Posted on 08/19/2004 5:02:20 PM PDT by OESY
just checked Borders.com, and they have it listed, and you can order it either at your local store for pickup, or online, which sends you to Amazon.com (shipdate - 5-7 weeks). Sounds like that particular Borders the caller encountered has its own particular beef, and should be reported.
That sounds strange, 5-7 weeks. Wasn't delivery time on Slick Willie's book a week or less?
I 5-7 weeks the Swifties will either be history of Kerry will have withdrawn from the candidacy.
The story above may be seen to be in conflict with Larry Thurlow's statements.
In the above story, from the book, Unfit for Command:
What Actually Happened
On March 13, 1969, Jack Chenoweth commanded the boat in front of Kerry, and his gunner, Van Odell, had a clear view of the entire incident. Dick Pease commanded PCF 3, which was blown up by the mine that day. None of these Swiftees recognized the incident as described by Kerry in his report, by Douglas Brinkley in Tour of Duty, or on Kerry’s website. They were furious when they realized Kerry’s fraudulent account.
In reality, Kerry’s boat was on the right side of the river when a mine went off on the opposite side, under PCF 3.
Here is Larry Thurlow's statement taken during an interview, posted to FR at Was Rassman Even on Kerry's Boat? - reply no. 66:
THURLOW: My recollection of that day is still pretty vivid after all these years. And what I remember, Judy, is that the incident involving Mr. Rassmann, five boats had come out of the river after running an operation up in the canal earlier that day. Three boats were going through a fishing weir on the left side of the river that had put in place between the time we entered and when we were leaving.
I'm the third boat in that column left. In the column right, there are two boats. The lead boat is John Kerry's.
He's going through a rather small opening on the right bank that (ph) had been left in his boat. The boat leading our column, as it goes through that small opening almost simultaneously, is blasted completely out of the water by a command detonated mine.
As best as I have been able to discover, PCF 3 commanded by Richard W. Pees (some spellings have him as "Pease" even "WQees") was in the lead, left column. Next in that left column was either PCF 23 commanded by (no information linking Jack Chenoweth to PCF 23, but presumably it is Jack Chenoweth, though author Douglas Brinkley places Skip Barker as an OIC for the middle boat in the left column) or PCF 43 commanded by Don Droz. Third in that column was PCF 51 commanded by Larry Thurlow.
In the right column, is PCF 94 commanded by John Kerry, followed by either PCF 23 or PCF 43.
Douglas Barker's article, John Kerry's Final Mission in Vietnam, first page of four (found online), excerpt:
[Tthe boats gathered at the mouth of the Rach Dong Cung, prior to heading up that canal and conduction operations there ... ]
Finally PCF-94 arrived at the opening to the small Dong Cung canal, where it was to rendezvous with the Swifts skippered by Lieutenants Skip Barker, Don Droz and Larry Thurlow, who would join them bearing the South Vietnamese Popular Forces members (called "Ruff-Puffs") they had picked up in Cai Nuoc.
Douglas Brinkley may have done a poor job, but the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth have not established by providing evidence --- logbooks, military records, repair depot logs, previous SITREPS, etc. --- the pertinent boat numbers and boats' crewmembers. They have not provided any accurate chart and backed it up.
Can I say that on Free Republic?
Of course not. That's a half-truth. I bet you can figure out what the other half is.
I bought mine a week ago at Barnes & Noble, NYC. Will try to check tomorrow if they still have copies and get back to you.
I had to download first an Acrobat update from Adobe.com, but then could open the recommendation (and the Citation) for Kerry's Bronze Star. I have transcribed the SUMMARY OF ACTION, which is the only "after-action" information I could find. If johnkerry.com had displayed a separate after-action report, it appears they may have removed it.
* * *
AWARD RECOMMENDATION, Bronze Star Medal, 23 March 1969
Para. 27 SUMMARY OF ACTION
On 13 March 1969, LTJG KERRY was serving as Officer-in-Charge of PCF-94 conducting a five boat Sea Lords operation in the Bay Hap river and Dong Cung (Gung?) canal together with ground forces. After sweeping the area for five hours, the boats extracted the ground troops and began exiting the river. Shortly after starting their exit, a mine detonated under one of the boats (PCF-3), lifting it two feet above the water and wounding everyone on board. Almost simultaneously, another mine detonated close aboard PCF-94, knocking 1st LT RASSMAN (sic) into the water and wounding LTJG KERRY in the right arm. PCF-51 immediately went to the aid of PCF-3 while PCF-94 provided cover fire. Shortly after LTJG KERRY was informed that he had a man over board, he immediately turned his boat around to assist the man in the water, who by this time was receiving sniper fire from the river banks. LTJG KERRY from his exposed position on the bow of the boat, managed to pull LT RASSMAN aboard despite the painful wound in his right arm. Meanwhile, PCF-94s (sic) gunners provided accurate suppressing fire. LTJG KERRY then directed PCF-94 to the stricken PCF-3, where his crew attached a line and towed the boat clear of danger. Throughout the entire action, LTJG KERRY proved himself to be calm, professional, and highly courageous in the face of enemy fire.
