Did The Band of Brothers Change Their Tune?

Did two of John Kerry's "Band of Brothers" change their story about the circumstances under which John Kerry won his first Purple Heart?  If so, were they lying before, or are they lying now?

Or is it possible that Kate Zernike of the Times has simply fluffed her reporting because she failed to do her homework?

In a Sunday story about John Kerry's intention to re-fight his battles with the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, Ms. Zernike wrote this:

The group has sent a letter to Mr. Schachte calling for a meeting with him, Mr. Kerry and two former veterans who maintain — as they did publicly during the campaign — that they were the only other people on the skimmer with Mr. Kerry and that he was wounded in a hail of enemy fire.

Emphasis added.  The two "former veterans" (sic) are Messrs. Zaladonis and Runyon, who gave this version in 2004 to the Boston Globe reporters preparing their biography of Kerry:

     Zaldonis and Runyon both said they were too busy to notice how Kerry was hit.
  "I assume they fired back," Zaldonis said. "If you can picture me holding an M-60 machine gun and firing it -- what do I see? Nothing. If they were firing at us, it was hard for me to tell."
    Runyon said he assumed the suspected Viet Cong fired back because Kerry was hit by a piece of shrapnel.
  "I can't say for sure that we got return fire or how [Kerry] got nicked," Runyon told the Globe. "I know he did get nicked, a scrape on the arm."

Two years ago, it was "what do I see? Nothing" and "I can't say for sure that we got return fire"; now it is "a hail of enemy fire".

Well.  If their story has changed this dramatically, one might almost wonder about their credibility.

But if we don't see a correction from the Times, it seems fair to imagine that the Paper of Record is standing behind this report.  The clear implication would be that Zaladonis and Runyon are, or were, hmm, lying.

My prediction?  Please - Ms. Zernike messed this up, Zaladonis and Runyon never changed their story, and we will never see a correction.  But why should we all play along and indulge this kind of sloppy substitution of wishful thinking for actual reporting?  If the Paper of Record does not admit their error, the inescapable implication will be that Zaladonis and Runyon have changed their story and are liars. 

Now here is a possible source of the mistake - "Hail of enemy fire" was used in a 2004 story about Kerry's disputes with the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, with Ms. Zernike sharing a byline.  The only problem - the "hail of enemy fire" related to Kerry's Bronze Star incident, not his first Purple Heart.  Oh, well - that "hail of enemy fire" was also controversial and possibly apocryphal, but that is a story for another day.

For the Times to actually correct this would be a baby step, but I expect it will be beyond them.  However, if there is a true investigative reporter out there, I propose the following puzzle - were Zaladonis and Runyon actually on that skimmer with Kerry?

Let me tell you why I wonder.  These three-man skimmer crews were assembled on an ad hoc basis, so there is no particular reason to think that the men who went out together would know each other or remember the circumstances years later.  And in fact, Runyon never served with Kerry before of after that night.

But what about Zaladonis?  He was on Kerry's PCF-44 and shipped out with Kerry in command on Dec 6, four days after their night in the skimmer.

And yet - Douglas Brinkley interviewed Zaladonis for his book.  But Brinkley did not identify the two enlisted men with Kerry in the skimmer.  Could it really be that Zaladonis never mentioned to Brinkley that he had met Kerry just before sailing with him, and had been with Kerry when he had his first combat and won his first Purple Heart?  Both Kerry and Runyon said it was the scariest night of their lives in Vietnam - did Zaladonis sleep through it?  Why wasn't it more of a bonding experience between Zaladonis and Kerry?

Well, let's ask the same question of Kerry, who did not remember the names of the men in the skimmer when he discussed it with either Brinkley or the Globe.  Why didn't he remember the enlisted man who shared his first combat and scariest night, since he sailed with the guy for two months starting a few days later?

Kerry's diary for this incident has not been disclosed; Zaladonis and Runyon were only identified in April 2004 as the two men in the skimmer.  And there has been an example of what seems to have been a "faux" Brother - David Alston claimed to have been a witness to Kerry's Silver Star incident, but records suggest he was not there.

So - what is the evidence that Zaladonis and Runyon were on that skimmer?  Will Kerry release the relevant portions of his diary, or the witness statement that ought to have been a part of his Purple Heart application?

I am sure that Kate Zernike is on this.  Any serious investigative journalist would be.

