SodaHead - Blogs

The Boy Who is Annoying...part 2

2008-07-04T09:13:08Z

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ok i got some feed bak from my last blog which was kewl... But 2day he kept poking me with his stupid ruler. i wrote 'i hate u' on a piece of paper and pasted it 2 him. then he drew a really gross pic on it. Then the teacher caught us and he blamed it all on ME! And his name is Ben, Ben Le. And guess what, there is Nhat, Danyar and Joe who are annoying too. They drive me insane!!! Danyar has a mono-brow which is really like eww and Joe, i think he is gay.. Cuz he sits behind me and he just sits there and sings retarded songs. Oh and Nhat, he put a pin on my chair and guess wat.. I SAT ON IT! It hurt so much. But that was like 4 months ago i keep trying 2 get him back but it neva works!!! How should i deal with all four???

Obama Supporters Are Throwing Him Under The Bus

2008-07-04T08:50:24Z

Terry

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Obama Voters Protest His Switch on Telecom Immunity By JAMES RISEN Published: July 2, 2008 WASHINGTON — Senator Barack Obama’s decision to support legislation granting legal immunity to telecommunications companies that cooperated with the Bush administration’s program of wiretapping without warrants has led to an intense backlash among some of his most ardent supporters. Thousands of them are now using the same grass-roots organizing tools previously mastered by the Obama campaign to organize a protest against his decision. In recent days, more than 7,000 Obama supporters have organized on a social networking site on Mr. Obama’s own campaign Web site. They are calling on Mr. Obama to reverse his decision to endorse legislation supported by President Bush to expand the government’s domestic spying powers while also providing legal protection to the telecommunication companies that worked with the National Security Agency’s domestic wiretapping program after the Sept. 11 attacks. During the Democratic primary campaign, Mr. Obama vowed to fight such legislation to update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA. But he has switched positions, and now supports a compromise hammered out between the White House and the Democratic Congressional leadership. The bill is expected to come to a vote on the Senate floor next Tuesday. That decision, one of a number made by Mr. Obama in recent weeks intended to position him toward the political center as the general election campaign heats up, has brought him into serious conflict for the first time with liberal bloggers and commentators and his young supporters. Many of them have seen the issue of granting immunity to the telecommunications companies as a test of principle in their opposition to Mr. Bush’s surveillance program. “I don’t think there has been another instance where, in meaningful numbers, his supporters have opposed him like this,” said Glenn Greenwald, a Salon.com writer who opposes Mr. Obama’s new position. “For him to suddenly turn around and endorse this proposal is really a betrayal of what so many of his supporters believed he believed in.” Jane Hamsher, a liberal blogger who also opposes immunity for the phone companies, said she had been flooded with messages from Obama supporters frustrated with his new stance. “The opposition to Obama’s position among his supporters is very widespread,” said Ms. Hamsher, founder of the Web site firedoglake.com. “His promise to filibuster earlier in the year, and the decision to switch on that is seen as a real character problem. I know people who are really very big Obama supporters are very disillusioned.” One supporter, Robert Arellano, expressed his anger on the Obama site. “I have watched your campaign with genuine enthusiasm,” Mr. Arellano wrote, “and I have given you money. For the first time in my life, I have sensed the presence of a presidential candidate who might actually bring some meaningful change to the corrupt cesspool of national politics. But your about-face on the FISA bill genuinely angers and alarms me.” For now, the campaign is trying to put a positive spin on the new FISA fight among its supporters. “The fact that there is an open forum on BarackObama.com where supporters can say whether they agree or disagree speaks to a strength of our campaign,” said Bill Burton, a campaign spokesman. Several activists and bloggers predicted that Mr. Obama’s move toward the center on some issues could sharply reduce the intensity of support he has enjoyed from liberal activists. Such enthusiasm helped power his effort to secure the Democratic nomination, and it has been one of his campaign’s most important tools for fund-raising and organizing around the country. Markos Moulitsas, a liberal blogger and founder of the Daily Kos Web site, said he had decided to cut back on the amount of money he would contribute to the Obama campaign because of the FISA reversal. “I will continue to support him,” Mr. Moulitsas said in an interview. “But I was going to write him a check, and I decided I would rather put that money with Democrats who will uphold the Constitution.” Greg Craig, a Washington lawyer who advises the Obama campaign, said Tuesday in an interview that Mr. Obama had decided to support the compromise FISA legislation only after concluding it was the best deal possible. “This was a deliberative process, and not something that was shooting from the hip,” Mr. Craig said. “Obviously, there was an element of what’s possible here. But he concluded that with FISA expiring, that it was better to get a compromise than letting the law expire.”

Obama’s Iraq Quagmire/Some more lies

2008-07-04T08:22:58Z

Terry

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Obama’s Iraq Quagmire July 03, 2008 4:40 PM FROM GUEST-BLOGGER RICK KLEIN, from ABC's The Note. There’s been lots of speculation this week about whether Sen. Barack Obama has an Iraq problem. He does now. His comments Thursday, saying that he will “continue to refine” his plan to withdraw combat troops from Iraq inside of 16 months, seems likely to leave the campaign on the defensive on this issue for days or weeks. And it increases the likelihood that his trip to Iraq later this month will not turn out like Obama wants it to. There will be only one relevant question now out of Obama’s trip now: Do you stand by your plan? Obama is unlikely to give a direct, yes-or-no answer -- and that’s where Sen. John McCain and his allies can and will pounce. Obama has almost always built in some wiggle room into his proposal -- including promises to consult with commanders on the ground -- but surely not always. For point of reference, go to Obama’s own campaign Website: “Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda.” That’s pretty unequivocal. Obama’s migration to the political center has been well-documented, and is already a frame McCain is building around his candidacy. But Iraq -- this is qualitatively different, an issue that lives on a higher plane, since opposing the war was the rationale for his candidacy in the first place. Comment: So how many times has he been to Iraq? He has no clue as to what he is talking about or doing. At least McCain has been there and knows what is going on and how far the Iraqi government has come. What's even funnier is that the surge did work!

Maj. Smiths Distinguished Service Cross Citation

2008-07-04T06:50:28Z

Eagle II

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Maj. Smiths Distinguished Service Cross Citation reads: For extraordinary heroism during the period 5 April 1972 to 7 April 1972 while serving as the Senior Battalion Liaison Officer to the 9th Infantry Regiment, 5th Infantry Division, Army of the Republic of Vietnam. On 5 April 1972, North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces launched a major offensive with the objective of capturing Binh Long Province in Military Region Three. The 5th Viet Cong Division was targeted against Loc Ninh the capital of Loc Ninh District in northern Binh Long Province. The 5th Viet Cong Division launched a massive coordinated ground attack against Loc Ninh beginning early in the morning of 5 April 1972. The attack was supported by artillery and tanks. Captain smith skillfully directed tactical airstrikes and helicopter gunships in support of the 9th Infantry Regiment and other South Vietnamese forces in the area. To inflict the maximum casualties on the enemy and to bring the fires as close as possible to the friendly forces, he left the safety of his bunker and moved throughout the area seeking strategic vantage points from which he directed friendly fire. Time and time again he directed the fighters, bombers, gunships, and artillery fire on top of his own position to drive off the attacking enemy. The combination of Captain Smith’s courage and professional skills coupled with all available firepower kept the numerically enemy at bay for more than two days. Captain Smith’s extraordinary heroism was in keeping with the highest traditions of the United States Army and reflected great credit upon himself and the military service.

The Distinguished Service Cross (DSC) is the second highest military decoration that can be awarded to a member of the United States Army, awarded for extreme gallantry and risk of life in actual combat with an armed enemy force. Actions that merit the Distinguished Service Cross must be of such a high degree to be above those required for all other U.S. combat decorations but not meeting the criteria for the Medal of Honor. The Distinguished Service Cross is equivalent to the Navy Cross (Navy and Marine Corps) and the Air Force Cross (Air Force). The Distinguished Service Cross was first awarded during World War I. In addition, a number of awards were made for actions before World War One. In many cases, these were to soldiers who had received a Certificate of Merit for gallantry which, at the time, was the only other honor besides the Medal of Honor the Army could award. Others were belated recognition of actions in the Philippines, on the Mexican Border and during the Boxer Rebellion. The following are authorized components of the Distinguished Service Cross: 1. Decoration (regular size): MIL-D-3943/4. NSN 8455-00-269-5745 for decoration set. NSN 8455-00-246-3827 for individual replacement medal. 2. Decoration (miniature size): MIL-D-3943/4. NSN 8455-00-996-50007. 3. Ribbon: MIL-R-11589/50. NSN 8455-00-252-9919. 4. Lapel Button (metal replica of ribbon bar): MIL-L-11484/1. NSN 8455-00-253-0808. This decoration is distinct from the Distinguished Service Medal, which is awarded to senior military and government officials in recognition of meritorious career service to the government of the United States The Distinguished Service Cross was established by President Woodrow Wilson on January 2, 1918. General Pershing, Commander-in-Chief of the Expeditionary Forces in France, had recommended that recognition other than the Medal of Honor, be authorized for the Armed Forces of the United States for valorous service rendered, in like manner, to that awarded by the European Armies. The request for establishment of the medal was forwarded from the Secretary of War to the President in a letter dated December 28, 1917. The Act of Congress establishing this award (193-65th Congress) dated July 9, 1918 is contained in 10 U.S.C. § 3742. The establishment of the Distinguished Service Cross was promulgated in War Department General Order No. 6, dated January 12, 1918. The first design of the Distinguished Service Cross was cast and manufactured by the United States Mint at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The die was cast from the approved design prepared by Captain Aymar E. Embury II, Engineers Officer Reserve Corps. Upon examination of the first medals struck at the Mint, it was considered advisable to make certain minor changes to add to the beauty and the attractiveness of the medal. Due to the importance of the time element involved in furnishing the decorations to General Pershing, one hundred of the medals were struck from the original design and numbered 1 to 100. These medals were furnished with the provision that these crosses be replaced when the supply of the second design was accomplished which would also be numbered 1 to 100. 10 U.S.C. § 3991 provides for a 10% increase in retired pay for enlisted personnel who have retired with more than 20 years of service if they have been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. Order of precedence and wear of decorations is contained in Army Regulation (AR) 670-1. Policy for awards, approving authority, supply, and issue of decorations is contained in AR 600-8-22. In the case of the DSC, any false written or verbal claim to a decoration or medal or any wear, purchase, attempt to purchase, solicitation for purchase, mailing, shipping, import, export, manufacture, sale, attempt to sell, advertising for sale, trade, or barter of a decoration or medal authorized for wear by authorized military members or veterans is a federal offense punishable by up to six months in jail and up to a $5,000 fine. You can verify if someone received the Distinguished Service Cross HERE

