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John Kerry mentions his service in Vietnam so frequently that it has become a running joke on the campaign press plane. He seldom if ever mentions his postwar activities as a national coordinator and principal spokesman for Vietnam Veterans Against the War, a group he says he quit in 1971 because he was concerned about its radical agenda. One reason may be that a credibility gap has started to widen over his antiwar history, and he clearly doesn't want to discuss it at length. His campaign is issuing misleading and evasive statements on his antiwar service in a way that...

WASHINGTON: The head of a war veterans group said yesterday that United States troop withdrawals from Vietnam should be done at a rate matching the release of United States prisoners of war. Herbert Rainwater, commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, also said ... "the image that is being presented to the American people by the media of the United States involvement in Indochina has not been hindered by facts." He referred to the appearance before the Foreign Relations Committee of a former lieutenant, John Kerry. "He is an opportunist taking advantage of a very confused minority," the V.F.W. commander...

---------- The following transcript is taken from ABC's special June 30, 1971 broadcast of "The Dick Cavett Show," during which former Navy Lieutenant John Kerry represented Vietnam Veterans Against the War. He was opposed by fellow Navy veteran John O'Neill, representing Vietnam Veterans for a Just Peace. ---------- MR. CAVETT: The fact is I don't have an opening monologue tonight because the subject of the show is quite serious, and I figured why make it more serious with one of my monologues, so I thought I would just start in. You know, I guess, who my two guests are tonight:...

airing now c-Span

A repeat of ABC's June 30, 1971, "The Dick Cavett Show." This show featured a debate between John Kerry and John O'Neill on U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. Both men served in the Navy and commanded swift boats in Vietnam. After returning from the war, John Kerry served as spokesman for an organization called "Vietnam Veterans Against the War." John O'Neill supported the U.S. policy toward Vietnam and in Southeast Asia.

2004 VOTE John Kerry in 1971 TV Debate; From the June 30, 1971 broadcast of "The Dick Cavett Show," John Kerry debates John O'Neill on U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. SUN.Aug. 15,2004, C-SPAN, 6PM ET & 9PM ET

Editorial Second Thoughts 8-11-04 I'll say this about Sen. John F. Kerry. He told the truth about his war crimes to Tim Russert during an April 18, 1971, appearance on Meet The Press. Kerry said, "there are all kinds of atrocities and I would have to say that, yes, yes, I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other soldiers have committed in that I took part in shootings in free-fire zones. I conducted harassment and interdiction fire. I used 50-caliber machine guns which we were granted and ordered to use, which were our only weapon against people....

Useful Fools Watching Those Whom Lenin Called "Useful Fools" Blog Front Page | My Home Page My Tip Jar « Kerry Raises A Point | Click for Most Recent Articles| PULL OUT NOW! » April 16, 2004 Kerry to the Senate 1971 - Fisked Here is a "fisking" of Kerry's testimony before the U.S. Senate in 1971, where he makes numerous false allegations about his country and the conduct of our soldiers in Vietnam. He also acts as an agent for the enemy, recommending immediate, unconditional surrender. As a Vietnam Veteran, I consider John F. Kerry's testimony to be unforgivable. one of the...

Kerry defends his '70s anti-war activities KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Sen. John F. Kerry [related, bio] expressed pride in his 1970s antiwar activism yesterday as controversy continued to swirl over a TV ad accusing him of betraying his fellow veterans when he protested the Vietnam war. ``I stood up against the war in the 1970s,'' Kerry said. ``Some people still don't like that, and they're still trying to fight that. That's 35 years old. But I'm proud of what I did to stand up. And I learned a lot.'' A group calling itself Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth launched...

The following transcript is taken from ABC's special June 30, 1971 broadcast of "The Dick Cavett Show," during which former Navy Lieutenant John Kerry represented Vietnam Veterans Against the War. He was opposed by fellow Navy veteran John O'Neill, representing Vietnam Veterans for a Just Peace. ---------- MR. CAVETT: The fact is I don't have an opening monologue tonight because the subject of the show is quite serious, and I figured why make it more serious with one of my monologues, so I thought I would just start in. You know, I guess, who my two guests are tonight: John...