Comments

[richard mcenroe]

Don't forget the Times... and the rest of the MSM... the Right Reverend Alston, the token brutha in the Band of Brothers, who stood up in front of the DNC and testified, testified! to being at Kerry's side in the action where he "won" his Silver Star... except it turned out the Reverend had been flat on his back, unconscious, with a head wound, in an Army hospital miles away. The Reverend immediately and mysteriously disappeared from the Band and has not been heard from since.

[richard mcenroe]

That should read "The Times...and the rest of the MSM... missed or ignored the Right Reverend..."

[jaed]

Mrph. Did anyone ever get around to asking Kerry whether he did, as he claimed in January 2005, run guns to the Khmer Rouge with Lucky Hat Man?

I mean, not that I expect a mainstream media reporter, much less anyone from the NYT, to engage in such a breach of decorum. But I can dream.

[kim]

He's still got the hat. DNA analysis can be done on the hatband. No unknown soldier here. Cough it up. That hat might be instructive.
==============================

[Javani]

The last purple heart was suspect also. He claimed he got a bit of shrapnel when a water mine exploded under of near his boat.

Problem is, that guy from Oregon (?), Rassman who joined the campaign told the funny tale how earlier that day Kerry fragged a rice bin and got covered with rice and a piece of shrapnel in the "butt."

Kerry's pal thereby affirmed the Swift Boaters account of how Kerry was wounded that day!

What's the big diff? The rice episode wasn't during hostilities. Thereby it doesn't qualify for the award.

[Javani]

BTW Kerry should follow the Fawlty Towers advice: "Don't mention the war."

[kim]

He had two injuries that day. One was self inflicted rice in the butt, the Ricible Wound. He also claimed a contusion of the arm suffered during his panic flight down river, probably the same violent nameuver that threw off Rasmussen, not a mine going off under the boat. That is disinformation that Kerry has sown, at a funeral, for God's sake. His contusion was a bruise, no blood was shed. My heart bleeds purplish for him, that day.

I was going to change nameuver to maneuver, but I like it as it came out.
=================================

[Fresh Air]

Richard Mac, as usual, nails it. The Reverend Altston, though disappeared, was interviewed on Nightline with Jake Tapper recounting the Silver Star incident even though he was most definitely in a hospital over 500 miles away at the time. I haven't seen a correction from ABC, either.

No, Occam's Razor says Kerry bought off Mediros, Zaladonis and Sandusky once he got into serious contention for the nomination. They were said to previously have hated Kerry's guts and then somehow managed to turn into the backup singers for Flip Wilson. Kerry probably enlisted Zaladonis to say he was on the skimmer, since it was Kerry's word against Schacte's.

[Dwilkers]

Heh. You sure do love a mystery TM.

8^)>~~

[richard mcenroe]

Fresh Air — Ah, but it's not just Kerry's word against Schachte's. If Schachte was aboard that skimmer, higher would have known who was on the mission that night.

[Fresh Air]

Richard--

Yep. Plus, Schachte was certainly on the boat for one simple reason: Kerry and Zaladonis were not yet qualified to take it out on their own. Either they disobeyed orders or someone of higher rank was on the boat.

[capitano]

the Ricible Wound

OK, you can quit pouting now, it's a damn good line now that all has been made clear.

[willem]

Anyone remember that bizarre situation with Admiral Lehman and version 3.0 of Kerry's Silver Star citation? I found it telling that too was absent from Zernike's puff piece. I found this in my archives:

Kerry citation a 'total mystery' to ex-Navy chief

August 28, 2004

BY THOMAS LIPSCOMB

Former Navy Secretary John Lehman has no idea where a Silver Star citation displayed on Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry's campaign Web site came from, he said Friday. The citation appears over Lehman's signature.

"It is a total mystery to me. I never saw it. I never signed it. I never approved it. And the additional language it contains was not written by me," he said.

The additional language varied from the two previous citations, signed first by Adm. Elmo Zumwalt and then Adm. John Hyland, which themselves differ. The new material added in the Lehman citation reads in part: "By his brave actions, bold initiative, and unwavering devotion to duty, Lieutenant (jg) Kerry reflected great credit upon himself...."

Asked how the citation could have been executed over his signature without his knowledge, Lehman said: "I have no idea. I can only imagine they were signed by an autopen." The autopen is a device often used in the routine execution of executive documents in government.

Kerry senior adviser Michael Meehan could not be reached for comment on Kerry's records.

Thomas Lipscomb is chairman of the Center for the Digital Future in New York.

[Lurker]

Off the topic but TM might want to open a new thread regarding the connection between Jefferson, Africa, AND Joe Wilson.

