is john kerry strong on defense ?

AR182

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here is an interesting e-mail that i just received:

Is Senator John Kerry is strong on defense? Senator Kerry claims he is.

The record is factual:

He voted to kill the Bradley Fighting Vehicle
He voted to kill the M-1 Abrams Tank
He voted to kill every Aircraft carrier laid down from 1988
He voted to kill the Ages anti-aircraft system
He voted to Kill the F-15 strike eagle
He voted to Kill the Block 60 F-16
He voted to Kill the P-3 Orion upgrade
He voted to Kill the B-1
He voted to Kill the B-2
He voted to Kill the Patriot anti-missile system
He voted to Kill the FA-18
He voted to Kill the B-2
He voted to Kill the F117

In short, Senator Kerry voted to kill every military appropriation for the development and deployment of every weapons systems since 1988 including the Battle armor for our troops.

Senator Kerry also voted to kill ALL anti-terrorism activities of every agency of the U.S. Government and to cut the funding of the FBI by 60%, to cut the funding for the CIA by 80%, and cut the funding for the NSA by 80%.

But then he voted to increase OUR funding for U.N operations by 800%!!!

These are facts, not rhetoric, which hopefully will become the basis for informed decisions.
 

dr. freeze

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Oh Shit!! We are going to be throwing rocks at Al Quaeda if we get 4 years of Kerry!

(After negotiating with them of course)
 

dr. freeze

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The choice of topics underscored his intention to challenge President Bush's conduct of the war on terror, and he accused the president of shortchanging the troops on items needed for their own protection.

Kerry said tens of thousands of troops arrived in Iraq "to find that - with danger around every corner - there wasn't enough body armor to protect them." Many families purchased the equipment and had it sent overseas, he added.

"Families should be sending pictures and care packages to Iraq - and the Department of Defense should be sending the body armor," Kerry said.

He called on the president to support a bill he has introduced in the Senate to reimburse families for their purchase of body armor. Similar legislation is pending in the House.
 

DOGS THAT BARK

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Next few months will get interesting. So far its been one sided rock throwing---now the shoe will be on other foot----I see some dozeys coming especially on Kerry's military backround;)
 

BobbyBlueChip

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It hasn't seemed one-sided lately to me. I really don't think that Kerry's military or activist record is where GW's planners want to go. You'll be comparing Kerry's actions at a time in his life when GW was or was not in Alabama or was later driving his car into ditches.

I think the Republicans best chance is focusing on the tax cut (it's giving back the surplus to the Americans, no wait, it's a demand side solution to the recession, no wait, it's supply side trickle down) and a few well-timed terror alerts to make people fearful.

The issues seem pretty well laid out, but it will be interesting to see how they're sold.
 

THE KOD

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"John Kerry...You decide

I know nothing about "Swift Boat" tactics so I can't judge the veracity of this letter. Maybe a more knowledgeable classmate can shine some light on this. It was forwarded to me by a high school classmate, USNA grad ('59) and Rear Admiral (Ret.)

Sent to me by an old shipmate....

I was in the Delta shortly after he left. I know that area well. I know the operations he was involved in well. I know the tactics and the doctrine used. I know the equipment. Although I was attached to CTF-116 (PBRs) I spent a fair amount of time with CTF-115 (swift boats), Kerry's command.

Here are my problems and suspicions:

(1) Kerry was in-country less than four months and collected, a Bronze Star, a Silver Star and three purple hearts. I never heard of anybody with any outfit I worked with (including SEAL One, the Sea Wolves, Riverines and the River Patrol Force) collecting that much hardware so fast, and for such pedestrian actions. The Swifts did a commendable job. But that duty wasn't the worst you could draw. They operated only along the coast and in the major rivers (Bassac and Mekong). The rough stuff in the hot areas was mainly handled by the smaller, faster PBRs.

(2) Three Purple Hearts but no limp. All injuries so minor that no time lost from duty. Amazing luck. Or he was putting himself in for medals every time he bumped his head on the wheel house hatch? Combat on the boats was almost always at close range. You didn't have minor wounds. At least not often. Not three times in a row. Then he used the three purple hearts to request a trip home eight months before the end of his tour. Fishy.

