Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

TexasTowelie

(111,303 posts)
Sun Mar 29, 2015, 11:25 PM Mar 2015

American Pravda: What Was McCain's True Wartime Record in Vietnam?

[font color=green]The story begins with commentary about Tokyo Rose and how she was tried for treason for her radio broadcasts. Considering that McCain's father was a four-star admiral it is possible that McCain received preferential treatment while he was a POW and by the press after his release.[/font]



...

My earliest recollections of John McCain are vague. I think he first came to my attention during the mid-1980s, perhaps after 1982 when he won an open Congressional seat in Arizona or more likely once he was elected in 1986 to the U.S. Senate seat of retiring conservative icon Barry Goldwater. All media accounts about him seemed strongly favorable, describing his steadfastness as a POW during more than five grim years of torture by his Vietnamese jailers, with the extent of his wartime physical suffering indicated by the famous photo showing him still on crutches as he was greeted by President Nixon many months after his return from enemy captivity. I never had the slightest doubts about this story or his war-hero status.

McCain’s public image took a beating at the end of the 1980s when he became one of the senators caught up in the Keating Five financial scandal, but he managed to survive that controversy unlike most of the others. Soon thereafter he became prominent as a leading national advocate of campaign finance reform, a strong pro-immigrant voice, and also a champion of normalizing our relations with Vietnam, positions that appealed to me as much as they did to the national media. By 2000 my opinion had become sufficiently favorable that I donated to his underdog challenge to Gov. George W. Bush in the Republican primaries of that year, and was thrilled when he did surprisingly well in some of the early contests and suddenly had a serious shot at the nomination. However, he then suffered an unexpected defeat in South Carolina, as the large block of local military voters swung decisively against him. According to widespread media reports, the main cause was an utterly scurrilous whispering campaign by Karl Rove and his henchmen, which even included appalling accusations that the great war-hero candidate had been a “traitor” in Vietnam. My only conclusion was that the filthy lies sometimes found in American politics were even worse than I’d ever imagined.

Although in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, I turned sharply against McCain due to his support for an extremely bellicose foreign policy, I never had any reason to question his background or his integrity, and my strong opposition to his 2008 presidential run was entirely on policy grounds: I feared his notoriously hot temper might easily get us into additional disastrous wars.

Everything suddenly changed in June 2008 when I read a long article by an unfamiliar writer on the leftist Counterpunch website. Shocking claims were made that McCain may never have been tortured and that he instead spent his wartime captivity collaborating with his captors and broadcasting Communist propaganda, a possibility that seemed almost incomprehensible to me given all the thousands of contrary articles that I had absorbed over the decades from the mainstream media. How could this one article on a small website be the truth about McCain’s war record and everything else be total falsehood? The evidence was hardly overwhelming, with the piece being thinly sourced and written in a meandering fashion by an obscure author, but the claims were so astonishing that I made some effort to investigate the matter, though without any real success.


Read more: http://www.unz.com/runz/american-pravda-when-tokyo-rose-ran-for-president/
11 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies

haikugal

(6,476 posts)
1. Kick...worth the read though not news to me it may well be to others.
Sun Mar 29, 2015, 11:37 PM
Mar 2015

From the above article...

In 1993 the front page of the New York Times broke the story that a Politburo transcript found in the Kremlin archives fully confirmed the existence of the additional POWs, and when interviewed on the PBS Newshour former National Security Advisors Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski admitted that the document was very likely correct and that hundreds of America’s Vietnam POWs had indeed been left behind. In my opinion, the reality of Schanberg’s POW story is now about as solidly established as anything can be that has not yet received an official blessing from the American mainstream media. And the total dishonesty of that media regarding both the POW story and McCain’s leading role in the later cover up soon made me very suspicious of all those other claims regarding John McCain’s supposedly heroic war record. Our American Pravda is simply not to be trusted on any “touchy” topics.

TexasTowelie

(111,303 posts)
3. I have not used Ron Unz or American Pravda as a source before;
Mon Mar 30, 2015, 12:17 AM
Mar 2015

therefore, I wanted to leave an "out" since I couldn't verify the veracity of the report.

In response to your comment, I also checked and learned that Ron Unz ran for governor of California as a Republican in 1994. My apologies for not being aware of his political background. I believe that I stumbled across the report when I went to MondoWeiss.com on a story on Netanyahu.

TexasTowelie

(111,303 posts)
11. Thanks for the kind comments.
Mon Mar 30, 2015, 05:55 PM
Mar 2015

I took a beating in another thread a couple of days ago (my fault) so it is nice to get some support to even things out.

marble falls

(56,358 posts)
4. McCain may be pure embaressment now, but being a POW is not why this former sailor thinks ....
Mon Mar 30, 2015, 12:31 AM
Mar 2015

he was a hero.



McCain saved lives that day and walked through flames to do it suffering some third degree burns.

The whole thing started when an a swabie backed a jet warmer up to the nose of a heat seeking missile loaded on an aircraft. The Navy records all aspect of a flight deck and I saw the footage first in '72.

How he left his first wife after coming home from Hanoi was a major disappointment for me. Rate right up there with Newt Gingrich.

The whole Forrestal episode can be read here:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/rocket-causes-deadly-fire-on-aircraft-carrier
 

nikto

(3,284 posts)
5. McCain was unquestionably courageous in the face of a deadly raging fire...
Mon Mar 30, 2015, 01:26 AM
Mar 2015

If only he was as brave in facing-down AIPAC, arms manufacturers and The Saudis.

gregcrawford

(2,382 posts)
9. No, it was John Wayne's character,Tom Doniphon...
Mon Mar 30, 2015, 08:53 AM
Mar 2015

... firing from concealment because Jimmy Stewart's character, Ransom Stoddard, was too much of a wuss to drop the hammer. McCain may have taken credit for it, though. And Bill O'Reilly will say he covered the event, I'm sure.

Saw that flick in its original release when I was in high school. Christ, I can hear the theme song now! "... the man who shot Liberty Valance, he was the bravest of them all!"

Now that's gonna be stuck in my head for the rest of the day! Thanks, Gene Pitney.

Latest Discussions»Issue Forums»Editorials & Other Articles»American Pravda: What Was...