Three Vietnam veterans who were held captive for years in the prison known as the "Hanoi Hilton" revealed Tuesday that their Communist jailers repeatedly cited John Kerry's 1971 Senate testimony branding them as war criminals to justify threatening them with execution and drive down their morale. "These statements [by Kerry] ... were proof I deserved to be punished," former POW Air Force pilot Jim Warner told United Press International. During every interrogation session, said Warner, his Vietnamese jailers echoed Kerry's charges that he was a war criminal. "The memory of that was still pretty fresh in my mind, and I...

John Kerry's "band of brothers" hasn't had much to say about his 1971 testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee where he claimed GIs in Vietnam routinely committed atrocities. Now former CNN executive Ted Kavanau says it's high time for somebody to ask them to verify Kerry's under-oath account. The would-be commander in chief claimed that American soldiers, "personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, [blew] up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in a fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle...

A Vietnam veterans group opposing Sen. John Kerry's bid for the White House is gearing up for a Washington, D.C., rally with a fund-raising dinner this month. Vietnam Vets for the Truth says it represents a majority of veterans of the war who contend the Democratic nominee is unfit to be commander in chief. Earlier this year, the group reported that a museum in Ho Chi Minh City, the former Saigon, honors Kerry as an anti-war activist with a photograph of him being greeted by the general secretary of the Communist Party, Comrade Do Muoi, in July 1993. Recently, it...

[snip]In one of his multiple references to his four-month tour in Vietnam, he declared that "our band of brothers" still knows "how to fight for our country." But he neglected to repeat his 1971 photo-op testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in which he issued a blanket indictment against that same "band of brothers," charging them with "war crimes committed in Southeast Asia — not isolated incidents — but [war] crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with full awareness of officers at all levels of command."     After spending two decades voting to decimate America's armed forces, Mr. Kerry audaciously...

<p>August 1, 2004 -- WATCHING last week's Democratic infomercial in Boston, one could be forgiven for thinking that John Kerry went straight from the Mekong Delta to the podium at the Fleet Center, with barely a stop in between.</p> <p>That he had almost nothing to say about his 20 years in the U.S. Senate was surprising. But that almost nary a word was heard about the events that rocketed John Kerry to nationwide fame is shameful.</p>

John Kerry, reporting for duty. Cheesy. Theatrical. And, as staged at this week's national Democratic convention, certain to energize groups of Vietnam veterans who bitterly oppose Kerry's anti-war activism. "It's not so much what Kerry did in country -- though his three purple hearts were for scratches -- but it was what he did when he came back home," says retired Army Col. Jack Peevy of Alpharetta. "He lied about my soldiers. . . . What he told were baldfaced lies, and he has never apologized to us in the military." Peevy, a 30-year veteran who served in the Central...

It's on now for the West Coast anyhow... I saw this another night last week as well. Worth watching!

I have great concern that it was Kerry's testimony (and the fakes he brought with him) before the Congress in 1971 that is DIRECTLY responsible for the greetings that our troops who served in Viet Nam received when they returned home. These heros DID NOT deserve the spit and epithets of "baby killer!" when they came home from one nightmare only to be confronted with another. John Kerry's testimony told Americans that our young men were worthless scum. He told Americans that our young men performed horrendous war crimes as a common, matter-of-course habit. HE LIED. This fact about that...

  In a videotape from 1971, obtained exclusively by ABCNEWS, Vietnam veteran John Kerry said he gave back his medals in order to "wake the country."ABCNEWS.com Discarded Decorations Videotape Contradicts John Kerry’s Own Statements Over Vietnam Medals By Brian Ross and Chris Vlasto ABCNEWS.com April 26— Contradicting his statements as a candidate for president, Sen. John Kerry claimed in a 1971 television interview that he threw away as many as nine of his combat medals to protest the war in Vietnam. "I gave back, I can't remember, six, seven, eight, nine medals," Kerry said in an interview on a...

BOSTON - John Kerry skipped past his role in the Vietnam protest movement that brought him to prominence when he talked of his younger days fighting for his country and ignored that conflict when praising the American tradition of going to war only "because we have to." Kerry once famously called the Vietnam War "the biggest nothing in history," and says he is still proud of his anti-war activism when he came back. But in the text of his televised speech at the Democratic National Convention, he emphasized his war record and offered mere clues to his protesting past. A...