Rereading Vietnam, by Robert Kaplan, at the Atlantic, recalling Bud Day, a living military hero of the Vietnam era.

Via Cassandra, Glenn Reynolds, and Stephen Green.

“The Vietnam analogy looms ever larger in the debate over Iraq, but the U.S. military has memories of that conflict that the public doesn’t.”

Take THAT, Mr. Christmas in Cambodia.

Yes, Virginia, in spite of the media never admitting we have them, we still do have our heroes.

clipped from gatewaypundit.blogspot.com Video by Mudville Gazette Today in the Opinion Journal, former KGB intelligence officer Ion Mihai Pacepa explained the propaganda tactics of the communists during the Cold War. Here is a bit of what Pacepa had to say about the Soviet’s propaganda campaign in the West: During the Vietnam War we spread vitriolic stories around the world, pretending that America’s presidents sent Genghis Khan-style barbarian soldiers to Vietnam who raped at random, taped electrical wires to human genitals, cut off limbs, blew up bodies and razed entire villages. Those weren’t facts. They were our tales, but some seven million Americans ended up being convinced their own president, not communism, was the enemy. As Yuri Andropov, who conceived this dezinformatsiya war against the U.S., used to tell me, people are more willing to believe smut than holiness. Does that remind you of anyone?

It should be noted that Ion Mihai Pacepa is a survivor of Communist Romania who at one time had two death sentences on his head…and his stories are similar to those of Reverend Wurmbrand’s, although Wurmbrand never worked for communist intelligence, his story is instructive, as he was an evangelical minister who spent fourteen years in Communist imprisonment and torture in his homeland of Romania. Pacepa’s story, on the other hand, is similar to that of David Horowitz, a former peace activist, whose parents were card-carrying communists. Each one of these men have a unique instructive perspective that we should pay attention to, considering the democrats’ lip service to the communists’ methods, tactics and even slogans.

I personally like to listen to the people who were at one time on the inside - who can recognize the tactics and the verbiage that our enemies within are using- for what it really means.

Lt. Gen. Pacepa is the highest-ranking intelligence official ever to have defected from the Soviet bloc. His new book, “Programmed to Kill: Lee Harvey Oswald, the Soviet KGB, and the Kennedy Assassination” (Ivan R. Dee) will be published in November.

Exaggerated Claims of Violence
The Vietnam War was worse than what followed-BY JOHN KERRY *(probably his public relations arm while he’s parasailing somewhere)-Saturday, August 4, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT

———-

I haven’t been on point with this I haven’t written about Kerry releasing his records for a while–which by the way, he hasn’t done completely YET, even though he’s had a lot of offers from people who would be more than willing to help him fill out his 180 the right way - and release the records to the public rather than his biographer at the Boston Globe.

————-

James Taranto misinterpreted my words and misreads history (” ‘It Didn’t Happen,‘ ” July 26). I know the tragedy that followed a tragic war. John McCain and I led the effort to locate American POWs and ultimately normalize relations with Vietnam. I traveled to Cambodia to help create a genocide tribunal to bring to justice the butchers of the killing fields.

Nobody’s misinterpreting anything. Did we misinterpret you when you said they “at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war, and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country”?

Sorry bub, why should we believe anything you and Jane Fonda have to say? You supposedly also cared for the Vietnam POWs that were last seen alive; instead, you helped to bury any hope of their families finding out what happened to them or even recovering their remains. So that your cousin C. Stewart Forbes, chief executive for Colliers International, could broker a $905 million deal to develop a deep-sea port at Vung Tau. Convenient that all of this led the way to normalizing trade relations with Vietnam. Nice one, Johnny old boy.

I thought it was our soldiers who were the ‘butchers’ in the killing fields, according to your Winter Soldier “Investigation”.

From Vietnam Vet at Free Republic:

The genocide committed by North Vietnam on the South was carried out quietly and bureaucratically and resulted in the deaths of more than a million. After the fall of Saigon “politically unreliable” subjects were arrested at their homes or scooped up off the street. These included former members of the Viet Cong—the North’s partisan allies. They were imprisoned where many of them died. Those who chose to leave the country could legally do so by paying a $10,000 fee per head to the communist government and abandoning all their property. Tens of thousands died in boats on the high seas. Others died of disease and starvation hiding in the jungles along the Vietnamese-Cambodian border. The situation became so horrid that folksinger and peace activist Joan Baez—along with Cesar Chavez, Daniel Berrigan, I.F. Stone and others—ran full-page open letters in the New York Times imploring the Socialist Republic of Vietnam to show some mercy:

“We appeal to you to end the imprisonment and torture—to allow an international team of neutral observers to inspect your prisons and reeducation centers.”

Well, at least some people have a conscience. But you can leave John Kerry off of any list of leftists ‘with a conscience’.

John Kerry, since his youth, has served as a loyal steward of the goals of North Vietnam at the expense of American lives, non-communist Asian lives and U.S. interests. From his lying Senate testimony to his deplorable conduct on the Senate committee that investigated POW/MIA issues, Kerry has been the handmaiden of this brutal regime.

When John Kerry’s Courage went MIA

But what did not happen was the region-wide war or immediate chaos predicted by many who believed we had to maintain our massive military presence in Vietnam. A brutal dictatorship consolidated power in Vietnam, the region’s refugee crisis worsened, and two years after we left Vietnam, Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge launched a genocide.

Right. And I doubt that would have happened had we been allowed to win the war, as we were doing. But that’s something you and your communist buddies didn’t want to see…even George Mcgovern admitted that winning the war in Vietnam was not what he wanted.

Mr. Taranto mistakenly views the violence after 1973 as a direct result of our withdrawal. In fact, the violence arose from the conditions that led us to withdraw: a Vietnamese civil war we couldn’t stop supported by a Cambodian insurgency we couldn’t bomb into submission. It’s horrifying that so many South Vietnamese suffered. But, even accepting Mr. Taranto’s estimate of 165,000 Vietnamese deaths–double that of most academic sources–this is a significant decrease from the preceding eight years when 450,000 civilians and 1.1 million soldiers were killed.

No one is mistaken but you, Mr. I-have-a-man-servant. People who know what it’s like to live under a communist regime - will fight it. People who haven’t been fooled by elitists into thinking that it’s the only solution-will fight it.

The Viet Cong were soundly defeated during the Tet Offensive. It’s widely known by military historians that the VC expected Vietnamese peasants to rise up and join the Communists which, of course, never happened. The VC and North Vietnamese forces, therefore, were decimated; it took, literally, years for them to rebuild their strength. This, despite the likes of Walter Cronkite erroneously, and some would say deliberately, reporting the exact opposite.

We should not repeat the mistakes of Vietnam in Iraq, but let’s have an honest debate rather than a hysterical one. The agony of exiting a quagmire is that there are few certainties and no good options. That choice was created not by the advocates for changing course, but by the architects of a disastrous war.