Some more of Obama's lies

2008-07-04T06:49:31Z

Terry

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THE BATTLE OF LOC NINH - 1972 AAR

2008-07-04T06:49:21Z

Eagle II

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AFTER ACTION REPORT THE BATTLE OF LOC NINH 4 - 7 APRIL 1972 SUBMITTED BY: MARK A. SMITH, MAJOR, USA (RET) GROUND COMMANDER, BATTLE OF LOC NINH INTRODUCTION I have read a number of reports concerning the battle of Loc Ninh. The one most professionally disturbing is the one rendered by Major U. C. Collins while a student in the USA Command and General Staff College. One of the material sources from which he gathered information was Major Albert E. Carlson, currently Colonel Albert E. Carlson, Artillery. At the time of the Loc Ninh battle, Major Carlson was the Deputy Regimental Staff Advisor to the 9th ARVN Regiment. During the course of the battle, he was on the inner perimeter; not on the outer perimeter or in the Regimental Tactical Operations .Center (TOC). The important point is that, as an Artillery officer, Major Carlson was assigned to the inner perimeter and ordered to stay there prepared to offer advice to the tactical commander concerning fire support planning. Also to be noted is that as an Artillery officer and staff advisor to the ARVN, this is the job in which he had been trained. Sergeant Kenneth Wallingford was also assigned to the inner perimeter to assist Major Carlson. These men did not have access to the command group during this battle. Additionally, their capability to communicate was limited to one PRC-77 radio adjusted to only the assigned advisor frequency. In regard to the tactical disposition of friendly and enemy forces, as related in Major Collins' report, they are based upon pure supposition by Major Carlson and are a complete fantasy. As I recall, a majority of the events, as described in the report, either did not happen or did not occur as described. Perhaps they are the opinion of Ed Carlson and the 5th DCAT after action report "writers" They could also be the opinion of some Washington based Vietnamese Generals. The opinions provided by these sources, however, are wrong; and have no basis in fact. I was the ground commander of all ARVN and U.S. forces during the battle of Loc Ninh. I wrote the attached report from that point of view. Within minutes of the on-set of the battle of Loc Ninh, command of all defending forces was passed to me by Lieutenant Colonel Richard Schott. I retained this command authority for the duration of the battle; and, in fact, throughout the subsequent period of imprisonment in Cambodia. From almost the opening moments of the battle, Colonel Vinh, 9th ARVN Regimental Commander, did not command. Thirty five minutes into the battle, I superceeded his authority and relieved him of command for the reasons noted in the attached report. His staff then served under my command during the entire fight. LTC Richard Schott placed me in command and then protected me from all personnel who attempted to interfere. LTC Schott's deferment of command to me was communicated to MG James Hollingsworth and BG John McGiffert. They agreed with LTC Schott's decision. This command situation was further communicated by me to General Hung, Commander, ARVN 5th Division. LTC Schott's decision to put me in command was made in deference to my experience in combat. I had participated in major battles at Loc Ninh in 1966 and 1967. Further, my ability to use the various supporting arms was established. I had served in Vietnam, for at least a portion of soldier, on the ground at Loc Ninh, who was fluent in the Vietnamese language. The attached report describes the true disposition of friendly forces, not where some commanders claimed them to be, and the true disposition of enemy forces, not where they were "assumed" to be. The report also correctly reflects an organization of 4 rifle companies per battalion which was the standard rifle company organization in the 9th Infantry Regiment. I have written the attached report to set the record straight. I regret that The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) chose to classify my initial report, which I rendered while in Letterman Army Medical Center in early 1973. Classification. of my initial report, I have been told, was required because of sensitivity regarding the manner in which LTC Schott was killed; and the actions of SFC Howard Lull. The U.S. Army's uneasiness concerning the content of my initial report was further compounded by my pointed statements concerning Major Davidson, the acting Loc Ninh District Senior Advisor, and his Vietnamese counterpart. These two men escaped from Loc Ninh and Major Davidson was subsequently awarded the Distinguished Service Cross; the award being presented prior to myself and Captain George Wanat being released from the POW camp. Subsequent to our release, however, my comments in regard to Major Davidson were that he "whined" throughout the entire battle; and finally deserted Captain George Wanat while under fire. My DIA debriefers and the U.S. Army ignored my comments because the Army would be embarrassed if it admitted a "deserter" had received the Distinguished Service Cross for heroism during a battle where he ran away. I could not professionally ignore Major Davidson's conduct and actions during the battle and refused to retract the truth. As a result, my initial report remains classified or has ceased to exist. At my insistence, the Army accepted my submission of a recommendation for award of the Distinguished Service Cross to Captain George Wanat for his actions at Loc Ninh and for his thirty one days of escape and evasion (E&E) prior to being captured by the Vietnamese. George was, most deservingly, awarded the DSC. In Annex D to this report is a description of the events in the prisoner of war (POW) camp in Cambodia. Once again, as with my initial Loc Ninh after action report, the DIA chose to classify my debriefing concerning the period of imprisonment. The DIA did so because of my strong statements concerning "who did what" and "who did not do as duty and honor would dictate" while held as a POW. The end-notes referenced in this report are located immediately after "The Battle" section of the report. At Annex B, is a roster that reflects names and/or call signs of participants. If anyone was omitted from the report or was not given proper credit it is unintentional. As to the question: Who was in command? I was in command! My call sign, and nickname, is "Zippo"; my call sign was the prefix all call signs of personnel assigned to the 9th RCAT. Annex C reflects the names of eleven Americans, not counting myself, and one Frenchman. I believe ten of these people are still living. I further believe at least eight of them will verify that I commanded the defending forces during the battle of Loc Ninh. PRELUDE TO BATTLE: During the winter of 1971-72, the 5th ARVN Division conducted operations of a limited nature in Bing Long, Phouc Long, and Bing Doung provinces. These operations rarely made contact with the enemy, except for limited incursions into Cambodia toward the town of Snoul. It should be noted that, within the 9th ARVN Regiment, contacts with the enemy increased when advisors again accompanied battalions on operation. This practice was reinstituted by myself in November 1971. SFC Lull and myself accompanied battalions on operations on a regular basis. One small battle between Lai Khe and Ben Cat was initiated by the 2nd Battalion, 9th Infantry, in December 1971. The area had been worked by numerous units without advisors. By pushing the ARVN commander to move farther off the highway, contact with a company of NVA was achieved. This indicated to LTC Schott, Colonel Bill Miller, and to me that all was not as pacified as the 5th ARVN Division staff would have us believe. Contacts around Loc Ninh were rare, as the enemy could see you coming for a very long distance. Members of the Border Ranger Battalion and the French plantation manager, however, assured me that the NVA were in the area continuously. The Frenchman also told me that he paid the NVA not to start trouble in the plantation. This was done to preclude damage to the trees. The 9th Regiment soon learned that by operating only within the confines of the rubber plantation, one could avoid trouble. One operation conducted northwest of Loc Ninh was to put a "scissor" bridge in place on a small river at the border. The reason given was to allow units to avoid using QL13 as the single avenue of approach to Cambodia. My observation was that the bridge offered an excellent avenue of approach for the enemy. The ARVN, however, left the bridge in place and never guarded it or used it for operations because of its size and location, in the jungle. The NVA made fine use of this bridge, and one other, to put the 5th NVA Division in place for battle; and, the 9th Division used it to by-pass Loc Ninh for points South. During the battle of Loc Ninh it took one full day to destroy this bridge. A short time prior to the battle, LTC Schott and myself drove to Fire Support Base (FSB) Alpha. 'At the Montagnard village, short of Fire Base Alpha, is a river. The bridge there had long since been destroyed; however, "someone" had been building an underwater bridge with rocks. Inquiries to the Rangers and to the 9th Regiment Headquarters drew a negative response on knowledge of this endeavor. A stop at the village and a discussion with some children made it clear that "someone" had ordered the people to bring rocks to build this structure. Further questioning about "who" only solicited the response: "The Vietnamese." When asked if it was the ARVN or the enemy, the response was that all Vietnamese were the enemy. When LTC Schott and I raised the issue with Colonel Vinh, he was not worried. Me was sure the Montagnards were using the underwater bridge to smuggle wood from Cambodia. This structure held no tactical implications for Colonel Vinh. He further stated that it was good for the "scissor" bridge to remain in place as it gave the NVA the opportunity to by pass Loc Ninh. He also said that if the NVA came with full combat power, using the tanks and armored personnel carriers (APC), captured in an earlier battle, we would have to surrender. He also stated that he had been a prisoner in the 1950's and it was better than being dead. I made up my mind to two things at this time: (1) Loc Ninh would not surrender without a fight; (2) The bridges would become prime targets at the onset of any battle. With this in mind, the stage was set for the battle of Loc Ninh. On 30 March 1972 the Stars and Stripes published a picture of NVA T-54 tanks on the "Ho Chi Minh Trail" headed South. Colonel Vinh, however, remained convinced that the only armor the 9th ARVN Regiment faced was captured M-41 tanks and APCs. An inventory of high explosive anti tank (HEAT) ammunition, for the sole 106mm Recoilless Rifle at Loc Ninh, showed the presence of precisely six rounds on-hand! There were also fifty rounds of canister ammunition on-hand. Colonel Vinh assured me he would request more ammunition. On the afternoon of 4 April 1972 Major Carlson, SOT Wallingford, a French photographer named Michael Dummond, and myself journeyed from Lai Khe to An Loc. We were passed by numerous overloaded vehicles fleeing south. Just south of Loc Ninh the French plantation manager passed us and waved for us to go back. We proceeded on to Loc Ninh. The village square was basically deserted, except for some drunk ARVN soldiers at the local "soup stand". They said they were drunk because tomorrow they would die. Colonel Vinh was not alone in his defeatism. Amazingly the National Police station was erecting additional barbed wire and filling sandbags. This for a staff of six people! These personnel included one female and five male police. When I inquired of Major Davidson as to the district chief's plans for the police, he stated that they had been ordered to defend the police station. Other after action reports state that the 1st ARVN Cavalry was operating in Cambodia just prior to the battle. This is a myth concocted by Vinh and the Commander of the 1st ARVN Cavalry. They were, in fact, at FSB Alpha. The only exception to this was a total of five APCs and one tank at the intersection of QLIS and QL14. These vehicles were placed here for two reasons: (1) To provide a blocking force to protect the flank of the 1ST Cavalry Regiment moving to Loc Ninh; (2) to assist or reinforce the 1ST Battalion, 9th infantry, at Bo Dop. The small size of this force indicates the lack of tactical awareness of the 9th Infantry and 1st Cavalry Regimental Commanders; because if is not tactically sound to appose a force of two NVA regiments with an ARVN force of only five APCs and one tank. Colonel Bill Miller, SRA 5th DCAT and myself both attempted to convince Colonel Vinh and General Hung to pull the 1ST Cavalry back to Loc Ninh. Colonel Vinh's thinking was that the NVA would attack FSB Alpha and leave Loc Ninh alone. Also this was his reasoning to move the two companies of the 3rd Battalion, 9th Infantry, not to the west of Loc Ninh as previously reported, but to place them on the first hill mass south of Loc Ninh to cover a withdrawal by the 9th Regiment. This movement was ordered immediately after the departure of General Hung and Colonel Miller from Loc Ninh. There was a contact to the west of Loc Ninh on the afternoon of 4 April. It was actually made by the 9th Regiment Reconnaissance (Recon) Company but it was reported as a contact made by the 3rd Battalion because Colonel Vinh had told General Hung that the 3rd Battalion remained to the west. After this contact, all that remained of the Recon Company was one wounded soldier with a radio. He remained on the radio until the afternoon of 6 April and provided me with targets to the west of Loc Ninh. When I returned from An Loc, late in the afternoon of 4 April, I advised Colonel Vinh to move the 2nd Battalion, 9th Infantry, except for one company, back to Loc Ninh from Fire Support Base Alpha. I also advised him to leave a PF Platoon and RF Company at the Cam Le bridge to assure it's destruction. Again, Colonel Vinh stated that we could "survive" if we provided the enemy a variety of targets. Also he felt that ordering the destruction of the bridge would anger not only General Hung, but also the NVA Commander! Colonel Vinh's theory was that, "when we surrender", we could bring up certain things to show we actually helped the enemy. The term "when we surrender" became more and more common in Colonel Vinh's discussions, until he did in fact try to surrender Loc Ninh on 7 April 1972. A contact was made by the 3rd Battalion, 9th Infantry, South of Loc Ninh on the evening of 4 April 1972. A five man squad of NVA was ambushed and two were captured. At approximately 0200 hours, according to the 9th Regiment S2, these two stated that they were from the 272nd Regiment, 9th NVA Division. They further stated that the rest of thee division was passing Loc Ninh to attack An Loc. Their regiment was to provide a blocking force to the south while the 5th NVA Division made the main attack on Loc Ninh with Soviet Armor. When I learned this at 0300 hours, I carried the E-6 Regiment west of Loc Ninh on the situation map and added the 272nd Regiment to the south and the remainder of the 5th NVA Division as the attacking force. The events described above and the resulting disposition of friendly and enemy forces, as depicted on my map as of 0300 hours, 5 April 1972, set the stage for the battle of Loc Ninh. As the battle scenario develops, it will become evident why I continued to place the 272nd Regiment of the 9th NVA Division south of Loc Ninh. THE BATTLE The battle of Loc Ninh began during the afternoon of 4 April 1972 when the Recon Company, 9th ARVN Regiment, was destroyed