A funny thing happened on the way to Lurch's multimillion dollar rollout of ads touting his Vietnam history - some other folks who were serving nearby spilled the beans. Here's the doctor who treated the "injury" that got Lurch his first Purple Heart:
I have a very clear memory of an incident which occurred while I was the Medical Officer at Naval Support Facility, Cam Ranh Bay.For the metrically challenged, 1 cm is .39 inches and 4 mm is .16 inches. Remind me not to invite Lurch to help dig up wild rose bushes!
John Kerry was a (jg), the OinC or skipper of a Swift boat, newly arrived in Vietnam. On the night of December 2, he was on patrol north of Cam Ranh, up near Nha Trang area. The next day he came to sick bay, the medical facility, for treatment of a wound that had occurred that night.
The story he told was different from what his crewmen had to say about that night. According to Kerry, they had been engaged in a fire fight, receiving small arms fire from on shore. He said that his injury resulted from this enemy action.
Some of his crew confided that they did not receive any fire from shore, but that Kerry had fired a mortar round at close range to some rocks on shore. The crewman thought that the injury was caused by a fragment ricocheting from that mortar round when it struck the rocks.
That seemed to fit the injury which I treated.
What I saw was a small piece of metal sticking very superficially in the skin of Kerry's arm. The metal fragment measured about 1 cm. in length and was about 2 or 3 mm in diameter. It certainly did not look like a round from a rifle.
I simply removed the piece of metal by lifting it out of the skin with forceps. I doubt that it penetrated more than 3 or 4 mm. It did not require probing to find it, did not require any anesthesia to remove it, and did not require any sutures to close the wound.
The wound was covered with a bandaid.
Not [sic] other injuries were reported and I do not recall that there was any reported damage to the boat.
At yesterday's Swift Boat Vets news conference, there was more in the same vein as reported in the Boston Globe:
In addition, one of Kerry's commanding officers, retired Lieutenant Commander Grant Hibbard, said he strongly questioned whether Kerry the senator deserved his first purple heart Purple Heart. Elaborating on an account reported in The Boston Globe last month, Hibbard said he was briefed after the Dec. 2, 1968, event for which Kerry received a Purple Heart.A newbie officer takes a moonlight cruise, starts shooting up the scenery, and gives himself a scratch. Then he games the system for a medal. That's a winning tale, fer sure!
''The briefing from some members of that crew the morning after revealed that they had not received enemy fire," Hibbard said. ''And yet Lieutenant [junior grade] Kerry informed me of a wound, he showed me a scratch on his arm and a piece of shrapnel in his hand that appeared to be from one of our own M-79s. It was later reported to me that Lieutenant Kerry had fired an M-79 and it had exploded off the adjacent shoreline. I do not recall being advised of any medical treatment and probably said something like, `Forget it.'
''He later received a Purple Heart for that scratch, and I don't know how," Hibbard said.
But not to worry, Lurch fans! The Boston Globe article reveals the campaign is saying it's another of those pesky Vast Right Wing Conspiracies! At least he didn't blame the Secret Service.
But what I really want to know is when the Lurchketeers will get to the ads touting his service with the Vietnam Veterans Against the War? C'mon, don't be shy!