Um…John - we can start by not listening to the democrats who spit on our military, spit on our right to exist as a democracy and are trying to turn us into a socialist country - the same kind of socialism that is in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam-which any regular citizen should be mortified by…any war that’s waged against a communist regime to a communist is ‘disastrous’. That’s why people marched in support of Saddam Hussein-And that’s why we shouldn’t be listening to you on Iraq, Mr. Kerry. And that’s why I’m astonished how in the hell you got re-elected.

Kerry only belittles himself by describing Taranto’s comment ‘The outcome of that war was a defeat for America and a humanitarian disaster for the people of South Vietnam and Cambodia’ as ‘hysterical’.

You can thank John Kerry for burying our POW/MIAs in order to have trade with Communist Vietnam. You can thank John Kerry for our putting up the white flag and retreating from Vietnam when we were winning.

There is much John Kerry will answer for one day, to be sure. In this life, or the next.

What is disgusting is we have trade relations thanks in part to John Kerry’s burying the POW/MIA issue, which is far from dead, in my opinion.

People protested Nguyen Minh Triet’s visit, one man chanting through a bullhorn “no communists! no communists! no communists!”

We should try that chant at anti-war rallies where there are members of Code Pink, International ANSWER, United for Peace and Justice, the World Workers Party, et. al.

Was there anyone protesting the return of the remains of our missing POW/MIAs? Was there anyone there defending their honor? Was there anyone demanding that Vietnam give up what they know about our missing soldiers, nurses and missionaries?

President of Vietnam Nguyen Minh Triet waves as he arrives in Los Angeles Friday June 22, 2007. Nguyen Minh Triet, the first Vietnamese head of state to visit the U.S. since the end of the Vietnam War, is leading a delegation of more than 100 Vietnamese businessmen, to focus on accelerating U.S.-Vietnam trade relations. No additional identification. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)

Picture and caption from John Kerry’s fans at the Boston Globe.

More at Gateway Pundit, showing the protestors. There are some really good pics and commentary there, too. Here’s an earlier post at Jim’s; the protestors were anticipating this visit with disdain.

And let’s not forget our POW/MIAs

We are looking for someone who can identify these two men:

There are, in fact, at least 19 servicemen that we know ’survived into captivity’ who the POW/MIA families have been pleading the government to help find out what happened, yet Kerry, in cold-hearted response, rolls his eyes and says “talk to my aid, I don’t have time for this.’

Nine servicemen, acknowledged by the Vietnamese as “captured alive” are:

Carlos Ashlock, James T. Egan, Jr., Robert L. Greer, Roger D. Hamilton, Gregory J. Harris, Donald S. Newton, Madison A. Strohlein, Robert L. Platt and Fred Schreckengost. Remains for both Greer and Schreckengost were recovered. Commenting on Greer and Schreckengost, Tourison notes; “During the recovery of their remains in 1990 Vietnamese officials acknowledged they had been captured alive and killed in captivity. The U.S. Marine Corps still does not list them as having died in captivity but to have died while in a MIA status.”

Of the 7 remaining “new POWs” Tourison offers the following information:

Carlos Ashlock – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Corporal Aslock (sic) was captured alive in Quang Ngai Province. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

James Egan, Jr. — – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Lieutenant Egan was captured alive and has reported that he died in captivity in December 1968.”

[It should be noted that Egan’s name was not on the list of POWs who died in captivity presented in Paris in January 1973. Yet, based on this new information Egan survived in captivity for almost 3 years, from January 21, 1966 to December 1968. As no other POW reported seeing Egan in captivity, where was he held?]

Roger D. Hamilton – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Lance Corporal Hamilton was captured alive in Military Region 5. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Gregory J. Harris – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Corporal Harris was captured alive. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Donald Newton – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Sergeant Newton was captured alive and taken to Hospital 102 of Military Region 5. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Robert L. Platt – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Private First Class Platt was captured alive. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Madison Strohlein – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Sergeant Strohlein was captured alive on June 22, 1971 in Quang Nam Province. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Whatever the reason, this information was not made public during the life of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs.

Added to the list of men who “survived into captivity” are: Richard C. Bram, John F. Dingwall, Fredric M. Mellor, Charles J. Scharf/ Martin J. Massucci, John F. O’Grady, Thomas A. Mangino, Paul A. Hasenbeck, David M. Winters, Daniel Nidds, and John T. McDonnell.

The horrible emotional toll of not knowing if your loved one is alive or dead, or just wanting to bring them home for a proper burial is a devastating reminder of what kind of man we’re dealing with in John Kerry; someone who puts his political aspirations, and friendships with other lying communists, above all else.

Ted Sampley has written about this, too. See his bio, here.

Sampley points out that Kerry isn’t the only one to have taken part in burying evidence that there were POW/MIAs alive in Vietnam;

“the person in Washington who has done more to bury the POW/MIA issue than any other elected official is none other than U.S. Senator John McCain from Arizona, himself a former POW.”

The POW/MIA families will readily supply file folders inches thick of correspondence related to Kerry and McCain’s betrayal.

The Select Committee, established in August 1991, was tasked with the mission of resolving the lingering POW/MIA issue by either gaining the release of American prisoners of war believed to be alive under the control of Hanoi, but never released, or explaining what happened to the missing prisoners.

In hindsight, it is obvious that McCain and Kerry were more interested in using the Select Committee as a means to justify lifting the U.S. imposed trade embargo against Vietnam than resolving the issue of missing U.S. servicemen.

So this visit was a result of their disgusting politics.

Didn’t have time to put something together, too many things going on.

But we’re still calling to see those missing 100+ or so pages that he hasn’t released.

“if it were not for the disunity created by…stateside protests, Hanoi would have ultimately surrendered.”

General Vo Nguyen Giap - North Vietnamese War Hero

Isn’t that special? The Vietnamese communists credited the American Anti-War crowd at home with their victory. So much, in fact, that they honored John Kerry in the war remnants museum for the part he played in the Anti-War movement after he returned from Vietnam:

This the infamous picture of John Kerry’s meeting with Comrade Do Muoi, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam, in Vietnam, July 15-18, 1993. This Photo was taken in the War Remnants Museum (formerly the “War Crimes Museum”) in Saigon in May 2004.

It is because of this that we need to steadfastly stand against the democrats’ yearning for the days of Vietnam, looking to recreate what happened to Nixon’s administration. It is because of this that we need to recognize that rooting for the enemy and destroying our ability to defend ourselves is precisely what they are working toward.

And, it’s another reason to keep pounding on the Kerry’s 180 drum all day.

As you may recall, John Kerry promised the American people on the Tim Russert Show that he would release his military records. He then pulled a dirty trick: he released what was already out there to his biographer, Mike Cranish, at the Boston Globe, declaring triumphantly that he’d fulfilled his promise. But surely he doesn’t think the American people are that easy! Surely he doesn’t think we’re willing to drop our interest in the 100+ missing pages that would fill in the blanks about his military service, Christmas in Cambodia, the paperwork he wrote up for his purple hearts and the 6 years between his leaving the Navy and your discharge, etc.

