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Dexter Lehtinen, former United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, was a reconnaissance-platoon leader in Vietnam. In National Review Online he writes:
In 1971, I awoke from three days of unconsciousness aboard a hospital ship off the coast of Vietnam. I could not see, my jaws were wired shut, and my left cheekbone was missing, a gaping hole in its place.
Later, while still in that condition at St. Albans Naval Hospital, one of my earliest recollections was hearing of John Kerry’s testimony before Congress. I remember lying there, in disbelief, as I learned how Kerry told the world that I served in an Army reminiscent of Genghis Khan’s; that officers like me routinely let their men plunder villages and rape villagers at will; that “war crimes” committed in Vietnam by my fellow soldiers “were not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all levels of command.”
Then Kerry went to Paris, meeting with North Vietnamese enemy officials, while our soldiers continued to fight in the field. The pain and disbelief I felt listening to his words went deeper than the pain I felt from the enemy fire that seriously wounded my face.
Eighteen months later I was discharged from the hospital, the enemy-inflicted wounds fully healed. But more than 30 years later, the wounds inflicted by John Kerry continue to bring pain to scores of Vietnam veterans. Those wounds from the bearing of false witness against a generation of courageous young Americans who fought and died in Vietnam are much more serious than any wound warranting a Purple Heart. Those wounds go to the heart and soul. Those wounds never go away.
Read the whole thing.
