John Kerry’s Up-Hill Battle to Win Over Veterans
Commentary by Steve Yuhas
August 3, 2004

John Kerry and the Democratic National Committee have gone to great lengths to show John Kerry as a war hero and the man best qualified to replace President Bush this November.  For all the discussion and all the home video that John Kerry re-enacted there are almost two dozen reasons that veterans and active duty, reserve and national guard troops today should vote to re-elect George W. Bush as President of the United States.

The recent convention of Democrats was carefully choreographed to show Kerry riding across Boston Harbor with a few of his navy swift boat comrades was made for television.  A beautiful Boston day with Kerry at the helm of a boat that made the crossing of waters deservedly revered for their role during the opening salvos of our war for independence.  Veterans who see the signs and see Kerry’s former shipmates standing along side him would generally believe that Vietnam veterans as a whole support the four month combat veteran, but that is not the case.

The Kerry campaign points to his service in Vietnam as the strongest reason why veterans and active duty members of the military should remove their current Commander-in-Chief and replace him with the Kerry-Edwards duo.  The Vietnam War was hell – no question about it, but to spend four months in Vietnam and to return to the United States by request makes just about every soldier, sailor, airman and Marine who fought to liberate Afghanistan or Iraq more qualified to be President by time in a combat zone than the Democratic nominee.

Awards for valor are not lacking from the Vietnam War, indeed some 63 men who earned the nation’s highest award for valor, the Congressional Medal of Honor, are still alive today, yet not one of those men publicly support John Kerry for President of the United States.  On the other hand, 14 Vietnam Congressional Medal of Honor recipients signed a letter along with 7 other recipients from the Korean War and World War II endorsing President Bush.  John Kerry’s list of veteran supporters is impressive, admirals and generals who have been activists in the Democratic Party, but the unprecedented pleas by true American battle heroes not to allow John Kerry to be President must have some impact on the military vote.

Four months in Vietnam was a dangerous and long four months I’m sure, but does spending less time in a combat zone than it takes to become a fully trained fleet ready Marine make a man automatically qualified for holding the highest office in the land?  Yes, John Kerry was awarded three Purple Hearts, but even those are in question as the medical officer who examined his first wound called it superficial and was treated with a band-aid and his then commanding officer indicated the wound didn’t warrant an award.  How many men or women in Afghanistan or Iraq got a scratch that required a band-aid and didn’t receive a Purple Heart?

One cannot dismiss his Silver and Bronze Star, those are certainly medals that require our admiration and respect, but I’ve watched with pleasure as men and women returning from Iraq and Afghanistan earned the same medals in similarly heroic circumstances.  The difference between Kerry’s medals and the medals of our modern day military is that 19 of the 23 officers who served with Kerry in Vietnam signed a document saying that he does not have what it takes to be Commander-in-Chief.  How many commanding officers today, after pinning a prestigious medal on the uniform of a deserving soldier or Marine would turn around and declare them unfit to lead?

More troubling than the unanswered questions about John Kerry’s four month stint in Vietnam is the fact that John Kerry declares that President Bush doesn’t care about America’s armed forces.  The fact is that aside from Ronald Reagan there has been no better friend to and no man who respects the military more than President Bush.  No, President Bush doesn’t have medals from his National Guard service during Vietnam, but John Kerry dishonored the medals he earned by throwing them away in protest of the war.  Today he boasts about earning the medals, but to throw away something that so many men and women cherish and respect only to point to them when convenient is hypocrisy at the highest level.

When Kerry returned from Vietnam he protested, in uniform, wearing the ribbons that represented the medals he so despised in public and told the world how evil our troops were (ask anyone in the military today if there is a difference between the medal and the ribbon – they’ll tell you that a Marine or soldier wears his resume on his chest with those ribbons – throwing the medals away was akin to burning money – once you throw the money away the numbers in the check book mean nothing).

Senator Kerry became the darling of the political left when he requested that he be permitted to return to the United States after receiving his third Purple Heart in Vietnam.  Keeping in mind that he has no service connected disability (how many veterans do you know who have three Purple Hearts and not a scratch or scar on them) – if he was such a hero why didn’t he ask to stay with his unit that he ostensibly loved so much?  Every television interview of any soldier or Marine returning injured from Iraq or Afghanistan ultimately includes that Marine or soldier saying something like, “I just want to get better and get back to my unit.”  That is heroic; not filing paperwork that says, “I got my third – send me home with my video so I can protest and run for Congress.”