Check Strata-sphere (one of the comments) and Mac Rangers.

The wife of Akita (Nigerian VP), Jennifer, recently indicted, was supposedly Joe Wilson's first wife. (But then crosspatch came back with another name, Jacqueline).

[willem]

What disturbs me is not the 'fog of war' differences in the eyewitness accounts. Many of the differences between the "facts" are not that compelling.

What concerns me: 1) the prospect of a pattern of records tampering; 2) the refusal of Kerry to direct the military to release his military records during the campaign and the legalistic way he seems to play hide and seek with this information now; and, 3) how all that medal production could happen to a lone Lt/JG in a mere 10 weeks of swiftboat command. Without being "stimulated" it seems a remarkable coincidence for someone who entirely avoided serious, life-threatening injury. Who else in the swiftie command produced so many medals over 10 weeks of with no serious injury prior to being discharged? How great of a coincidence was it that the "magic number" of Purple Hearts was the ticket out? Ten weeks. Just like magic.

This is why I see the Lehman revelations as so explosive. Here, in Kerry's Silver Star citation version 3.0, seems to be evidence of records tampering well beyond the emotions of Vietnam and vagaries of youth. Someone, at the request of someone, cooked this up behind Lehman's back, exploited his office and station, apparently forged his signature without his permission, and "revved up" the text of the salutation. Someone also allegedly gave it "v" for valor. This too would be bogus. Only the Bronze Star utilizes the "v" for valor mechanism.

[Sara (The Squiggler)]

Cross posted from other thread:
NYT is full of Kerry

This lays it all out.

[RBMN]

Other great work by Lipscomb:

Did Kerry write own report of disputed clash?
BY THOMAS LIPSCOMB
Chicago Sun-Times
October 1, 2004
http://www.suntimes.com/output/elect/cst-nws-lip01.html>http://www.suntimes.com/output/elect/cst-nws-lip01.html

[Seixon]

So I guess we can put Zernike in the pro-Kerry column...

[Clyde]

Kerry = Loser = Over.

Hasn't everyone else figured this out yet?

If the Donks are foolish enough to nominate him again in 2008, they deserve to get Paulsened again.

[Sue]

Is Kerry stuck on stupid? Why would he want to fight this battle again?

[Tom Maguire]

Is Kerry stuck on stupid?

I don't care - I want to battle the Times.

[Sue]

::grin::

And you do it so well...they must really wish you weren't so dedicated.

[Rick Ballard]

"I want to battle the Times."

A sound ecological decision. A world without 'Pravda on 43rd St.' would be a cleaner, brighter place.

Keller and Sulzberger in felony orange jumpsuits remains a fond dream for me - go Alberto, you can do it.

[Uncle BigBad]

In the 2004 campaign the Democrats informally adopted a requirement that any candidate for the presidency must be a combat veteran.

Will that requirement hold for the 2008 campaign, and if so, which potential candidates, aside from Kerry, qualify?

[Black Jack]

Hillary qualifies. Recently found records prove she was operating a helicopter in the first Gulf War. Was shot down in combat and handily saved her crew and won the Bronze Star with Oak Leaf Clusters. Before that she was the first woman to become a navy seal. She was awarded several Purple Hearts for secret missions in Niger.

She's come out of the closet to reveal her true identity as an experienced combat vet qualified to drink too much beer, cry over lost causes, and tell war whoppers to transgendered interns and gullible Lefties.

[Lesley]

"I don't care - I want to battle the Times." TM

Sulzberger SUNY Commencement Address

Sulzberger:

"I'll start with an apology.

When I graduated from college in 1974, my fellow students and I had
just ended the war in Vietnam and ousted President Nixon. Okay, that's not quite true. Yes, the war did end and yes, Nixon did resign in disgrace
but maybe there were larger forces at play.

Either way, we entered the real world committed to making it a better, safer, cleaner, more equal place. We were determined not to repeat
the mistakes of our predecessors. We had seen the horrors and futility of
war and smelled the stench of corruption in government.

Our children, we vowed, would never know that.

So, well, sorry. It wasn't supposed to be this way."

Sulzberger:

"Yes, it's important that those of us at The New York Times have the courage of our own convictions and defend the rights of our journalists to protect their sources or, after much debate and discussion, publish the news that our government is bypassing it's own legal systems to tap into phone calls made to and from the United States."

It would appear as if the new motto of the NYT should be: "All the news that fits our worldview."

Sulzberger's mission isn't journalism, its about changing the world and making it a better place (The World According to Pinch) through the auspices of the NYT.