by what was believed to be elements of the NVA E-6 Regiment West of Loc Ninh. A lone surviving soldier, with a radio, reported tanks and infantry in large numbers moving toward Loc Ninh and the South. At 0300 hours, 5 April, a rocket attack on Loc Ninh was initiated by the NVA. At this point Colonel Vinh became concerned about Loc Ninh itself. He informed LTC Schott and myself that now he would order the 1ST Cavalry Regiment back to Loc Ninh. We told him in no uncertain terms that it was too late. Besides, FSB Alpha had an anti-tank ditch and four tubes of artillery. Colonel Vinh disregarded this advice and ordered the Rangers, 2/9 Rifle Companies and the 1ST Cavalry at FSB Alpha to return to Loc Ninh. The five APCs and one tank at the intersection of QL13 and QL14 were to "cover the withdrawal." At 0335 hours, the Commander of the let Calvary informed Colonel Vinh he was surrendering. Vinh said he understood! As a result of Vinh's action, it became clear to me that he did not intend to fight the NVA and I told Vinh he no longer commanded anything. The regimental staff, with the exception of the regimental XO, backed me. LTC Schott also backed me. As of that moment, and for the rest of the battle of Loc Ninh, I commanded the 9th ARVN Regiment. I immediately contacted the commander of the 1ST ARVN Cavalry Regiment and told him I would "air strike" him if he surrendered without a fight. He stated that they would try. Ten minutes later the Rangers and 2-/9 contacted me and said they were attempting to fight on to Loc Ninh; but, the 1ST Cavalry had surrendered and was moving West with the NVA. I contacted the United States Air Force (USAF) Forward Air Controller (FAC) and requested air strikes on all personnel and vehicles moving toward the west and into Cambodia (Note 1). A Spectre Gunship reported attacking armored vehicles moving west, five kilometers from QL13. The Rangers and 2/9 made contact with the five APCs and one tank from the 1ST Cavalry at the intersection of QL13 and QL14. As many personnel as possible mounted the vehicles and they tried to break through to Loc Ninh. I requested that "Spectre"" try to cover their withdrawal. This is the unit that was ambushed just north of Loc Ninh. The Rangers reported an ambush one kilometer long. I ordered them to light through the ambush and ordered air strikes in support. The Rangers reported that Colonel Vinh had ordered them back to FSB Alpha. It was at this point that we noticed Colonel Vinh on another radio. We disconnected Vinh's handle - and told the staff to keep him off the radio to subordinate units. Vinh was told that if he wanted to do something, talk to 5th Division and tell them what was happening. As the battle began to develop, the sensor operator from 5th Division began to bang on the side of his console. All the little black buttons on his console had turned white. I knew nothing about sensors; but I asked him if this real function had ever happened before. He stated that animals would sometimes cause an individual sensor to activate but that he had never before observed all sensors activated at one time. I asked him for the sensor locations. He said only 5th Division knew the locations. I then asked Colonel Vinh and later General Hung about these locations. I was unable to obtain a satisfactory answer. I finally asked the "Sundog" FAC to contact 5th Division and Corps for the positions of the sensor fields and then for him to bomb them. He said, "which one?" I took another look at the sensor console and said, "all of them." What was done about this request I don't know; the sensor console ceased to operate after our TOC received a hit that morning from a 75mm Recoilless Rifle round. The volume of fire into Loc Ninh increased over the next two days. The vast majority of the fire was rockets and tube artillery, with some mortar rounds. The tube artillery was from three locations: (1) Four tubes of 105mm, captured from the 1ST Cavalry Regiment; (2) 105mm and 155mm firing from the south, probably captured at Hung Tam on 6 April; (3) fire coming from the north and northwest. The artillery from this third source was fired from a great distance and I believe it was 130mm gun rounds rather than the 155mm previously reported. I spoke to an advisor (Note 2) at Hung Tam by radio and he assured me that his counterpart had "spiked the tubes" prior to their attempting to pullout. On 6 April, however, the Company Commander of the 2nd Battalion, 9th Infantry, at Cam Le bridge informed me that the guns from Hung Tam were firing on Loc Ninh. I ordered an air strike on Hung Tam at approximately 1900 hours, 6 April. General Hung, however, canceled my order as he still believed the guns were in the hands of the 52nd Regiment. By evening of the same day the guns had disappeared to the west. Earlier, on the morning of-5 April, direct fire weapons had commenced firing into Loc Ninh from across the airstrip to the east. One roundfrom a 75mm recoilless rifle struck the 9th Regiment TOC directly in front of the command radio. Both LTC Schott and I were wounded in the head and neck (Note 3). Major Carlson, Sergeant Wallingford, and Michael Dummond came through the fire and patched us up as best they could. Major Carlson, in the mean time, attempted to direct the air campaign. MG James Hollingsworth, however, demanded to know why "Zippo" was not using all of the air support he had provided. I got back on the radio and informed MG Hollingsworth that he would have to wait until I got the holes in my head patched up. He apologized to me and in ten minutes I was back on the radio. Major Carlson, SGT Wallingford, and Michael Dummond returned to the inner perimeter. I never saw Major Carlson again during the battle. At approximately 1000 hours, 5 April, a platoon (two) tanks pulled into the tree line to the west of Loc Ninh. I took a portable radio, LTC Schott, and SFC Lull and headed for the perimeter just outside of our bunker. When we reached the bunker with the single 106mm RR on it, SFC Lull was no longer with us. We climbed to the top of the bunker and engaged the tanks with the 106mm RR. This, I believe, is the tank that has been described in various after action reports as being destroyed by direct fire artillery. Infantry engaged us on the bunker and I was wounded again (Note 3). LTC Schott and I then went to the artillery compound, got the gunners of their bunkers, and ordered them todirect fire into the tree line. I requested an air strike west of the camp. The FAC on station offered the "Spectre" Gunship as a solution. The second tank in the woodline was either destroyed by "Spectre" or the lO5mm direct fire. I suspect that the "Spectre" actually did the job as there was the appearance of "flashbulbs" going off on the back deck of the tank just prior to it blowing up. I must dispute the after action reports that claim the tanks stayed exclusively in the woodline and supported the infantry. In daylight hours this was true; at night, this was not the case. Twice on the night of 5 April, T-54s rolled through the perimeter from the west and back out on the airfield side. The first time this happened they were hardly noticed because of the intense indirect fire assault on Loc Ninh. The second time this happened the 106mm engaged them with canister! The commander and driver of both tanks were killed. The tanks then sat in the wire to the east, next to the airfield, for about thirty minutes. There was no Spectre on station at the time; and, the FAC on station and I both thought the tanks were knocked out of action. I was called by the defenders on the east of the compound as the 174th NVA Regiment was making a ground assault across the airfield. I called for CBU and NAPALM. This forced them to withdraw. The real objective of their attack became obvious when two new drivers from the 174th Regiment drove the "knocked out" tanks into the rubber trees across the airfield. During this entire first day, I tried to coordinate with Major Davidson and Captain Wanat in the District Compound. Captain Wanat would get out of the bunker, look around, and report targets. He reported the mortars firing from the swimming pool on the grounds of the plantation house. These mortars were subsequently destroyed by Spectre. He also alerted me to the presence of an NVA forward observer located on the top floor of the plantation house. General Hung would not clear "Spectre" to fire on the plantation house. As a result, LTC Schott and I took with 106mm canister fire. During this entire period, Major Davidson whined on the radio. His complaint was that I was "hogging all the air strikes" for the main compound. A simple look at a picture of Loc Ninh from' the air, however, will show that all these compounds were interconnected. I told him to get off the bunker and look at where the air was going in. Later in the night Captain Wanat described the Major as being "distraught." Under the circumstances, I think the Captain's words were most kind. I consider Major Davidson's actions as being most unprofessional, to the point of being childish and cowardly. Nothing that happened, to include his "escape" from Loc Ninh, alters my initial impression that this officer acted in a cowardly fashion throughout the battle. At approximately 2200 hours, 5 April, I saw Colonel Vini tell his bodyguard and two other soldiers to do something. They donned flack jackets and helmets. They then sprinted from the bunker. I finally ascertained, upon their return, that Vinh had ordered them to open the gates of the compound. Vinh explained: "we had do this so we can run out easier". By this time we had approximately one hundred wounded, from all compounds, in the hospital bunker. Colonel Vinh was preparing to desert them and run away. I seriously considered shooting Vinh there and then bur I had not reached that point yet; that would come later. The remainder of the first night was basically artillery fire on the compounds. I established with the FACs (Note 4) and the Spectre Gunships, that only I would clear each target and would provide my initials to take responsibility. From that point on they never allowed anyone, including Vinh and General Hung, to cancel a target. At 0500 hours, 6 April, I saw tracers coming up from the area of the rubber plantation office and processing plant. These were east of the airfield and I ordered them destroyed by NAPALM and 250 pound bombs, ("Snake & Nape"). This was done and no more fire came from that area. Amazingly, I also saw tracers coming from the police station on the edge of town. The brave policemen and one policewoman continued to hold out. At 0900 hours, 6 April, I was informed by a Spectre Gunship that an anti-aircraft gun on a vehicle was firing from the village square in Loc Ninh. I cleared Spectre to engage this target. I refused to allow jet aircraft to engage this target to protect the Loc Ninh village from collateral damage. At approximately 1100 hours, I was notified by the forces on the east side of the perimeter that women and children were coming up the road from the village. This was verified by the FAC on station (Note 1). When LTC Schott and I climbed to the top of bunker, we saw one of the most pitiful sights I have ever witnessed. The NVA were forcing the children and teachers to walk toward the compounds carrying an American flag. I fired in front of them and they fled back into the village. At approximately 1400 hours, the lone survivor, from the Recon Company, reported tanks and infantry moving toward Loc Ninh from the west in regimental strength. I called for air strikes on these targets. The soldier on the radio adjusted this fire until the bombs were heard on our radio and transmissions ceased. I did not know his name but he was a real hero. At 1700 hours, 6 April, Loc Ninh's main compound was overrun the first time by infantry. Elements of the 174th Regiment attacked in company strength across the airfield and a battalion of E-6 Regiment attacked from the west. The company from the 174th massed and tried to run through the front gate as a group. They were decimated by the CBU that I called onto the camp's perimeter. The battalion from the west stopped in the wire when Spectre engaged their supporting tanks. The tanks turned tail and ran. Earlier that morning two TOC radio operators, the regimental surgeon, and myself had crawled into the barbed wire on the west perimeter. With LTC Schott and SGT Lull covering us, we placed claymore mines and white phosphorous grenades behind the six "FOOGAS" drums on that side. We then attached the mines and grenades to a blasting machine with communications wire. When I climbed the steps, I saw hundreds of NVA "standing" in the wire and the ARVN soldiers staring at them. When I detonated the "FOOGAS", it was brutal, as if coming out of a daze the ARVN soldiers began firing. The NVA battalion was decimated. When I went outside to check the soldiers, a single T-54 Tank rolled from the woodline and entered the perimeter. I grabbed an M-72 LAW and fired directly into the front of the tank. The tank and crew were not impressed! Finally, Spectre munitions "sparkled" on the rear deck of the tank and it took a round into the engine compartment. The defenders on the bunker line then killed the crew as they exited the tank. That evening when I checked the bunker lines, the 9th Regiment was down to about fifty defenders. There were about 150 wounded in the hospital bunker. The regimental surgeon and I went to the hospital and ordered all who could walk back to the perimeter. There was no whining, they just went and did their duty. As the surgeon and I were putting the wounded on the perimeter, I noticed that the disabled enemy tank was gone. I questioned a young soldier in the bunker near where the tank had been sitting concerning what had happened to the tank. He explained: "Another pair of tanks had come out of the rubber trees and drug the disabled tank away." I then asked him why he had not fired his X-72 LAW at the tanks. In response, he said "the tanks were nor shooting and he didn't want to make them mad." I understood his reasoning and could only pat him on the shoulder to convey my feelings. It is my experience that the M72-LAW is ineffective when attacking the frontal armor of the T54 Tank. That night Colonel Vinh ordered all the warm soda pop stored in the TOC be opened and passed out to the troops. This was Colonel Vinh's last contribution to the battle. He had stripped off his uniform and was wearing only white under shorts and a T-shirt. He told me we would have to surrender soon. He advised me to keep a white shirt handy. He also told me we were lucky because we were officers. We could surrender. Junior enlisted men would be shot by the NVA. The regimental surgeon confirmed Vinh's statement. We went around the perimeter and told all the Border Rangers to strip to their underwear and try to get to the Cam Le bridge. This was done because it was generally accepted that the Montagnard, Cambodian, and Nhung soldiers would be executed by the NVA. It was then that I learned that most of the unwounded Infantry soldiers on the perimeter were from the 2nd FSB Alpha and the bridge. They stated that they had been given the option to go north, south, or stay. This group had come to Loc Ninh. That night about twenty men straggled in from the 3rd Battalion which had been located south of the camp. The 3rd Battalion had been virtually wiped out by the NVA 272nd Regiment on the high ground south of the camp. That night, 6 April, at approximately 2000 hours, lights were seen in the open south of the camp. I directed CBU and NAPALM onto the lights. These lights were within 500 meters of the barbed wire. I did not determine until the next evening what they were. At about 2300 hours, two 240mm rockets landed almost simultaneously on the Loc Ninh Infantry and