All of those questions and others remain unanswered, and Kerry is supposed to be, in his capacity as a Senator, an American public servant; and NOT a puppet for communist dictators.

The American Spectator reports:

After Kerry met with Ortega, he returned to Washington waving a promise from Ortega that the Communist leader would moderate his policies. “We believe this is a wonderful opening for a peaceful settlement without having to militarize the region,” Kerry said. “The real issue is: Is this administration going to overthrow the government of the Sandinistas no matter what they do? This opportunity puts this to the test.” The normally cautious Secretary of State George Shultz was so flabbergasted by Kerry’s shilling for Ortega that he denounced Kerry publicly for “dealing with the communists” and letting himself be “used” by Ortega.

Kerry’s diplomacy blew up in his face. As Kerry was reassuring his colleagues that Ortega wouldn’t establish Soviet and Cuban bases in Nicaragua, Ortega (a few days after he met with Kerry) was flying to Moscow to arrange a $200 million transfer of Soviet monies to Nicaragua. Kerry’s sales pitch for the Sandinistas — “I see an enormous haughtiness in the United States trying to tell them what to do. Our economic squeeze on them is very sad. The whole population is suffering” — worked in Congress. It voted against aid to the Contras, even as Ortega was collecting aid from his Soviet bosses.

This is just one example of what I’m talking about.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

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NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

Taking John Kerry’s example from the Vietnam days, the political left calls our soldiers in uniform ‘baby killers’. They say they’ve committed any number of atrocities, and paint our soldiers in the worst possible light, saying that our president and the men who fight are ‘war criminals’.

During the days following Kerry’s return from Vietnam, he joined the Vietnam Veterans against the war, and called THEM war criminals, slandering an entire generation of men who had the courage to stand up and fight, some of whom were POWs at the hands of the communists. Some believe that Kerry’s anti-war activism actually prolonged their imprisonment and torture.

POW Lawsuit Could Force Kerry To Come Clean On Vietnam ‘War Crimes’ Charges

Now, a lawsuit filed in Philadelphia’s Court of Common Pleas will test the very foundation of Kerry’s anti-war persona for the first time. It isn’t dubious medals or Kerry’s disputed service record in Vietnam that is being called into question. This time Kerry may finally be forced to answer for the events that launched his public career, one that made him an anti-war hero for many American liberals and a turncoat for millions of Vietnam veterans.

The lawsuit (Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation, et al. v. Kenneth Campbell, et al.) challenges the basis, the factual accuracy of then-Lt. (j.g.) Kerry’s acrimonious testimony before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1971. It was there Kerry’s public career was catapulted with his now ubiquitous portrayal of American soldiers as murderers, rapists and torturers “who ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam . . . [and] razed villages in a fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan.”

Kerry said then his accusations were based on the so-called “testimony” of “150 honorably discharged” Vietnam veterans who, like himself, claimed to have committed or witnessed “war crimes, not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command.”

Many if not all were members of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), an organization led by Kerry and financed by Jane Fonda during the early 1970s. Now, a number of those “witnesses” will be required to testify, under oath for the first time ever, about what they really did and saw in Vietnam.

What these VVAW witnesses say could have implications reaching beyond Kerry’s veracity and reputation. Their lasting portrait of the American soldier as a blood-thirsty butcher, a baby killer, is also at stake. And that picture remains entrenched among their kind, “proof” that those serving in the U.S. military, even today, truly are a “horde of barbarians” capable of unspeakable brutalities. That is the underlying theme, the constant drumbeat from the mainstream media and others as they try to undermine the American military today.

For the anti-war, anti-American protesters, the American soldiers are the “terrorists,” and the enemies are the victims of a barbaric U.S. military which tortures and murders defenseless civilians.

That false premise, one of the most vicious and enduring smears spawned by Kerry 35 years ago, will also be put to the test once Kerry’s true “Band of Brothers” are put under oath in a Philadelphia courtroom.

The background to this lawsuit is long and complex, but even a condensed version is rich in irony and poetic justice.

It had it roots in 2004 with the documentary Stolen Honor: Wounds that Never Heal. Many may recall the film, although it is probably best known for not being seen, suppressed after Sinclair Broadcasting Company courageously announced it was going to air the documentary in its entirety. Thanks to Kerry and his liberal colleagues in the Senate and their enablers in the mainstream media, Sinclair was browbeaten into withdrawing the film, its broadcast license threatened by a Kerry campaign manager in 2004.

Stolen Honor focused on Kerry’s venomous diatribe before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in April 1971 when he accused Vietnam veterans of “war crimes” on a genocidal scale. (A full transcript is available at http://ice.he.net/~freepnet/kerry/index.php?topic=Testimony. ) It examined the impact Kerry’s widely reported statements had on hundreds of Americans who were being held prisoners of war by the North Vietnamese communists. The film’s producer, Carlton Sherwood, a Pulitzer Prize and Peabody Award-winning investigative reporter, interviewed former POWs for the documentary.

I was among those whom Sherwood, a decorated Marine combat veteran himself, asked to participate in Stolen Honor. I was a POW for nearly six years, held in North Vietnam prison camps, including the notorious Hanoi Hilton, a place of unimaginable horrors — torture, beatings, starvation and mind-numbing isolation. When Kerry branded us “war criminals,” he handed our captors all the justification they needed to carry out their threats to execute us. Thanks to Kerry, Jane Fonda and their comrades in the anti-war movement, our captivity was prolonged by years. The communists in Hanoi and Moscow couldn’t have had a better press agent to spread their anti-American propaganda.

To guarantee Stolen Honor would never be seen by anyone – not even theatre-goers – the producer was slapped with a libel and defamation lawsuit. That lawsuit was filed by Kenneth Campbell, a University of Delaware professor, Kerry campaign aide, and long-time anti-war disciple of the Massachusetts Senator. Campbell co-founded the Philadelphia chapter of Vietnam Veterans Against the War and, in 1971, he was one of Kerry’s key war crimes “witnesses,” one of several on whom Kerry claims he based his Senate testimony.

Campbell was and still is regarded by some as one of the VVAW’s most articulate and published “experts” on U.S. atrocities in Vietnam. He has “testified” before Congress, in Europe, and elsewhere that while in Vietnam he deliberately killed “dozens and dozens” of innocent civilians as a Marine artillery forward observer. He has written extensively about his and others’ atrocities in Vietnam and he even teaches a course on the Vietnam War that showcases his war crime accusations. Campbell, like Kerry, met with enemy delegations — Vietcong and North Vietnam Communist officials — in Paris in 1971 while he was still a U.S. uniformed reservist. He was also flown to Moscow that same year to meet with other Communist leaders, all expenses paid by the Soviets.

Campbell’s lawsuit put a unique spin on the definition of defamation: He claimed that Stolen Honor damaged the public reputations of himself, Kerry and others by questioning whether they truly were the baby-killers they claimed to be!

