Is Unfit for Command Unfit for Bookstores?

Posted on August 19, 2004

The Washington Post has a major story today which totally discredits the claims of Larry Thurlow which are detailed in the Kerry-bashing book, Unfit for Command. The Post obtained military records about the incident on the Bay Hap River in Viet Nam, during which Senator Kerry saved Green Beret Jim Rasmussen's life, while under heavy fire.

Thurlow claims there was no gunfire during the incident and that Kerry made that part up. But Thurlow's military records describe "enemy small arms and automatic weapons fire" directed at "all units" of the five-boat flotilla. Thurlow won his own Bronze Star that day, and the citation praises him for providing assistance to a damaged Swift boat "despite enemy bullets flying about him."

Should the book be pulled from the shelves, because of the false facts? Salon reports that the Kerry campaign thinks it should be pulled.

Kerry campaign spokesman Chad Clanton told Salon: "If I were them, I'd be ducking under my desk wondering what to do. This is a serious problem. No publisher should want to be selling books with proven falsehoods in them, especially falsehoods that are meant to smear the military service of an American veteran."

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