Artillery compounds. What these notoriously inaccurate, weapons achieved is amazing. One struck the hospital bunker, killing every wounded soldier and medic inside. The regimental surgeon was with me and was spared. The other hit the ammunition dump, in the Artillery compound, and totally destroyed the guns and soldiers. General Hollingsworth, who was flying overhead at the time, said: "it looked like a nuclear explosion." At 2330 hours, 6 April there was another major attack from the east across the airfield and through the wire from the west. This was repulsed with air strikes and the last few rounds of 106mm canister ammunition. After the attack, Sergeant Wallingford and Michael Dummond brought food and encouragement from the inner perimeter. I did not see Major Carlson; the others said he was manning the radio. Sergeant Lull had become moody and refused to leave the bunker after the second major attack. He asked what my plan was and I said: "To fight." He was not happy with my response. Though he had been wounded only slightly, his mental attitude had greatly deteriorated. LTC Schott and I moved throughout the perimeter that night and used a portable radio to direct air strikes. We were both wounded a number of times during the night (Note 3) and LTC Schott kept repeating: "I'm glad you are here" By early morning, I noted that there was some mental deterioration in LTC Schott. I believe it was caused by the head wound he had received on the first night of the battle. Despite his head wound, LTC Schott continued to fight throughout the battle. His bravery under fire is unquestionable and he gave me his loyalty and support to the very end of the fight. I further believe this mental deterioration significantly influenced his actions on the following day. Early on the morning of 7 April Loc Ninh became strangely quiet. There were occasional artillery rounds and mortars but little else. It was as if the attacking force and the defending force were holding their breath for some reason. I increased the air strikes to the west and observed numerous secondary explosions. I also cleared the Spectre Gunship on station to fire at will into the plantation house and grounds. Major Davidson, during this phase of the battle, continued to periodically come up on the radio from his bunker and complain the lack of fire support he was receiving. His statements were totally absurd and embarrassed LTC Schott, Major Carlson, Captain Wanat, Sergeant Wallingford and myself. The FACs tried to reassure him, to no avail. Major Davidson was scared to death. About 0700 hours, 7 April, there was another major ground attack, from the west and north from the town of Loc Ninh itself. Tanks entered the perimeter from the west. One T-54 Tank chased me around the perimeter until I could get behind it and shoot an into its rear section. During this "chase" Captain Dey, a brave helicopter pilot from the 1st of the 9th Cavallry, tried to draw the tank's fire off of me with his LOH. In fact, it is most probable his actions enabled me to eventually destroy the tank (Note 7). Captain Dey also observed the mass of bodies in the barbed wire and the trench lines. Many of the bodies were entangled, friend and foe, indicating that at some point in the late evening hours of 6 April the fighting had been close quarter, "hand-to-hand", combat. At approximately 0800 hours, 7 April, Colonel Vinh, his loyal body guards still trailing him, ran out through the front gate of Loc Ninh and surrendered. The 9th Regiment Executive Officer (XO) observing Colonel Vinh's desertion and surrender, immediately ran from the bunker toward the inner perimeter. I understood why only when I saw him begin to lower the flag of the Republic of Vietnam. When I observed his action, I ran after him. When I reached him he was pulling off his white T-shirt which he then ran up to the top of the flag pole, signifying to the NVA that we were surrendering. I demanded that he pull the T-shirt down from the pole. We argued and fought for the rope. As we were fighting over possession of the rope, I glanced around and saw all of the soldiers in the TOC were watching from the doorway and other soldiers on the perimeter were starting to strip off-their shirts. It appeared that the XO's act of surrender was going to end the battle then and there. As the commander, I felt the defenders of Loc Ninh could hold on until reinforcements or firepower could be provided to enable us to prevail over the NVA. Accordingly, I shot the XO dead and hauled down the white flag. The soldiers, upon observing my actions, put their shirts back on and faced out again to defend the perimeter. I do not know if anyone put up another white flag after I shot the XO. I assume that it was his white T-shirt that was observed by some pilots. This shirt, however, flew for no more than five or ten minutes. From this point through the end of the battle things became absolutely bizarre. A major attack at about 0930 hours, 7 April, required that I call for air strikes on the camp itself. I lost all communications with the other members of the team on the inner perimeter. I was later told that they had been forced to hide inside the roof when chased from the bunker by a tank. At 1115 hours two APCs entered the front gate. Initially we thought these were 1st Cavalry troops but when the ramps lowered, NVA soldiers piled out. At 1000 hours, 7 April, a flight of B-52 aircraft made a bombing run west of Loc Ninh. During the bombing mission there was a short lapse in air support over Loc Ninh; but this, as some claim, did not cause the fall of Loc Ninh. Also, during the B-52 strike a LOH from 1st of the 9th Cavalry came in and attempted to rescue friendly personnel. I left the bunker with an M-60 Machine Gun and covered the Vietnamese soldiers jumping onto the skids of the LOH. During this action I was shot by NVA soldiers coming across the airfield. Contrary to previous reports by the LOH helicopter pilots, the personnel who pulled me to my feet were ARVN Rangers, not NVA soldiers (Note 8). I returned to the TOC and asked for all available fire power to destroy the camp (Note 9). SFC Lull then grabbed the radio handset and screamed "no NAPALM". Major Davidson also came on the net and yelled "no NAPALM". LTC Schott then took the handset and talked to "someone". He recommended me for a high award and signed off. At that moment I told Schott and Lull that we should now fight our way out. Colonel Schott said he couldn't make it with his wounds and that Lull and I should go. I said, "that's it, we all stay". As the NVA began to throw satchel charges into the bunker, Lieutenant Colonel Richard Schott, understanding there was no time to argue; believing he could not physically endure an attempt to E & E, and knowing I would not leave him; sat down on a stool and shot himself between the eyes with his own .45 caliber pistol. LTC Schott's action was not an act of fear, Dick Schott died to save SFC Lull and myself. I have heard disparaging remarks about LTC Schott's action from a number of people, including some General Officers. In response to these people, I say: "On the best day of your life, you should hope to be half as brave as LTC Richard Schott." His was an act of sacrifice, not personal desperation. He died for me! No one else was there, except Lull. No one has the right to judge Dick Schott except for me because I was there. He is the bravest man I have ever known. He is dead, not missing in action (MIA) and the North Vietnamese know it! Then I went to the roof the NVA entered the bunker. They cut off LTC Schott's collar and name tag and, then tried to cut off his head. During this, SFC Howard Lull and twelve ARVN soldiers "played dead" in the TOC! I went to the roof of the bunker and tried to organize the three soldiers left in the trench line. They just ran back and forth yelling "May Bay" the Vietnamese word for helicopter. I tried to call for air support on the radio but it was destroyed by gunfire from an NVA who had mounted a tower in the inner perimeter. One bullet went through my radio, and the back pack, and entered my back. This bullet, or part of it, lodged in the base of my left lung (Note 3). Immediately after I was shot, by the NVA soldier located on the inner perimeter tower, I saw a LOH swooping in on my position from the west. He headed straight toward me. At the same moment I saw NVA coming out of the bunker line to fire on the LOH. I tried to wave him off as I no longer had a radio. Finally, just before he flared to land, I shot out his windshield and the LOH moved away to the South (Note 7). I re-entered the bunker and killed three NVA who were attempting to cut off LTC Schott's head. The instant they were dead, SFC Lull and the twelve ARVN soldiers "came back to life". I tried to organize the thirteen people and with the Regimental Surgeon, who came down the other stairwell, led them outside. We retook two bunkers on the bunker line. We held these bunkers until 1830 hours. Then as "Spectre" made a pass on targets to the west, we escaped through the mine field to the southwestJust on the other side of the perimeter road, a squad of NVA jumped up and engaged us. During this engagement I was shot in the groin with a pistol. I also received a small schrapnel wound in the lower right abdomen (Note 3). We returned fire and killed all five NVA but my bowels filled with blood and I had to pull down my pants and defecate. While I was in this position, SFC Howard Lull stood up and announced that I had to be left behind. I was virtually immobile and so physically and emotionally drained that I could only cry. SFC Howard Lull and all but two of the ARVN soldiers chose to desert me. They moved toward a hill mass where they felt they would be secure until they could escape or be rescued. The Regimental Surgeon and my bodyguard, Corporal Hen, stayed with me. We started south and avoided any movement by the NVA. When we reached the small stream bed about 500 meters south of the camp, we saw what the lights the night before were from. A reinforced company had tried to dig into the walls of the stream bed. They were still there, almost all had been killed by the CBU and NAPALM. We looked at the wounded; they looked at us; we moved on. During the night we observed a massive air strike go onto the hill mass that SFC Lull and the ARVNs had run up. I believe they were killed by the air strike. Subsequent to my capture the NVA Commander told me they had all been killed. During this night, we had three contacts with the NVA. After the third contact we were all crawling from exhaustion and wounds. At 0800 hours, 8 April, I spotted a FAC. I used my LRRP mirror to signal him. In response, the FAC called in a flight of two fast movers dropping CBU. I was again wounded (Note 3). We fled, as best we could, toward the rubber trees south of the camp. As we stumbled up the hill, I saw a white rice bowl fall to the ground. I shot the soldier who was eating with my pistol and we continued on. The next thing I saw was a huge orange flash and then my left leg was knocked from under me (Note 3). I was knocked unconscious. When I came to my senses, I had a great weight on my head. An NVA soldier was standing on my head. I saw them shoot my bodyguard dead. They were lining up the Regimental Surgeon when I forced my way to my feet. I tried to shoot my .45 caliber pistol but the slide was back and it was empty. The NVA just took it out of my hand. I explained that they did not want to kill a doctor. He could help them. Right or wrong, I intended to preserve at least one friend from that battle. The Surgeon cursed me for telling them he was a doctor but the NVA let him live. He was eventually released with me in 1973. When they took me to their headquarters an older officer ran down the hill and hit me across the face with a bamboo stick (Note 3). A distinguished looking officer then ran down the hill and threw the man who had hit me aside. He kicked the man and told him in Vietnamese that I was a good soldier. The whacking came because the doctor had, inadvertently, called me "Zippo". It seems that "our friend" Colonel Vinh had told the NVA much during his short stay with them. The distinguished looking officer had me undressed and my wounds treated. Treatment was superficial at best. They tried to give me food but I was afraid to eat because of the abdominal wounds. The interpreter, who spoke perfect English, told me I had been captured by the 272nd Regiment, 9th NVA Division. He further stated that I was the guest of the "Group Commander", "Mr. Tra". When I asked if he didn't mean Regiment or Division Commander, he said that Mr. Tra had many Divisions. Soon, my old jeep arrived carrying Major Carlson, SGT Wallingford, and Mick Dummond. Mr. Tra had no words for any of them. We were added to the load in the jeep and i was then tied to the floor boards. We went to the West until we reached the road to the scissor bridge. We then went North to the river and east back toward QL13. When a Spectre Gunship flew over they laid branches on the jeep and left me tied to the floor board. They also left the engine running. I knew the destruction Spectre did to tanks and I couldn't even imagine what it would do a jeep. Although I probably gave away a secret, I finally yelled to them, in Vietnamese, to turn off the engine. At QL13 we crossed the underwater bridge. We also met up with a number of captured ARVN M577 vehicles hauling items for the NVA. When we reached Snoul, I was given additional medical treatment for the benefit of photographers. Carlson and Wallingford told me how a tank had chased them out of their bunker and how they had hidden in the roof of the bunker. Then Carlson said he had been wounded in the chest, by a "Mini Gun" from one of the Cobra helicopters. I told him that I was outside the bunker when the Cobras were shooting and the only thing fired was "NAILS." He became quite flustered and told me he was now ready to take command. SGT Wallingford and I said "cold day in Hell." It seems that Ed Carlson believed he was seriously wounded. According to Wallingford, immediately after Carlson was hit, he was bleeding a lot and Sergeant Wallingford gave him a shot of coagulant. It was too much coagulant because Carlson began to hallucinate. While hallucinating, Carlson tried to shoot at things coming out of the bunker wall and had to be disarmed. At some time on 8 April, the NVA heard Carlson, Wallingford, and Dummond in the bunker and began pouring gasoline onto the bunker and into the firing ports. The defenders assumed the NVA objective was to burn them out. The Americans, the Frenchman, and the ARVN crawled out of the bunker and surrendered because they feared being burned alive. On 9 April 1972, I was again taken to see Mr. Tra. He was now in Snoul. He said I would be well treated and that he would check on me. I interpreted his comment as soldier to soldier talk, not propaganda. That night we were separated from Mick Dummond and driven to the East on QL13. Late that night we were taken out of the jeep and walked all the rest of the night to a prison near to Kratie, Cambodia. They took my shoes and clothes. I marched in GI socks and a Sarong. The next morning we waited outside the camp. This was because the NVA didn't want us to see any other prisoners. While we waited, Major Carlson and Ken Wallingford counted my visible wounds. There were, from head to toe, thirty eight (38) holes in my body (Note 3). In closing this report of my observations on the Battle of Loc Ninh, I state: There were those on the ground and in the air who can debate their own participation and performance; as for my performance, the Battle of Loc Ninh was mine - I ran it all! For better or for worse, I did it.' MARK A. SMITH Major (Retired) United States Army Ground Commander, Battle of Loc Ninh