Ignored and censored by the mainstream news networks, Stolen Honor eventually aired on some small local cable outlets. The documentary managed to penetrate Kerry’s blacklisting in rural northern Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania and several other places. But, Campbell’s lawsuit against Sherwood continued in 2005, when he even added POWs who appeared in the film to the litigation!

The POWs and the wives of POWs who participated in Stolen Honor refused to abandon the facts conveyed in the film. For some of us, it was the first time since our release by the Communists in 1973 that we were able to have our voices publicly heard, to tell our stories about the consequences of Kerry’s treachery. In 2005, we formed a nonprofit organization, the Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation (VVLF), to gather records, documents and other materials to form a fact-based, educational repository for students and scholars of Vietnam history and to tell the true story of the American soldiers in Vietnam. The VVLF’s mission is “to set the record straight, factually, about Vietnam and those who fought there.”

For our efforts, we were promptly sued by Campbell and another long-time anti-war Kerry follower and VVAW member, Dr. Jon Bjornson. It was clear that Kerry not only wanted to punish us for Stolen Honor; he intended to use surrogates to sue us into permanent silence and financial ruin.

But in lawsuits, even defendants have an opportunity to question the accuser under oath in pre-trial depositions — even when a lawsuit is filed solely to harass, intimidate and silence and when the legal system is abused for political vengeance, as these lawsuits clearly were.

Our chance came earlier this year when Kenneth Campbell was deposed. Among the first thing he disclosed was that this was the first time he had actually been put under oath in over 35 years of “testifying” about Vietnam “war crimes.” Neither he nor any of his fellow “war criminals” – Kerry included – had ever been sworn in at any hearings, not before the Senate, the House of Representatives, or anywhere.

All of the so-called “testimony” the old mainstream media trumpeted for nearly four decades — graphic, sickening and grisly “testimony” about savage atrocities committed by Vietnam veterans, “testimony” to which Congress and the media gave so much weight and credibility — wasn’t “testimony” at all! Just propagandist speeches told without limitation or fear of consequences, least of all penalties for perjury. As for the “war crimes” Campbell claimed for years he committed and personally witnessed, he now conceded he didn’t actually see innocent civilians killed by his artillery barrages. In fact, if anyone had been killed or wounded, he admitted, they may not have been civilians at all! Concerning other atrocities Campbell identified in his lawsuits — things like Marines massacring an entire village, killing surrendering enemy soldiers — those incidents, too, failed to stand up under questioning. Some were things he said he had heard or assumed happened; others, he acknowledged, were simply “rumors.”

That Campbell alleged personal knowledge of horrible atrocities in his complaints and then gave wholly different stories of hearsay and assumption at his deposition is detailed in the recently filed Philadelphia lawsuit, which repeatedly alleges that Campbell lied about supposed war crimes in 1971 and lied again when he claimed in 2004 that his war crime stories were true.

While hard evidence may have been in short supply during his sworn testimony, Campbell did offer the names of “witnesses” who would confirm his stories. Not surprisingly, the first two were Kerry State Veterans Campaign Coordinators and long-time VVAW organizers in Florida and Massachusetts.

Subpoenas were served on both men but, before either could be deposed, one checked himself into a hospital for elective back surgery and the other had himself arrested and committed to a mental institution. At last press reports, he was released from the psychiatric hospital and fled the country to Vietnam via Hawaii.

Both men clearly knew what was coming, as did Campbell. For the first time in nearly four decades they would be forced to answer for their alleged “war crimes,” their slanderous accusations against their fellow soldiers finally examined, under oath.

It was just a matter of days before all the lawsuits were withdrawn, nearly two years of costly litigation abruptly ended, Campbell’s libel claims ground to dust under the weight of his own testimony.

Like their leader, John Kerry, his surrogates wanted no part of having to defend these despicable allegations, or for being held accountable for the great harm they and he continue to inflict on our men and women in uniform. They fled the moment the light of truth shined their way.

My fellow POWs and I who were the target of these lawsuits are not willing to quit or surrender. Kerry and his cowardly followers may have achieved their purpose of keeping the American people from seeing Stolen Honor in 2004, but we refuse to allow the truth about Vietnam to remain untold.

Forced to spend huge sums to defend ourselves from these frivolous lawsuits, we have filed a countersuit against these Kerry surrogates and intend to reveal the truth about the lawsuits and their sponsors. We believe that we can prove that the purpose of nearly two years of litigation was to cover up for Kerry’s treachery, to drain us financially and spiritually, and to prevent us from setting the record straight.

At stake is ultimately nothing less than the integrity of the American military in Vietnam, the honor of the men who served their country, the nobility of those who gave their lives, and the truth of America’s history in Vietnam. Until or unless we do correct the existing record, the American military may never be free of the myths and smears of Vietnam, its honor and integrity cleansed as it fights to defend freedom at home and around the world.

Our mission is hardly over. We hope you will join us in fighting this battle . . . for our soldiers, then and now.

Col. George E. “Bud” Day, USAF (Ret.,) was a POW in North Vietnam for five years, seven months and 13 days. He served in three wars (WWII, Korea, and Vietnam) and earned the Medal of Honor. He is the Air Force’s most decorated living veteran. He is the Director and President of the Vietnam Veterans Legacy Foundation, Inc., an organization created to better educate and inform the public about the Vietnam War, its events, its history, and the men and women who sacrificed to serve their country.

Some of us, in honor of those who were known alive in captivity and who Kerry buried when he was on the Select of POW/MIA affairs, still want Kerry to come clean on his military records and release them.

We’re demanding that he not re-release what is already public to his biographer at the Boston Globe, and not re-release what we’ve already seen; but release the records which would answer the questions surrounding his purple hearts and other gaping holes in the record. We’d like to know what happened and where he was during the 6-year period between his leaving the Navy and his discharge. We’d like to see the missing 100+ pages and his medical record, which would clear up the “Christmas in Cambodia” story and a number of other - what appear to be - lies that he’s told about his four month tour.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

Image: LindaSog.com

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

Kerry Lied, Men Died

I’ve written before about the War Dogs of Vietnam, and how they were tragically left behind after Vietnam ended. This was a heartbreak for the handlers who grew to love them. But did you know that we left behind SERVICEMEN, TOO??? And that John Kerry and John McCain had a hand in it?

In the past I’ve written about John Kerry and John McCain, and how they made sure that evidence of their fellow service members who were still in Vietnam and ’survived into captivity’ was buried when they were on the 1991-92 Senate Select Committee on POW and MIA Affairs. There are numerous examples of the despicable behavior of both of these men toward their fellow service members.

We are looking for someone who can identify these two men:

There are, in fact, at least 19 servicemen that we know ’survived into captivity’ who the POW/MIA families have been pleading the government to help find out what happened, yet Kerry, in cold-hearted response, rolls his eyes and says “talk to my aid, I don’t have time for this.’