Source: www.johnkerry.com/More Issues/Rapid Response/View John Kerry’s Official Naval Records/Bronze Star Recommendation
* * *
Note there are many discrepancies between this account and "Unfit for Command" pp. 87-95, namely regarding the number of mines, hostile (and sniper) fire, the cause of Rassmann's being knocked overboard, the immediacy of Kerry turning his boat around, the extent of Kerry's arm injury, the absence of any reference to being wounded in the buttocks from the mine (or rice-bin grenade explosion), references to the Coast Guard cutter offshore, and the extent of Kerry's participation in towing PCF-3 clear of danger, courageous acts on the part of other crewmen, and last but not least the claim that Kerry was "calm, professional, and highly courageous in the face of enemy fire."
CROWLEY: We want to talk more about Larry Thurlow's claims about Kerry and what happened to them on March 13, 1969. Former swift boat commander Larry Thurlow joins us on the phone from Kansas.
Mr. Thurlow, thank you so much for being here. I want to try and just sort of set the stage for our audience.
You were on the same mission, although a different boat that John Kerry was on, along with other boats up the Mekong at the time that he was awarded a Bronze Star and you were awarded a Bronze Star. He says that you all were under fire. You have said that you were not
And now up comes your citation, which does several times say that you were under small arms fire. Can you justify the two of those for us?
LARRY THURLOW, FMR. SWIFT BOAT COMMANDER: Well, I can certainly try to explain why this would have happened. One point I would make, we were not on the Mekong River. We were on the Bay Hap River. [Song Bai Hap; see map.]
. . .
THURLOW: Certainly. On this day in question, the three boat, a PCF in front of my boat, was blown up by a water mine. Immediately, the boat I was on, the boat directly in front of me, the 23 boat, opened fire on the left bank of the river in case there would be an ambush in connection with the water mine.
If Larry Thurlow is correct, then PCF 23 (presumably skippered by Jack Chenoweth) was the no. 2 boat in line of column left, approaching the fishing weir near map grid coordinates VQ995770. That leaves PCF 43 (Don Droz) as no. 2 boat behind PCF 94 (John Kerry) in column right; and, Unfit for Command, is in error: PCF 23 ( Jack Chenoweth) was not the lead boat ahead of PCF 94 (John Kerry), and Van Odell did not have such a "clear view."
Mark
Kerry wants to show Johnson his wound in the Buttox, just like Forest Gump.
What a maroon.
DK
All reports that I've seen place Odell in the machine gun station above the pilot house. From that vantage point, about 20 or so feet above the water, he'd have a clear view of all of the boats regardless.
I agree with you - crazy, isn't it? However, I am guessing its a computerized version of CYA as far as delivery date - this way, they don't have panicky buyers, emailing them frantically, a week or two from now (I am assuming that at the moment, delivery date may be, to some extent, out of their control. I believe that the publisher is getting orders faster than they can print books. YAY!!!)
I can't wait to read this book, haven't been out to see if its in our local stores yet!
Just watching these guys, you know they are holding back some pretty serious ammo. They had to know they would be attacked and I think they have stuff in reserve that is going to blow Kerry completely away.
These Swift Boat Vets for Truth should hire you. Nice job of putting this disjointed information into some kind of coherent order.
Thanks!
So the question remains... Who wrote this after action report? Thurlow claims Kerry did.
Is there any way to check this out?
I heard this lady call Hannity in the last hour of his program. I may be wrong, but I think she was in New Jersey because Sean told her Borders was a good bookstore. She had been calling around to bookstores for the book. Now, it's possible I could have heard wrong...
As of 10am this morning Barnes & Noble, 82nd St @ Broadway, NYC (212-362-8835) has a dozen copies of "Unfit" left and will mail for $3.99 + book cost of $27.95.
"Kerry wants to show Johnson his wound in the Buttox, just like Forest Gump"
But-tox.....Bo-tox....Shome confushion shirley?
Run! Forest RUN!......for President
LOL ;o)
Hard to tell. The Award Recommendation was sent 10 days after incident from Cmdr, Coastal Div.11 (G.M. Elliott) to Cmdr, Coastal Sqdn ONE (endorsed by C.F. Horne III), approved by S. Edelman (Asst Chief of Staff for Persnl & Admin) -- all of which means we don't know who wrote the SUMMARY OF ACTION, though it was probably Elliott.
It is also probable there was a separate after-action report from which Elliott extracted and condensed the summary. Since no PCF commander has claimed he wrote it, Thurlow is probably right that Kerry wrote it.
BTW, the Recom. lists Thurlow and R.E. Lambert as also recommended for the Bronze Star. D.L. Sandusky, QM1, is listed as an eyewitness. Neither Lambert nor Sandusky are mentioned in "Unfit." The plot thickens.
Typo in the book itself, I would guess (Amazon still hasn't delivered the copy I ordered). Thurlow was OIC of the 53 boat.
I've got a copy coming from Amazon. It might actually get here, next week. But I'm guessing that middle of the week, what copies Regenery managed to print might start showing up in Costco and Wal-mart and such. And you won't get any grief buying it there.
LOL, you're right! We have a "hugh" super WalMart right by us, I will give them a call and see if they have it in stock, or are expecting it this week. I am so looking forward to reading Mr. O'Neill's book - and sharing the salient parts with my self-proclaimed "bleedin' heart liberal" cousin in FL (she always was the "slow" one in the family, and proclaims Michael Moore as her "hero" - go figure). If I can at least make her feel too ashamed to actually show up at the polls, I will have served my country well.
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