Could Vietnam win the White House?

[T_i_B]

UK Guardian article about how Kerry's Vietnam record is helping him.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1137459,00.html

It was March 13 1969, and the US army Green Beret was running out of breath after diving five times beneath the surface of the Bay Hap river, to escape Vietnamese sniper fire from its banks. From downriver, he heard a gunboat approach. A US navy lieutenant, who had already been hit in the arm, exposed himself to fire once more to haul the Green Beret over the bow and to safety.
Half a lifetime later, Jim Rassman, the erstwhile Green Beret, is a paunchy, retired police official who grows orchids for a hobby. Memories of that day are seared for ever in his brain. "He could have been shot and killed at any time, and so could I. So I figure I probably owe this man my life," he says.

More than 30 years later, Rassman had his chance to repay the debt. The navy man was John Kerry, one of the contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, and Rassman may have saved his political career. The registered Republican has emerged from quiet retirement in Oregon to put himself at the Kerry campaign's disposal. Their tearful reunion earlier this month - their first meeting since Vietnam - has transformed Kerry's fortunes.

Two days after the two Vietnam veterans embraced at a campaign rally, the caucus goers of Iowa delivered a stunning victory to Kerry, confounding those who had declared his campaign dead. Two weeks later, the senator from Massachusetts is either the frontrunner or up there competing in all seven of the states holding their primaries today, and the pundits are now wondering if he is unstoppable.

[IndianaGreen]

1. I don't think it is a good idea to reopen the Vietnam War debate

Vietnam was a Democratic war. A Democratic President sent troops to Vietnam under the authority of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, which like the Iraq War Resolution, was based on lies.

US troops were involved in war crimes in Iraq, including those Green Berets that were involved in the CIA's Phoenix Program, essentially a program of death squads and torture.

I don't think it is a good idea to reopen the Vietnam War debate. Both major parties have blood on their hands!

[T_i_B]

6. Might be for Kerry

Seeing as he served in it, got highly decorated then protested against it.

[gonefishing]

2. I just cried after reading that first paragraph!

If it is Bush vs Kerry and RoveCo figures out a way to disgrace Kerry the way they did Clealand I swear I Will move my family to Canada!

[IndianaGreen]

3. More on Vietnam and CIA's Phoenix Program

For those that want to resurrect Vietnam as an issue, there are some serious pitfalls and some serious questions involving Democratic and Republican Administrations.

One of those issues that will be coming back into the limelight, if the Democrats decide to use Vietnam as an issue, is the CIA's Phoenix Program. Here is more:

Documents from the Phoenix Program

supplied and introduced by Douglas Valentine
author of The Phoenix Program

Created by the CIA in Saigon in 1967, Phoenix was a program aimed at "neutralizing"—through assassination, kidnapping, and systematic torture—the civilian infrastructure that supported the Viet Cong insurgency in South Vietnam. It was a terrifying "final solution" that violated the Geneva Conventions and traditional American ideas of human morality. (For a full introduction to Phoenix, see below: http://www.thememoryhole.org/phoenix/#intro)

While researching the Phoenix Program for my book on the subject, I conducted over a hundred interviews and collected boxes full of documents from individuals, as well as from the State Department and Department of Defense. The most important documents provided by any one individual came from retired CIA officer Nelson Brickham, the man most responsibile for the creation of the Phoenix Program.

Luckily for history, Brickham kept copies of the documents he wrote while with the CIA; otherwise, there would be no documentary evidence of how Phoenix was actually created. During the evacuation of Saigon in April 1975, the CIA destroyed most of the documents it had about its assassination program, and none of what it kept at Langley headquarters can be obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests. This is no accident, for Phoenix is the model for the equally terrifying US homeland security aparatus.

http://www.thememoryhole.org/phoenix/

[goobergunch]

4. We shouldn't be picking a President for the 21st Century

based on something that happened before I was born.

[berner59]

5. Kerry's character as a leader....

Is what this is all about...and to drag up Vietnam is perfect since Iraq is turning into one... Dem pres behind Vietnam is useless since Kerry was a soldier, not a senator and once he served, fought against the war so he's covered on all angles... BIG mistake if Rove tries to discredit him on his service...too many soldiers are dying for the same reason when Kerry was there...it won't fly.