SwiftVets.com

[Nathanyl]

Michael,

[Grampa]

...
_________________
Iraqi Freedom 2003-2004. We won't take any of that 1960s crap when We come home!

[buzsq]

[AMOS]

Mike, none of the real war vets from ANY wars talk about what happened or what they did. The reason we're having forums like this is the dumbass opened his mouth and became a "hero". This was after thirty-some years of him being on the "other side". The idiot is a real phony and real ignorant. For example, early on in the campaign, he muttered something like "We gotta get someone that can speak Muslim". "Speak Muslim?" Yeah, get someone that can speak Methodist or Catholic while you're at it. He's just plain stoooopid. He gets diarrhea of the mouth and there's no telling what'll come out. I, like many others here probably aren't that excited about politics, normally. But Old Dumbo ain't normal in what he says and does. And we're so p_ssed off with him trying to do the switcheroo over to "hero" that we've decided that ain't gonna happen.

Like I said in an earlier post, if I could just have a few minutes alone with him I could make him understand that slamming me about V.N. ain't a bright thing to do. "Old Norman" would "get out" for that one, fo sho.

Amos.

Semper Fidelis

[baldeagl]

[unohombre]

I recall meeting a young man at a Viet Vet gathering in support of the men and women serving in the first gulf battle. I told him I saw no atrocities during my fifteen months in Vietnam. He replied that his father told him that atrocities were commonplace. To prove his father's validity, I guess, he then volunteered that his father's best friend was killed while on guard duty at night. According to "dad", he had just lit his cigarette and passed the light to his buddy, who was shot en la cabeza while lighting his own cig.

This was too much of an opportunity to pass up, so I called over a retired Army Light Colonel and asked the kid to repeat both his charge about the "commonplace" atrocities and the classic story of the best buddy getting KIA'd for being the second to grab a light. He did repeat himself, closing with "my dad would never lie to me".

Then we presented our points. Neither of us saw any atrocities. Between us, we served nearly three years in Vietnam; myself in support, the LTC in infantry as an advisor to the ARVNs. And NOBODY ON GUARD DUTY AT NIGHT WOULD BE STUPID ENOUGH TO LIGHT A CIGARETTE. If anyone was stupid enough to do it, he would have been busted so hard that he might wish Charlie actually did take a shot at him. Stupidity like that gets good guys killed.

My name is Don Truitt. I served in RSVN in '67 and '68.

There are a lot of myths about Vietnam and Viet Vets that have been accepted as facts over the intervening decades. Most of them are based on lies told by jerks who probably never saw Vietnam except on television.[/b]
_________________
Don Truitt
Author of THE ORIGINALS, "a bitingly funny" novel of the Vietnam War.

[PO2]

[PO2]

[/quote]

I think it's very possible and even probably that Kerry and his campaign could convince some vets if not to outright lie, to at the least withhold information, and twist facts for the "sake of the country".
[/quote]

I have the feeling that it is in their interest that they are doing what they are. We all know that there are many appointments the President makes when assuming office. Wonder where we will see these guys if Kerry gets ellected (perish the though) In addition, look at their lifestiyle right now. Jetting around the country on someone elses expense account, flying around in private jets, parading in front of TV cameras, being greeted warmly and in hero stiyle by the Democrats each place they go. The temptation is just too much to resist by some people.
_________________
Duty. Honor. Country.
To me, more than just words.

[xcorpsman-usn]

[d19thdoc]

Michael B. Smith wrote:

[d19thdoc]

Michael,
I have developed an unfortunate habit of reading the first post in a new thread and popping off a claymore. I have read this entire thread since my first post, and I am sorry if I appear to have been hostile. You seem like a sincere and honest veteran of the next generation. We (Vietnam Vets) often forget that other generations have come along who have no first hand recollection of what it was like in those days both here and in Vietnam. We also grew up in a time when the MSM and the American educational system had not yet been over-run by the bastard children of Chairman Mao and Madame Binh.

I suggest that the very first item on your reading list should be Kerry's entire testimony to the Senate of 4/22/71. The entirety is almost unknown to the public and to the media "giants" on both sides of this question. I have devoted hours daily for the past seven months to reviewing the source documents. They are stunning. Start there. Look in WinterSoldier.com.
_________________
For The Honor of the Fifty-Eight Thousand.
"He Can Lose, But He Can Not Hide"

[d19thdoc]

PO2" wrote:

[TEWSPilot]

Who's to blame for nation's Vietnam wounds? -- John Kerry

August 29, 2004

BY MARK STEYN SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

...probably the only thing in John Kerry's life for which he can take full credit -- to his eternal disgrace.

Michael, all your research has been done for you at www.WinterSoldier.com, and the article linked above is just one of hundreds exposing John Kerry for the opportunist and shallow scoundrel he is.

Now let's ask some of his volunteers how he treated them earlier THIS YEAR -- not during the Vietnam War, not AFTER the Vietnam War, THIS YEAR. Democrat volunteers opening their homes and businesses to him, providing free phone banks for communication, free transportation -- all so he could enjoy his FREE vacation at Sun Valley. Did he thank them properly? THEY report, YOU decide:

Kerry Leaves Local Dems Hanging in Sun Valley

From the Editor: Kerry Volunteers Deserved Better

How do you think he will treat "us little people" if he becomes President?

