Something new about JFK - from the Smithsonian -

[hedgehog]

JFK was always diffident about his actions on PT-109 - "It was entirely involuntary - they sank my boat."

Some have even suggested that a better skipper would have kept his boat out of the way of the destroyer - that JFK was somehow derelict in his duty. Here's a story I've never heard before that offers some insight into Kennedy's character:

"Marines were trapped during a raid on Japanese-held Choiseul Island. “They landed on the enemy island in the middle of the night,” he says. “Their commanding officer radioed the next morning that he and his men were surrounded and heavily engaged. The CO who received the message said he’d get them out after dark.” According to Robinson, the Marine responded, “If you can’t come before then, don’t bother coming.”

The CO asked for a volunteer to make a daylight dash to save the Marines. “I wasn’t there,” Robinson told me, “but if I’d been, I’d have hidden behind the biggest palm tree I could find.” But Kennedy volunteered. “With a full load of fuel that would get him there and halfway back to where he could be towed home,” Robinson says, “he took off and got the Marines out.”


Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Remembering-PT-109.html#ixzz13CLD6yAK

[Turbineguy]

1. It's why the Americans

won WWII.

They had people who thought like that and in sufficient numbers.

[DavidDvorkin]

5. The Americans won WWII?

That's teabagger history.

[Turbineguy]

6. Well,

most of it anyway.

[DavidDvorkin]

8. Not even that.

[Joe Chi Minh]

9. Surely, they did in the Far East, though. The Russians did give some help,

there, too, although it was nowhere near the giant's contribution they made in the European theatre.

[damonm]

10. It's ACTUAL history in the Pacific theater.

The Russians did the Lion's share in Europe, to be sure, but the Pacific was mostly an American show.

[glitch]

2. Yet another reason why the Bailout-Bushes (starting with Poppy) hate the Kennedys?

Cowards hate Heroes.

[hedgehog]

3. Joe Kennedy saw the story of PT109 as good publicity for a possible

career in politics and made certain the story became well known. From what I've read, John Kennedy really bonded with the men of PT109, but was shy about references to his heroism.

[glitch]

4. Joe Kennedy was a creep. Fortunately his sons took after their mother. nt

[COLGATE4]

7. How different things might have been if not for Dallas nt