Pacifica Radio is the only network to have a full copy of this speech, it was aired today on Democracy Now. I had never heard the whole thing thanks to our shitty corporate media.
Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the young Vietnam veteran says: "Someone has to die so that President Nixon won't be, and these are his words, "the first President to lose a war... how do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"
John Kerry returned from Vietnam in April 1969, having won early transfer out of the conflict because of his three Purple Hearts. He had also won a Silver Star.
When Kerry returned home, over 540,000 U.S. troops were deployed in Vietnam. Some 33,400 had been killed, and the number of protests in the U.S. was surging. Kerry gradually became active in the antiwar movement.
After working behind the scenes and making a few little-noticed appearances at rallies, he joined a group called Vietnam Veterans Against the War.
Listen here:
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/07/30/1510259