John Kerry's whole life has been a self-serving crusade, a theatrical experience, all with one goal: to one day be President of the United States. He was in a unique position to affect history in a positive way and reverse the course of "anti-Americanism" starting to sweep the country when he returned from Vietnam had he simply conducted himself with honor and told the truth. We had virtually won the war by smashing the TET offensive in '68. His record shows he failed to do that. In fact, if you read the article at the beginning of this post, you see the results.

His poison cost us victory then, and it threatens our victory now. We survived the loss in Vietnam. We cannot survive a loss to the Islamofascists. The "war on terror" is really a war to preserve or destroy civilization, and again, John Kerry is on the wrong side.

Click on my website link in my signature, read the poem, then click on it and you might find answers to some of your questions, especially about atrocities. My year in Southeast Asia was not at all as John Kerry and the misnamed "Vietnam Veterans Against the War" described it. You will also find out why I chose those words as my signature.

John Kerry never saw the moon over Cambodia from inside the borders, but I did. That's posted on my site, too.

...you can also contact me through that page.
_________________
Find the perfect babysitter, petsitter, or tutor -- today!

[Michael B. Smith]

[quote="d19thdoc"]Michael,
I have developed an unfortunate habit of reading the first post in a new thread and popping off a claymore. I have read this entire thread since my first post, and I am sorry if I appear to have been hostile. You seem like a sincere and honest veteran of the next generation. <<<<

I was trying to be - I am truley concerned and truly interested.

However - no offense taken - I know and I understand this is a touchy subject - especially now. This is why I am even more concerned about this.

I am not calling anyone a liar - especially not the swift vets, or anyone on this board who served in Vietnam. I deeply respect you and all your brethren and sincerely thank you for your service.

I would say respectfully (if I may) your first response is proof of why I am concerned and frankly - it frightens me that our country is being torn apart!

PS - according to my DD214 it was combat radio operator (hence the Bravo designator) but - really - it doesn;t matter - I was never in comabt and only 2 or 3 years into my tenure - they did away with the MOS and chaged it to 31K which was a cross between RTO (05B) and a "wire rat" whopse old MOS nomenclature I do not remember.

Thank you for you response (both of them) and I will file it all in my brain.

I might add - If I haven't said in any other post - I am not voting for Kerry - frankly I care less for him. I have traditionally always been a conservative Republican - however - as I have done the past 3 general elections, I will vote for the Libertarian candidate this year.

I only mention this - as I want to assure all you fine men and ladies that I have no partisan reason for having asked my questions - only the concern that I would wish ALL people would have for our country and our countrymen! And I think the main proof of this is - I have been frank and posted under my real name.

Sincerely
Michael Berryman Smith
Fort Worth, Texas
_________________
Michael B. Smith

[d19thdoc]

Michael,
Part of the reason some of us are hostile in our responses to anyone who appears here to question what we are about is that many Vietnam Vets feel like this is a repeat of the smears we endured from the left for a lifetime, of which John Kerry was the principle spokesman - he did not start it, but he validated it for the mainstream; and partly because in the early days of this board (go back on the index page and click the high number pages) we were over run with vile trolls, some posing as "uninformed" innocents, before the moderators got hold of the situation; and partly because some of us, me among them, especially if we have read deeply into the source documents (i.e. news articles and other valid records of the actual words and actions of these people - VVAW, etc. in the '60s and '70s, and our own experiences then) are conviinced that they were true subversives and willing operatives of the communist intel organizations, actively working to undermine America through demoralization and subversion of our military. Their goal was the military victory of the communist forces in SE Asia. They said so repeatedly.

And what actually happened?

This is not as "paranoid" as it might at first seem to some, if you understand that our freedoms make such subversion here possible, while in the police states on the other side, such psy-ops activities by us against them were not possible. They would have been derelict in their duty as they saw it, and stupid of the opportunity, if they had not acted against the USA in this way.

History, as I see it, proved this - both in what transpired in SE Asia after "their" Congress, elected in 1974, cut the legs out from under our South Vietnamese allies, long after all our troops were home, and in what has since transpired in this country in the mediums of mass propaganda, the court-oligarchy and education especially.

The impotence of our military, both in terms of funding and in morale terms (see the Iran hostage crisis of impotence) was also a direct result of this deliberate campaign. What, do you think, would have happened if Carter had won a second term and Ronald Reagan had never served as President? The worst part of it is this: their program is deliberately hidden (see the Democratic National Convention just over) and based on lies and deceit - as we have personally experienced.

The divisions you see and fear in America have been deliberately created. Divide and conquer. "E Pluribus, Plures."

All I am trying to do is expose this and prevent it from becoming the dominant power here. To many of us, this is merely a continuation of the psychological warfare in the "American Theater of Operations" we became unknowing participants in, and victims of, back in the early 70's. They won many battles, and they now want to close the deal.

Kerry is another big, recycled nail in the coffin of our freedoms. Vietnam veterans know this better than any other group, and we will not remain silent again.
_________________
For The Honor of the Fifty-Eight Thousand.
"He Can Lose, But He Can Not Hide"