Kerry's Interminable Four Months (Combat Tour My ...)

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For all of you who wave the Kerry/Edwards placards, or merely voice their rhetoric on this site and others, here is something that should give you pause. The great war hero John Kerry spent only four months in Vietnam. This is a news item that I have only recently taken note of, being in less of a position to keep up to speed with the political grapevine. I am curious how a man who only spent four months in a combat zone can keep the diatribe as to his wartime prowess and his combat attributes so prominent in his personal salespitch.

You may not know this, though you all probably do, but combat tours lasting four months are laughable at best. One year tours are very nearly standard in the Iraq/Afghanistan conflict. One year was also the standard for Vietnam. During WWII the average was over 3 years. Now, if he was seriously injured and therefore had to be evacuated from the combat zone this is understandable. But, John Kerry was NEVER seriously injured.

I have a friend, a young Green Beret, who just spent 2 months recovering as a guest in my house after being seriously injured in Afghanistan. He was several feet from a anti-tank landmine that detonated severing his right thumb, blowing out a chunk of his leg and leaving shrapnel in his face and torso. That is seriously injured.

For his injuries the Army awarded him the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star. But, I guess since it only requires a pitiful 4 months of duty to make one eligible for a lifetime of ambitious self-promotion for political gain, perhaps my good friend ought to run for president.

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Lusatian, what's come out with all of this stuff is that no matter how things are done now, at the time, medals were handed out willy-nilly. Dole has said so. Two veterans here said so in very affecting posts on the "bookie" thread (links on request. One voting for Bush, one voting for Kerry.)

So, was he seriously injured? I dunno, but he was injured enough to legitimately get the medal, as legitimately as scores of others at the time.

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Yup, we've got enough vets of that experience here at A2K, and at another board I frequent, to get a pretty decent picture of what was going on. Although I understand why some of them don't care to say more, the ones that have, well ... it makes me appreciate why some don't want to say anything.

Nothing said by a young person today is going to change how I feel about men and women who volunteered to go to Vietnam. Nothing.

edited to add that volunteering when you can expect to go to war, is a far different thing than volunteering to serve when you believe you will never be called into active service.

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Lusatian said:

"I have a friend, a young Green Beret, who just spent 2 months recovering as a guest in my house after being seriously injured in Afghanistan. He was several feet from a anti-tank landmine that detonated severing his right thumb, blowing out a chunk of his leg and leaving shrapnel in his face and torso. That is seriously injured."

Good try, Lusatian.

However, generally qualifications other than having had the grave misfortune to have chunks blown out of you are required for success in politics.

I admire Kerry for his activism against the Vietnam war - I have no way of knowing from here how much the war trumpet is being blown by Kerry - however, given his anti-war activism, it would seem that his war record would have to be faced up to and discussed by him - especially in such a conservative and relatively militaristic milieu as the USA.

I think it a pity that the went to war/avoided war issue is being blown up so much by either side - I cannot see the relevance of this to the ability to be president - except that I observe that those who have actually seen the realities of war generally seem much more committed to peaceful alternatives than those who have seen nothing but the bombast in their own heads about it.

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sozobe wrote:

Lusatian, what's come out with all of this stuff is that no matter how things are done now, at the time, medals were handed out willy-nilly. Dole has said so. Two veterans here said so in very affecting posts on the "bookie" thread (links on request. One voting for Bush, one voting for Kerry.)

So, was he seriously injured? I dunno, but he was injured enough to legitimately get the medal, as legitimately as scores of others at the time.

I agree. It's been pointed out more than once in different threads that severity of injury is not an issue in qualifing for medals. I think the reason it's getting so much scrutiny is Kerry's campaigning so much on his military service while not saying much about the real issues at the DNC. If he didn't or doesn't want the scrutiny, he shouldn't have made such a big deal about it. I'm sure I'm not the only one that questioned his reluctance to release all of his records. It would have never occured to me to even want to see them if he'd not made such an issue out of his service.

I personally don't care if he was ever in Cambodian waters or not. But any man who campaigns by saying his military service has prepared him to be a better leader should be able to back up his claims. Now even the men who were with him are saying that he wasn't really in Cambodia, but close to it.

If he has truly been libeled, then he should sue. I don't think he will and I'm pretty sure I know his reasons.

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Re: Kerry's Interminable Four Months (Combat Tour My ...)

Lusatian wrote:

The great war hero John Kerry spent only four months in Vietnam. This is a news item that I have only recently taken note of, being in less of a position to keep up to speed with the political grapevine. I am curious how a man who only spent four months in a combat zone can keep the diatribe as to his wartime prowess and his combat attributes so prominent in his personal salespitch.

Well, first of all, let's begin with: you're wrong.

