwho John Kerry and his motley crew of winter soldiers thought they were speaking for but I can tell you it wasn't us.

Arrow>>>>>>>>>

[Arrow]

http://www.jameswebb.com/articles/va...hywefought.htm

[Gimpy]

One veterans has to say about this!


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When anger reaches a certain level, one has two options: rage or repression. I?m teetering on a violent explosion, or possibly catatonic silence. I?m not sure, but I know that some injustices are too unjust to deal with rationally.

You see, I?m a disabled Vietnam veteran. One leg was amputated and the other has nerve damage, my spleen and a testicle were removed, and I have lots of shrapnel scars. But I?m just another Marine who made it home, minus a few parts. The war is over for me, a long time ago. Yet some Americans want to bring the war back, to bring it back to hurt us who fought that war. It is not the longhaired hippies of yesterday or the war protestors that marched in our streets against that divisive war that are attacking us, but supposedly patriotic Americans.

And these so-called patriotic Americans say they represent the heartland of America. But do they? I don?t think so.

By trashing these three combat veterans, two Democrats and one Republican, they have actually trashed all combat veterans of that war. Is this what Americans want? They have insulted the 58,000 Americans who died in that horrible war and also the parents, most of whom are now in their graves, who lost a son in Vietnam.

This Republican attack machine does not speak for the heartland of America; it is attacking the heart of America.

These are the same people who do not like the American working class, those struggling to make ends meet today. And they do not care about their children who suffer from the wounds of war--just look how Republicans in Congress are attempting to cut the VA budget during this war. The war on Vietnam veterans is an extension of this Republican class war, a branch of the Republican war against working Americans. Not only do these Republicans not represent the heartland of America; they don?t represent anything about this country. This is why they are attacking good Americans who sacrificed for their country.

A Vietnam Vet who's disgusted.

Posted Sunday, August 15, 2004
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