Marines and soldiers weren’t that different during the Vietnam War.  Men were men and loyalty to your unit was second only to the loyalty a soldier or Marine has to Almighty God in the foxhole (you’ve heard the adage that there are no atheists in foxholes).  The fact is that most wounded men or women want to rejoin their units and return to the front.  John Kerry is the only man I’ve ever heard who was wounded in battle whose first thought was to abandon his unit instead of talking with tears in his eyes of returning to it.

Curiously when John Kerry returned from Vietnam he joined a protest organization.  He personally admitted to committing what he termed atrocities and war crimes himself, but has never been held to account.  Journalists have the tape and the video of his admissions and I can think of nothing that would preclude the Justice Department from charging him.  Ask the soldiers at Abu Ghraib (a far cry from the things that Kerry admitted to doing) how they feel about being charged with atrocities and mistreatment while their would-be Commander-in-Chief who admitted to worse crimes may ultimately be the man they have to apply to for a pardon.

Kerry took to Vietnam with him an 8mm video camera where he and his units re-enacted scenes of John Kerry finding an enemy and marching through the jungles of Vietnam.  Amazingly all he had to do was capture a few minutes of war crimes being committed on his camera, but he never did.  Of all the video tape he took it was of nothing more than him getting footage of himself to use in future political campaigns – imagine the coup if he could have proved his accusations during Senate hearings and anti-war demonstrations.

Senator Kerry has made his service in Vietnam the centerpiece of his campaign for President of the United States.  I share with the editor of this publication the need to respect military service and to be careful when speaking of the sacrifice men and women made in defense of our nation.  This column does not come easy as any man or woman who has worn the uniform deserves our respect and thanks.

With that it is imperative that everyone look carefully at his service and consider for themselves whether or not spending four months filming yourself re-enact periods of your service in Vietnam qualifies you to be Commander-in-Chief.  Just about everyone I knew in the military who went to Iraq or Afghanistan took a camera or a video recorder with them – I took a camera to every deployment I went on.  How many people do you know who re-enacted particular events in order to capture them on film?  Probably not many.  How many people do you know who were treated with a band-aid and received a Purple Heart?  I’d imagine, none.

President Bush’s record with the military and with veterans is a good one – despite what the Kerry campaign would have everyone believe.  Kerry claims that VA benefits are being cut, but they’ve gone up over 25% during President Bush’s administration.  Kerry voted to send our troops to war, but then voted against spending the money to feed, arm and protect them.  Kerry claims today that our military is too small, but Kerry voted to cut submarines and their crews from military budgets, voted to cut coastal mine hunting programs, voted to force the retirement of no less than 60,000 military members in 1993.  Worst of all – John Kerry has voted against defense authorization bills that would raise military pay – today complaining that our military is paid too little for their sacrifice.

Outside of gutting the military with billions of dollars in cuts and voting against almost every major weapons system that won the war in Afghanistan and Iraq and those that are being used to fight the war against terror, Kerry has voted to cut intelligence funding by billions of dollars and proposed decreasing our ability to know what our enemy is doing – all in the name of liberal political correctness.  While Ronald Reagan was facing down the Soviet Union John Kerry was voting for a nuclear freeze and after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait – the whole world (including beloved France and Germany) voted to go to war and oust him, but not John Kerry who believed Saddam could be reasoned with.

John Kerry is not only wrong for the nation, but he is specifically wrong for members of the military currently serving today and for those of us who served the nation in the past.  During his acceptance speech for his party’s nomination for President of the United States Kerry told us how he would fight the war on terror – he’ll respond to attacks on the United States and put Osama, if caught, in federal court.  Great – we wait until we’re attacked again before we respond and we’ll treat Osama like Martha Stewart if we catch him.  That’s tough on terror?  I can think of no man or woman who has ever worn the uniform of the United States who would subscribe to the notion that we should wait until the terrorists deliver another attack on our nation before we hunt them down.  Federal court is for criminals – leave the terrorists to the Marines and soldiers.

Four months in Vietnam, less time than it takes to become a full-fledged Marine, is admirable, but not enough coupled with an anti-military voting record to command the men and women who swear to protect and uphold the Constitution of the United States and to salute the flag that John Kerry once desecrated.

This was a difficult column to write and one that was researched carefully.  Please examine the record for yourself before you vote, but whatever you do, consider the next Commander-in-Chief will be called upon to make decisions more difficult than any other.  The threat of terrorists in this nation is real and only our military can stop another attack.  All the conversation and think-taking in the world won’t stop it – only you men and women in camouflage can save the nation from another 9-11.