In recent years, many of us held this suspicion wrt to the NYT. Sulzberger has confirmed it.

[Sara (The Squiggler)]

Well how nice for Sulzberger thatn as he left the safety of his college in 1974 all full of how he and his friends singlehandedly "ended the war" (GAG!) that me and mine were waiting for our loved one to return from his 4th combat tour. We bought our first home that year and we were struggling to make it on my salary and my husband's Navy pay that even after nearly 12 years of service was still considered below the poverty level. Sulzberger and his ilk make me sick!!!!!!!!

[richard mcenroe]

Black Jack — Uh, no, that was Melanie Griffith. I saw the movie. What the hell, close enuf...

[Tom Maguire]

Now that I have the poor man's Lexis A la Carte, I am trying to double-check when Runyon and Zaladonis first stepped up to vouch for Kerry's first Purple heart.

Runyon appears in this Cox News Service story on 3/26/2004:

For 36 years, Pat Runyon has wanted to talk with the tall, young lieutenant with whom he shared a terrifying firefight in a starlit bay in Vietnam. It was an unforgettable night, the first combat experience for both of them. Although Runyon had never spoken to him, he had no...

And Runyon came forward on in February 2004, per a story to which I linked at the time; link-rot has rendered that useless, and I forgot the date.

Byline: James Kuhnhenn

Feb. 20--DAYTON, Ohio -- It happened again. John Kerry reunited this week with another former seaman with whom he shared a harrowing night 35 years ago in a dark finger of water in Vietnam.

Patrick Runyon, a 58-year-old shipping clerk from Eaton, Ohio, showed up at a local union headquarters where Kerry was to speak and reintroduced himself to the Massachusetts senator. Runyon wanted to find out whether Kerry recalled their single nighttime mission as well as he did.

"He remembered quite a bit of it," Runyon said in an interview about his private meeting with Kerry.

It was the second time in five weeks that a figure from Kerry's Vietnam past has surprised him on the campaign trail. In Iowa last month, Kerry had an emotional reunion with Jim Rassmann, a former Green Beret whom Kerry had pulled from the water during a fierce firefight between Swift boats and Viet Cong. That episode earned Kerry a Bronze Star.

Vietnam veterans have become a staple of Kerry's campaign retinue, providing a reminder of his days as a gunboat skipper and a link to average Americans for a candidate otherwise known for his patrician bearing and privileged upbringing.

The skirmish involving Runyon occurred one night in early 1969. Kerry, Runyon and Bill Zaldonis, who was Kerry's Swift boat engine man, were assigned to a small Boston Whaler to patrol a peninsula north of Cam Ranh in search of Viet Cong in South Vietnam's "no man zone."

"It was very dark, really," Runyon said. "Then we seen some cross the water. A silhouette. Mr. Kerry saw them with starlight scope. He said, 'I'm gonna pop a flare.' When he popped the flare I started the engine. We got going."

Kerry recalls the episode in "Tour of Duty," historian Doug Brinkley's book about the senator's service in the war and his ensuing antiwar stance.

"The light from the flares started to fade, the air was full of explosions. My M-16 jammed, and as I bent down in the boat to grab another gun, a stinging piece of heat socked into my arm and just seemed to burn like hell," Kerry says in the book.

It was Kerry's first real action, and it earned him his first of three Purple Hearts.

Neither Kerry nor Runyon has any idea whether they wounded or killed the enemy. In the book, Kerry says he and his crew strafed the beach, then destroyed the sampan the Vietnamese had beached.

"It was just a scary moment in our lives," Runyon said.

He'd never seen Kerry again. Until this week.

When Kerry landed in Dayton on Wednesday he was alerted to Runyon by an article in that day's Dayton Daily News. Kerry wasn't sure he remembered Runyon and asked to meet Runyon and his wife, Anne, privately, out of sight of journalists.

"I wanted to see if he remembered the incident," Runyon said. "I knew he wouldn't remember me."

Runyon said he followed Kerry's career from the moment Kerry became an antiwar activist as a leader of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.

"The man had done his duty," Runyon said. "Then he came back and protested. That's the right way to do it, instead of running off or hiding away in college."

Runyon has been disaffected with politics since Vietnam. "I lost interest after that," he said.

But now, he's willing to reconsider.

"If it does help, I'm definitely going to register and vote for him," Runyon said.

(c) 2004, Knight Ridder. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

Well, then - as of Feb, we also knew about Zaldonis (sic).

