Anti-Kerry ad dispute grows
ELECTION 2004
Anti-Kerry ad dispute grows
Statements question heroism in Vietnam
By SCOTT SHEPARD
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 08/07/04
WASHINGTON ?- The controversy surrounding ads questioning John Kerry's war record grew Friday when a key figure in the veterans' group airing the ads was quoted in the Boston Globe retracting one of his central allegations.
But later in the day, retired Navy Lt. Cmdr. George Elliott issued a statement saying he had been misquoted in the newspaper.
The ad, sponsored by an anti-Kerry organization called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, features 13 Vietnam veterans accusing the Democratic presidential nominee of betraying his shipmates, dishonoring his country and telling lies to win combat decorations as a swift boat skipper in the Mekong Delta during the Vietnam war.
Elliott, one of the 13 accusers in the ad, was one of Kerry's superiors in Vietnam when Kerry was awarded medals for heroic actions, including the Silver Star, the Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts.
"John Kerry has not been honest about what happened in Vietnam," Elliott is quoted as saying in the ad.
In a signed affidavit he provided to the ad sponsors on July 21, Elliott suggested Kerry did not deserve his Silver Star, stating, "I was never informed that he had simply shot a wounded, fleeing Viet Cong in the back."
On Friday, the day after the ad started airing in three presidential battleground states, the Boston Globe quoted Elliot as saying, "It was a terrible mistake probably for me to sign the affidavit with those words. I'm the one in trouble here."
The Globe reported that Elliott thinks Kerry did deserve the medal. "I still don't think he [Kerry] shot the guy in the back," the Globe quoted Elliott as saying.
Later Thursday, however, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth released another signed affidavit from Elliott saying he had been misquoted by the Globe.
The new affidavit does not specify how Elliot was misquoted, however, and Swift Boat Veterans for Truth did not respond to a request to interview Elliott.
'Many sources'
At issue is an event in which Kerry killed a fleeing Viet Cong guerrilla while on patrol on the Mekong River. According to accounts Kerry and his swift boat crewmates provided to Kerry's biographers, Kerry left his boat and pursued the guerrilla because the man was carrying a Russian-made rocket launcher capable of penetrating armor.
Kerry and eyewitnesses to the event have long claimed that the guerrilla posed a serious threat, despite having suffered an undisclosed injury, and Kerry has denied shooting him in the back.
Elliott, in his latest affidavit, said he had no personal knowledge concerning Kerry's killing of the guerrilla and that in accusing Kerry of lying about what happened in Vietnam, he had relied upon "many sources," including a Kerry biography published by Boston Globe reporters.
"Had I known the facts, I would not have recommended Kerry for the Silver Star for simply pursuing and dispatching a single wounded, fleeing Viet Cong," Elliott stated in his latest affidavit.
Anatomy of a shooting
The Boston Globe biography upon which Elliott relied includes a portion of the after-action report concerning Kerry's battlefield heroics, saying Kerry "chased VC inland behind hooch and shot him while he fled, capturing one B-40 rocket launcher with round in chamber."
"I don't have a second's question about that, nor does anybody who was with me," Kerry told the Globe biographers in recalling his decision to shoot. "He was running away with a live B-40, and, I thought, poised to turn around and fire it."
When the Globe asked if he had shot the guerrilla in the back, Kerry replied, "No, absolutely not. He was hurt, other guys where shooting from back, side, back. There is not a scintilla of question in any person's mind who was there [that] this guy was dangerous. He was a combatant, he had an armed weapon."
But Elliott said in his affidavit Thursday: "While I suppose the fleeing, wounded Viet Cong could have been backpedaling, I have never heard this faintly suggested by anyone, and I do not understand why he would have to turn around to face Kerry if he was fleeing backwards."
