‘Sampan incident’ belies heroic image

A number of the combat commanders, fellow officers and other men who served with Sen. John Kerry in Vietnam challenge his accounts of combat heroism in a new book, “Unfit for Command” (Regnery Publishing), by John E. O’Neill, who took over command of Swift Boat PCF 94 from Lt. Kerry, and Jerome R. Corsi, who has written extensively about the Vietnam War protest movement. Each of these excerpts from “Unfit for Command” includes comparisons of Mr. Kerry’s earlier published accounts to recollections of others who served with him.

Second of three excerpts

John Kerry invented a “war hero” persona in his private journals and in the home movies he filmed and staged in Vietnam. Playing the lead role, he developed a past intended to advance his future political ambitions.

In reality, Kerry was regarded by his Navy peers as reckless with human life. Although Douglas Brinkley’s biography “Tour of Duty: John Kerry and the Vietnam War” recalls that Kerry used the call sign “Square Jaw” for a short time, it doesn’t mention the sign he actually used for most of his four months in Vietnam: “Boston Strangler.”

Kerry portrays himself as a Swift Boat officer constantly protesting to his superiors about criminal war policies and inappropriate tactics. In reality, while Kerry constantly complained about the location of assignments to his peers, he hardly ever said a word of protest or spoke out in objection to any superior officer.

Kerry, who skippered two Swift Boats in the Mekong Delta from Dec. 6, 1968, to March 17, 1969, often sported a home-movie camera to record his exploits for later viewing. Fellow “Swiftees” report that Kerry would revisit ambush locations for re-enacting combat scenes where he would portray the hero.

Kerry would take movies of himself in combat gear, sometimes dressed as an infantryman walking resolutely through the terrain. He even filmed mock interviews of himself narrating his exploits.

A joke circulated among Swiftees was that Kerry left Vietnam early not because he received three Purple Hearts, but because he had recorded enough film of himself to take home for his planned political campaigns.

Only after returning home did Kerry argue publicly that war crimes were committed on a daily basis at the direction of all levels of command. He compared his superior officers to Lt. William Calley of My Lai infamy. Kerry’s accusations typically relied on impostors who concocted incidents that, when investigated, proved to be exaggerations or fabrications.

On the other hand, the propriety of Kerry’s own conduct in Vietnam was and is the subject of serious question.

“Kerry seemed to believe that there were no rules in a free-fire zone, and you were supposed to kill everyone,” Swift Boat veteran William E. Franke of Coastal Division 11 told us. “I didn’t see it that way. I will tell you in all candor that the only baby killer I knew in Vietnam was John F. Kerry.”

The evidence shows John Kerry was a ruthless operator in the field, with little regard for life. One example is the sampan incident in An Thoi in January 1969.

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