Ventura claims to have a signed confession

[Robert Howard]

http://www.trutv.com...confession.html

Video of the show.

I say this with a touch of sarcasm, but he [Ventura] was a Governor,

and politicians and truth are, to a great degree mutually exclusive.

One thing about E Howard Hunt's revelations,

[although there seemed to be some downtime

between his death and the release of his book

Saint John Hunt, is a separate category altogether.]

But regarding American Spy what really bothered me was

his biggest take on the assassination was implying or stating more or less, that LBJ was the chief culprit....see pages 136-138

He took a very disingenuous path in his approach to American Spy, with a few exceptions, it was as if he had never been associated with the topic of the JFK assassination, which is pretty cute, when you consider that the photograph in Dealey Plaza at the time immediately after the assassination was either him or someone trying very hard to look like him.

I would have much preferred to hear him expound on an area like that, instead of hearing the

"here's how it may have happened," shtick.

Although LBJ may or may not have been what Hunt alleged, I believe

somewhere, conservative icon William Buckley was smiling, when that particular book hit the shelves.

Pretending that Senators Eastland, Morse, Goldwater Tower, later Republican John Connally

and Governor George Wallace, and the people who were devoted to their mindset were not worth mentioning,

and focusing on LBJ to me was a sign the books main impact would be to make the biggest association for the reader.

JFK Assassination=Democrat scandal, which is such perverse a twist on history, Oliver

Stone would blush...figuratively speaking, that is......

Saint John Hunt saved the collective day, that is if you feel comfortable with the credibility

of his personalization of the real E Howard Hunt, which I am.

I am sure I have offended many people's sensibilities, but remember

I am stating my opinion, that's all.

Edited November 21, 2010 by Robert Howard

[Len Colby]

My understanding is that Jesse Ventura was a member of UDT-12 and in that capacity served in Vietnam. Since both SEAL teams and UDTs were getting shot up in Vietnam, the difference between the two doesn't matter very much.

Ventura served in Vietnam but in exactly what role or unit he refused to explain other than to admit he did not see combat and was “never shot at”. He was based in the Philippines. He was awarded the Vietnam Service Medal, which was issued to soldiers who served in Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and the territorial waters of the latter, but not the “Combat Action Ribbon, which was awarded to those involved in a firefight or who went on clandestine or special operations where the risk of enemy fire was great or expected”. Thus I presume he did some diving in areas firmly under US/RVN control. One thing that occurred to me is that he might have checked RVN ports for mines.

http://web.archive.org/web/20020203035901/http://www.startribune.com/stories/587/1130195.html

http://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/1999/dec/02/jesse-great-pretender-ventura/

A Navy officer who transferred from the UDT to the SEALS and severed in Vietnam does not think “the difference between the two doesn't matter very much”

The difference in training reflected the difference in missions: seals in platoons of 12 to 14 men went looking for the VC and NVA in the swamps, paddies, and jungles of Vietnam; udts in platoons of 22 men conducted hydrographic recons in advance of actual or anticipated Marine amphibious landings. Most of these recons were “admin,” or unopposed by the enemy. udts mainly floated around the South China Sea on ships with Marine battalion landing teams as part of what’s called an amphibious ready group or arg.

[…]

These are not distinctions without differences. No one from udt during the Vietnam War would dare misrepresent himself as a seal. Consider this: seal Team One, with roughly the same number of men as udt 12, had 34 killed during the war. I knew many of them. udt 12 lost but a single man. 34:1.

He classified “instances of udt 12 combat” as isolated.

http://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/1999/dec/02/jesse-great-pretender-ventura/

Not to put the UDTs down, both you and Ventura can be proud to have served in an team; but he falsely claimed the greater cachet of being a SEAL and thus of having seen combat which he did not.