Nine servicemen, acknowledged by the Vietnamese as “captured alive” are:

Carlos Ashlock, James T. Egan, Jr., Robert L. Greer, Roger D. Hamilton, Gregory J. Harris, Donald S. Newton, Madison A. Strohlein, Robert L. Platt and Fred Schreckengost. Remains for both Greer and Schreckengost were recovered. Commenting on Greer and Schreckengost, Tourison notes; “During the recovery of their remains in 1990 Vietnamese officials acknowledged they had been captured alive and killed in captivity. The U.S. Marine Corps still does not list them as having died in captivity but to have died while in a MIA status.”

Of the 7 remaining “new POWs” Tourison offers the following information:

Carlos Ashlock – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Corporal Aslock (sic) was captured alive in Quang Ngai Province. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

James Egan, Jr. — – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Lieutenant Egan was captured alive and has reported that he died in captivity in December 1968.”

[It should be noted that Egan’s name was not on the list of POWs who died in captivity presented in Paris in January 1973. Yet, based on this new information Egan survived in captivity for almost 3 years, from January 21, 1966 to December 1968. As no other POW reported seeing Egan in captivity, where was he held?]

Roger D. Hamilton – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Lance Corporal Hamilton was captured alive in Military Region 5. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Gregory J. Harris – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Corporal Harris was captured alive. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Donald Newton – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Sergeant Newton was captured alive and taken to Hospital 102 of Military Region 5. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Robert L. Platt – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Private First Class Platt was captured alive. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Madison Strohlein – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Sergeant Strohlein was captured alive on June 22, 1971 in Quang Nam Province. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Whatever the reason, this information was not made public during the life of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs.

Added to the list of men who “survived into captivity” are: Richard C. Bram, John F. Dingwall, Fredric M. Mellor, Charles J. Scharf/ Martin J. Massucci, John F. O’Grady, Thomas A. Mangino, Paul A. Hasenbeck, David M. Winters, Daniel Nidds, and John T. McDonnell.

John Kerry, who prides himself as a veteran, who stood in front of the American people saluting, saying he was ‘reporting for duty’, doesn’t have time for the families of these servicemen, his brothers at arms. He doesn’t have time to see to it that they return home. He doesn’t have time to put their families’ hearts to rest and solve the mysteries or answer the questions surrounding their ’survival into captivity’ at the hands of the Vietcong. On top of all of that, he met with the Vietcong and quickly accepted their lies that the POW issue was closed. This is reminiscent of Jane Fonda passing the palmed notes from American POWs back to their Vietcong captors.

It isn’t enough that Kerry found a legal loophole to cut and run from Vietnam after just four months of service (running from the enemy), or that he returned and joined Jane Fonda’s Vietnam Veterans Against the War as a spokesman, or that he met with Madame Binh in Paris to come back and talk the communist talking points, or filmed himself on the battlefield with his own Super 8 camera for his political campaigns later. It isn’t enough that he claimed Christmas in Cambodia was seared in his memory…in true John Kerry style, years later, sitting on the Senate Select Committee on POW and MIA Affairs, he made sure he crushed any hope for the families of POW/MIAs awaiting news or word of their loved ones’ fates.

The horrible emotional toll of not knowing if your loved one is alive or dead, or just wanting to bring them home for a proper burial is a devastating reminder of what kind of man we’re dealing with in John Kerry; someone who puts his political aspirations, and friendships with other lying communists, above all else.

Ted Sampley has written about this, too. See his bio, here.

Sampley points out that Kerry isn’t the only one to have taken part in burying evidence that there were POW/MIAs alive in Vietnam;

“the person in Washington who has done more to bury the POW/MIA issue than any other elected official is none other than U.S. Senator John McCain from Arizona, himself a former POW.”

The POW/MIA families will readily supply file folders inches thick of correspondence related to Kerry and McCain’s betrayal.

The Select Committee, established in August 1991, was tasked with the mission of resolving the lingering POW/MIA issue by either gaining the release of American prisoners of war believed to be alive under the control of Hanoi, but never released, or explaining what happened to the missing prisoners.

In hindsight, it is obvious that McCain and Kerry were more interested in using the Select Committee as a means to justify lifting the U.S. imposed trade embargo against Vietnam than resolving the issue of missing U.S. servicemen.

From the onset of the hearings, Kerry and McCain’s obvious bias for Vietnam were the source of many confrontations between the Select Committee and the POW/MIA activists.

At one point during the Select Committee hearings, the Kerry/McCain team were caught coaching DIA witnesses on how to discredit satellite imagery that showed the presence of living U.S. POWs in both Vietnam and Laos. When the activists found out about the witness tampering, they confronted Kerry and demanded his resignation. Numerous letters were written to the Select Committee demanding an outside investigation of the incident.

To deflect attention from their many clearly unethical acts, Kerry and McCain teamed up again and turned on the activist, managing to divert the entire Select Committee away from investigating Vietnam focusing instead on investigating the POW/MIA families and activist for alleged fraudulent fund raising.

The Kerry/McCain team disguised their investigation of the POW/MIA families and activists and the subpoenaing of private and organizational financial records by claiming they only wanted “to get to the truth.” Kerry and McCain explained that they were looking for “professional predators” who were at work within the POW/MIA issue “feeding on the false hopes of the POW/MIA families.”

By 1994, the way was clear for Kerry and McCain to provide political cover for President Clinton with his efforts to lift the U.S. trade embargo against Vietnam.

In a smoothly choreographed political maneuver, Clinton used the two “Vietnam War heroes” and their “no POWs are left alive conclusion” as justification to lift the trade embargo…having them stand side by side with him when he made the announcement.

At the same time, to ensure that the POW issue could be not be resurrected by the POW/MIA families and activist, Kerry and McCain consummated their deceit by spoon feeding tainted and false data to Susan Katz Keating, an ambitious Washington Times reporter with intiment ties to the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). She planned writing a bestseller book - Prisoners of Hope - with information spoon fed her by DIA.

Col. Joe Schlatter has kept the lies in Keating’s failed book alive by posting it’s contents on the Internet on news groups such as alt.war.vietnam.

By 1997, he had created a “MIA Facts” web domain www.miafacts.org/

Kerry and McCain also relied heavily on a secret Pentagon collaborator, Army Col. Joe Schlatter who from 1986 to 1995, was tasked with running the Defense Intelligence Agency Special Office for POW-MIA Affairs.

Schlatter’s job while heading the POW/MIA office was to correlate and interpret the hundreds of intelligence reports about living American POWs left in Southeast Asia that were pouring into the Pentagon.

Schlatter had actually early on in his assignment begun to systematically kill on paper the several hundred U.S. servicemen described as prisoners in the intelligence reports.

Later, when called upon by the Kerry/McCain team, Schlatter joined in attempting to discredit (killing the messenger) any individual or group that got in the way of plans to normalize U.S. trade relations with Vietnam.

——————–
On November 5, 1991, then Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney said: “The families of POW’s and MIA’s have been, and will continue to be, our most important constituents. This nation is committed to keeping the faith with every soldier, sailor, airman, Marine, and civilian until the fullest possible accounting is achieved. We owe them, and their families, nothing less. We will not rest until the job is done.”

