QandO

August 10, 2004

The Tale of Two Stories
Posted by McQ

Dale has covered this, but I wanted to add my two-cents worth.

James Rassmann makes the following case today in the WSJ about the "No Man Left Behind" story that he and Kerry tell about his rescue:

On March 13, 1969, John Kerry's courage and leadership saved my life.

While returning from a SEA LORDS operation along the Bay Hap River, a mine detonated under another swift boat. Machine-gun fire erupted from both banks of the river, and a second explosion followed moments later. The second blast blew me off John's swift boat, PCF-94, throwing me into the river. Fearing that the other boats would run me over, I swam to the bottom of the river and stayed there as long as I could hold my breath.

When I surfaced, all the swift boats had left, and I was alone taking fire from both banks. To avoid

the incoming fire, I repeatedly swam under water as long as I could hold my breath, attempting to make it to the north bank of the river. I thought I would die right there. The odds were against me avoiding the incoming fire and, even if I made it out of the river, I thought I'd be captured and executed. Kerry must have seen me in the water and directed his driver, Del Sandusky, to turn the boat around. Kerry's boat ran up to me in the water, bow on, and I was able to climb up a cargo net to the lip of the deck. But, because I was nearly upside down, I couldn't make it over the edge of the deck. This left me hanging out in the open, a perfect target. John, already wounded by the explosion that threw me off his boat, came out onto the bow, exposing himself to the fire directed at us from the jungle, and pulled me aboard.

That's the story and he's sticking with it. Rassmann tells of his worries, etc. about being killed by fire from the banks or being captured and executed. He says he fell of Kerry's boat after a 2nd huge explosion, when both banks "erupted" in hostile machine gun fire.

One problem .... no one else who was there seems to remember it that way. In fact, not even Kerry or his crew remember it that way. Kerry's account in Douglas Brinkley's "Tour of Duty," places Jim Rassmann on the PCF-3 and not his PCF-94 boat.

Neither Kerry nor his crewmembers have ever claimed their boat, the PCF-94, had ever struck a mine and blown out of the water. The only boat that hit a mine and was lifted 2-3 feet out of the water was the PCF-3 on March 13, 1969. In fact, Kerry's PCF-94 had to tow the PCF-3 after it had hit the mine because it was so badly damaged from the explosion

But that's not what Rassmann says ... so if Kerry doesn't remember it that way and his crew doesn't remember it this way, why in the world should we believe this story from Rassmann?

To further compound Rassmann's story problems, there is the testimony of other sailors on the scene that day to include the commanders of two other boats. They tell the story this way:

As recounted in the affidavits of Van Odell (Exhibit 6), Jack Chenoweth (Exhibit 7), and Larry Thurlow (Exhibit 10) (and verified by every other officer present and many others), a mine went off under PCF 3 -- some yards from Kerry's boat. The force of the explosion disabled PCF 3 and knocked several sailors, dazed, into the water. All boats, except one, closed to rescue the sailors and defend the disabled boat. That boat -- Kerry's boat -- fled the scene. After a short period, it was evident to all on the scene that there was no additional hostile fire. Thurlow began the daring rescue of disabled PCF 3, while Chenoweth began to pluck dazed survivors of PCF 3 from the water. Midway through the process, after it was apparent that there was no hostile fire, Kerry finally returned, picking up Rassman who was only a few yards from Chenoweth's boat which was also going to pick Rassman up.

Kerry describes "boats rcd heavy A/W and S/A from both banks. Fire continued for about 5000 meters." Exhibit 17. In other words, the boats went through a double gauntlet at about 50 yards distance that was 3.2 miles long (comparable to Seminary Ridge at Gettysburg on two sides), and yet none of the other boats within feet of Kerry's boat heard a shot or suffered an injury after the PCF 3 mine explosion, except for John Kerry's buttocks rice wound of earlier origin.

This is information found in a letter from the lawyers of the Swift Boat Vets for Truth in answer to the DNC lawyer demands that TV stations in battleground states cease and desist running the ad because it is a collection of lies.

So we have multiple people who were there, to include Kerry and his crew, saying Rassmann wasn't even on the 94 boat with Rassmann claiming he was. We have Rassmann claiming there was a 2nd explosion while none of the others say there was. And last we have Kerry and Rassmann claiming there was hostile fire, when the crews of the other three boats involved, say there was none.

So, with Rassmann's version so out of kilter with just about everyone elses (to include Kerry and crew on two of the points), why in the world should we give his story any crediblity at all?

In Rassmann's defense, its been over 30 years and he's probably told the "revised" version so many times he may actually believe that's what happened now. But for the other Swifties who had no reason to tell it any way but the way it happened (as that was dramatic enough) its interesting that they, 30 plus years later, seem to all remember it the same, but completely differently than Rassmann (and Kerry).

So who's telling the truth? Well I'd have to fall on the side of the SBVT version. If a boat is disabled, the first thing you do is secure it and rescue/treat the crew. If there were hostile fire that would be a very difficult task and its very hard to believe that none of the boats doing the rescuing would escape at least damage from rounds impacting from the machine guns which were supposedly erupting from each bank. But none of the PCFs, to include the 3 boat or the 94 boat, had any such damage. Trust me, the VC were not that poor as marksman. Had there actually been fire, the evidence would have been there.

Rassmann apparently got blown off the PCF3 boat. Might he have been a little loopy from a mine powerful enough to lift the 3 boat 2 feet in the air? Could he have been confused? You bet. But that possibility is never raised. He, of all the participants and because of what had happened to him, was the most likely not to remember "how it really happened".

But to stick to the story in the face of a huge volume of conflicting testimony, to include that of Kerry, makes his credibility suspect. Its the "its my story and I'm stickin' with it" defense, and its beginning to fall apart.

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