Plastic stuff is really bad news. C4 has a burn rate of 25,000 feet per second (fps) and that will out drag a Chevrolet. (Boom)

In the late 50's and early 60's we (Special Forces) trained Greeks, Italians, Germans, French, Saudi, Lebanese, Pakistani, Libyan, Turks, Irani, and OTHERS in the use of field expedient demolition techniques....(How many US KIA in Iraq from IED?) Don't ya know this came back to bite us in the ass big time....or was that by design?! Friggin CIA at work again....

In 1962 I was working as an Intelligence Analyst in the 10th Special Forces in Bad Toelz, Germany.

Upon return from Lebanon, Captain Billy Goodpaster wrote his father, General Goodpaster, then the Army Chief of Staff in the Pentagon, of his and other A Teams experiences and exploits in the above countries. The General took Billy's letter to the next meeting of the Joint Chief's of Staff meeting saying "I didn't know we had American's in all these countries!"

Three days later, we received a secret message from Special Operations Task Force Europe, SOTFE, the CIA headquarters in Frankfurt, Germany. It directed the Commander of Special Forces in Germany to order Captain Billy Goodpaster "NOT to write to his father about ANY and ALL Special Forces activities in Europe, North Africa or the Middle East."

That is when the light came on for me! True to habit, the same held as fact in Vietnam. The Pentagon didn't have a clue as to what we were doing in South East Asia!

Is that skullduggery or what?

"I swore never to be silent whenever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented." -Elie Weisel

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The other day I wrote to jmac asking for his opinion on the current anti-Kerry swift boat ads:

Hi John,
As a former Vietnam vet, I was wondering what you think of the swift boat vets' allegations regarding Kerry's service? The medals, trip to Cambodia, etc. I realize you may be too busy to respond, but if you get the chance, I 'd really be interested in your perspective.

Hope you are well,

Gal

And he wrote back:

Hi Gal,
Seems pretty cut and dry to me. The accounts of the people on Kerry's boat have one collective version whereas the others who were not on Kerry's boat have a completely different account. So, you have eye witnesses and you have rumor mongers. Who are you going to believe?

It is also very clear the motivation for the dissenting interpretation results from the anti-war statements and medal tossing incident at the Pentagon, AFTER Kerry left the service.

If those in receipt of medals and awards were questioning their own viability with respect to the authenticity of combat accounts, they should have reported this to the appropriate command structure way back then. Medals are poor compensation for the trauma of wounds. Some deserved them, and some didn't. But you have to look at your own face when you shave....everyone knows exactly whether they deserve a citation. Cutting ones self shaving is not a qualification for the Purple Heart, but it happened. Fortunately, I was only wounded in my mind.

Personally, anyone who set foot in Vietnam has the right to say how they feel about the war. That goes for the guys in grave registration, helicopter pilots, boat drivers, trigger pullers, cooks, artillery pounders, tank drivers, and anyone else unfortunate enough to be sent into that crappola. But second guessing a combat action that you were not present for is a bit disingenuous, to say the least, and obviously politically motivated.

Re Cambodia. I wasn't with Kerry so I don't know if he was told to go into that country. I personally was directed to fly over Cambodia and take pictures of an installation in the Parrots Beak region. We were promptly shot out of the area. Beyond that, my duty as Case Officer for the Rogue CIA outfit that I had the misfortune of commanding consisted of maintaining the skills for assassination teams who were to be sent into Cambodia dressed as North Vietnamese to conduct "Black Terror", all this in violation of Presidential Directives issued during National Security Council meetings in 1966. We found the documents in 2000 when the State Department decided to declassify the documents, much to the chagrin of the CIA. Now we know why; treason in wartime.

So if the politicos wish to bring up Cambodia, I will have to say, "Bring it on!" Then we will see how fast the Intelligence Community crawls back under their propaganda rock....

Hope that clears things up and you may post this if you will.

Amazing that none of this came up before Kerry entered the Presidential Race. Also amazing that all the money for the Swift Boat putsch came from wealthy Texan's with close ties to El Presidente. Go figure! 

The Swift Boat ads are backfiring on GW. The Bush campaign's top outside lawyer, Benjamin L. Ginsberg, gave legal advice to the attacking vets. And what an image it was, Max Cleland, injured in Vietnam, attempting to deliver a letter to Bush at the Crawford ranch condemning the ads. Stopped in his wheelchair by a roadblock, Cleland asks, "...where is George Bush's honor? The question is, where is his shame to attack a fellow veteran who has distinguished himself in combat ... Regardless of the political combat involved, it's disgraceful."

Gal and Mr. P,

Thank you for your kindness and attention to this serious matter.

 

"Just curious John, when you say, "So, you have eye witnesses and you have rumor mongers," why are the people who were in other boats who were at the scene not eye witnesses? Also can the people on Kerry's boat be trusted to tell the truth if indeed they did leave the scene immediately after the mine exploded, as one eye witness contends, only to return later?"

 

Two men in the same foxhole give two accounts of the same combat action and you would not recognize the renditions as being from the same ordeal. It is a phenomena of combat. When someone is trying to kill you and you are trying to kill them, your perception of reality is altered, by varying degrees. When a person is on a boat where action is being realized, it is not unlikely that they would have any discernible impression of what was going on in adjacent boats hundreds of yards away.

I wrote "eye witnesses and rumor mongers" because I defy any of the people NOT on Kerry's boat to tell you where their weapons were pointed and how many bullets they fired that day, all day. Some things don't stick in your mind during combat while others do, especially when it's up close and personal. Rasmussen definitely remembers Kerry dragging him aboard the boat. How could you forget that? Where were the other people on the boat looking when this was happening? There are so many variables to all these "witnesses" that I conclude their recollection as "rumor mongers" because they were all essentially saying the same thing at the direction of the lawyer who just resigned today from the RNC. Can the people on Kerry's boat be trusted to tell the truth? Who said they "left the scene" and can THEY be trusted? Hell No Miss Mason, no one can be trusted to relate life and death situations! The Fog of War, my dear Miss Mason. If you've been there, talk about it, everybody deserves that. If you haven't, ask your questions, take the answers and shut up. I'm glad to see that you are still your picky self. Don't you see all the bru ha ha over this is taking away the focus on the war in Iraq? Touché.

Hear that sound, Mason? That's the sound of the ring of truth emanating from jmac's post.

It's funny, but when Kerry's name is mentioned, righties shift to a Kafkaesque kind of reality.

When Bush's name is mentioned, righties turn into the three monkeys: "hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil."