If the Democrats learned anything from the 2002 election, it’s
that in 2004 they won’t beat George Bush with another Bill Clinton.
Americans don’t want the San Francisco Democrats leading them now.
It’s war, stupid, and anyone who doesn’t get it won’t win. This
year even Georgia’s Max Cleland — who lost his legs fighting in
Vietnam — was beaten because he stuck to the SFD’s line that union
jobs were more important than homeland security. Looking ahead is
pretty easy. Alone among the still-gathering gaggle of dwarves,
Massachusetts Senator John Kerry stands alone as combat veteran.
President Bush’s experience as a Texas Air National Guard pilot
pales in comparison to Kerry’s service, for which he received not
only a Silver Star, but a Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts as
well. You can’t say that he hasn’t been there and done that.
But Kerry’s military record isn’t enough to win the hearts and
minds of our professional military. They have a profound distrust
of Kerry and it’s not because he’s a pure-as-Ivory-soap liberal.
(His ACLU and NARAL ratings are exactly the same as those of Teddy
Kennedy, Babs Boxer and Oregon’s Ron “the Whiner” Wyden. People for
the American Way — Norman Lear’s hyper-lib group — says he voted
their way on 11 of the 12 issues they care about.) The reason for
the military’s distrust of Kerry is his positively Clintonian
contempt for them.
After serving with distinction in Vietnam, Kerry soon left the
Navy and joined the Vietnam Veterans Against the War. Kerry
testified in a highly-publicized Senate hearing on 23 April 1971,
when the war was still going hot and heavy, and long before Vietnam
released the American prisoners of war it admitted holding. Kerry’s
Senate appearance made him a public figure and was the foundation
on which he has built political success. In it, Kerry eloquently
condemned America’s military for what he called “war crimes
committed in Southeast Asia.” He said these were “not isolated
incidents, but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full
awareness of officers at all levels of command.”
He condemned American soldiers not only for war crimes, but for
racism, and condemned his country for that and more:
We rationalized destroying villages in order to save them.
We saw America lose her sense of morality as she accepted very
coolly a My Lai and refused to give up the image of American
soldiers who hand out chocolate bars and chewing gum. We learned
the meaning of free fire zones, shooting anything that moves, and
we watched while America placed a cheapness on the lives of
Orientals…We fought using weapons against those people which
I do not believe this country would dream of using were we fighting
in the European theater…
It is part and parcel of everything we are trying as human
beings to communicate to the people of this country — the question
of racism that is rampant in the military…the hypocrisy in
our taking umbrage at the Geneva Conventions and using that as
justification for a continuation of this war when we are more
guilty than any other body of violations of those Geneva
Conventions…
In those days, Kerry was a supporter of the “People’s Peace
Treaty.” One of its provisions would have set a firm date for U.S.
withdrawal, and only after that date was set would negotiations
begin for release of our POWs. In short, Kerry would have given up
any ability we had to pressure the North Vietnamese to release the
POWs.
Kerry’s testimony lingers, a shouted libel that hangs in the air
over silent listeners. His sincerity cannot be doubted. But he has
the facts wrong. The My Lai massacre tore this country apart. Lt.
William Calley, the commander of the unit involved, went to prison
for it. Then, Kerry’s passion overcame the facts. Today, he wants
to use the past he was once ashamed of to propel him to the
presidency.
We call upon the young men to fight. All of us, in our late
twenties and early thirties, had experiences that made deep
impressions, and stayed with us for the rest of our lives. So it is
with John Kerry. His war scarred him deeply, perhaps too deeply for
his mind to ever heal. Announcing his presidential bid on “Meet the
Press,” Kerry said he still suffers from nightmares about
Vietnam.
Now, Kerry makes much of his war record. In that same “Meet the
Press” appearance, he mentioned his military service several times,
and even said it was a positive force in his life. None of that
rings true to the military. During the Clinton era, they all
developed a very sensitive nose for baloney. Now they smell it
every time Kerry speaks.
ONE SENIOR ARMY OFFICER, A WARRIOR from Gulf War 1, told me that
Kerry suffers from the Vietnam syndrome. In his judgment, Kerry is,
“too traumatized by the lost war to cope with any other war under
any circumstances.” A former Navy SEAL told me he thinks Kerry is
an opportunist. That same judgment of Kerry came independently from
a Marine whose Vietnam service was as tough or tougher than
Kerry’s. He told me, “I do not trust people like [Kerry] — scratch
that individual and watch an opportunist bleed.”
Kerry’s opportunism echoes Clinton’s. Kerry looks at the
military as a mechanism to advance leftist social change. He has
supported mixed-gender training, which has dumbed down all of the
services’ standards (except the Marines, God bless ‘em). He opposes
the death penalty for usual criminals, but supports it for
terrorists because terrorists are the headliners, and he wants his
share of the front page. He opposes missile defense and has voted
against a proposed constitutional amendment to prohibit desecration
of the flag. He voted against the 1991 Gulf War resolution — when
Saddam already occupied Kuwait — and voted for the 2002 resolution
even though he said the threat of Saddam’s weapons of mass
destruction isn’t imminent enough to go to war over. His support
for the International Criminal Court — aimed at the U.S. military
— is a big strike against him.
Kerry wants the military to think he’s complex, perhaps a little
confused, but someone with whom they can work. But Kerry, unlike
Clinton, is not complex at all. He would be a disaster as a
commander in chief, because he would never trust the military, and
it could never trust him. One of George Bush’s most important
campaign promises in 2000 was to restore the trust between the
White House and the troops. He has made a good start, and the
people who now serve have faith in him because he keeps the faith
with them. He has been truthful with them in a manner that John
Kerry never could be, and never will.
Some men who survive one war have the ability to fight another.
But John Kerry is not one of them. That his Vietnam experience
still haunts him does not disqualify him for the presidency. His
disdain for the military, driving opportunism and liberal purity
do. Were we at peace, his candidacy could pose a credible
alternative to George Bush. We should respect Kerry, even honor
him, for this wartime service. But we must not trust him to lead us
— and the world — to victory in this war.
