... get involved in most of this discussion. However, I have to disagree with your statement:

>> After all, when he signed up for swiftboat duty, the mission wasn't
>> direct combat related. The mission changed, and his butt was in a hot seat.

The first swift boats (technically, "Patrol Craft, Fast" or PCF) got to Vietnam in 1962. Initially, they were used in Operation Market Time (interdiction of NVN troops and supplies). In 1965, a large contingent of swift boats was added to the Navy's intercoastal defense force. They were immediately engaged in significant combat operations and remained so through late 1970, when the last of the river boats were transferred to the South Vietnamese Navy.

John Kerry was commissioned an Ensign in 1966 and served his first tour of duty in Vietnam on the guided missile frigate Gridley. He volunteered for swift boat duty and arrived incountry for such duty in November 1968. By that time, the swift boats had been heavily involved in combat operations for more than three years.

During my incountry service (Nov 1967 to Feb 1968), I was assigned to Commander, Seventh Fleet Detachment Charlie (COMSEVENTHFLT, DET C), the Navy's Saigon headquarters. I also visited the Commander, Naval Forces (COMNAVFOR) headquarters in Danang. I was a Navy Public Affairs Officer and my duties included reviewing operational reports and transforming them into Navy press releases and briefings for the "five o'clock follies" (the daily press corps briefing in Saigon). Although I was primarily concerned with the operations of the 7th fleet off the coast of Vietnam, I saw and discussed with other staff officers many operational reports of incountry operations, including those of the swift boats.

It is simply incorrect to characterize swift boat duty, by the time Kerry volunteered for it, as "not direct combat related".

----- jim o\-S