I am not kidding!!!

2008-07-04T06:23:49Z

Roxy Girl

0 raves

People think that I lie whenever I say that I have nver had a crush. Girls in my class used to tell me that I was CRAZY!!! But I am not . I am just not interested in boys. My frinds tell me that I am messed up. That at my age I should be getting interested in boys. Besides I am not that pretty.Let's be honest. I am not even pretty. I think that I am ugly So please write your comments if you would like to. I want to hear your thoughts. Do you believe me or not? What do you think about this message?

The whole TRUTH and nothing but The TRUTH!

2008-07-04T06:15:13Z

Eagle II

0 raves

On one side of the isle, we have the all returned crew, who, no matter what evidence is presented ( even from their golden boy John McCain see below ) they go into immediate denial that any one was left behind,. then character assassinate any one who disagrees. They throw their medals around as a way to intimidate those who would go against their grain.

Freedom of speech and expression is something I appreciate and I will not allow any one, no matter where they been or what they have done rob me of that freedom through intimidation. PERIOD

On the other side of the isle we have the nuts... good men who believe in the promise that "No Man will ever be intentionally left behind". The Nuts and weirdo's are a persistent lot and will not relent until all are home or in American soil. This miffs the all returned crew to the point that they will even try and disparage their own, other Nam PoW's who broke away from the circle and investigated. Col. Ted W. Guy was one of the nuts with guts, and this site is dedicated to his mission, a mission he started before he died, "Just say NO to John McCain". In items immediately following you will see the attempt to brand Col. Ted Guy a nut. These messages below were written between Nam PoWs and I. I have the originals with header information in tact .

Republican, Bob Smith of New Hampshire, wanted to travel to Moscow to ask Boris Yeltsin, leader of the Russian republic at the time,, to open the KGB files on POWs.

The following is a reply to Paul E. Galanti Commander, U.S. Navy (Retired) former PoW also known as "The Attitude Adjuster". A man I respect for "Returning With Honor" despite McCain. I never got an answer from Paul about the "Tiny Handful of men" McCain referenced, nor, why John McCain sealed all avenues concerning PoW/MIA and why John McCain sealed the NAMPoW Experience records from public inspection. In fact, all correspondence stopped after this send and Paul G. wrote back a one liner, "Do I know you?".

I grinned.

You will also see reference to Mark Smith ("..and Mark Smith, another wierdo who was never near McCain or our camps..") You can read about Maj. Mark Smith, Former PoW and holder of the Distinguished Service Cross at Army Ranger McDonald Valentine's website (click HERE). After the intro look for Major Smiths link.

A brief summation of a "wierdo" named Mark Smith. Smith who has more credentials than McCain and if Military service qualified one for the presidency ( it doesn't ) or time spent as pow ( it doesn't either) Mark Smith should be elected.