Kerry spent a total of 13 months in the Viet Nam theater on two tours of duty. He enlisted in '66; after two years of OCS was deployed to the Gulf of Tonkin on the frigate USS Gridley, and in November 1968 volunteered for a second tour as a Swift Boat captain. That began his four months in-country ( this is where you apparently got confused ). In units that saw a 70% casualty rate, John Kerry earned three Purple Hearts, one Bronze Star, and one Silver Star. He left Nam in March of 1969 and separated from active service in March, 1970.

It's all at his website, and is independently verifiable from multiple sources, including his records from the US Navy.

(Where were you in '68, Lusatian? I'll tell you where I was: spending my first summer at Scout camp.)

Where was George W Bush?

He was defending the gin mills and roadhouses of Alabama from invasion by Charlie.

Now, shrapnel in one's thigh as a reminder of one's service to one's country might not be as significant to you as, say, the two teeth fillings Dubya carries, or the five deferments Dick Cheney was awarded, or the pilonidal cyst that prevented Rush Limbaugh from serving, or the minority gentleman that kept Tom DeLay out, but then that's why the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (which in an Orwellian turn are neither swift nor truthful) came into existence.

To keep otherwise intelligent people distracted from the real issues.

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Re: Kerry's Interminable Four Months (Combat Tour My ...)

Lusatian wrote:

I am curious how a man who only spent four months in a combat zone can keep the diatribe as to his wartime prowess and his combat attributes so prominent in his personal salespitch.
I have a friend, a young Green Beret, who just spent 2 months recovering as a guest in my house after being seriously injured in Afghanistan. He was several feet from a anti-tank landmine that detonated severing his right thumb, blowing out a chunk of his leg and leaving shrapnel in his face and torso. That is seriously injured. .

i am sorry to hear that your friend got hit. my best wishes that he recovers and can continue into a well life. i suspect that his mental wounds will require your help beyond bandages. please do those things.

i am puzzled by the whole " kerry was only in country for 4 months" thing. fact is, he was there. he didn't wait to be drafted, he signed up. could have gone to germany like my friend down the street, but requested vietnam. even if you believe he did so just to pump up his resume for political purposes, one thing is for sure. the vietcong didn't care why he was there. he was a target.

if anyone who wanted to could get a p/h and book it on home, i suspect that the vietnamese would have had nobody to look at but each other.

and for the sake of perspective, how many p/h's did dubya earn in texas? or alabama or where ever the hell he was supposed to have been?

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While young Dubya was stealing Christmas wreaths and getting arrested at football games, young Kerry, a man of privilege who could have easily avoided service, was volunteering to fight for his country. That a man of Kerry's stature would spend even one day on a swift boat is astounding to me.

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Re: Kerry's Interminable Four Months (Combat Tour My ...)
People the courageous defense put up by some of you in support of John Kerry still fails to realize the crux of the matter. 4 MONTHS is nothing. I already have three tours in combat zones, 2 of which were over 4 months long. I've just received orders for an eight month stint on the Pakistani border in Afghanistan (this tour is considered medium length in regards to the average duty in today's army).

PDiddie wrote:

Kerry spent a total of 13 months in the Viet Nam theater on two tours of duty. He enlisted in '66; after two years of OCS was deployed to the Gulf of Tonkin on the frigate USS Gridley, and in November 1968 volunteered for a second tour as a Swift Boat captain. That began his four months in-country ( this is where you apparently got confused ). In units that saw a 70% casualty rate, John Kerry earned three Purple Hearts, one Bronze Star, and one Silver Star. He left Nam in March of 1969 and separated from active service in March, 1970.

PDiddie, (who should look to coin his signature, if redundantly rustic-sounding phrase "You're Wrong"), spouts all the Kerry propaganda and is too bedazzled to note that he made my argument through his own "rebuttal". PDiddie, you probably have no idea as to military experience so allow me to clue you in on something. Time served on a USS frigate is statistically safer than time spent Stateside in a base with a high crime rate. Does that sound like combat time to you?

Four months of "in country" work may sound like an acheivement to you, but to anyone serving today it sounds like - "That dude got off easy, oh he's a rich kid from a political family, that explains it. What? He got three Purple Hearts and he wasn't even injured enough to have to be put on convalescent leave? ... Oh, we should vote him in for President."

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Your ideological differences with Kerry make you impervious to the facts. Kerry could easily have stayed on board a ship, or even went home. Instead he volunteered for a vey dangerous duty. That you have the gall to belittle this shows you are too ideologically set to be objective.

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Lol - now THERE'S news!

(But keep safe anyway, yer li'l biter!)

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JustWonders wrote:

I think the reason it's getting so much scrutiny is Kerry's campaigning so much on his military service while not saying much about the real issues at the DNC. If he didn't or doesn't want the scrutiny, he shouldn't have made such a big deal about it. I'm sure I'm not the only one that questioned his reluctance to release all of his records. It would have never occured to me to even want to see them if he'd not made such an issue out of his service.

