I think the GOP is gonna regret making his records an issue
http://www.johnkerry.com/about/Request_For_Swiftboat_Duty.pdf(Kerry's REQUEST to go to Nam and serve on Swift Boats)
Compare Bush* assignment records - checked "do not volunteer for overseas"
http://discover.npr.org/photo_gallery/photo_gallery_display.jhtml?gallery=1676511On Feb. 28, 1969, Kerry's craft and two other boats came under heavy fire from the riverbanks. Kerry ordered his units to turn into the ambush and sent men ashore to charge the enemy. According to the records, an enemy soldier holding a loaded rocket launcher sprang up within 10 feet of Kerry's boat and fled. Kerry leapt ashore, ran down the man and killed him.
Kerry and his men chased or killed all the enemy soldiers in the area, captured enemy weapons and then returned to the boat only to come under fire from the opposite bank as they began to pull away. Kerry again beached his boat and led a party ashore to pursue the enemy, and they successfully silenced the shooting. Later, the boats were again under fire, but Kerry initiated a heavy response that killed 10 Viet Cong and wounded another with no casualties to his own men.
He won the Silver Star "for gallantry and intrepidity in action" that day. Two weeks later, Kerry was engaged in another fire fight that resulted in a Bronze Star for heroic achievement and the third Purple Heart that would result in his reassignment out of Vietnam.
Kerry was commanding one of five boats on patrol on March 13, 1969, when two mines detonated almost simultaneously -- one beneath another boat and one near Kerry's craft. Shrapnel hit Kerry's buttocks, and his right arm was bleeding from contusions, but he rescued a boatmate who had been thrown overboard in the blast and was under sniper fire from both banks. Kerry then directed his crew to return to the other damaged craft and tow it to safety.
In April 1969, Kerry was sent stateside to the Military Sea Transportation Service, U.S. Atlantic Fleet, in Brooklyn, N.Y. On Nov. 21, 1969, Kerry requested that he be released from his commitment to serve actively until August 1970 so that he could run for Congress.
He was promoted to full lieutenant on Jan. 1, 1970, and soon after was discharged from active duty and became a reservist.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Kerry-Purple-Hearts.html?hpno doubt Kerry was a badass back in the day