[Terrence]

First, the guy went and served, and if his stories are screwed up, so what…but, he has made an ass of himself, he is a liar, and he basically brought this episode on himself! So, two other inconsistencies mentioned from supporters of Sen. Kerry (and of lesser importance to his combat stories, but I’ll mention anyway), are that he patriotically and without reservation joined the Navy after graduating from Yale, and that he volunteered for combat. The later claim is categorically untrue. The information I have is straight from Kerry’s mouth in a New York Times article from, I think 1971 – found it in Times archives online. Regarding joining the Navy, after Kerry graduated from Yale he was hoping to study abroad, he wanted to evade the draft, took initial steps to do so, but when he knew he was about to receive a draft notice (his lottery no.?), he volunteered for the Navy so as to not be engaged in war combat (I am paraphrasing his words). Most importantly, after a year at sea, he wanted to get closer to Vietnam to see what it looked like and what this whole thing was about, but he was careful NOT to be put in harms way, or get involved with combat. So he joined the peaceful waters on a Swift Boat. Peaceful?! YES! When he volunteered for that duty, Swift Boats were patrolling the peaceful beaches of South Vietnam. Shortly after Kerry volunteered for this, the Pentagon decided to start sending these Swift Boats up river into the heart of Vietnam – Kerry was not expecting to be put in harms way. That’s the way it happened according to Kerry in his interviews with the New York Times in 1971. I am splitting hairs, but he did bring this on himself!

[maryrose]

Terrance:
Absolutement!

[Bill Jacobs]

Every single claim the so-called SWiftvets for Truth made was a total fabrication or wild turned-upside exaggeration. Every single libelous charge they made against Kerry has been proved false and it's about time for the rightwing to stop smearing war hero leaders just besude they oppose Bush.

[Bill Jacobs]

AWOLBUSH.com has the original document showing Kerry volunteered for combat.

http://swiftvets.eriposte.com/behindsbv.htm

This website and the NY Times article do most of the work absolutely proving everything the smearvets claimed was a lie, most of it just total fabrications made up out of thin air.

[Bill Jacobs]

The conservative Washington Times also studied all the evidence and came to the conslusion Kerry's military record was perfect, including an honorable discharghe in 1970 which the rightwing continues lying about to this day.

[cathyf]

Gee, hon, if he'd just release his records publicly then he wouldn't need you to defend him, would he?

cathy :-)

[Bill Jacobs]

Kerry has released all his pertinent records, as explained by the Ny Times. The rightwing just keeps lying about this, pretending there's something there, perpetrating the same old discredited lies.

As John McCain said of these smear jockeys, "they're dishonest and dishonorable". Just a vicious hoax. And remember the same type ugly smears were hurled at McCain in 2000 by Bush's dirty tricksters, which was how Bush got past McCain for nomination. Time to stop rewarding politicians for lying and cheating.

[Bill Jacobs]

What was the smear campaign against Kerry (and McCain, Cleland and Murtha) really all about? The fact that the pro-war rightwing doies not have a single major leader who has ever dared to step foot on a battlefield. In fact most of them intentionally dodged ever serving or being in harm's way, including Bush, Cheney, Delay and on and on down the line.

Kerry was a superlative war hero and never lied about it, nor faked anything. He was the real deal. So Bush's campaign needed to pull a fast one. They created the smearvets and just let them make up anything they wanted to. Not a single claim of thiers was true. Not even 10% true.

[Lurker]

If you are referring to New York Times, written by Zerniker, check Thoms Libscomb's The Truth, John Kerry, and The New York Times

Where is the link to Kerry's Form 180 and DD214's?

[Lurker]

Are you this person?

Letter: Vietnam's lessons unheeded in Iraq

[Lurker]

And this one?

Westwood, Bay Area police, merchants target homeless

[Lurker]

Ah, of course!

Iraq Rebuilding Cash 'Goes Missing'

[Lurker]

Becoming familiar...

Blair Urges Bush to Put Iraq War on Hold

redcatcher

War Crimes (find Jacobs)

Well, take your pick....he could be any of them.

[Lurker]

Ah ha...

Tracks of Her Tears: The Swift Boaters and Sam Alito

[Bill Jacobs]

All Kerry's records have been released except his medical records which are none of anyone's business. Kerry's war record is the most investigated record in US history and no one has ever been able to find anything remnotely wrong with it. But this doesn't stop Bushies fram makming up lies and silly imaginary theories. Kerry was a great war hero. Bush dodged the draft, went AWOl and lied about it. Simple as that.

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