@okie,
I've no doubt that during the Vietnam War, as with every war, atrocities were committed, and by American forces.
I'm not sure what constitutes an "atrocity" in war. Isn't shooting someone in the face or slitting his throat with a knife, or blowing his legs off with a mine pretty atrocious?
A sniper picks off three or four enemy soldiers walking down a street...not atrocious? Soldiers shoot three or four enemy soldiers who have surrendered...atrocious?
A drone takes out a high value enemy target driving through the Yemeni desert in a bus...his family is with him and they are vaporized as well. The "damage" is collateral, but not atrocious.
A squad of marines who have just seen their buddies blown to bits, follow a furtive figure into a village and shoot several women who come up in their faces screaming and spitting...that must be an atrocity...right?
It's all atrocious, but here again we have constructed "rules" that tell us what murder and mayhem is acceptable and what is not, and then we send a bunch of kids into the most intensely fucked up situations anyone will ever experience and we expect them to assiduously follow these rules.
What is truly amazing is that there were less than 400 incidents during the Vietnam War that could be classified as "atrocities."
Kerry of Vietnam is a despicable narcissist. If even half of what the so-called Swiftboaters alleged is true, his exploits in Vietnam were exaggerated puffery, and if they are all true ( closer to the mark), he is a vile opportunist.
But wait, he is a vile opportunist...witness his speech before congress upon returning from Vietnam.
This wasn't someone blowing off the lid of a dark American secret, this was someone who felt which way the wind of the time was blowing and made his move to let it carry him aloft.
It is entirely in keeping with the contempt shown for him by his fellow Swift Boaters, that he condemned his fellow warriors with as broad a brush as he needed to make a name for himself.
Okie your nearly perfect question can be rephrased:
If Kerry of Vietnam witnessed all of these atrocities, and he was such a White Knight, why didn't he report them when reporting might actually have made a difference?
Oh yes, he didn't want to rat out certain of his brothers in arms.
So instead he waited until he was back home and then he ratted out all of his brothers in arms, in a calculated move to launch his political career.
There is a reason so many of the men who served with him in Vietnam find him contemptible.
I didn't serve, as John Kerry did, and his service was anything but dishonorable. In fact it is the one redeeming aspect of his utterly self-centered life.
But if everyone who serves doesn't get a free pass when it comes to " atrocities," why should any of them get one for opportunistic hucksterism?