There were US soldiers who raped and murdered in Vietnam.
Stop turning a blind eye toward the reality of it.
Jim
Jim you keep setting up strawmen. True, there were atrocities during the Vietnam War. There were atrocities during EVERY war. No one denies this. No one denies that Kerry had a right to protest the war either. Can we quit arguing against points that were not being made?
What is objected to was his inference, if not outright statement that such activities were commonplace and that they were characteristic of American GI’s. He seemed more interested in making a name for himself on the backs and reputations of the many thousands of troops who neither participated nor condoned such activities.
***These were not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command. It is impossible to describe to you exactly what did happen in Detroit - the emotions in the room and the feelings of the men who were reliving their experiences in Vietnam. They relived the absolute horror of what this country, in a sense, made them do.
They told stories that at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Ghengis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside of South Vietnam in addition to the normal ravage of war and the normal and very particular ravaging which is done by the applied bombing power of this country.***
Do you understand why I think Kerry was more than just another war protestor? Were you aware that this testimony to a great extent was totally debunked, that many of those testifying were found not to have even been in Vietnam, much less participated in such evil acts.
Futher, had Kerry ever admitted his brash actions, asking forgiveness for being a young hothead and that his dismay with the war had perhaps clouded his judgement, well it might have been a different story. Instead he shows up at the Democrat Convention, puffed up and proud, trying to parlay his limited military service into some kind of argument that he was best able to manage the Iraq War.
Like Estes Bob, reliving those days is disturbing. I see the whole 60s era, the protests, the turning away from tradition, faith and family as the beginning of the decline of our country. These aging hippies, yippies, protestors and progressives have left a disaster in their wake.
Lisa
