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We can discuss US Grant, Robert E. Lee, George Patton and most other American heroes but pop-culture has determined that there are certain icons that cannot be questioned and if you do you risk emotional outbursts. Everything we know or think we know about PT 109 is based on a puff piece called "Survivor" written by family friend John Hersey and published in the New Yorker magazine in 1944. The notion that JFK is a hero because he swam out to a coral reef and forlornly waved a lantern at passing ships hoping to hitch a ride is ludicrous. Maybe it indicates his lack of leadership but it isn't an example of clear thinking. JFK confessed that he was worried about the fallout over PT 109 and rightfully so but the article turned things around.
Another fine example of a conservative smearing the honor of an American soldier because he was liberal.
Have they no shame?
Go easy with that broad brush their Captain. I have read the accounts of JFK's actions and this is the very first time I have heard some of these accusations. I tend to give them the same weight as I give John Kerry's testimony to Congress about Vietnam Vets.
I was around when JFK was President, although I was in the 4th grade when he was assasinated. He did some very good things... and he did some really dumb things.
If you'd read the accounts of the Cuban Missle Crisis and just how close we really came, you'd realize that he was a pretty good President over all.
J.F.K. was less afraid of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev's ordering a surprise attack than he was "that something would go wrong in a Dr. Strangelove kind of way"with a politically unstable U.S. general snapping and launching World War III.
Kennedy was particularly alarmed by his trigger-happy Air Force chief, cigar-chomping General Curtis LeMay, who firmly believed the U.S. should unleash a pre-emptive nuclear broadside against Russia while America still enjoyed massive arms superiority. Throughout the 13-day Cuban missile crisis, Kennedy was under relentless pressure from LeMay and nearly his entire national-security circle to "fry" Cuba, in the Air Force chief's memorable language. But J.F.K., whose only key support in the increasingly tense Cabinet Room meetings came from his brother Bobby and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, kept searching for a nonmilitary solution. When Kennedy, assiduously working the back channels to the Kremlin, finally succeeded in cutting a deal with Khrushchev, the world survived "the most dangerous moment in human history," in Schlesinger's words. But no one at the time knew just how dangerous. Years later, attending the 40th anniversary of the crisis at a conference in Havana, Schlesinger, Sorensen and McNamara were stunned to learn that if U.S. forces had attacked Cuba, Russian commanders on the island were authorized to respond with tactical and strategic nuclear missiles. The Joint Chiefs had assured Kennedy during the crisis that "no nuclear warheads were in Cuba at the time," Sorensen grimly noted. "They were wrong." If Kennedy had bowed to his military advisers' pressure, a vast swath of the urban U.S. within missile range of the Soviet installations in Cuba could have been reduced to radioactive rubble.
Read more: Warrior For Peace - The Lessons of J.F.K. - TIME
"War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today."
Jack Kennedy
JFK's Navy record indicated a rich careless kid who had a relationship with a Nazi spy and lost his job in Intelligence. His PT Boat was the only Boat to be run over in WW2 without firing a shot. Indications were that the dumb ass skipper was sleeping in the middle of a heavily traveled Japanese supply route. The Japanese destroyer never saw the little PT Boat and obviously the PT boat never saw the destroyer.While the Navy was getting a Court Martial together old Joe Kennedy immediately sent a family friend and novelist to re-write young John's adventures before the Navy had a chance to get a Court martial court together. The result was the myth of PT109.
JFK's Navy record indicated a rich careless kid who had a relationship with a Nazi spy and lost his job in Intelligence. His PT Boat was the only Boat to be run over in WW2 without firing a shot. Indications were that the dumb ass skipper was sleeping in the middle of a heavily traveled Japanese supply route. The Japanese destroyer never saw the little PT Boat and obviously the PT boat never saw the destroyer.While the Navy was getting a Court Martial together old Joe Kennedy immediately sent a family friend and novelist to re-write young John's adventures before the Navy had a chance to get a Court martial court together. The result was the myth of PT109.
Another fine example of a conservative smearing the honor of an American soldier because he was liberal.
Have they no shame?