I hear this a lot and I honestly wonder if you or others who say this watched the convention or have heard any of his speeches where he 'runs' on his war record? From my recollection, the vets didn't come out until the last day -- right before Kerry's speech. He mentioned Vietnam twice in his hour long acceptance speech and one of those times was to show how he had worked with McCain to find out what happened to those still missing in action. If he were running and not talking about Vietnam -- a pivotal point in his life -- those who are attacking him would wonder what he was hiding.

I think the posters point about the 4 months is also kind of silly. He was in the Navy, not the Army or the Marines, so of course he spent most of his two tours on a ship. In fact, he might well have served both tours without firing a shot had he not volunteered for the swift boats.

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Re: Kerry's Interminable Four Months (Combat Tour My ...)

Lusatian wrote:

Four months of "in country" work may sound like an acheivement to you, but to anyone serving today it sounds like - "That dude got off easy, oh he's a rich kid from a political family, that explains it. What? He got three Purple Hearts and he wasn't even injured enough to have to be put on convalescent leave? ... Oh, we should vote him in for President."

I applaud the service to our country of you, your friend, and all others who are waging war overseas. Your sacrifice will never be questioned by me.

As you probably gather, the actions of our current C-inC are most assuredly questionable, going back to the Viet Nam period and continuing to the present day.

I notice you do not mention Bush, which is perhaps prudent for you (I would imagine that active-duty soldiers being even slightly critical on public message boards would be a bad career move). I will still be asking you about him, though.

Now to your rejoinder:

Most of your post conveys a substantial amount of unrequited guilt, Lu, which you appear to be converting into rage and transferring to John Kerry.

Hint: John Kerry isn't culpable in your friend's injuries. Neither are you.

Another hint: there is no delineation among severity of wounds that qualify for the Purple Heart (at least not according to regulation. There does, however, seem to be confusion in the minds of Republicans...). Injuries simply aren't graded or comparable for purposes of qualification. And it's been that way since at least WWII. See Bob Dole's account of his self-inflicted (though unintentional) grenade wound in his autobiography.

I suppose veterans of combat action have every right to compare who had it better or worse. That's an argument I am not allowed to enter. But then, so are the vast majority of the electorate.

But the matter of the length of the tour and the Purple Hearts aside (since we won't agree that each is significant and worthy), how do you suppose Kerry faked getting a Bronze Star and a Silver Star? I don't believe the accounts of those who were several hundred meters away from his boat, compared to those who were on his boat, incidentally.

Lu, I suspect you're experiencing a big ol' buttload of cognitive dissonance associated with your putting your life on the line for a war based on Bush's prevarications, your buddy's wounds, and perhaps other factors. All of which I empathize with you about. Rather than explore that with you, though, let's address just the paragraph posted above, namely the portion I have indicated in red:

How in the world do you justify George W Bush's service to his country during the same period?

Because that is who you are describing (just in case you still have the blinders on this morning)...

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Quote:

I hear this a lot and I honestly wonder if you or others who say this watched the convention or have heard any of his speeches where he 'runs' on his war record?

http://cagle.slate.msn.com/working/040802/koterba.gif

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Well, I guess that answers my question.

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Quote:

How in the world do you justify George W Bush's service to his country during the same period?

Has President Bush claimed that his military service makes him better qualified or better prepared to be president?

Has President Bush ever saluted and said "I am reporting for duty just like I did in Vietnam"?

You can still continue the lies and slander, but most, indeed the majority of Americans see it differently.

Hanoi John is toast.

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JustWonders wrote:

You can still continue the lies and slander, but most, indeed the majority of Americans see it differently.

Delusional. You cannot even distinguish who is being slandered and lied about.

This is an adult conversation. Please go away and come back when you have grown up.

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PDiddie wrote:

JustWonders wrote:
You can still continue the lies and slander, but most, indeed the majority of Americans see it differently.

Delusional. You cannot even distinguish who is being slandered and lied about.

This is an adult conversation. Please go away and come back when you have grown up.

About what I expected Laughing

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PDiddie wrote:

JustWonders wrote:
You can still continue the lies and slander, but most, indeed the majority of Americans see it differently.

Delusional. You cannot even distinguish who is being slandered and lied about.

This is an adult conversation. Please go away and come back when you have grown up.

LOL!!!!!!! Laughing

*whew* I needed that laugh!

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JustWonders wrote:

Quote:
How in the world do you justify George W Bush's service to his country during the same period?

Has President Bush claimed that his military service makes him better qualified or better prepared to be president?

Has President Bush ever saluted and said "I am reporting for duty just like I did in Vietnam"?

You can still continue the lies and slander, but most, indeed the majority of Americans see it differently.

Hanoi John is toast.

ha ha ha, that's the best laugh I have had all day!

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Kerry's Interminable Four Months (Combat Tour My ...)

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