Zippo Smiths NVA Hunting Club RVN - 1966 to 1973 C Co. 1/506th BN 101 ABN 03/70 to 10/70 WIA / POW 1972 / 1973

MAJOR MARK A. SMITH, UNITED STATES ARMY, RETIRED, served on active duty for over twenty one years. His primary area of orientation was Asia. He served at least part of every year from 1965 to 1972 in the 2nd Indo-China War as either a Non-Commissioned Officer or, later, as an Officer. He was captured after the Battle of Loc Ninh RVN on 8 April 1972 during Escape and Evasion (E & E). He was released from a jungle prison camp in Kratie, Cambodia on 12 February 1973. He was the first U.S. Army POW returned to the United States on 14 February 1973.

Major Smith was given mandatory retirement in May 1985. In September of that year he sued President Ronald Reagan and his predecessors for the abandonment of American military men and civilians during the war in Southeast Asia.

Major Smith's combat awards include; Distinguished Service Cross, Silver Star, Eight Bronze Stars and four Purple Hearts.

-----------------REPLY STARTS HERE-------------------

Dear Pablo,

( Can I still call you Pablo? ) A few pictures stand out in my mind from the Vietnam PoW Experience.

Col. Ted Guy's is one. It was a pic just after shoot down in Laos and probably one taken for propaganda purposes. When Col. Guy saw the camera - he politely gave them the bird. He sent me that pic and unfortunately I can't find it. I know it's in my archives but remains in hiding - so be it.

The second is one you sent. The non-redacted version of you siting in a cell while your captors were trying to do propaganda shoots and you gave them the bird - that was airbrushed out by the States news media that published. That is also MIA or I'd include it with this reply. ( the bird: - for the blonds on board and barbijo in FL. the bird was not a parakeet or pigeon - the bird is an ancronym for the middle finger)

Wherefore, I want you to know from the start you are respected and admired for what you endured and for returning with Honor. I know you were with John McCain in a managerial position when he ran for President, I believe John McGrath (John McGrath is actually Mike - I know a John as well so often called Mike "John" ) also worked with McCain as well as Orson Swindle <-Swindle was misspelled by Joe and corrected here -> (SP) and a few others. That was your personal convictions and Lord knows more than earned right(s) to support who ever you chose.

All Navy Pilots who shared an experience.

You know where I stood. A no-one next to a monument - an ex USAF Fighter Jock named Col. Ted W. Guy. A man who endured yet has been chastised by many in NAMPoW for standing up for what he believed was truth. Because he believed - he became the groupie, sick, demented - a problem caused by his head injury's inflicted by the NVA while he was interned as PoW living a NO COMPROMISE HONOR existence in a hot cell in isolation most of the time. I know you worked with swiftvets & pows for the truth -along side others including one of Col. Ted Guy's best friends. Col. Larson.. the poster boy for those PoW's marched through the streets.

I know about Rathergate - and and Kopellgate - that sleezebag - but I also know how to read. Most of what you have stated were righteous issues many worked on nationally - not the few - as without the many who jumped in to hold up and support - no one would have walked any where, swiftvets, pow's for the truth, no one. It was ALL working together as ONE for a common cause that made the difference.

When I see you mention Schanberg helped snatch a victory I have to ask, given the statements about Col. Guy that came from NAM PoW's who were pissed off Col. Guy walked out of the circle, investigated; he felt betrayed and took a stand - are you making these statements because Schamberg investigated the "Public Record" available to all of what McCain has done to shut the doors on "live" pow mia and the entire issue, or because you belive your statement about the man who won the Pulitzer Prize for his 1975 coverage of political and social chaos in (very anti communist stance) Cambodia The man who's news reports and a best-selling book about his experiences in Southeast Asia became the basis for the Academy Award-winning film The Killing Fields. Paul was that anti US grunt or was tha an anti communist statement about what happened ex post facto the VN war? Have you read Schambergs article on McCain's anti-PoW.MIA stance? What he wrote is not hard to verify - specially McCains bullying and vilification of familiy members of those still missing or any one who brings up PoW/MIA and that men were left behind?

What do you fell about John McCains statement, "on the record in DC" that"

"McCain has said again and again that he has seen no "credible" evidence that more than a tiny handful of men might have been alive in captivity after the official prison return in 1973."

More than a tiny handful? Who's hand was used to measure the worth of just one life of any one held in captivity?

Pablo, ( in endearing names is not a nono now ) investigate. I asked that SwiftVets & PoW's for the Truth investigate - just Schanberg's statements, information readily available and report back with the truth.

My question to you is, WHY, if all came home ( but a tiny handful of men - John just happened to see - they are not my words ) WHY has he closed every door he could close on the issue so others who want to investigate can't or are totally frustrated, or as with some family members insulted, vilified and brought to tears.

Click Start Arrow to Play

McCain insults Delores Alfond, Chairperson of the National Alliance of Families for the Return of America's Missing, at the Senate Select Committee for POW/MIA Affairs in November 1992

Why? Why are records from the PoW experience SEALED - another work of John?

Click Start Arrow to Play

John McCain assaulted Jeannette Jenkins, cousin of an American missing in South Vietnam since May of 1965, by backhanding her against the wall. He then threatened a wheelchair-bound mother by raising his left arm as if to strike her before coming to his senses. He then pushed her wheelchair out of the way and abruptly continued down the hall.

The two speakers are Eleanor Apodaca, sister of a Vietnam War MIA, and Carol Hrdlicka, wife of a USAF pilot shot down in 1965. Photos demonstrate that Hrdlicka's husband was held in CAPTIVITY, yet he never returned after the war. She details her long experience with John McCain's betrayal of trust.

Let me print, as I am sure shortly, I will be on the alter, a few of the direct statements that were sent here about Col. Guy from the few NAM POW's who support "all came home". but first a word from Nam Historian Mike McGrath.

Date: Tue, 24 Aug 1999 12:12:34 +0000

I have had some quick exchanges with Swede (click here), Orson and others who have first hand knowledge. The story of the relationship between Ted (click here) and McCain is getting clearer. Seems that Ted did in fact tell La boutiller (Click Here - In sum, John McCain is not the man for the presidency. He is a fraud. ) (or what ever his name was) and others that he suspected that McCain left camp for six months....this was untrue.

Col. Guy was not into the "untrue" statement syndrome. I can not prove that McCain did so some one needs to prove that he did not - else - Col. Guy's statement is gospel. He was John McCains SRO. Being "tortured" at the plantation, well, ain't no one going to convince me he was as two SRO's have stated NO ONE at the Plantation was. Col. Guy & Col. Larson.

I have the following emails with headers in tact. when they are archived it is in machine readable ( by a mail reader only ) format so without the mail reader they are impossible to read. In order to "un archive" they must be brought back into the email reader they came from - so no alteration of header or other is possible.

They were sent to me with a request to read and erase.

I didn't agree with the later, but will not publish where they came from unless you really want me too. Just a few as they make the point I mentioned above and in the letter below.. if you stand up for those you feel were abandoned... if you go after those you feel impeded their recovery - you will be character asassinated or other..

Of course this all poured in after Col. Guy passed away..

------------ one jab--------------------------- Some NamPoW's said: ( not in any special order )

Joe...As much as you and Swede love Ted, I had differences of opinion with Ted. I don't have time to tell you about the (almost) violent shouting matches I had with Ted. In the end, I concluded that the head injuries Ted suffered with the beating he took in captivity was still taking its toll the couple of years before he died.

In short, he was not stable, he made irrational accusations about McCain which are unsubstantiated by fact. Ted (and Mark Smith, another wierdo who was never near McCain or our camps), was never "privy" to sensitive information as he claimed. I doubt that Ted was ever "SRO over McCain," ------------ two jabs------------------------- The conspiracy groups really got to Ted and sold him a bill of goods.

------------three jabs------------------------ I'm just expressing my opinion that Ted was "not all there." Something was wrong, and I think it started with the head injury in captivity.

Click Start Arrow to Play - This one takes a second!

------------ four-------------------------------------- I forgot about our exchange, thanks for the reminder. For example, on the faulty brain of Ted, take an objective look at the statement you sent: "Guy told folks that he suspected McCain left camp for six months...."

I don't mean to get into details tonight, but this exactly the type of horse *** that Ted was spreading....stupid baseless "suspicions" which impinge a man's integrity...and Ted didn't know what the hell he was talking about.

------------- I think these should be sufficient-------------------------

As to his dumb assertion that he had "facts," that some didn't get released, I could never get him to name a verifiable "fact" to me, a name of a single man, for example.

( Joes Note: If your reading this - please reread John's statement above -"... more than a tiny handful of men" - do you believe John? )

Enough banter...I have some data entry to work on. Thanks for the exchanges, and thanks for your great work on the Kerry issues.

I agree, enough banter. Public Record concerning the Schanberg article should be sufficient. Lets continue based on fact, facts that appear some want to keep swept under the rug.. Schanberg just glued them ( from public record and contact with McCain ) all together from the record. What say ye to just one simple question..

If none remained - why all the laws created by McCain to shut the doors to investigate? I think The Wall ( for one ) gave us that right to find out for ourselfs. The only nations that want things locked out of the publics eye are Dictatorial (Left or right wing) thank God we are no there yet, If some have there way - we would be held to the premise of royalty and serfs - where I must retort, Give me Liberty or Give me Death.

No need to brand me a fruit cake or other - what ever y'all dubbed Col. Guy - I'd be honored to have you lay on me.. I will take it as an Honor and Award and an affirmation that , SHITHOT Col. Guy - you did your job, you stood by those tiny hand full who were abandoned and I was proud to walk by your side for a moment in your life, you made a difference.

Finally

Who is Rod? Rod does a PoW/MIA news show on a radio station out of Colorado. He's one of the silent majority.

(( If I can't find your picture Pablo - tossing the bird at the cameras - despite all above - would you resend - I really respect what you did with that bird.. too bad - I think you and Col Guy would have settled the PoW/MIA issue in a shot time - if you had joined forces. At least you don't resort to name calling.. I resepct that.))

Now.. only wish I could find the Col.'s. pic in Laos tossing the bird. I'd send it to John McCain.

Despite the circumstances, it was nice hearing from you once again, Stay well.. Paul.

And thats the way it is...

Joe News & Views (Not Politically Correct, No Speil Chicker, No GrammaTics (Got Gramm a Tic Collar ) Not a Yes man. Houston, TX

bcc: sydney schanberg

Lets not forget Matt Maupin & Scott Speichter and the recent SEALMIA(s)

To the men and women who came home without Arms or Legs or both or other...

You are our hero's too. You have been sentenced to a life of Honor among many for your never ending sacrifice.. just wanted you to know as I dwell on PoW/MIA I dwell on what you gave so that I can print how I feel and see it -- you are NOT FORGOTTEN!

