Unfit For Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry by John E. O'Neill

Description

In 1971 John O'Neill – the officer who took over John Kerry's Swift Boat in Vietnam -returned home to find that Kerry had become a leader of Vietnam Veterans Against the War and was slandering his fellow veterans. O'Neill debated Kerry in 1971, demolishing his accusations. Here, O'Neill and co-author Jerome Corsi present the voices of more than 200 US Navy veterans who served with Kerry.

Editorial Review

Due to the timing of its publication, Unfit for Command could be dismissed as the sort of controversial, loaded book typical in a presidential election year: Either courageous and necessary, or untruthful and malicious, depending on one's political point of view. Filled with interviews of men who served in Vietnam at the same time as John Kerry, the book poses the following question: “Why do an overwhelming majority of those who commanded or served with John Kerry oppose him?” (Note that the issue of “service” has sparked investigation into its definition–in other words, just how close was the interaction between Kerry and those cited in the book during Kerry’s Vietnam tour of duty?)

The charges leveled against Kerry in this book are severe and include filing false operating reports; lobbying for and receiving three Purple Hearts for minor wounds, two of which were self-inflicted; receiving a Silver Star under false pretenses; offering false confessions of bogus war crimes in both print and testimony; and recklessness in the field, including the burning of a village without cause or direct order. The book also claims that Kerry left Vietnam after serving just four months instead of the usual one year tour and that he returned home and accused his fellow soldiers of atrocities without offering any evidence, endangering POWs in the process.

It is debatable whether the book will change any minds, or votes. Instead, readers will likely reach one of two conclusions: Either John Kerry grossly misrepresented his military service or the authors are spinning the interviews that they conducted for ulterior motives. There is a third option, however; readers will further investigate both sides of the debate, and by doing so, may reach conclusions independent of partisan extremes. –Brian Neff