We know there are any number of fraudsters out there who are making hay on this issue. There are people selling bones, there are people doctoring photographs, telling made-up stories, to the point where the MIA issue has become so clouded with haze that MIA families have been painted as “the MIA cult”. People should stop a moment and have some compassion for people who’ve been waiting over 30 years to find word about family members who they’ve been told by the government were “MIA” or “KIA”, and then later found they ’survived into captivity’ when no remains have turned up. In some cases, these men were not classified as POWs, when it is clear that they were.

—————-

When John Kerry was interviewed on the Tim Russert Show about releasing his records his 180 form, he said he would release them. Then, he cleverly used a magician’s trick: sleight of hand. He re-released the same records that were already out there, to his biographer, Michael Kranish, at the Boston Globe, and declared the controversy closed.

But we still have many questions about his record. We would still like to know about the 6 years between his leaving the Navy and his discharge. We would still like to know the circumstances around his purple hearts, and his having written up the paperwork to get at least one of them. We would still like to know who it was exactly who signed off on that paperwork. And the list goes on.

Because he claims to have already released his records, we’re asking that Kerry’s MIA 180 be released, just like we would like the remains of his brothers at arms released, or at least find out what happened to them, because they are still in Vietnam to this day.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

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NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

Today I’m starting out calling for Kerry to fill out his 180 properly so we can fill in the gaps between when he left the Navy and when he received his discharge. At the end, you’ll see how you can join this blogburst.

But aside from calling for him to really fill out his 180 rather than pull a magic trick with his biographer that was supposed to shut people up about it but really didn’t answer the questions…I’d like to start telling the stories of some of the POW/MIAs who were left behind after we pulled out of Vietnam. Not only did millions die in Cambodia after we pulled out, but in our haste, we left our dogs behind as ’surplus equipment’, and left some of our men behind, left to fend for themselves at the hands of merciless cruel torturers; a horrifying story to anyone who cares about a fellow human being. This is particularly important because Kerry has a long history of betraying his brothers at arms in Vietnam - first when he came back from Vietnam and became the spokesman for the Vietnam Vets against the War, met with Madame Binh in Paris, came back talking the communist talking points, and then later, when he sat on the Senate Committee for POW/MIA Affairs in 1992/1993 and did his utmost to bury the men who might still be alive.

Michael Benge, himself a POW from 1968-1973 had this to say in an interview with Jamie Glazov at Frontpage Magazine:

The office in DID in charge of accounting for the POW/MIAs has never investigated the Cuban connection to American POWs despite intel intercepts that Cubans were guarding POWs in Laos, Intel reports that 17 Americans POWs from Vietnam were being held in Cuba, Intel reports of Cubans interrogating POW at COSVN headquarters in Cambodia and that all of the historical records of the same Cuban engineering unit that maintained a good stretch of the Ho Chi Minh trail was captured at the airfield in Grenada when the U.S. invaded that country.

The Cuban and Soviet influence here begs more questions.

There are many pilots who worked in may of our very most top secret missile, electronics warfare and other programs lost in Vietnam who should never had been allowed to participate in that conflict. There are indications of a jump in Soviet Technology correlated to certain pilots lost in Vietnam, and there have been books written by Soviet’s in their aircraft industry giving thanks our American friends (POWs) who helped us develop this technology.

He makes the point that we will only get the truth out of the Vietnamese if they have a democratic form of government. As long as the communists rule there, we will not get an honest accounting of what happened to our men, or have their remains returned to us. There is evidence to suggest that they have kept meticulous records on our men and women that they captured, their hope was to hold some of them for ransom.

… I lay part of the blame on the fact that our politicians lost a winnable war. You are at a great disadvantage in getting the truth out of the enemy when you lose, instead of winning — rather like being a eunuch. The American and Vietnamese military were not defeated by the NVA, but were betrayed and defeated by politicians in the United States. These same politicians, such as John Kerry, and later, John McCain, as U.S. senators in 1993, swept it all under the rug when they were members of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs and issued their final report that there was no evidence that any POWs were still alive in Vietnam. Neither was there evidence that they were dead. Our government gave the North Vietnamese a list of over 300 POWs that were last known to be alive and in the hands of the North Vietnamese. To this date, only a handful of remains of these POWs have been returned. This begs the question, “What is the fate of those not yet accounted for?” Yet Senators McCain and Kerry, apologists and advocates for the North Vietnamese communists, claim that they are fully cooperating in the accounting process. I beg to differ with them.

You see, we had no bargaining chips with the communists after we withdrew and ‘lost’ the war with Vietnam. And we left men and women behind, some of whom weren’t even in uniform. Some were journalists, doctors, nurses and Christian missionaries.

I’d like to highlight the first man on the list, Richard Bram. He is listed along with the others below, on this post that I published on March 17th during the Gathering of Eagles demonstration in Washington, D.C.

Kerry, McCain and their POW/MIA Committee knew about this List of “New” POW cases back in 1993, but the families were never notified. The news about their loved ones has slipped, though. Some of them are a part of- Project X, which was an investigation into the whereabouts of some of these individuals, in secret. Much of the information on the men seen last alive, and sightings was actually instructed by U.S. government officials to be buried in the archives. Unfortunately, relatives and friends, and just concerned citizens like me, will never forget that these men went missing and our government turned its back on them during SEVEN presidential administrations.

Bram, Richard C.
Dingwall, John F.
Egan, James T.
Greer, Richard (documents say Richard, he’s actually Robert Lee Greer)
Hamilton, Roger Dale
Harris, Gregory J.
Hasenbeck, Paul A. part of the Mangino Four
Mcdonnell, John T.
Mangino, Thomas A. part of the Mangino Four
Massucci, Martin J.
Mellor, Fredric M.
Newton, Donald S.
Nidds, Daniel R. part of the Mangino Four
O’Grady, John F.
Platt, Rober L. Jr.
Scharf, Charles J.
Schreckengost, Fred T. *remains returned*
Winters, David M. part of the Mangino Four

——

But before we get to Bram, let’s take a look at the Tourisan Memo

“My review of JCRC casualty files has surfaced several messages which list a total of nine American servicemen Vietnam has acknowledged were captured alive, all of whom are listed by DOD as having been declared dead while missing. None are officially listed as ever having been a POW. This information has come from Vietnamese officials a piece at a time over the past two years. I suspect we will learn about more such cases as time goes on. While the precise fate of the nine is not clear, it appears likely they died in captivity in southern Vietnam and this is the first admission from Vietnam that these nine were captured alive.” This is how a memo entitled “Vietnamese reports about U.S. POWs not previously known by the Defense Department,” and dated July 22, 1992, reads, that was prepared by Sedgwick D. Tourison, Jr. during his tenure as an investigator with the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs.