We can discuss US Grant, Robert E. Lee, George Patton and most other American heroes but pop-culture has determined that there are certain icons that cannot be questioned and if you do you risk emotional outbursts. Everything we know or think we know about PT 109 is based on a puff piece called "Survivor" written by family friend John Hersey and published in the New Yorker magazine in 1944. The notion that JFK is a hero because he swam out to a coral reef and forlornly waved a lantern at passing ships hoping to hitch a ride is ludicrous. Maybe it indicates his lack of leadership but it isn't an example of clear thinking. JFK confessed that he was worried about the fallout over PT 109 and rightfully so but the article turned things around.
Like rightwinger said, the Kennedys have been fully vetted. Just like old man Kennedy's bootlegging smear is BS. The man passed two senate confirmation hearings. FDR and Joe Kennedy had plenty of enemies. They would have slaughtered him if there was even a shred of evidence.
Maybe you should take a harder look at Patton and the Biscari massacre.
We can discuss US Grant, Robert E. Lee, George Patton and most other American heroes but pop-culture has determined that there are certain icons that cannot be questioned and if you do you risk emotional outbursts. Everything we know or think we know about PT 109 is based on a puff piece called "Survivor" written by family friend John Hersey and published in the New Yorker magazine in 1944. The notion that JFK is a hero because he swam out to a coral reef and forlornly waved a lantern at passing ships hoping to hitch a ride is ludicrous. Maybe it indicates his lack of leadership but it isn't an example of clear thinking. JFK confessed that he was worried about the fallout over PT 109 and rightfully so but the article turned things around.
Sometimes you just have to have facts to support your wild conspiracy theories. There has been plenty of chances to interview the crew of PT 109. If they thought their young officer had screwed the pooch and almost cost them their lives, they would have bitched about it. Not just officially, but to any other sailor in the fleet as well as their family and friends
But you don't have a record of that do you?
When you get beyond the emotion you understand that it's all about politics. The Skipper of CA-35 was court martialed and convicted despite testimony from his crew that he acted honorably and courageously. The Navy needed a scapegoat for it's own negligence in not recording the missing USS Indianapolis and McVay was it. The Navy didn't really concern itself about a Mosquito Boat skipper who may have been sleeping on duty especially when he had an influential father who was a former ambassador and had important friends in high places. John Hersey's story was the perfect plan.
What disgusting revisionism.
A caracter assassination of a hero that comes without a stred of evidence to support it.
What piece of shit one needs to be to play that game.
We can discuss US Grant, Robert E. Lee, George Patton and most other American heroes but pop-culture has determined that there are certain icons that cannot be questioned and if you do you risk emotional outbursts. Everything we know or think we know about PT 109 is based on a puff piece called "Survivor" written by family friend John Hersey and published in the New Yorker magazine in 1944. The notion that JFK is a hero because he swam out to a coral reef and forlornly waved a lantern at passing ships hoping to hitch a ride is ludicrous. Maybe it indicates his lack of leadership but it isn't an example of clear thinking. JFK confessed that he was worried about the fallout over PT 109 and rightfully so but the article turned things around.
Sometimes you just have to have facts to support your wild conspiracy theories. There has been plenty of chances to interview the crew of PT 109. If they thought their young officer had screwed the pooch and almost cost them their lives, they would have bitched about it. Not just officially, but to any other sailor in the fleet as well as their family and friends
But you don't have a record of that do you?
No crew in the history of the Navy ever turned on their skipper. If JFK let his crew sleep on duty they would be the last ones to accuse him of negligence when they were run over. They must have thought it was kind of peculiar that the skipper would subject himself to danger by trying to signal a ship while they slept in the sand but Joe Kennedy's novelist friend John Hersey covered JFK's ass and nobody ever had to ask the tough questions.
What disgusting revisionism.
A caracter assassination of a hero that comes without a stred of evidence to support it.
What piece of shit one needs to be to play that game.
It happens all the time from both sides. Witness the attempt to smear Patton.
What disgusting revisionism.
A caracter assassination of a hero that comes without a stred of evidence to support it.
