Posted on 08/14/2004 12:22:11 AM PDT by Pikamax
"wouldn't it be very easy to verfify his whereabouts in January of 69?"
Only if he releases ALL of his military records.
THE PING!Nixon had been elected by Christmas 1968 but didn't take office until the next month.If Kerry had said, "I remember sipping Christmas eggnog on the deck as we cruised the waters of Cambodia, thinking how ironic it was that President Nixon was allergic to eggs," his campaign would still deny it (which it did -- said Kerry had never said he was in Cambodia Xmas '68, only near Cambodia; but he did say it).
Two weeks from now, he'll have flip-flopped once again, and will be claiming that -- in actual point of fact -- he was "reporting for actress Alison Doody."
Following is some different Cambodia stories from Kerry, from
http://www.slantpoint.com/mt-arx/001675.html
hmmm. Now more stories emerge about Kerry and Cambodia, but these ones offer a plausible explanation as to why no one else would know about his time in Cambodia - it was a covert operation for the CIA. Kerry supposedly delivered CIA operatives into Cambodia. Or did he?
In 1992, an AP story about missing POWs filled in further details: "One of the missions, which Kerry, at the time, was ordered not to discuss, involved taking CIA operatives into Cambodia to search for enemy enclaves."
In 2000, US News & World Report ran a brief piece that said Kerry "made his first forays into Cambodia during the Vietnam War as a Navy lieutenant on clandestine missions to deliver weapons to anticommunist forces."
In 2003, the Washington Post ran a story about Kerry in which he explained that he carries around an old hat in his briefcase: "My good luck hat," Kerry said, happy to see it. "Given to me by a CIA guy as we went in for a special mission in Cambodia."
I do find it strange that for the past few days these stories were left out of the general discussion going around on blogs. If true, this could backfire on the Right. Kerry delivering CIA operatives is quite a brave thing to do. Pretty heroic if you ask me. It is kinda quirky that he mentions it so non-chalantly years later, but time does that I suppose.
Bottom line, I still demand the truth. Kerry hasn't explained Cambodia yet, so I'm skeptical. But supposing he comes out and mentions he was indeed on a covert operation for his country, that could put a silver bullet through the SwiftVets, and silence the hero naysayers once and for all.
I'm sure someone somewhere is filing Freedom of Information Act papers as I speak to get CIA files form that time period. And proof would be demanded. But, it may not matter.
Then again, all of this could be an even bigger morphing of a tall tale into colossal proportions. Like I said yesterday - this will be the most-anticipated political answer of the season. and now, it looks like it can go both ways.
Tim Blair has more, and National Review Online's Byron York addresses "Kerry's Secret Agent Career". Hugh Hewitt, Powerline and LGF have more as well.
-----
http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2004/08/a_cite_for_swif.html
Kerry-MIA
Copyright, 1992. The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
By JOHN DIAMOND
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Navy Lt. John Kerry knew he had no business steering his Mekong River patrol boat across the border into Cambodia, but orders were orders.
A quarter-century later, Sen. John Kerry says newly declassified documents have convinced him fellow servicemen captured on such trips were left behind at war's end.
Kerry, D-Mass., announced this week at hearings of the Senate Select Committee on POW-MIA Affairs he chairs that as many as 133 U.S. servicemen may have been left behind, either as unrecorded fatalities or prisoners of war, when the Vietnam War ended in 1973.
This conclusion that the government failed to account for all its soldiers, sailors and fliers did not come easily for the 48-year-old senator. Through two decades of political activism since he returned from Vietnam, first as an opponent of the war, then as a lawmaker, Kerry has remained studiously neutral
on the POW-MIA question.
Veterans groups and researchers of varying credibility raised allegations and published photographs suggesting that Americans might still be languishing in Southeast Asian stalags. Bereaved family members pleaded with lawmakers to rescue loved ones they were convinced were still alive. Kerry said only that
there was evidence that needed to be explored.
"I've always said there's evidence. But I'm not going to draw any conclusions about this until we do a sound, sensible job," Kerry said in an interview. "This conclusion was drawn from documents which no one saw 10 years ago."
But for Kerry, who spent six violent months commanding a patrol boat on the Mekong River, there's always been a ring of truth to allegations of abandoned Americans. By Christmas 1968, part of Kerry's patrol extended across the border of South Vietnam into Cambodia.
"We were told, `Just go up there and do your patrol. Everybody was over there (in Cambodia). Nobody thought twice about it," Kerry said. One of the missions, which Kerry, at the time, was ordered not to discuss, involved taking CIA operatives into Cambodia to search for enemy enclaves.
"I can remember wondering, `If you're going to go, what happens to you,"' Kerry said.
Even though it is madeup/a lie.
David Brinkley is apparently going to become Kerry's Golan Cipel and attempt to cover Kerry's butt in the upcoming New Yorker, by retrofitting Kerry into Cambodia in January.
The good folks at the blog-http://kerryhaters.blogspot.com/- (scroll down to Christmas in Cambodia)- have done an extensive evaluation of Kerry's timeline as written by Brinkley in Tour of Duty-
using Kerry's diary.
Unless Kerry was a time traveller-
there is no way he could have been in Cambodia, if we are to believe his biographer and Kerry's own words.
But I still can't find any river that "consists as a border between Vietnam and Cambodia," as per Michael Meehan.
Sorry but I'd say it's pretty implausible.
Why in the world would anyone choose to use a loud, 50-foot-long, 20-foot-high Swift boat to perform a covert insertion of a single CIA agent or even a few of them? I think the idea of doing that is ludicrous on its face.
"Christmas, January, these were absolutely interchangeable."
That shows you how sloppy the Kerry campaign's staff work is. They make this crap up, and they send this poor schmuck out to say this stuff in public, and nobody bothered to look at a map to see what would happen if somebody checked.
A question for Kerry. What was the name of the commanding officer who ordered you into Cambodia? It's a simple question. Now, is Kerry ready to slander a fellow vet yet again?
In the chaos of war, only Kerry knew where his rifle was aimed.
Using that logic, Bush volunteered for the National Guard.
That shows you how sloppy the Kerry campaign's staff work is. They make this crap up, and they send this poor schmuck out to say this stuff in public, and nobody bothered to look at a map to see what would happen if somebody checked.
I can't tell if that river on the left is considered part of the same river. There is what appears to be a very short stretch on it near the city/town(?) labeled "Xom Khanh Hoa". It's toward the upper left corner of the map.
Of course, that doesn't make the story any more true.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
