Portion of John Kerry remarks on NBC's "Meet the Press" May 6, 2001:



MR. RUSSERT: You mentioned you're a military guy. There's been a lot of

discussion about Bob Kerrey, your former Democratic colleague in the

Senate, about his talking about his anguish about what happened in Vietnam.

You were on this program 30 years ago as a leader of the Vietnam Veterans

Against the War. And we went back and have an audiotape of that and some

still photos. And your comments are particularly timely in this

overall discussion of Bob Kerrey. And I'd like for you to listen to

those with our audience and then try to put that war into some

context:



(Audiotape, April 18, 1971):



MR. CROSBY NOYES (Washington Evening Star): Mr. Kerry, you said at one time or

another that you think our policies in Vietnam are tantamount to genocide

and that the responsibility lies at all chains of command over there. Do

you consider that you personally as a Naval officer committed atrocities in

Vietnam or crimes punishable by law in this country?



KERRY: There are all kinds of atrocities, and I would have to say that,

yes, yes, I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other

soldiers have committed in that I took part in shootings in free fire

zones. I conducted harassment and interdiction fire. I used 50 calibre

machine guns, which we were granted and ordered to use, which were our only

weapon against people. I took part in search and destroy missions, in the

burning of villages. All of this is contrary to the laws of warfare, all of

this is contrary to the Geneva Conventions and all of this is ordered as a

matter of written established policy by the government of the United States

from the top down. And I believe that the men who designed these, the men

who designed the free fire zone, the men who ordered us, the men who signed

off the air raid strike areas, I think these men, by the letter of the law,

the same letter of the law that tried Lieutenant Calley, are war criminals.



(End audiotape)

Here is some more info about Kerry from former VIETNAM POW Michael Benge...

John Kerry's war record



When Mr. Kerry pontificated at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial on Veterans

Day, a group of veterans turned their backs on him and walked away. They

remembered Mr. Kerry as the anti-war activist who testified before Congress

during the war, accusing veterans of being war criminals. The dust jacket

of Mr. Kerry's pro-Hanoi book, "The New Soldier," features a photograph of

his ragged band of radicals mocking the U.S. Marine Corps Memorial, which

depicts the flag-raising on Iwo Jima, with an upside-down American flag.

Retired Gen. George S. Patton III charged that Mr. Kerry's actions as an

anti-war activist had "given aid and comfort to the enemy," as had the

actions of Ramsey Clark and Jane Fonda. Also, Mr. Kerry lied when he threw

what he claimed were his war medals over the White House fence; he later

admitted they weren't his. Now they are displayed on his office wall.

Long after he changed sides in congressional hearings, Mr. Kerry lobbied

for renewed trade relations with Hanoi. At the same time, his cousin C.

Stewart Forbes, chief executive for Colliers International, assisted in

brokering a 5 million deal to develop a deep-sea port at Vung Tau,

Vietnam ? an odd coincidence.

As noted in the Inside Politics column of Nov. 14 (Nation), historian

Douglas Brinkley is writing Mr. Kerry's biography. Hopefully, he'll include

the senator's latest ignominious feat: preventing the Vietnam Human Rights

Act (HR2833) from coming to a vote in the Senate, claiming human rights

would deteriorate as a result. His actions sent a clear signal to Hanoi

that Congress cares little about the human rights for which so many

Americans fought and died.

The State Department ranked Vietnam among the 10 regimes worldwide least

tolerant of religious freedom. Recently, 354 churches of the Montagnards, a

Christian ethnic minority, were forcibly disbanded, and by mid-October,

more than 50 Christian pastors and elders had been arrested in Dak Lak

province alone. On Oct. 29, the secret police executed three Montagnards by

lethal injection simply for protesting religious repression. The communists

are conducting a pogrom against the Montagnards, forcing Christians to

drink a mixture of goat's blood and alcohol and renounce Christianity.

Thousands have been killed or imprisoned or have just "disappeared." The

Montagnards lost one-half of their adult male population fighting for the

United States, and without them, there might be thousands more American

names on that somber black granite wall at the Vietnam memorial.

As Mr. Kerry contemplates a run for the presidency, people must remember

that he has fought harder for Hanoi as an anti-war activist and a senator

than he did against the Vietnamese communists while serving in the Navy in

Vietnam.



MICHAEL BENGE

Foreign Service officer and former Vietnam POW (1968 to 1973)

Here is a bit of info about Kerry and his Skull & Bones connections...

Kerry made his Bones in secret club - like Bush

by Andrew Miga

Thursday, May 15, 2003

WASHINGTON - Sen. John F. Kerry expounds on many issues in his presidential campaign, but he's completely silent on one topic: his membership in Skull and Bones, Yale's infamous secret society.

``John Kerry has absolutely nothing to say on that subject. Sorry,'' said Kerry spokeswoman Kelley Benander.

Kerry is a respected senator and a decorated Vietnam War combat veteran, but 36 years after he was initiated into what has been called the ``ultimate old boy network,'' he's wary of breaking the ultra-exclusive club's strict secrecy code.

There's also another high-profile member of the club: President Bush.

Bonesmen already are buzzing over the prospect of the first Bones vs. Bones presidential race should Kerry win his party's nomination and face Bush in 2004.

``Bones don't care who wins,'' said author Alexandra Robbins, whose book ``Secrets of the Tomb'' pierced the secrecy shrouding the 171-year-old society. ``If Kerry wins, it's still a Bones presidency.''

Robbins calls the group ``probably the most secretive and successful club in America,'' and adds, ``It's also pretty bizarre.''

Every year, 15 Yale juniors are tapped for the club, which holds meetings twice a week in a crypt-like building known as the ``Tomb.''

Robbins described the interior, replete with skulls and skeletons, as a cross between the ``Addams Family'' and a slightly shabby English men's club.

There are bizarre initiation rites, including a ceremony where new members must spend an evening before a roaring fire in the Tomb recounting details of their sexual history to fellow members.

Kerry was tapped for the club in 1968, two years after Bush, whose father and grandfather were also Bonesmen. Kerry's brother-in-law from his first marriage, David Thorne, was Bones. So was the late husband of Kerry's current wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry. The Bones alumni roster is flush with CIA officials, business moguls, congressmen and Supreme Court justices. The club owns a secluded 40-acre island retreat on the St. Lawrence River.

In 1986, Kerry allegedly tried to recruit Jacob Weisberg, then a college-age intern at ``The New Republic'' magazine.

Weisberg, now Slate magazine editor, said Kerry made his pitch during a private meeting in his Senate office. Weisberg declined, pointedly asking Kerry how he squared his liberalism with membership in such an elitist club that refused to admit women. ``Kerry got sort of flustered and said, `I've marched with battered women,' '' Weisberg told the Herald.

Five years later, Kerry was among those voting to force the club to admit women after a bitter court fight.



Want to read more about Skull & Bones War Criminal Kerry check the links below...

http://lists.village.virginia.edu/lists_archive/sixties-l/3221.html

http://vietpage.com/archive_news/politics/2002/Dec/14/0002.html

http://www.oilempire.us/kerry.html

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=5468

http://oll.temple.edu/hist249/course/Documents/vietnam_veterans_against_the_war.htm

http://www.usvetdsp.com/story35.htm



Take Care...