The men who served in KerryÕs swift boat swear by their commander. The one surviving swift boat commander who witnessed the incident in which John Kerry turned his boat into enemy fire and chased down a Viet Cong and killed him, attests to those facts. He is now an editor at the Chicago Tribune.
The Department of Navy attested to and approved KerryÕs medals. KerryÕs commanders recommended them. No one puts himself in for a medal. Despite what Bob Dole says, you do not have to be disabled or in a hospital to earn a Purple Heart. A large number of my fellow combat soldiers in Korea got no farther than a battlefield medic and the battalion aid station, where they were stitched up. They earned their Purple Hearts.
It took a great deal of courage for a very young John Kerry to stand before Congress and attack the government for its war policies and repeat the abuses that his fellow veterans witnessed. The My Lai massacre and other atrocities are well-documented facts, and journalists won Pulitzer Prizes for reporting them. Facing the facts does not diminish the bravery and honor that over two million Vietnam veterans displayed.
Sen. John McCain, my war hero, stated that the people behind the anti-Kerry commercials are dishonest and dishonorable. One might also conclude that your letter writers who propagate this garbage are either misguided or may also be so described.
H. Adrian Osborne
Pinehurst
