"Stolen Honor" offers a one-sided attack on Kerry

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"Stolen Honor" offers a one-sided attack on Kerry

DAVID B. CARUSO

Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA - Sinclair Broadcast Group surprised journalists and media watchdog groups earlier this month when it announced it would pre-empt regular programing on its 62 television stations with a news special featuring a documentary called "Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal."

The 42-minute film, made by a former reporter and Vietnam veteran, is a bitter, one-sided attack on John Kerry's anti-war activities after he returned disillusioned from a tour of duty in Vietnam.

The documentary consists mostly of interviews with American prisoners of war who survived long terms of imprisonment and torture in Hanoi, and emerged enraged at activists like Kerry for suggesting they had suffered for an unjust cause.

No people opposed to the war or supportive of Kerry are interviewed in the film.

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The film implies that Kerry accused the POWs themselves of having committed war crimes, when in fact he spoke only in general about the conduct of U.S. troops.

It also falsely implies that Kerry either committed atrocities himself or personally witnessed them. Kerry told Congress he was summarizing accusations made by other servicemen at an earlier event, and not relaying personal experiences.

"Stolen Honor" makes the argument that in repeating uncorroborated, and possibly fabricated, tales that U.S. soldiers had raped Vietnamese women, mutilated bodies and randomly shot at civilians, Kerry unfairly blackened the reputation of all servicemen.

read rest here, good stuff
Google says it's a subscription but it gave the story to me...

[Carolab]

1. too much work

here's the rest of it:

No historians appear to comment on the documentary's premise, which is that Kerry, then a little-known activist, single-handedly extended the fighting in Vietnam by two years and delayed the return of American prisoners by telling Congress in 1971 that U.S. forces had committed human rights violations.

After enduring a week of criticism, Sinclair said Tuesday that the special, now scheduled to be broadcast Friday on about 40 stations, would contain only segments of the film and would be part of a wider look at the use of documentaries to influence elections.

That leaves the full version of "Stolen Honor" available mostly by mail-order or over the Internet.

Michael Hoyt, executive editor of the Columbia Journalism Review, said it would be inappropriate for Sinclair to present the documentary as fair and truthful journalism.

"There is just no way that this can be considered news. It is propaganda," he said. "If you are going to do a story on an issue like what a candidate for president said in 1971 about a divisive and controversial war, you are going to have to make an effort to be balanced, and they have done the opposite here."

"Stolen Honor" was produced and narrated by Carlton Sherwood, who opens the film by saying it is about "a treachery that was, in its own way, as frightening as the hand-to-hand combat I experienced as a young Marine."

It includes interviews with more than a dozen former POWs describing the torture they endured in Hanoi, and their certainty that they would have been released sooner if Kerry and other activists hadn't accused the United States of committing war crimes.

"We stayed two more years because of him," said Jack H. Fellowes, who was imprisoned for 6 1/2 years.

"This man committed an act of treason," said George E. "Bud" Day, a prisoner for 5 1/2 years and winner of the Medal of Honor.

Their anger is genuine, but the film may leave viewers with misconceptions about what Kerry told Congress.

The film implies that Kerry accused the POWs themselves of having committed war crimes, when in fact he spoke only in general about the conduct of U.S. troops.

It also falsely implies that Kerry either committed atrocities himself or personally witnessed them. Kerry told Congress he was summarizing accusations made by other servicemen at an earlier event, and not relaying personal experiences.

"Stolen Honor" makes the argument that in repeating uncorroborated, and possibly fabricated, tales that U.S. soldiers had raped Vietnamese women, mutilated bodies and randomly shot at civilians, Kerry unfairly blackened the reputation of all servicemen.

Dr. Ernest Bolt, a history professor at the University of Richmond, said scholars continue to debate how widespread human rights abuses were during the war.

"There are some people among Vietnam vets who don't want to acknowledge any atrocities, but in fact they did happen." he said. "Whether they happened as often as Vietnam Veterans Against the War made them out to be, though, is a matter of debate."

Bolt said it was unlikely that Kerry's testimony directly affected how long the POWs were held, or how long the war lasted. He said Kerry's importance in the anti-war movement has been exaggerated since he began running for president.

Sherwood was part of a Gannett News Service team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 1980, but later left journalism and took a job in the administration of Gov. Tom Ridge, now the U.S. Homeland Security Secretary.

He did not respond to several requests for an interview this week, but previously told The Associated Press that he made the film because he believed the mainstream media had ignored Kerry's anti-war past.

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2. heh, thanks. Love the movie reviews, eh? n/t

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3. gratuitous bump for a comprehensive take on the Kerry attack..n/t