THE THIRD WAY PRESIDENT VS. A FIFTH COLUMN SENATOR:

Hanoi Approved of Role Played By Anti-War Vets (THOMAS LIPSCOMB, October 26, 2004, NY Sun)

The communist regime in Hanoi monitored closely and looked favorably upon the activities of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War during the period Senator Kerry served most actively as the group's spokesman and a member of its executive committee, two captured Viet Cong documents suggest.

The documents - one dubbed a "circular" and the other a "directive" - were captured in 1971 and are part of a trove of material from the war currently stored at the Vietnam Archive at Texas Tech University at Lubbock. Originally organized by Douglas Pike, a major scholar who is now deceased, the archive contains more than 20 million documents. Many are available online at the Virtual Vietnam Archive and, as the election has heated up, have been the focus of a scramble for insights into Mr. Kerry's anti-war activities. The Circular and the Directive are listed as items numbered 2150901039b and 2150901041 respectively. Their authenticity was confirmed by Stephen Maxner, archivist at the Vietnam Archive.

The two documents provide a glimpse of the favorable way the Viet Cong viewed the activities in which Mr. Kerry was involved.

We were wrong, he does have some passionate supporters.

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 26, 2004 8:24 AM