In the memo Mr. Tourison speculates on the reason this information was not discussed during the 24 – 25 June 1992 hearing before the Senate Committee in which General John Vessey, along with representatives of DIA and JTF testified. Mr. Tourison offers the following: “… two obvious explaination (sic) could be that (a) it would be irresponsible to discuss such information prior to investigating it fully, (b) they do not want to publicly discuss active cases still under investigation, and (c) they may not believe Vietnamese assertions.”

The memo continued; “A fourth explanation is that the Administration is too embarrassed at this point to even want to have this information made public. After all, it must be clear to the Administration that the Vessey/DOD-ISA “lists” have led to a relatively inflexible investigation schedule which is being directly controlled from Washington and with little seeming flexibility on the part of those on the ground to react to changing conditions. This is a direct repeat of the criticism levied at DOD/JCS/White House in its inept prosecution of the war two plus decades ago and it is evident that Viet Nam is well aware of these modalities and these new “POW” reports could well represent Viet Nam’s own effort to tie up the Administration.”

The nine servicemen acknowledged by the Vietnamese as “captured alive” are: Carlos Ashlock, James T. Egan, Jr., Robert L. Greer, Roger D. Hamilton, Gregory J. Harris, Donald S. Newton, Madison A. Strohlein, Robert L. Platt and Fred Schreckengost. Remains for both Greer and Schreckengost were recovered. Commenting on Greer and Schreckengost, Tourison notes; “During the recovery of their remains in 1990 Vietnamese officials acknowledged they had been captured alive and killed in captivity. The U.S. Marine Corps still does not list them as having died in captivity but to have died while in a MIA status.”

Of the 7 remaining “new POWs” Tourison offers the following information:

Carlos Ashlock – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Corporal Aslock (sic) was captured alive in Quang Ngai Province. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

James Egan, Jr. — – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Lieutenant Egan was captured alive and has reported that he died in captivity in December 1968.”

[It should be noted that Egan’s name was not on the list of POWs who died in captivity presented in Paris in January 1973. Yet, based on this new information Egan survived in captivity for almost 3 years, from January 21, 1966 to December 1968. As no other POW reported seeing Egan in captivity, where was he held?]

Roger D. Hamilton – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Lance Corporal Hamilton was captured alive in Military Region 5. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Gregory J. Harris – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Corporal Harris was captured alive. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Donald Newton – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Sergeant Newton was captured alive and taken to Hospital 102 of Military Region 5. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Robert L. Platt – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Private First Class Platt was captured alive. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Madison Strohlein – “Vietnam has now acknowledged that Sergeant Strohlein was captured alive on June 22, 1971 in Quang Nam Province. His eventual fate has not yet been determined.”

Whatever the reason, this information was not made public during the life of the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs. Documents generated by that committee including its investigators were turned over to the National Archives where they remain today… Hidden in plain sight.

The family of M/Sgt. Gregory J. Harris, acknowledged by the Vietnamese as “captured alive,” was shocked by the information contained in the Tourison memo. The Harris family were never told of this information. Nor, does it seem as if U.S. investigators have factored this stunning information into ongoing efforts to locate M/Sgt. Harris. Instead, investigators continue to search for M/Sgt Harris at the loss area, when in fact the Vietnamese admitted, sometime prior to at least 1991, that he had been captured.

A word about this document, this and other documents were found within the Sedgwick Tourison Collection housed at Texas Tech University in Lubbock Texas, in mid-March. With the discovery of this document the National Alliance of Families and Mary Reitano, cousin of Greg Harris, joined forces to download and review the documents within the Tourison Collection. Through these efforts, many additional documents of value were located, and passed onto family members.

Among them a memo dated August 1, 1992 titled “Individuals Reported Died in Captivity and not listed on current DOD/Vessey/SSC priority lists.” In this memo, Mr. Tourison states: “My review of POW/MIA case files disclosed DIA/JTFFA message traffic referring to individuals DOD now has information survived into captivity.”

This memo appears to be a follow-up to the July 22nd memo. In the 13 cases cited, representing 19 servicemen, 9 are named in the July 22nd memo. The additional servicemen added to the list of men who “survived into captivity” are: Richard C. Bram, John F. Dingwall, Fredric M. Mellor, Charles J. Scharf/ Martin J. Massucci, John F. O’Grady, Thomas A. Mangino, Paul A. Hasenbeck, David M. Winters, Daniel Nidds, and John T. McDonnell.

———————–
Name: Richard C. Bram
Rank/Branch: USMC, E6
Unit: VMFA 225 MAG 12
Date of Birth: 25 November 35
Home City of Record: Cleves, OH
Date of Loss: 08 July 65
Country of Loss: South Vietnam
Loss Coordinates: 1084630E 152114N
Status (in 1973): Missing
Category: 4
Acft/Vehicle/Ground: Ground

South Vietnam

On July 8, 1966, Staff Sergeant Bram and Gunnery Sergeant Dingwall left their unit at Chu Lai Air Base for a hike in the surrounding countryside. They were last seen in a local hamlet.

Local South Vietnamese police reported on July 8th that the Viet Cong had captured and killed two Americans and then buried their bodies. This report led to a muster of the unit and the discovery that Sergeants Bram and Dingwall were missing. A search of the area in which they were last seen produced hearsay information that the two had been captured, but there was conflicting information on their fate. They were never seen alive again, and their remains
were never located.

Both individuals were initially declared missing. In September 1978 they were declared dead/body not recovered. Returning U.S. POWs were unable to provide any information on their survival in captivity, and U.S. investigation teams in Vietnam have been unable to learn anything further concerning their precise fate.

———————————

I have been unable to secure a picture of Craig, but here is another page with his story and that of Gunny Sgt. John Dingwall. May God bless them all wherever they are today. And may McCain and Kerry both be ashamed of what they’ve done.

———————————-

It should be noted that both McCain and Kerry have been given recognition by the Vietnamese communists for their part in this whole affair. I will be talking more about that next week.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

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NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

In a few days, we’re going to step into a time machine for a long moment, and examine some facts that I’ve been going over about Kerry’s history with the military. It is no wonder that so many people are planning to attend the Gathering of Eagles to oppose his ilk in Washington to defend the Vietnam Memorial Wall. Some of the names on the wall are indisputable, their remains were brought back and the families grieved. But some names never made it to the memorial wall, because that memorial is dedicated to all those who served who are accounted for. I couldn’t go to the Gathering of Eagles, so…being that of the 58,253 names now listed on the Memorial, with approximately 1200 of them listed as missing (MIA’s, POW’s, and others) -according to the website for the memorial, -

I’m preparing a special dedication to our men and women of the Vietnam era: to the ones we left behind ALIVE. There are MIAs, POWs, and Last Seen Alives. And shortly I’ll be taking a look at that with you and telling some of their stories.

These are special men and women, who Kerry, McCain and others decided weren’t important enough to pursue. There were reports of their last seen alive sightings, which were swept aside, and reports that didn’t fullly explain what happened to them which remained buried. Normalization of trade relations with Vietnam was the goal, you see. And they had to get rid of this pesky little POW/MIA problem.

