Larry Thurlow respons to Kerry smears
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| Thu, 08-19-2004 - 12:59pm |
I am convinced that the language used in my citation for a Bronze Star was language taken directly from John Kerry's report which falsely described the action on the Bay Hap River as action that saw small arms fire and automatic weapons fire from both banks of the river.
To this day, I can say without a doubt in my mind, along with other accounts from my shipmates-there was no hostile enemy fire directed at my boat or at any of the five boats operating on the river that day.
I submitted no paperwork for a medal nor did I file an after action report describing the incident. To my knowledge, John Kerry was the only officer who filed a report describing his version of the incidents that occurred on the river that day.
It was not until I had left the Navy-approximately three months after I left the service-that I was notified that I was to receive a citation for my actions on that day.
I believed then as I believe now that I received my Bronze Star for my efforts to rescue the injured crewmen from swift boat number three and to conduct damage control to prevent that boat from sinking.
My boat and several other swift boats went to the aid of our fellow swift boat sailors whose craft was adrift and taking on water. We provided immediate rescue and damage control to prevent boat three from sinking and to offer immediate protection and comfort to the injured crew.
After the mine exploded, leaving swift boat three dead in the water, John Kerry's boat, which was on the opposite side of the river, fled the scene.
US Army Special Forces officer Jim Rassmann, who was on Kerry's boat at the time, fell off the boat and into the water. Kerry's boat returned several minutes later-under no hail of enemy gunfire-to retrieve Rassmann from the river only seconds before another boat was going to pick him up.
Kerry campaign spokespersons have conflicting accounts of this incident-the latest one being that Kerry's boat did leave but only briefly and returned under withering enemy fire to rescue Mr. Rassmann. However, none of the other boats on the river that day reported enemy fire nor was anyone wounded by small arms action. The only damage on that day was done to boat three-a result of the underwater mine. None of the other swift boats received damage from enemy gunfire.
And in a new development, Kerry campaign officials are now finally acknowledging that while Kerry's boat left the scene, none of the other boats on the river ever left the damaged swift boat. This is a direct contradiction to previous accounts made by Jim Rassmann in the Oregonian newspaper and a direct contradiction to the "No Man Left Behind" theme during the Democratic National Convention.
These ever changing accounts of the Bay Hap River incident by Kerry campaign officials leave me asking one question.if no one ever left the scene of the Bay Hap River incident, how could anyone be left behind?
Edited 8/19/2004 1:14 pm ET ET by truemobile

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Amen!
I agree. Bush's reaction in the classroom is really a non-issue just like Kerry's 30 years ago. Obviously Kerry's actions weren't so bad back then the they would warrent a reprimand (in fact he got a few medals....we can debate the criteria the US military uses to give out medals if we want....but that has nothing really to do with John Kerry) just like Bush's 7 minutes in the classroom (with his handlers close by, keeping him informed of developments) So puleeease! I just wish people would focus on the REAL issues. This other stuff is just harming everyone and getting in the way of real and positive debate over what is best for America (and by extension many other nations in the world).
Kerry's service is not even mentioned in Bush's campaign.
Bush has enough to go after Kerry on based on Kerry's voting record, and attendence in the Senate Intelligence Committee meetings (27% I think it is).
<<He does that to everyone. >>
Hardly. He can toss the soft questions with the best of them.
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Renee ~~~
Renee ~~~
Renee ~~~
This month the Kerry Campaign abandoned one claim that John Kerry had made for years about his Vietnam War service and put another into question. The claim that has been dropped: that Kerry was in Cambodia at Christmastime in 1968. In a 1979 review of the movie Apocalypse Now in the Boston Herald, Kerry wrote, "I remember spending Christmas Eve of 1968 5 miles across the Cambodian border being shot at by our Vietnamese allies." In a 1986 speech on the Senate floor, Kerry said, "I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia. . . . I have that memory which is seared-seared-in me." In a 1992 interview with States News Service, Kerry claimed, "On Christmas Eve of 1968, I was on a gunboat in a firefight that wasn't supposed to be taking place." That year he also told the Associated Press, "Everybody was over there . Nobody thought twice about it."
These are vivid statements full of colorful detail-South Vietnamese soldiers shooting off guns to celebrate Christmas. But, as Emily Litella used to say on Saturday Night Live, "Never mind." Historian Douglas Brinkley's bestselling Tour of Duty, based partly on Kerry's wartime journals, places Kerry on Christmas 1968 in Sa Dec, 50 miles from Cambodia. On August 11, Kerry spokesman Michael Meehan said Kerry's boat was "in the watery borders between Vietnam and Cambodia" on Christmas Eve. That's far from an endorsement of Kerry's oft-told stories. "He was mistaken about Christmas in Cambodia," Brinkley told London's Daily Telegraph last week. But he "went into Cambodian waters three or four times in January and February 1969 on clandestine missions. . . . He was a ferry master, a drop-off guy, but it was dangerous as hell. Kerry carries a hat which he was given by one CIA operative." Indeed, Kerry showed the hat to a Washington Post reporter last year. Similarly, in 2000 Kerry told U.S. News's Kevin Whitelaw that he had run guns into Cambodia.
The Kerry camp has provided no documentation of Kerry's missions to Cambodia; Meehan says that's not surprising because the missions were secret. Perhaps. But none of Kerry's boat mates, most of whom support him, corroborate his story, and the one boat mate who opposes him flatly denies it. Retired Adm. Roy Hoffman, commander of the swift boats during Kerry's four months in Vietnam, insists that no swift boats went into Cambodia. Hoffman is, to be sure, a member of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which opposes Kerry and sponsored the anti-Kerry book Unfit for Command. But there is nothing on the record except Kerry's word to prove him wrong.
There is public documentation of other secret missions to Cambodia in 1968-69. In most, if not all, cases it seems that agents and special ops were flown into Cambodia by helicopter. If boats were used, the Navy had available smaller, quieter craft than swift boats. That makes Kerry's story seem implausible, but it could still be true. If he made public the journals he provided to Brinkley, there might be more evidence that could be checked.
Character counts. On the Christmas story (which even the pro-Kerry New York Times admits Kerry has not "put to rest"), perhaps Kerry was just confused about dates, or perhaps he convinced himself that an untrue story was true, as people sometimes do, and had no intent to mislead. A more unsettling possibility is that he consciously leapt the bounds of truth to make his experience seem more spectacular or to score political points. Those are not the sort of things most people want in a president.
Will Kerry's evidently untrue statements about Christmas in Cambodia raise doubts about his as-yet-uncorroborated stories about later Cambodian missions? Will they undermine his credibility and bolster the charges of his swift boat critics? Not clear. Most of Kerry's boat mates testify to his heroism; most of those serving on other swift boats in the unit take a different view. So far as I know, all served honorably and are entitled to respectful attention; some may have political motives, in both directions. Battlefield memories inevitably and understandably differ. But character counts in presidents, and some of Kerry's statements over the years-not all, but some-count against his character.
Renee ~~~
Renee ~~~
"Bush has enough to go after Kerry on based on Kerry's voting record, and attendence in the Senate Intelligence Committee meetings (27% I think it is)."
Of course!
"Amen!
Renee ~~~
Oh Renee, you always manage to elevate our discussions to
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