Closest to Kerry stay steadfast
Bay Area vet: Attacks hurt the entire crew

Chip Johnson
Monday, August 30, 2004



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The veterans slinging mud at Democratic presidential candidate John
Kerry's military record can run as many negative TV ads as they can
afford, but it's not going to change Mike Medeiros' mind.

Nor will it persuade James Rassmann, the special forces soldier Kerry
fished out of the Bay Hap River in March 1969.

Unlike Steve Gardner, the veteran who served on Kerry's first boat and
appears in an anti-Kerry TV ad, Medeiros -- or "Duke" as he was known
back then -- was on board with Kerry that day 35 years ago, a day that
has become a focus of the 2004 presidential campaign. Medeiros sat in
the tail gunner's position aboard PCF-94, the river patrol swift boat
under the command of the 26-year-old second lieutenant from
Massachusetts.

"I'm a little befuddled by all of this, because I don't know what the
conflict is all about," said Medeiros, 56, a San Leandro resident and
active- duty staff sergeant assigned to Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas.

"Not only do I remember being fired on, I remember seeing VC (Viet
Cong) jump up, run and dive behind bushes along the bank," Medeiros
said. He also remembered returning fire on the riverbank.

Medeiros has remained a loyal crew member, as has everyone who was
under Kerry's command that day. He has been on Kerry's side of the
renewed fight over his military service record since it first surfaced
during his Senate run in 1996. Now a Vietnam veterans group called the
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth has forced the controversy to the
forefront of the presidential campaign.

That group, led by other commanders who were there that day, has
challenged the Massachusetts' senator's version of events on the river
and questioned the injuries that earned him a Purple Heart, which he
received for catching shrapnel in his buttocks after dropping a hand
grenade into a large rice bin.

"I saw blood on the back of his pants," Medeiros said.

While Kerry's actions during the battle continue to stir the debate,
most people agree on the essential facts of the incident.

Kerry was one of five swift boat commanders whose vessels formed a
flotilla making its way up the Bay Hap River to deliver friendly
forces upriver and show the U.S. flag as a deterrent to raids on river
commerce. As the swift boats veered past a fishing net set up in the
river, PCF-94 went right and swift boat PCF-3, commanded by Richard
Pees, went left.

Just as the lead boats were about to clear the obstacle, the other
boat crews watched an explosion lift Pees' 26-ton vessel 3 feet out of
the water, Medeiros said.

"I could see the screws," he said referring to boat's propellers. The
explosion was a mine detonated by a guerrilla fighter concealed on the
riverbank.

And the confusion caused by the first explosion has lingered for years
afterward.

Competing accounts

Several competing versions have surfaced, including a detailed account
by John O'Neill, a former swift boat commander and the author of
"Unfit for Command," a book highly critical of Kerry's account of his
military service.

Moments after the first explosion, a second blast -- either another
mine or a rocket-propelled grenade -- rocked Kerry's boat and slammed
him against the pilothouse wall, injuring his arm. The blast also
knocked Rassmann into the river.

Kerry's critics, including O'Neill in his book, claim Kerry charged
his boat upriver in an attempt to escape the ambush. They also claim
he was not under enemy fire.

No one disputes that Kerry turned his boat around and fished out
Rassmann.

Insult to whole crew

Thirty-five years later, Medeiros is fighting the battle all over
again, and not only because it has become a touchstone in the
presidential campaign. He views the attempt at revisionist history as
a personal insult.

"I probably know a great many of the veterans who were angry with him
(Kerry) for his actions after the war, and they have every right to
be, but their approach is all wrong," he said, referring to the
negative ad campaign. "It's not only Kerry's integrity they're
questioning," he said, "it's all of us.''

But it became clear last week that the swift boat group -- backed by
top Republican campaign contributors from Texas with administrative
support from people close to the Bush camp -- may have some integrity
problems of its own.

Backing their commander

Medeiros and Rassmann appeared alongside Kerry at the Democratic
National Convention, and Rassmann went to Bush's ranch in Crawford,
Texas, to ask the president to denounce the television ads that attack
Kerry.

If integrity and accuracy are at the crux of the battle between Kerry
and his detractors, why wasn't it an issue when Kerry was not a
national figure?

If Lt. j.g. John Kerry's actions were so egregious on that day, why
isn't his negligence noted in the after-action report, which is
supposed to be reviewed and approved by all the commanders in an
incident?

The same commanders who are now challenging Kerry's recounting of
events are some of the ones who approved the after-action report that
noted the presence of heavy and small-arms fire.

"I don't know if it is so much a lapse of memory as it is a specific
agenda," said Medeiros