Reply #69: More from a Vietnam Vet on Kerry [View All]

[seventhson]

Another excerpt from Brian Willson's letter linked in the previous post (he is one of my heroes, by the way -- and I trust this man WAY more than I would ever trust Kerry. Willson has integrity unto death (and the BFEE DID try to off him at least once)

Letter to Kerry from a Vet:

"...Your activities, both in the war, and in years following, were prompted, at least in part, to an intense political ambition, even as you addressed your Yale law school graduating class with an anti-Vietnam War speech shortly prior to enlisting in the U.S. Navy. Your career in the Senate has revealed your all-consuming ambition, but that is quite typical of politicians.

The first hint of a bit of disconnect in your style was when during your first Senate campaign you denied returning your war medals, with a thousand other veterans, in protest of the war during Dewey Canyon III. That was a bit of a shock, since for most veterans who returned their medals in that emotional ceremony on Friday, April 23, 1971, it was a very proud and healing moment. Your 1984 campaign response: You had returned the medals of a WWII acquaintance at his direction. All those 13 years everyone thought you had had the courage and leadership to return medals that to veterans who returned them represented medals of dishonor drenched in the blood of innocent Vietnamese who did not deserve to die for a lie, any more than our fellow US Americans. I guess you knew then that you were to be running for office.

The second hint occurred at the celebration party you organized for us "doghunters" at your friend John Martilla's Beacon Hill house in Boston in late June 1985, 6 months into your term as a junior Senator. In the wee hours of the morning, you made two comments that troubled me: (1) you stressed your initials as "JFK" that would help you one day in your quest for the White House, and (2) that after War Department briefings (and perhaps CIA as well) about the need for funding and training contra terrorists in Afghanistan and Nicaragua you had a new appreciation for their importance in furthering U.S. policies