What piece of shit one needs to be to play that game.
It happens all the time from both sides. Witness the attempt to smear Patton.
Patton and War Crimes
During the battle for Sicily in 1943, American troops of 180th Regimental Combat Team of the 45th Division (Thunderbolt) fought German and Italian forces for control of the Biscari Airfield, which changed hands several times.
After the airfield finally came under Allied control conclusively, American soldiers murdered 76 of their prisoners in two separate incidents. 34 Italians and two Germans were shot to death in the first, and 40 more Italians were killed in the second.
When news of these events made it to Gen. Omar Bradley, he sought Patton's opinion. From Patton's journal:
I told Bradley that it was probably an exaggeration, but in any case to tell the officer to certify that the dead men were snipers or had attempted to escape or something, as it would make a stink in the press and also would make the civilians mad. Anyhow, they are dead, so nothing can be done about it.
Bradley refused to cover up the massacre, and demanded that someone be held accountable.
However, only two men were brought up on charges - despite the obvious duplicity of others in a crime of such magnitude.
More disturbing, however, was the defense both defendants mounted. They quoted a speech Patton gave to them earlier in the campaign, and claimed they were following orders:
"When we land against the enemy, don't forget to hit him and hit him hard. When we meet the enemy we will kill him. We will show him no mercy. He has killed thousands of your comrades and he must die. If you company officers in leading your men against the enemy find him shooting at you and when you get within two hundred yards of him he wishes to surrender- oh no! That bastard will die! You will kill him. Stick him between the third and fourth ribs. You will tell your men that. They must have the killer instinct. Tell them to stick him. Stick him in the liver. We will get the name of killers and killers are immortal. When word reaches him that he is being faced by a killer battalion he will fight less. We must build up that name as killers."
Several more soldiers said they were willing to give evidence that Patton had told them to take no prisoners. One officer claimed that Patton had said:
The more prisoners we took, the more we'd have to feed, and not to fool with prisoners.
After the massacre it came out that Patton was said to have stated that the prisoners being shot in ordered rows was 'an even greater error.'
The defense was apparently successful. In order to protect Patton from the charge of war crimes, Bradley fast tracked the trials. For the first incident, the Army charged Sergeant Horace T. West. West admitted that he had participated in the shootings, was found guilty, stripped of rank and sentenced to life in prison. However, after serving just 6 months, he was released as a private.
For the second incident, the Army court martialed Captain John T. Compton for killing 40 POWs in his charge. He claimed to be following orders. The investigating officer and the Judge Advocate declared that Compton's actions were unlawful, but the court martial acquitted him. The Army transferred Compton to another regiment where he died a year later fighting in Italy.
Furthermore, the Army held neither Patton nor the unit commanding officer, Colonel E Cookson, to account in any way.
(Some summation via Wiki. Original sources: James Weingartner, `Massacre at Biscari: Patton and An American War Crime, The Historian LII, no. 1, (November 1989), 24-39.
Botting, Douglas & Sayer, Ian: Hitler's Last General: The case against Wilhelm Mohnke. Bantam Books, London, 1989, 354-9 )
It happens all the time from both sides. Witness the attempt to smear Patton.
Patton and War Crimes
During the battle for Sicily in 1943, American troops of 180th Regimental Combat Team of the 45th Division (Thunderbolt) fought German and Italian forces for control of the Biscari Airfield, which changed hands several times.
After the airfield finally came under Allied control conclusively, American soldiers murdered 76 of their prisoners in two separate incidents. 34 Italians and two Germans were shot to death in the first, and 40 more Italians were killed in the second.
When news of these events made it to Gen. Omar Bradley, he sought Patton's opinion. From Patton's journal:
I told Bradley that it was probably an exaggeration, but in any case to tell the officer to certify that the dead men were snipers or had attempted to escape or something, as it would make a stink in the press and also would make the civilians mad. Anyhow, they are dead, so nothing can be done about it.
Bradley refused to cover up the massacre, and demanded that someone be held accountable.
However, only two men were brought up on charges - despite the obvious duplicity of others in a crime of such magnitude.
