Wednesday, August 11, 2004

How the Swift Boat groups operated

Balloon Juice has a great post that describes the operation and deployment of Swift boat units. Why is this important? One of the main talking points for the Democrats is that the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth who have come out against Kerry did not serve in Kerry's boat.

My thought process has been, that's nice, but at least the Swiftees know how the boats operated, their missions, their duties, and Kerry's actions in multi-boat firefights. Now, however, I feel better educated.

Why? Swift boats were deployed in UNITS, not on individual patrols like Apocalypse Now. I imagined the Coppola-fied version but that's not how Kerry operated.

Instead, the Swiftees were billeted at various naval bases, trained together and had multiboat patrol and combat missions. In other words, the Swift boats operated like aquatic fighter squadrons on Vietnamese rivers and along Vietnam's shores, much like aerial fighter patrols fly multiple planes together.

More from the Juicers:
Media Matters, the wholly owned subsidiarity of the DNC, funded by George Soros, has been quick to pass out the talking points:

Despite the ad's claim, members of the group did not serve with Senator John Kerry on his swift boat in Vietnam. Not only did the programs ignore that fact, but FOX News Channel hosts Sean Hannity and Alan Colmes went so far as to call them Kerry's "fellow crewmates."


You see where this is going, don't you? They were not on the actual boat with Kerry, so therefore they have no idea who the man is or what he was like during the time in question. Except, of course, this defies reality. As I stated last night, you almost have to admire the brazenness and the audacity of those willing to make this statement, because it is so misleading and stupid that surely they must be afriad of being caught.


Go check out the Balloon Juice post (link in title to this post), very detailed; and check out QandO for pictures from Kerry's service time that show the boats on river patrol.

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