Senate Foreign Relations Committee: April 22, 1971

[H2O Man]

" ....In 1970 at West Point Vice President Agnew said, 'Some glamorize the criminal misfits of society while our best men die in Asian rice paddies to preserve the freedom which most of those misfits abuse,' and this was used as a rallying point for our effort in Vietnam.

"But for us, as boys in Asia whom the country was supposed to support, his statement is a terrible distortion from which we can only draw a very deep sense of revulsion; and hence the anger of some of the men who are here in Washington today. ......Now we are told that the men who fought there must watch quietly while American lives are lost so that we can exercise the incredible arrogance of Vietnamizing the Vietnamese.

" Each day, to facilitate the process by which the United States washes her hands of Vietnam, someone has to give up his life so that the United States doesn't have to admit something the entire world already knows, so that we can't say that we have made a mistake. Someone has to die so that President Nixon won't be, and these are his words, 'the first President to lose a war.'

"We are asking Americans to think about that because how do you ask a man to die for a mistake? But we trying to do that, and we are doing it with thousands of rationalizations, and if you read carefully the President's last speech to the people of this country, you can see that he says and says clearly: 'But the issue, gentlemen, the issue, is Communism, and the question is whether or not we will leave that country to Communists or whether or not we will try to give it hope to be a free people.' But the point is they are not a free people under us ...."
Navy Lieutenant John Kerry

Sounds kind of familiar, doesn't it?

[Me.]

1. "how do you ask a man to die for a mistake? "

The questioned has yet to be answered as we are haunted by the ghostly repeat of history by those who should have known better.

[Catrina]

2. Great picture!

And yes, it does seem eerily familiar ~ it reminded me of a song written by John Boyle and sung by the Clancy brothers called the Green Fields of France. He wrote it after being in a graveyard in France and I guess he was sruck by the waste of lives since the it all happened again, just like now, as the last verses say:

Green Fields of France is, in contrast with The Band Played Walzing Mathilda, which is also written by Eric Bogle, commonly recognised as anti-war song. Until present times this song, in our opinion a very successful illustration of the meaninglessness absurdity of war, is quite popular in Ireland. Perhaps its popularity is an expression of the ambiguous attitude of the Irish regarding the First World War.

.......

Well the sun's shining down on these green fields of France
The warm wind blows gently, and the red poppies dance
The trenches have vanished long under the plow
There's no gas, no barb wire, there's no guns firing now

But here in this graveyard that's still no-man's land
The countless white crosses stand mute in the sand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man
The whole generation was butchered and damned

Did they beat the drums slowly?
Did they play the pipes lowly?
Did they bugles carry you over as they lowered you down?
And did the band play 'The Last Post' in chorus?
Did the pipes play 'The Flowers Of The Forest'?

And I can't help but wonder young Willy McBride
Do those that lie here know why that they died?
And did they really believe you when you told them the cause
Did they really believe that this war would end wars?

Well the suffering, and the sorrow, the glory of pain
The killing and dying they were all done in vain
For young Willy McBride it's all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again...

http://www.vincentpeters.nl/triskelle/lyrics/greenfieldsoffrance.php?index=080.010.040.010

I guess that answers my question ~ it will happen again, but maybe not for a long time this time ~ human beings seems to be unable to live in peace ~

[H2O Man]

9. "Do those who lie here know why that they died?"

Beautiful lyrics. One of my wife's second cousins used to travel back and forth to the Old Sod for investment purposes, of sorts. He brought back wonderful tapes of the music of the those involved in "the struggles." There is such a saddness in it.

[MH1]

3. Link to full text.

http://www.c-span.org/vote2004/jkerrytestimony.asp

Anyone who hasn't read this, should.

[Me.]

12. !

[MH1]

4. The part that hooked me.

Finally, this administration has done us the ultimate dishonor. They have attempted to disown us and the sacrifice we made for this country. In their blindness and fear they have tried to deny that we are veterans or that we served in Nam. We do not need their testimony. Our own scars and stumps of limbs are witnesses enough for others and for ourselves.

We wish that a merciful God could wipe away our own memories of that service as easily as this administration has wiped their memories of us. But all that they have done and all that they can do by this denial is to make more clear than ever our own determination to undertake one last mission, to search out and destroy the last vestige of this barbarous war, to pacify our own hearts, to conquer the hate and the fear that have driven this country these last 10 years and more and so when, in 30 years from now, our brothers go down the street without a leg, without an arm or a face, and small boys ask why, we will be able to say "Vietnam" and not mean a desert, not a filthy obscene memory but mean instead the place where America finally turned and where soldiers like us helped it in the turning.

Let's turn America, again.

[FreedomAngel82]

6. That part right there always gets me

I always cry and get goosebumps. What a hero. :( And it hurts when you see assholes try to demonize him and his bravery and what he and the other vets tried to do and did eventually. They don't deserve to be treated like that. I'll always be a Kerry supporter and always be proud of my vote for him no matter what.

[MH1]

7. Back in the primaries, when the swift liars started their thing,

I didn't know how dishonest they were and the accusations really hit home for me. It was good I was able to find this transcript and read it for myself. On the second read I became a Kerry fan for life and I knew how morally bankrupt the swift liars were, to twist Kerry's words like they did.

This is a hugely emotional thing for me. You have no idea. Well, maybe you do. :hug:

(gotta crash now. work tomorrow. ugh.)

[H2O Man]

10. I have a book

"The Eloquence of Protest: Voices of the 1970s", edited by Harrison E. Salisbury, (1972), that has the full text of the speech. It is one of the great American speeches, in my opinion.

[FreedomAngel82]

5. Dejavu

Go Kerry!

[LSK]

8. great post n/t

[Me.]

11. "I went into a dream"

I read the news today oh boy
About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to laugh
I saw the photograph.
He blew his mind out in a car
He didn't notice that the lights had changed
A crowd of people stood and stared
They'd seen his face before
Nobody was really sure
If he was from the House of Lords.
I saw a film today oh boy
The English Army had just won the war
A crowd of people turned away
but I just had to look
Having read the book.
I'd love to turn you on
Woke up, fell out of bed,
Dragged a comb across my head
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup,
And looking up I noticed I was late.
Found my coat and grabbed my hat
Made the bus in seconds flat
Found my way upstairs and had a smoke,
Somebody spoke and I went into a dream
I read the news today oh boy
Four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire
And though the holes were rather small
They had to count them all
Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall.
I'd love to turn you on

[H2O Man]

13. Filling the holes ....