More disturbing, however, was the defense both defendants mounted. They quoted a speech Patton gave to them earlier in the campaign, and claimed they were following orders:
"When we land against the enemy, don't forget to hit him and hit him hard. When we meet the enemy we will kill him. We will show him no mercy. He has killed thousands of your comrades and he must die. If you company officers in leading your men against the enemy find him shooting at you and when you get within two hundred yards of him he wishes to surrender- oh no! That bastard will die! You will kill him. Stick him between the third and fourth ribs. You will tell your men that. They must have the killer instinct. Tell them to stick him. Stick him in the liver. We will get the name of killers and killers are immortal. When word reaches him that he is being faced by a killer battalion he will fight less. We must build up that name as killers."
Several more soldiers said they were willing to give evidence that Patton had told them to take no prisoners. One officer claimed that Patton had said:
The more prisoners we took, the more we'd have to feed, and not to fool with prisoners.
After the massacre it came out that Patton was said to have stated that the prisoners being shot in ordered rows was 'an even greater error.'
The defense was apparently successful. In order to protect Patton from the charge of war crimes, Bradley fast tracked the trials. For the first incident, the Army charged Sergeant Horace T. West. West admitted that he had participated in the shootings, was found guilty, stripped of rank and sentenced to life in prison. However, after serving just 6 months, he was released as a private.
For the second incident, the Army court martialed Captain John T. Compton for killing 40 POWs in his charge. He claimed to be following orders. The investigating officer and the Judge Advocate declared that Compton's actions were unlawful, but the court martial acquitted him. The Army transferred Compton to another regiment where he died a year later fighting in Italy.
Furthermore, the Army held neither Patton nor the unit commanding officer, Colonel E Cookson, to account in any way.
(Some summation via Wiki. Original sources: James Weingartner, `Massacre at Biscari: Patton and An American War Crime, The Historian LII, no. 1, (November 1989), 24-39.
Botting, Douglas & Sayer, Ian: Hitler's Last General: The case against Wilhelm Mohnke. Bantam Books, London, 1989, 354-9 )
Where did he order the massacre? I see where he tried to protect his men from a terrible thing that a very few of them did. Patton merely wanted the military to handle the investigation and not have it tried in the press which even back then was starting to flex its muscles towards disseminating its own propaganda.
Nice try dipshit but all you've done is prove my point.
Patton and War Crimes
During the battle for Sicily in 1943, American troops of 180th Regimental Combat Team of the 45th Division (Thunderbolt) fought German and Italian forces for control of the Biscari Airfield, which changed hands several times.
After the airfield finally came under Allied control conclusively, American soldiers murdered 76 of their prisoners in two separate incidents. 34 Italians and two Germans were shot to death in the first, and 40 more Italians were killed in the second.
When news of these events made it to Gen. Omar Bradley, he sought Patton's opinion. From Patton's journal:
I told Bradley that it was probably an exaggeration, but in any case to tell the officer to certify that the dead men were snipers or had attempted to escape or something, as it would make a stink in the press and also would make the civilians mad. Anyhow, they are dead, so nothing can be done about it.
Bradley refused to cover up the massacre, and demanded that someone be held accountable.
However, only two men were brought up on charges - despite the obvious duplicity of others in a crime of such magnitude.
More disturbing, however, was the defense both defendants mounted. They quoted a speech Patton gave to them earlier in the campaign, and claimed they were following orders:
"When we land against the enemy, don't forget to hit him and hit him hard. When we meet the enemy we will kill him. We will show him no mercy. He has killed thousands of your comrades and he must die. If you company officers in leading your men against the enemy find him shooting at you and when you get within two hundred yards of him he wishes to surrender- oh no! That bastard will die! You will kill him. Stick him between the third and fourth ribs. You will tell your men that. They must have the killer instinct. Tell them to stick him. Stick him in the liver. We will get the name of killers and killers are immortal. When word reaches him that he is being faced by a killer battalion he will fight less. We must build up that name as killers."
Several more soldiers said they were willing to give evidence that Patton had told them to take no prisoners. One officer claimed that Patton had said:
The more prisoners we took, the more we'd have to feed, and not to fool with prisoners.