Piece written by:: Gerald 'Beak' Atkinson, CDR USN (Ret.) So, where does that leave us? You NAM-POW leaders have set in stone your own set of deceptions concerning the behavior of John McCain as a POW. John McCain knows what he did. You know what he did. And no one told the truth. Now you are stuck with it. And you have stuck our nation with it. As Sir Walter Scott wrote, "Oh what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive! Now that Carl Rove and the Republican spinmeisters are promoting the 'herohood' of John McCain, you have no one to blame but yourselves. It would have been so easy for John McCain to come clean and admit, very early on, that he gave military information to the enemy in order to obtain medical treatment for his very serious shootdown injuries, a level of treatment that essentially no other POW received. He could then have been 'forgiven' over time by the American public. But no, you kept on generating obfuscations, allowing John McCain to hide under the truly heroic efforts of some of you, and creating the 'Mythical John McCain.'

Each of you has demanded that I apologize to John McCain for the 'slander' that I have brought against him. That so-called 'slander' is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. It is you who should apologize. To your NAM-POW compatriots, to those of us who also fought alongside you in the Vietnam War, to your Naval Academy classmates, and most importantly to the American people.

As I said above, Beak's In! Let the fun begin!

The Mythical John McCain: A Conversation with the Leadership of the Vietnam War POWs The Second Round

Piece written by:: Gerald 'Beak' Atkinson, CDR USN (Ret.) According to the 'P.O.W.' book [pp. 566-574], Ted Guy was transferred to the reopened Plantation on 25 November 1970. [There] torture remained much in vogue [from the time it reopened in 1970 through early 1972, the year before the POWs returned home]. [Guy] remained isolated, but was now in a cell from which he was able to at least see other Americans…SRO Guy found that the bulk of the prisoner population was enlisted men and that they wanted nothing so much as strong leadership. He promulgated policies virtually identical to the BACK US policy Jim Stockdale had established at Hoa Lo years earlier, but urged a gradual buildup of the resistance campaign in order to soften the Vietnamese reaction."

Ted Guy was tortured during January/February 1972 [only 14 months before all of our POWs were returned home]. The torture chamber was filthy. For the first three days and nights Guy was allowed no sleep. He was stripped naked, locked in leg irons, and made to lie on his stomach. A guard stood on the backs of his legs, Cheese kept a foot on his neck, pinning his head to the floor, and another guard flogged him with a rubber hose. The beating lasted a long time. Guy lost control of his bodily functions, he vomited, and when the pain became more than he could bear, he screamed. Rags were crammed into his mouth and the flogging continued."

"In the long days and nights that followed, torture guards who enjoyed their work took turns inflicting long beatings with their fists … During one stretch Guy was kept kneeling for approximately eighteen hours. His knees were swollen to the extent that he could not pull his trouser legs over them. When he refused to author a confession of crimes, he was made to kneel again, this time atop an iron bar…The torture ended for Guy when after ten days and nights, he produced an acceptable confession, an apology, and an agreement to do anything that was asked of him. Then he was asked to write a letter of 'solidarity' and encouragement to the Vietnam Veterans Against the War. When he balked at this, he was ordered back onto his knees and offered another round of torture. Unable to tolerate the prospect, he yielded…Although Ted Guy did not receive the most brutal torture dished out by the North Vietnamese - such as that recorded at the Zoo by the Cubans - he withstood brutal torture for much longer than the average at one of the most brutal camps, such as the Briarpatch." Although not a Medal of Honor winner, it appears that Ted Guy and James Stockdale had parallel experiences in Hanoi.

So, why have the NAM-POW leaders forsaken Ted Guy, one of their own, in favor of James Stockdale - who was not there when John McCain traded military information for medical treatment while held in the North Vietnamese hospital? Why has Ted Guy been thrown under the bus and James Stockdale lionized? Could it be because the NAM-POW leadership has become 'politicized' and bray into the wind about their 'hero,' John McCain to an unknowing American public?

Why would they disown and attempt to discredit and disgrace one of their own - Ted Guy - a POW who has been dead for nearly a decade -- in order to establish cover for John McCain? For shame! But now, Ted Guy has risen from the grave to tell the truth about John McCain. And whether the NAM-POW leadership likes it or not, one's credibility is based on TRUTH, not heat and emotion in the midst of a political battle - no matter how crucial the outcome!

Piece written by: Gerald 'Beak' Atkinson, CDR USN (Ret.)

In response to the second question, "If it wasn't mentioned back in 1973, why is someone suddenly discovering a 'recollection' 35 years later? The time to make those sorts of statements was after they returned," This is easy to answer -- the pathway is clear. Ted Guy had no quarrel with McCain during their years together at the Plantation. As explained in the two original essays on the subject (see above), Ted became an activist in the POW/MIA movement years after their homecoming and came to believe that Senator McCain had betrayed the MIAs by joining Senator John Kerry during the early 1990s in 'squashing' the POW/MIA matter. It was then that Ted Guy gathered the 'details' of John McCain's early behavior at the North Vietnamese hospital, which was readily available by declassification of documents by the Pentagon in the 1987 time frame.

When Ted Guy learned that McCain was making a run for the presidency in 2000, he sent me a package which contained the 'details' of McCain's 'interviews with the communist correspondents in Hanoi. He had found me though a chain that included ADM Moorer's public defense of Bob Stumpf, RADM C.A. 'Mark' Hill's public exposition of it in his 'corner' on my website, and my public documentation of it in The Washington Times. Ted Guy had no intention of 'trashing' McCain's reputation. But when he learned that McCain was running for the nomination for president in 2000 he knew he had to speak out. Ted Guy swore me to secrecy unless McCain won the South Carolina primary in 2000. I kept that promise when Bush won the nomination. Ted Guy died of cancer in 1999.

I did not take Ted Guy's word for granted -- that is, as fact -- in my public exposition of this matter. I spent hours and hours pouring over both the 'P.O.W' book and the 'Honor Bound' book -- over 1,400 pages in all -- read every word and paper-clipped all the pertinent pages. I found that, if one took the time to follow the time-sequenced trail of each of the principal 'actors,' in the saga, McCain indeed behaved as I have described. Both books back up what is published in this Blog, beginning with McCain's own public confession in his 'U.S. News & World Report' article on the subject in 1973, that he 'gave military information in exchange for medical treatment' at the North Vietnamese hospital. All Ted Guy did was provide the shocking details of what that information was.

Consequently, the 35-year-delay in this 'recollection' is due simply to the random set of circumstances surrounding this matter and the fact that we now know that Ted Guy -- the decade-or-so old dead guy -- has spoken from the grave on a very important matter of John McCain's character and his fitness to lead this nation as we near the next 'Social Moment' in our history.

Thus, a close look at the official record reveals that John McCain indeed 'Sang Like a Canary' to his North Vietnamese captors during his stay in their hospital from four days after his capture (26 October 1967) until around the middle of December 1967 -- at which time he was transferred to the Plantation prison complex. This record should put to rest the TRUTH of the matter. The NAM-POW Leadership is wrong, dead wrong on this matter -- Ted Guy was right.

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Christopher Hitchens in Vanity Fair | Believe Me, It’s Torture

