Posted on 08/12/2004 7:48:20 PM PDT by NavySEAL F-16
The biographer of John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate, said yesterday there was no basis for one of the senator's favourite Vietnam War anecdotes - that he spent Christmas 1968 in Cambodia, a neutral nation which US leaders vowed was off limits for American forces.
"On Christmas Eve he was near Cambodia; he was around 50 miles from the Cambodian border. There's no indictment of Kerry to be made, but he was mistaken about Christmas in Cambodia," said Douglas Brinkley, who has unique access to the candidate's wartime journals.
But Mr Brinkley rejected accusations that the senator had never been to Cambodia, insisting he was telling the truth about running undisclosed "black" missions there at the height of the war.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Kerry was in Vietnam?
Weird, I've never heard him mention it.
Apparently the goalposts have been moved once again:
JANUARY -- NOT CHRISTMAS -- KERRY IN CAMBODIA (More Flip-Flop Spin!)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1190548/posts
Are all of his "Band of Brothers" willing to swear that they accompanied Kerry into Cambodia on these "secret" missions?
"black" mission? Sounds racist to me.
"Yeah, I didn't put those trips in the biography I wrote of Kerry cause they didn't seem very interesting"
Or, well, something, you know.
no, it's just the current state of their story. Especially Brinkley, at least he wasn't stupid enough to include the story like the Boston Globe reporters who sucked it all up hook, line & sinker. he's still shilling though because so much of John Kerry, as the core of his soul has now been demonstrated to be by the admission this story was always a fraud, is a complete & total phony.
Kerry just needs to sign the 180 and if he's telling the truth much of this goes away but if he's not, he goes away.
He said: "Kerry went into Cambodian waters three or four times in January and February 1969 on clandestine missions. He had a run dropping off US Navy Seals, Green Berets and CIA guys." The missions were not armed attacks on Cambodia, said Mr Brinkley, who did not include the clandestine missions in his wartime biography of Mr Kerry, Tour of Duty.
"He was a ferry master, a drop-off guy, but it was dangerous as hell. Kerry carries a hat he was given by one CIA operative. In a part of his journals which I didn't use he writes about discussions with CIA guys he was dropping off."
NOTE - First the dates for 4-5 of these purported missions has been limited to January & February of 1969. They're doing this because they need to try and bring it back to Nixon since Kerry flubbed the LBJ facts first time around.
A good fact checker (FReeper or otherwise!) needs to put together a little calendar of those days while Kerry was active in January + February (in calendar grid form would be great!) and fill in the blanks. Then we can see, exactly, when these missions could have taken place given the records & committed stories which are already available. This was a period when medals were flowing so those episodes will take up some of the periods & he can't bare to dismiss those dates.
Lastly looks like Brinkley fell into the sucker trap of seeing the secret compartment in the attache case & he's sticking with the hat story ROFLMAO
kerry was just lost.
Kerry was sensitive when he went into Cambodia...
Brinkley has Kerry running 'black missions' in SE Asia, so the details have to be kept secret.
How convenient.
That's much longer than Clinton used to take to craft his lies.
"undisclosed "black" missions"
Since Kerry was on these missions, I wonder how he would best describe himself.
Secret Agent Man Kerry (strong on intelligence)
Duke Nuke 'em Kerry (strong on defense)
errh that's 3-4 ... maybe people can start posting here what happened on those dates for some enterprising individual to use as a source for a Kerry "Secret Mission" Calendar!
I'm thinking not.
That would really be a war crime, wouldn't it?
That's smart for him to do for two reasons: 1) it's the classy way to conduct his public campaign + 2) old rule in politics is when your enemy is self-destructing you don't get into the way.
And they need to make allowances for the recovery periods for all those wounds for Purple Hearts.
And why didn't the Telegraph reporter ask Brinkley why he failed to put those stories in his biography? Imagine that. Another reporter covering the Kerry campaign who doesn't have any curiosity about details that might hurt Kerry's run for the presidency.
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