After the massacre it came out that Patton was said to have stated that the prisoners being shot in ordered rows was 'an even greater error.'
The defense was apparently successful. In order to protect Patton from the charge of war crimes, Bradley fast tracked the trials. For the first incident, the Army charged Sergeant Horace T. West. West admitted that he had participated in the shootings, was found guilty, stripped of rank and sentenced to life in prison. However, after serving just 6 months, he was released as a private.
For the second incident, the Army court martialed Captain John T. Compton for killing 40 POWs in his charge. He claimed to be following orders. The investigating officer and the Judge Advocate declared that Compton's actions were unlawful, but the court martial acquitted him. The Army transferred Compton to another regiment where he died a year later fighting in Italy.
Furthermore, the Army held neither Patton nor the unit commanding officer, Colonel E Cookson, to account in any way.
(Some summation via Wiki. Original sources: James Weingartner, `Massacre at Biscari: Patton and An American War Crime, The Historian LII, no. 1, (November 1989), 24-39.
Botting, Douglas & Sayer, Ian: Hitler's Last General: The case against Wilhelm Mohnke. Bantam Books, London, 1989, 354-9 )
Where did he order the massacre? I see where he tried to protect his men from a terrible thing that a very few of them did. Patton merely wanted the military to handle the investigation and not have it tried in the press which even back then was starting to flex its muscles towards disseminating its own propaganda.
Nice try dipshit but all you've done is prove my point.
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.
George Orwell
Do you have a reading comprehension problem or just selective cognizance?
WHAT part of Patton's words don't you understand???
Patton: "If you company officers in leading your men against the enemy find him shooting at you and when you get within two hundred yards of him he wishes to surrender- oh no! That bastard will die! You will kill him."
two men were brought up on charges - They quoted a speech Patton gave to them earlier in the campaign, and claimed they were following orders:
Several more soldiers said they were willing to give evidence that Patton had told them to take no prisoners.
Where did he order the massacre? I see where he tried to protect his men from a terrible thing that a very few of them did. Patton merely wanted the military to handle the investigation and not have it tried in the press which even back then was starting to flex its muscles towards disseminating its own propaganda.
Nice try dipshit but all you've done is prove my point.
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.
George Orwell
Do you have a reading comprehension problem or just selective cognizance?
WHAT part of Patton's words don't you understand???
Patton: "If you company officers in leading your men against the enemy find him shooting at you and when you get within two hundred yards of him he wishes to surrender- oh no! That bastard will die! You will kill him."
two men were brought up on charges - They quoted a speech Patton gave to them earlier in the campaign, and claimed they were following orders:
Several more soldiers said they were willing to give evidence that Patton had told them to take no prisoners.
None of this is backed up by official documents that I have been able to find. The only source for anything is the Historian article which is behind a paywall. Many people didn't like Patton and would have sold their souls to get rid of him while he commanded the 7th Army so without something better than a wiki article i'll reserve judgment for now. Find some more evidence to back up what you say.
One thing I can say is there is no evidence in any quote attributed to him from the time that advocates commiting war crimes. he realised more than most the repurcussions from the ENEMY towards his men if that sort of thing happened. So the quotes attributed to him advocating such action I find HIGHLY suspect.
It is also telling that there is no mention of the atrocity in German or Italian communiques.
I am sure it happened, but the circumstances are far from as well known as you make them out to be.
Go easy with that broad brush their Captain. I have read the accounts of JFK's actions and this is the very first time I have heard some of these accusations. I tend to give them the same weight as I give John Kerry's testimony to Congress about Vietnam Vets.
I was around when JFK was President, although I was in the 4th grade when he was assasinated. He did some very good things... and he did some really dumb things.
If you'd read the accounts of the Cuban Missle Crisis and just how close we really came, you'd realize that he was a pretty good President over all.
J.F.K. was less afraid of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev's ordering a surprise attack than he was "that something would go wrong in a Dr. Strangelove kind of way"with a politically unstable U.S. general snapping and launching World War III.
