This evening I received an E-mail from a Republican friend of mine. It was a forward of a letter by Bud Day who was tortured in Vietnam and is a medal of honor recipient. I will put the full letter in the extended box and am hoping that together we can put together a cogent, link filled response. I've already pulled some links myself but this place has always proven awesome at putting together full rebuttals to these types of things.
I'd appreciate no vitriolic responses, only measured fatual ones. That's not to say that I won't be hard on my friend for some of the absolute bullshit in the letter. I will be quite hard on him because he is a better man than this.
Medal of Honor recipient Bud Day Talks of Torture
The prelude to the "response" below, from Colonel Bud Day, Medal of Honor recipient - prisoner of war survivor - reads "I didn't expect to be reminded of my treatment some 36 years ago on this holiday weekend but our politicians find it worthy to ignore what some have tried to recount to them, who have actually been there."
I got shot down over N Vietnam in 1967...a sq commander.
After I returned in 1973... I published 2 books that dealt a lot with "real torture" in Hanoi. Our make believe president is branding our country as a bunch of torturers when he has no idea what torture is.
As for me. Put thru a mock execution because I would not respond...pistol whipped on the head...same event... Couple of days later...hung by my feet all day. I escaped and got recaptured a couple of weeks later... I got shot and recaptured. Shot was OK...what happened after was not.
They marched me to Vinh... put me in the rope trick, trick. Almost pulled my arms out of the sockets. Beat me on the head with a little wooden rod until my eyes were swelled shut, and my unshot, unbroken hand a pulp.
Next day hung me by the arms...rebroke my right wrist...wiped out the nerves in my arms that control the hands. Rolled my fingers up into a ball. Only left the slightest movement of my L forefinger. So I started answering with some incredible lies.
Sent me to Hanoi strapped to a barrel of gas in the back of a truck.
Hanoi...on my knees. Rope trick again. Beaten by a big fool.
Into leg irons on a bed in Heartbreak Hotel.
Much kneeling--hands up at Zoo.
Really bad beating for refusing to condemn Lyndon Johnson.
Several more kneeling events. I could see my knee bone thru kneeling holes.
There was an escape from the annex to the Zoo. I was the Senior Officer of a large building because of escape. They started a mass torture of all commanders.
I think it was July 7, 1969...they started beating me with a car fan belt. In first 2 days I took over 300 strokes. Then stopped counting because I never thought I would live thru it.
They continued day-nite torture to get me to confess to a non-existent part in the escape. This went on for at least 3 days. On my knees. Fan belting... cut open my scrotum with fan belt stroke. Opened up both knee holes again. My fanny looked like hamburger. I could not lie on my back.
They tortured me into admitting that I was in on the escape and that my 2 room-mates knew about it.
The next day I denied the lie.
They commenced torturing me again with 3- 6- or 9 strokes of the fan belt every day from about July 11 or 12rh...to 14 October 1969. I continued to refuse to lie about my roommates again.
Now, the point of this is that our make-believe president has declared to the world that we (U.S.) are a bunch of torturers... Thus it will be OK to torture us next time when they catch us....because that is what the U.S. does.
Our make-believe president is a know nothing fool who thinks that pouring a little water on some one's face, or hanging a pair of womens pants over an Arabs head is TORTURE. He is a meathead.
I just talked to MOH holder Leo Thorsness who was also in my sq in jail.... as was John McCain ... and we agree that McCain does not speak for the POW group when he claims that Al Gharib was torture... or that "water boarding" is torture.
Our president and those fools around him who keep bad mouthing our great country are a disgrace to the United States. Please pass this info on to Sean Hannity. He is free to use it to point out the stupidity of the claims that water boarding ...which has no after effect... is torture. If it got the Arab to cough up the story about how he planned the attack on the twin towers in NYC ... hurrah for the guy who poured the water.
BUD DAY, MOH
George Everett "Bud" Day (born February 24, 1925) is a retired U.S. Air Force Colonel and Command Pilot who served during the Vietnam War. He is often cited as being the most decorated U.S. service member sinceGeneral Douglas MacArthur, having received some seventy decorations, a majority for actions in combat. Day is a recipient of the Medal of Honor.
I am at work and have to set up my overnight show as well as prep the morning show so I will be checking the diary occasionally until I am done. Then I will be adding more responses.