Slate's Fred Kaplan is trying to give Kerry's Kurtz Chronicles some cover. Sorry, but it won't work. Despite Kaplan's assertion that "[n]ot much paperwork exists for covert operations (officially, U.S. forces weren't in Cambodia)," there is quite a lot of material available on the Studies and Observations Group which ran the Cambodian cross-border operations in '68-'69, which I linked to and analyzed in my blog on August 15:
"Cross border missions were underway in early 1969, led by the "Studies and Observations Group" ("SOG") . Here is the best short history of SOG's operations in Cambodia, which were code-named "Salem House"
"Salem House Operations
Concurrent with the Prairie Fire operations were the SOG’s missions in northeastern Cambodia. These operations, originally named “Daniel Boone,” were later redesignated “Salem House.” These missions provided intelligence on North Vietnamese and Viet Cong bases located in Cambodia. Another objective of the Salem House operations was to determine the level of Cambodian Government support for the NVA and Viet Cong. 13
The Salem House operations had a number of restrictions that affected their activities in Cambodia. Many of the restrictions were modified or withdrawn and new restrictions imposed; the pattern of change in the restrictions presents an interesting picture of the war’s development in Cambodia. In May 1967, the Salem House missions were subject to the following restrictions:
Only reconnaissance teams were to be committed into Cambodia and the teams could not exceed an overall strength of 12 men, to include not more than three U.S. advisers.
Teams were not to engage in combat except to avoid capture.
They did have permission to have contact with civilians.
No more than three reconnaissance teams could be committed on operations in Cambodia at any one time.
The teams could conduct no more than ten missions in any 30-day period. 14
By October 1967, SOG’s teams had permission to infiltrate the entire Cambodian border area to a depth of 20 kilometers. However, their helicopters were only permitted ten kilometers inside Cambodia. In December, the DOD, with the Department of State’s concurrence, approved the use of Forward Air Controllers (FACs) to support SOG operations. The FACs had authorization to make two flights in support of each Salem House mission.
In October 1968, SOG teams received permission to emplace self-destructing land mines in Cambodia. The following December, the depth of penetration into northern Cambodia was extended to 30 kilometers; however, the 20-kilometer limit remained in effect for central and southern Cambodia. The final adjustment in Salem House operations made in 1970 during the incursion into Cambodia permitted reconnaissance teams to operate 200 meters west of the Mekong River (an average distance of 185 kilometers west of the South Vietnamese border). However, the SOG reconnaissance teams never ventured that far west, due to the lift and range limitations of their UH-1F helicopters. Thus from the initiation of SOG’s Cambodian operations in 1967 until 1970, there was a progressive expansion of the zones of operation and OPS-35 patrols within Cambodia. The enlargement of the areas of operation and the increasing number of Salem House missions, gives an indication of how seriously the Johnson and Nixon Administrations viewed the NVA’s use of Cambodian base areas. It was also indicative of the U.S. military’s growing awareness of the role of the Central Office for South Vietnam (COSVN) and its deleterious effect on the war in South Vietnam. 15
From 1967 through April 1972, OPS-35 conducted 1,398 reconnaissance missions, 38 platoon-sized patrols, and 12 multi-platoon operations in Cambodia. During the same period, it captured 24 prisoners of war. 16
This account, a pretty comprehensive one, does not seem to provide for the possibility swift boat transportation, indicating instead that helicopters were used for insertions of special forces, and that these flights were tightly controlled. (A couple of pictures of helicopter bases connected with these operations can be seen here .) First person accounts of participation in these cross-border operations are full of details about helicopter insertions and rescues but are silent on swift boat details.
My inability to locate any account of swift boat support for covert missions across the Cambodian border doesn't preclude such support having occurred, of course, but it raises many questions given the ease with which it is possible to verify helicopter support for these then-secret and now widely-discussed missions. Add to those questions the answers I got from John O'Neill to questions on this particular subject when I interviewed him Friday. O'Neill denied ever having been sent into Cambodia when he commanded a swift boat, and asserted that no swift boat commander other than John Kerry has ever claimed to participate in such missions."
Add to that research of ten days ago, the express denunciations of the idea of Swifties taking SEALs into Cambodia by former SEALs, and pretty soon Kerry is up the creek without a magic hat.
"And why would he make such claims if he hadn't been [in Cambodia]?" Kaplan asks, arguing that such missions were not glamorous or admirable. Obviously Kerry thought they were glamorous, in Colonel Kurtz kind of way, and he's used the magic hat for big drama twice in recent years, and then there's his gun-running claims to the U.S. News & World report. Kerry wanted to add exciting chapters to his four months, so he invented secret missions --how hard is that to understand? Evidently, very, if you are rooting for him.
Posted at 8:00 AM, Pacific
The absolute center of conventional wisdom among political journalists is ABC News' The Note, which has some questions today:
"Did Kerry alone write the after-action reports for his medal citations?
How close was he to Cambodia on Christmas, 1968?
What will Doug Brinkley's article in the New York conclude?
Is Kerry reluctant to acknowledge performing a top-secret mission for the CIA because he doesn't want to be accused of revealing classified information?
Why doesn't Senator Kerry recall attending the Vietnam Veterans Against the War conference in Kansas City in November of 1971?
How much will his post Vietnam political activities be scrutinized by the media?
Is that fair game for the Bush campaign? (We get the sense that yes, it is, and yes, it will be.)."
With The Note asking questions like these, Kerry will have to meet the press or continue to see every attempt at changing the page fail. Big media is fully engaged --finally-- and Kerry's in the quicksand unless and until he answers all the questions. |