Kennedy was particularly alarmed by his trigger-happy Air Force chief, cigar-chomping General Curtis LeMay, who firmly believed the U.S. should unleash a pre-emptive nuclear broadside against Russia while America still enjoyed massive arms superiority. Throughout the 13-day Cuban missile crisis, Kennedy was under relentless pressure from LeMay and nearly his entire national-security circle to "fry" Cuba, in the Air Force chief's memorable language. But J.F.K., whose only key support in the increasingly tense Cabinet Room meetings came from his brother Bobby and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, kept searching for a nonmilitary solution. When Kennedy, assiduously working the back channels to the Kremlin, finally succeeded in cutting a deal with Khrushchev, the world survived "the most dangerous moment in human history," in Schlesinger's words. But no one at the time knew just how dangerous. Years later, attending the 40th anniversary of the crisis at a conference in Havana, Schlesinger, Sorensen and McNamara were stunned to learn that if U.S. forces had attacked Cuba, Russian commanders on the island were authorized to respond with tactical and strategic nuclear missiles. The Joint Chiefs had assured Kennedy during the crisis that "no nuclear warheads were in Cuba at the time," Sorensen grimly noted. "They were wrong." If Kennedy had bowed to his military advisers' pressure, a vast swath of the urban U.S. within missile range of the Soviet installations in Cuba could have been reduced to radioactive rubble.
Read more: Warrior For Peace - The Lessons of J.F.K. - TIME
"War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today."
Jack Kennedy
I've said this many times before but it always goes ignored that people should be grateful kennedy got elected instead of Dick Nixon because Nixon is the years that LBJ was president,he said himself that if he had been president back then,he would have gone in and bombed them like Lemay wanted Kennedy to do.Dick Nixon would have done exactly what his war mongrel commanders wanted him to do.
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.
George Orwell
Do you have a reading comprehension problem or just selective cognizance?
WHAT part of Patton's words don't you understand???
Patton: "If you company officers in leading your men against the enemy find him shooting at you and when you get within two hundred yards of him he wishes to surrender- oh no! That bastard will die! You will kill him."
two men were brought up on charges - They quoted a speech Patton gave to them earlier in the campaign, and claimed they were following orders:
Several more soldiers said they were willing to give evidence that Patton had told them to take no prisoners.
None of this is backed up by official documents that I have been able to find. The only source for anything is the Historian article which is behind a paywall. Many people didn't like Patton and would have sold their souls to get rid of him while he commanded the 7th Army so without something better than a wiki article i'll reserve judgment for now. Find some more evidence to back up what you say.
One thing I can say is there is no evidence in any quote attributed to him from the time that advocates commiting war crimes. he realised more than most the repurcussions from the ENEMY towards his men if that sort of thing happened. So the quotes attributed to him advocating such action I find HIGHLY suspect.
It is also telling that there is no mention of the atrocity in German or Italian communiques.
I am sure it happened, but the circumstances are far from as well known as you make them out to be.
The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944 - Rick Atkinson - Google Books
None of this is backed up by official documents that I have been able to find. The only source for anything is the Historian article which is behind a paywall. Many people didn't like Patton and would have sold their souls to get rid of him while he commanded the 7th Army so without something better than a wiki article i'll reserve judgment for now. Find some more evidence to back up what you say.
One thing I can say is there is no evidence in any quote attributed to him from the time that advocates commiting war crimes. he realised more than most the repurcussions from the ENEMY towards his men if that sort of thing happened. So the quotes attributed to him advocating such action I find HIGHLY suspect.
It is also telling that there is no mention of the atrocity in German or Italian communiques.
I am sure it happened, but the circumstances are far from as well known as you make them out to be.
The Day of Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944 - Rick Atkinson - Google Books
It's a repeat of what has allready been posted or did you not bother to read it. Repeating the exact same thing multiple times is not multiple sources, you do realise that right?
What disgusting revisionism.
A caracter assassination of a hero that comes without a stred of evidence to support it.
What piece of shit one needs to be to play that game.
It happens all the time from both sides. Witness the attempt to smear Patton.