These people were determined to bury the memory of these men; and torture their families for over 30 years with doubts and fear for their loved ones. On March 17th, we will begin and will be standing in spirit with our brothers and sisters, defending that wall in Washington, D.C.

For now, I just want to remind everyone, particularly John Kerry, that - the magic trick with Michael Kranish didn’t do it for me. Your records were re-released to your biographer, and although you’ve now said the case is closed, it isn’t for everyone who’s been paying attention. Some think you didn’t fill it out correctly, and there are a few people who would be very willing to help you fill out a new 180. And there are medical records that need to be released so we can see what the real story was with those purple hearts and exactly who filled out the reports and approved them.

John Kerry, set your 180 free!

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

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The more people we have, the merrier!

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

Reference here.

Kerry refused to interview key witnesses and ordered committee staff to shred important intelligence documents….The committee’s final report…concluded there was “no compelling evidence that proves” that American POWs were still alive in Vietnam….Kerry and his committee…made no attempt to identify those who had been abandoned, how they had died, who killed them, or where their remains might be. As he had done twenty years earlier, former naval lieutenant Kerry turned his back on those with whom he had served. (Reckless Disregard, by Buzz Patterson, p. 63)

I’ve talked about how Kerry continued to hurt the men who served in Vietnam and their families, long after he’d come back to the States; not only serving as a spokesman for the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, but serving on the Senate Select Committee for POW/MIA Affairs to buried evidence that there were survivors, or that any of our men were still there; dead or alive. His ‘normalizing’ relations with Vietnam did his Forbes cousin some good businesswise and dollarwise, but it is another abomination where our armed forces are concerned.

But these sentiments of his carry over to today. And his throwing his medals over the wall, but somehow ending up with medals on the wall in his office, leads us to question what precisely happened and why he continues to flip flop back and forth, depending on the popular sentiments of the day.

Go to the Gathering of Eagles website and see that the Tom Haydens and Jane Fonda’s of the world have still not given up on their utopian dream; Jane Fonda has come out of retirement to join Cindy Sheehan and the rest of the anti-war moonbats to start protesting the War in Iraq by visiting the Vietnam Wall and disrespecting our dead.

And that’s just for starters. They seem to think they’re going to recreate another Vietnam scenario…and with the democrats in control, I can see that and other horrible things happening on the horizon. Unless people wake up, of course.

Socialists are masquerading as democrats in the Senate…and it’s time we let them know how we feel about the disgusting peace movement.

Look at how the guys in Iraq feel about the President’s ’surge’ and ask yourself if these guys REALLY WANT TO SUPPORT OUR TROOPS.

Kerry might not be there with Jane Fonda physically, but in view of his past history, I’m certain that he’ll be with them in spirit.

We are still calling for Kerry to release his records; we didn’t fall for the sleight of hand where he re-released the same records that were already out there to his biographer at the Boston Globe.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

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The more people we have, the merrier!

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

john kerry and john mccain did a terrible disservice to those who were mia in vietnam. the two of them sat on the senate select committee for pow/mia affairs and buried evidence that there were survivors, in order to rush normalized relations with vietnam. i don’t know what the heck mccain’s excuse for doing that is; but kerry’s cousin, C. Stewart Forbes had quite a bit to gain from it. Forbes ended up brokering a billion dollar deal between Hanoi and Colliers International, a large company based in his home state of Massachusetts. I wonder if Forbes sent Kerry a thank-you note.

link

“When he became a senator, Kerry continued to stab Vietnam soldiers in the back. Kerry began pushing normalization of trade with Vietnam. To that purpose, he founded the Senate Select Committee for POW/MIA Affairs. Kerry became chair of the committee. In order to normalize trade, the Vietnamese government would have to prove that its hands were now clean with regard to POW/MIAs.

Kerry tried to erase the possibility that prisoners of war were still alive in captivity in Vietnam. I spoke Monday evening with Mike Benge, a POW/MIA activist. Benge was a civilian POW held from 1968 until 1973 by the North Vietnamese Army; he spent 27 months in solitary confinement, one year in a “black box,” and one year in a cage in Cambodia. Benge accuses Sen. Kerry of shredding key papers documenting “live sightings of POWs in Vietnam and Laos” during the POW/MIA hearings. According to Benge, Kerry attempted to shred all copies to prevent leaks and future declassification of the materials.”

In “Reckless Disregard, Buzz Patterson talks about what Kerry did in order to normalize relations with his commie Vietnamese comrades:

Kerry refused to interview key witnesses and ordered committee staff to shred important intelligence documents….The committee’s final report…concluded there was “no compelling evidence that proves” that American POWs were still alive in Vietnam….Kerry and his committee…made no attempt to identify those who had been abandoned, how they had died, who killed them, or where their remains might be. As he had done twenty years earlier, former naval lieutenant Kerry turned his back on those with whom he had served. (p. 63)

But that just further punctuates the character of the man.

For the men still left behind…who John Kerry and John McCain were determined to erase any memory of…and for the ones who died in Vietnam…people from across the country are gathering together to defend the Vietnam Wall against the commies like Jane Fonda who will be protesting the war in Iraq by using our fallen. The date is going to be March 17, 2007. Part of their plan was to throw red paint on the memorial wall.

It is the same group of commie America-haters that Kerry hung out with back during the days of the Vietnam Vets against The War. Only today, we have a present-day version of it: The Iraq Veterans Against the War. But they are still standing on the same side as United for Peace and Justice, International Answer, and the rest of these loony leftist organizations who are being pimped by Fenton Communications.

We are still calling for Kerry to release his records; we didn’t fall for the sleight of hand where he re-released the same records that were already out there to his biographer at the Boston Globe.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

Image: LindaSog.com

The more people we have, the merrier!

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.

Well, the Gathering of Eagles is forming, and I have very little to say except point out a few things through pictures…

I’m calling again and still, for Kerry’s records to be released in their entirety, including his medical records, but want everyone to remember in the coming days as the Eagles will be descending on Washington to defend the wall…that Jane Fonda made a big mistake coming out of retirement; and John Kerry’s records are still in question, as he only re-released the same information to his biographer as that which was already known.

We are looking for the missing pages that will answer our questions. In the meantime, click on the gathering of eagles link which will take you to the new website where you can obtain information on people planning the trip to defend the Vietnam Veterans’ memorial wall in Washington, D.C.. Click on the banner at the top of this post to go to the post to get to the Gathering of Eagles website.

Join the blogbursts to help FREE Kerry’s 180 every Tuesday!

We’ve formed a blogburst group and here are the bloggers who are contributing so far. If you want to join the blogroll for Free Kerry’s 180, click here to email me, include the url for your blog. The blogburst is every Tuesday, so don’t forget to blog about it. All you have to do is encourage Kerry to set his 180 FREE, I’ll send you the code for the blogroll.

Image: LindaSog.com

The more people we have, the merrier!

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only.