(3) The details of the event for which he was given the Silver Star make no sense at all. Supposedly, a B-40 was fired at the boat and missed. Charlie jumps up with the launcher in his hand, the bow gunner knocks him down with the twin .50, Kerry beaches the boat, jumps off, shoots Charlie, and retreives the launcher. If true, he did everything wrong.
(a) Standard procedure when you took rocket fire was to put your stern to the action and go balls to the wall. A B-40 has the ballistic integrity of a frisbie after about 25 yards, so you put 50 yards or so between you and the beach and begin raking it with your .50's.
(b) Did you ever see anybody get knocked down with a .50 caliber round and get up? The guy was dead or dying. The rocket launcher was empty. There was no reason to go after him (except if you knew he was no danger to you just flopping around in the dust during his last few seconds on earth, and you wanted some derring do in your after-action report). And we didn't shoot wounded people. We had rules against that, too.
(c) Kerry got off the boat. This was a major breach of standing procedures. Nobody on a boat crew ever got off a boat in a hot area. EVER! The reason was simple. If you had somebody on the beach your boat was defenseless. It coudn't run and it couldn' t return fire. It was stupid and it put his crew in danger. He should have been relieved and reprimanded. I never heard of any boat crewman ever leaving a boat during or after a firefight.

Something is fishy.

Here we have a JFK wannabe (the guy Halsey wanted to court martial for carelessly losing his boat and getting a couple people killed by running across the bow of a Jap destroyer) who is hardly in Vietnam long enough to get good tan, collects medals faster than Audie Murphy in a job where lots of medals weren't common, gets sent home eight months early, requests separation from active duty a few months after that so he can run for Congress, finds out war heros don't sell well in Massachsetts in
1970 so reinvents himself as Jane Fonda, throws his ribbons in the dirt with the cameras running to jump start his political career, gets Stillborn Pell to invite him to address Congress and Bobby Kennedy's speechwriter to do the heavy lifting, winds up in the Senate himself a few years later, votes against every major defense bill, says the CIA is irrelevant after the Wall came down, votes against the Gulf War, a big mistake since that turned out well, decides not to make the same mistake twice so votes for invading Iraq, but oops, that didn't turn out so well so he now says he really didn't mean for Bush to go to war when he voted to allow him to go to war.

I'm real glad you or I never had this guy covering our flanks in Vietnam. I sure don't want him as Commander in Chief. I hope that somebody from CTF-115 shows up with some facts challenging Kerry's Vietnam record. I know in my gut it's wildy inflated. And fishy. "

......................................................................
 

djv

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Good for him. Because of him and afew more like John Mc Cain they went to work on those bills and made them better. Imus in the morning was talking about some of these items. And you find out when the final votes were taken. Not all is as you get by email. So it gets much more clouded then as cut and dry as said above. Like they have NUKES in Iraq. You bet Mr Bush under every tree. They all have there little screw up's dont they.
 

DOGS THAT BARK

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Scott If you read any of my post on ordeal they mimic your friends to a tee.

I have printed both views on subject and one thing they have in common is it was lone VC with B-40 (rocket launcher).

Now, taking this one fact in common and having experience with VC evasive tactics(most ambushes you never see em-they hit and run)
The Swift boats usually had crews of 9 to 11 soilders--they have twin mounted 50 cals a couple m-60's plus your usual arsenal.

So Kerry wants me to believe that instead of firing this lone VC's ass up with overwhelming fire power available--he puts boat and crew in jeopardy by docking boat and jumping out and going after him AND even more unbeilable you have this VC who has wintnessed this fire power, voluntarily stays around watching boat dock--allows man to jump off boat and run him down. Yeh Right:rolleyes:

Some other things we may see come to light-- fellow (2nd in command)Del Sandusky tie in on medal nominations.

Also might see some news soon on his intially applying for deferment from service to go to school in France which was reportedly denied ---and I think we will discover that many of those that he relayed their storys of atrocities committed by U.S. soilders never even were in combat zone.
He sure thought he was an authority on matter before senate sub committe on his return--- especially for boat commander with 3 months in country.:tongue
 

THE KOD

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Dogs

Geez I agree with alot of what you are saying and have the
same type thoughts.

If any of that is true George W is going to eat his lunch.

Its going to get dirty.

I think George W likes being behind in the polls. Its a much
better position to be in than being ahead at this point.

The dirty politics hasn't started. Bush has alot of money in
his chester drawers.

KOD
 

Master Capper

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What is misleading about Kerry's record was that many of those votes occurred immediatly after the Soviet Union had fallen apart and much of those operations were centered on fighting the Cold War. I dont think it makes a difference between Bush or Kerry as far being soft or strong on defense, either one would be in command of the best fighting force in the world.
 
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