2008-07-04T05:44:49Z

Stacey A. Ward~NBA|HRCSObama

0 raves

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/08/hitchens2... The author catches his breath after undergoing his first waterboarding session. Photographs by Gasper Tringale. Believe Me, It’s Torture What more can be added to the debate over U.S. interrogation methods, and whether waterboarding is torture? Try firsthand experience. The author undergoes the controversial drowning technique, at the hands of men who once trained American soldiers to resist—not inflict—it. by Christopher Hitchens August 2008 Here is the most chilling way I can find of stating the matter. Until recently, “waterboarding” was something that Americans did to other Americans. It was inflicted, and endured, by those members of the Special Forces who underwent the advanced form of training known as sere (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape). In these harsh exercises, brave men and women were introduced to the sorts of barbarism that they might expect to meet at the hands of a lawless foe who disregarded the Geneva Conventions. But it was something that Americans were being trained to resist, not to inflict. Exploring this narrow but deep distinction, on a gorgeous day last May I found myself deep in the hill country of western North Carolina, preparing to be surprised by a team of extremely hardened veterans who had confronted their country’s enemies in highly arduous terrain all over the world. They knew about everything from unarmed combat to enhanced interrogation and, in exchange for anonymity, were going to show me as nearly as possible what real waterboarding might be like. View a video of Hitchens’s waterboarding experience. http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/video/2008/hitche... It goes without saying that I knew I could stop the process at any time, and that when it was all over I would be released into happy daylight rather than returned to a darkened cell. But it’s been well said that cowards die many times before their deaths, and it was difficult for me to completely forget the clause in the contract of indemnification that I had signed. This document (written by one who knew) stated revealingly: “Water boarding” is a potentially dangerous activity in which the participant can receive serious and permanent (physical, emotional and psychological) injuries and even death, including injuries and death due to the respiratory and neurological systems of the body. As the agreement went on to say, there would be safeguards provided “during the ‘water boarding’ process, however, these measures may fail and even if they work properly they may not prevent Hitchens from experiencing serious injury or death.” On the night before the encounter I got to sleep with what I thought was creditable ease, but woke early and knew at once that I wasn’t going back to any sort of doze or snooze. The first specialist I had approached with the scheme had asked my age on the telephone and when told what it was (I am 59) had laughed out loud and told me to forget it. Waterboarding is for Green Berets in training, or wiry young jihadists whose teeth can bite through the gristle of an old goat. It’s not for wheezing, paunchy scribblers. For my current “handlers” I had had to produce a doctor’s certificate assuring them that I did not have asthma, but I wondered whether I should tell them about the 15,000 cigarettes I had inhaled every year for the last several decades. I was feeling apprehensive, in other words, and beginning to wish I hadn’t given myself so long to think about it. I have to be opaque about exactly where I was later that day, but there came a moment when, sitting on a porch outside a remote house at the end of a winding country road, I was very gently yet firmly grabbed from behind, pulled to my feet, pinioned by my wrists (which were then cuffed to a belt), and cut off from the sunlight by having a black hood pulled over my face. I was then turned around a few times, I presume to assist in disorienting me, and led over some crunchy gravel into a darkened room. Well, mainly darkened: there were some oddly spaced bright lights that came as pinpoints through my hood. And some weird music assaulted my ears. (I’m no judge of these things, but I wouldn’t have expected former Special Forces types to be so fond of New Age techno-disco.) The outside world seemed very suddenly very distant indeed. Arms already lost to me, I wasn’t able to flail as I was pushed onto a sloping board and positioned with my head lower than my heart. (That’s the main point: the angle can be slight or steep.) Then my legs were lashed together so that the board and I were one single and trussed unit. Not to bore you with my phobias, but if I don’t have at least two pillows I wake up with acid reflux and mild sleep apnea, so even a merely supine position makes me uneasy. And, to tell you something I had been keeping from myself as well as from my new experimental friends, I do have a fear of drowning that comes from a bad childhood moment on the Isle of Wight, when I got out of my depth. As a boy reading the climactic torture scene of 1984, where what is in Room 101 is the worst thing in the world, I realize that somewhere in my version of that hideous chamber comes the moment when the wave washes over me. Not that that makes me special: I don’t know anyone who likes the idea of drowning. As mammals we may have originated in the ocean, but water has many ways of reminding us that when we are in it we are out of our element. In brief, when it comes to breathing, give me good old air every time. You may have read by now the official lie about this treatment, which is that it “simulates” the feeling of drowning. This is not the case. You feel that you are drowning because you are drowning—or, rather, being drowned, albeit slowly and under controlled conditions and at the mercy (or otherwise) of those who are applying the pressure. The “board” is the instrument, not the method. You are not being boarded. You are being watered. This was very rapidly brought home to me when, on top of the hood, which still admitted a few flashes of random and worrying strobe light to my vision, three layers of enveloping towel were added. In this pregnant darkness, head downward, I waited for a while until I abruptly felt a slow cascade of water going up my nose. Determined to resist if only for the honor of my navy ancestors who had so often been in peril on the sea, I held my breath for a while and then had to exhale and—as you might expect—inhale in turn. The inhalation brought the damp cloths tight against my nostrils, as if a huge, wet paw had been suddenly and annihilatingly clamped over my face. Unable to determine whether I was breathing in or out, and flooded more with sheer panic than with mere water, I triggered the pre-arranged signal and felt the unbelievable relief of being pulled upright and having the soaking and stifling layers pulled off me. I find I don’t want to tell you how little time I lasted. This is because I had read that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, invariably referred to as the “mastermind” of the atrocities of September 11, 2001, had impressed his interrogators by holding out for upwards of two minutes before cracking. (By the way, this story is not confirmed. My North Carolina friends jeered at it. “Hell,” said one, “from what I heard they only washed his damn face before he babbled.”) But, hell, I thought in my turn, no Hitchens is going to do worse than that. Well, O.K., I admit I didn’t outdo him. And so then I said, with slightly more bravado than was justified, that I’d like to try it one more time. There was a paramedic present who checked my racing pulse and warned me about adrenaline rush. An interval was ordered, and then I felt the mask come down again. Steeling myself to remember what it had been like last time, and to learn from the previous panic attack, I fought down the first, and some of the second, wave of nausea and terror but soon found that I was an abject prisoner of my gag reflex. The interrogators would hardly have had time to ask me any questions, and I knew that I would quite readily have agreed to supply any answer. I still feel ashamed when I think about it. Also, in case it’s of interest, I have since woken up trying to push the bedcovers off my face, and if I do anything that makes me short of breath I find myself clawing at the air with a horrible sensation of smothering and claustrophobia. No doubt this will pass. As if detecting my misery and shame, one of my interrogators comfortingly said, “Any time is a long time when you’re breathing water.” I could have hugged him for saying so, and just then I was hit with a ghastly sense of the sadomasochistic dimension that underlies the relationship between the torturer and the tortured. I apply the Abraham Lincoln test for moral casuistry: “If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.” Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture. Hitchens is helped up after signaling for the waterboarding to stop. I am somewhat proud of my ability to “keep my head,” as the saying goes, and to maintain presence of mind under trying circumstances. I was completely convinced that, when the water pressure had become intolerable, I had firmly uttered the pre-determined code word that would cause it to cease. But my interrogator told me that, rather to his surprise, I had not spoken a word. I had activated the “dead man’s handle” that signaled the onset of unconsciousness. So now I have to wonder about the role of false memory and delusion. What I do recall clearly, though, is a hard finger feeling for my solar plexus as the water was being poured. What was that for? “That’s to find out if you are trying to cheat, and timing your breathing to the doses. If you try that, we can outsmart you. We have all kinds of enhancements.” I was briefly embarrassed that I hadn’t earned or warranted these refinements, but it hit me yet again that this is certainly the language of torture. Maybe I am being premature in phrasing it thus. Among the veterans there are at least two views on all this, which means in practice that there are two opinions on whether or not “waterboarding” constitutes torture. I have had some extremely serious conversations on the topic, with two groups of highly decent and serious men, and I think that both cases have to be stated at their strongest. The team who agreed to give me a hard time in the woods of North Carolina belong to a highly honorable group. This group regards itself as out on the front line in defense of a society that is too spoiled and too ungrateful to appreciate those solid, underpaid volunteers who guard us while we sleep. These heroes stay on the ramparts at all hours and in all weather, and if they make a mistake they may be arraigned in order to scratch some domestic political itch. Faced with appalling enemies who make horror videos of torture and beheadings, they feel that they are the ones who confront denunciation in our press, and possible prosecution. As they have just tried to demonstrate to me, a man who has been waterboarded may well emerge from the experience a bit shaky, but he is in a mood to surrender the relevant information and is unmarked and undamaged and indeed ready for another bout in quite a short time. When contrasted to actual torture, waterboarding is more like foreplay. No thumbscrew, no pincers, no electrodes, no rack. Can one say this of those who have been captured by the tormentors and murderers of (say) Daniel Pearl? On this analysis, any call to indict the United States for torture is therefore a lame and diseased attempt to arrive at a moral equivalence between those who defend civilization and those who exploit its freedoms to hollow it out, and ultimately to bring it down. I myself do not trust anybody who does not clearly understand this viewpoint. Against it, however, I call as my main witness Mr. Malcolm Nance. Mr. Nance is not what you call a bleeding heart. In fact, speaking of the coronary area, he has said that, in battlefield conditions, he “would personally cut bin Laden’s heart out with a plastic M.R.E. spoon.” He was to the fore on September 11, 2001, dealing with the burning nightmare in the debris of the Pentagon. He has been involved with the sere program since 1997. He speaks Arabic and has been on al-Qaeda’s tail since the early 1990s. His most recent book, The Terrorists of Iraq, is a highly potent analysis both of the jihadist threat in Mesopotamia and of the ways in which we have made its life easier. I passed one of the most dramatic evenings of my life listening to his cold but enraged denunciation of the adoption of waterboarding by the United States. The argument goes like this: 1. Waterboarding is a deliberate torture technique and has been prosecuted as such by our judicial arm when perpetrated by others. 2. If we allow it and justify it, we cannot complain if it is employed in the future by other regimes on captive U.S. citizens. It is a method of putting American prisoners in harm’s way. 3. It may be a means of extracting information, but it is also a means of extracting junk information. (Mr. Nance told me that he had heard of someone’s being compelled to confess that he was a hermaphrodite. I later had an awful twinge while wondering if I myself could have been “dunked” this far.) To put it briefly, even the C.I.A. sources for the Washington Post story on waterboarding conceded that the information they got out of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was “not all of it reliable.” Just put a pencil line under that last phrase, or commit it to memory. 4. It opens a door that cannot be closed. Once you have posed the notorious “ticking bomb” question, and once you assume that you are in the right, what will you not do? Waterboarding not getting results fast enough? The terrorist’s clock still ticking? Well, then, bring on the thumbscrews and the pincers and the electrodes and the rack. Masked by these arguments, there lurks another very penetrating point. Nance doubts very much that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed lasted that long under the water treatment (and I am pathetically pleased to hear it). It’s also quite thinkable, if he did, that he was trying to attain martyrdom at our hands. But even if he endured so long, and since the United States has in any case bragged that in fact he did, one of our worst enemies has now become one of the founders of something that will someday disturb your sleep as well as mine. To quote Nance: Torture advocates hide behind the argument that an open discussion about specific American interrogation techniques will aid the enemy. Yet, convicted Al Qaeda members and innocent captives who were released to their host nations have already debriefed the world through hundreds of interviews, movies and documentaries on exactly what methods they were subjected to and how they endured. Our own missteps have created a cadre of highly experienced lecturers for Al Qaeda’s own virtual sere school for terrorists. Which returns us to my starting point, about the distinction between training for something and training to resist it. One used to be told—and surely with truth—that the lethal fanatics of al-Qaeda were schooled to lie, and instructed to claim that they had been tortured and maltreated whether they had been tortured and maltreated or not. Did we notice what a frontier we had crossed when we admitted and even proclaimed that their stories might in fact be true? I had only a very slight encounter on that frontier, but I still wish that my experience were the only way in which the words “waterboard” and “American” could be mentioned in the same (gasping and sobbing) breath.

I Reaffirm My Allegiance

2008-07-04T05:27:56Z

Stacey A. Ward~NBA|HRCSObama

+1 raves

I Reaffirm My Allegiance By Anonymous Thursday, July 3, 2008; 12:00 AM The following article appeared in The Post as an anonymous letter to the editor on July 4, 1976. If you have a suggestion for a column or editorial you'd like to see RePosted, send it to reposted@washingtonpost.com. --- What am I? I am a free man -- a good and decent man -- a man of compassion, generosity, and understanding -- a true friend, a steadfast ally, and a bitter foe. I owe my allegiance to a government founded in the belief that among the rights of man are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Indeed, I would acknowledge no other. I can redress my government for injury; not satisfied with redress, I can elect a new one. I have watched my government function smoothly during periods of transfer of power caused by re-election, assassination, and resignation. While other nations have a distinct race, religion, and/or geographic denominator, I live among people of my home without fear of intrusion by anyone -- citizen or government designee -- unless they have my personal invitation or a duly authorized search warrant. ad_icon I have a press to keep me informed -- a press free to write, without inhibition, the truth as they see it. A press that needs fear no repression, no retaliation, no censorship so long as it prints the truth. I live under a system of justice, merciful and fairly administered, where I am assumed innocent until proven guilty -- a system which provides me appellate privilege while denying it to the power of the state. I am free to go anywhere I want, earn my living in any way that suits me and, based on that freedom, I have created a standard of living unequalled in the history of man and envied the world over. I have suffered in humility at the consequences of my mistakes -- economic deprivation, social injustice, unequal opportunity and racial prejudice to name a few -- but, once aware of these mistakes, I have set out to right the wrongs they created. I have faced challenges to my way of life. I have fought and died countless times from Lexington and Concord to Vietnam. I was humbled at Valley Forge, Pearl Harbor, Corregidor and Malmady. But these experiences gave me the character I needed to go to Yorktown, Gettysburg, Midway and Normandy. I cherish my freedom above all else -- I bow to no tyrant. I am two hundred years old today. I have never been so proud of my ancient heritage, so grateful for my present situation, and so confident of the future. Today, I reaffirm my allegiance to, faith in, and love of my country. To the proposition that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth, I do humbly pledge my life, my fortune, and my sacred honor. I am an American.