Toliver’s Tale

A new controversy has erupted over John Kerry’s military service, this time over whether Lieutenant John Kerry spent Christmas of 1968 on a gunboat inside Cambodia. In a new book by his critics, Mr. Kerry is quoted as saying he did. But one of the authors of the book, “Unfit for Command,” says Mr. Kerry is lying and that he was never inside Cambodia.Well, it all reminds me of Bill Toliver. He was a combat reporter of the Pacific Stars and Stripes, the GI daily, during the Vietnam War. In late March of 1970, in what became one of Stars and Stripes’s greatest moments, he was sent to Chau Doc in the northern Mekong Delta to look into rumors that our allies in the South Vietnamese army were operating inside Cambodia.Toliver, a student in botany before being drafted, was perfect for the assignment. When he got to Chau Doc, he discovered to his dismay not only that Terence Smith of the New York Times was already there, but that Mr. Smith was being briefed inside the TOC, or tactical operations center, which was a sandbagged bunker full of radios and maps. Toliver, being an enlisted man as well as a reporter, was barred at the entrance.It was an infuriating situation, but Toliver was a patient fellow. He was sitting on the ground in front of the TOC, nursing his frustration, when an American major strolled by, spotted the forlorn GI, and asked what the problem was. Toliver explained that he was a reporter for the Stars and Stripes but because he was an enlisted man, he was barred from the TOC, while the New York Times had a man inside who was getting briefed.“Well, if you’ve got time to kill, come along with me,” the major said, or something to that effect. And before Toliver knew it, he was seated in a Huey slick, one of the open-sided work-horse helicopters then in widespread use, lifting off from a nearby pad. They bounced along in the sky for some minutes, when the major gestured for Toliver, who had a map on his lap, to look down.Toliver leaned out of the chopper and looked straight down, to see a V-formation of armored personnel carriers crawling across some rice paddies. There were dozens of the vehicles. Toliver pulled his head in and the major gestured for him to stick his head out again and look back to see where they were coming from. Toliver was amazed to see the Seven Mountains and the Vinh The canal, border landmarks, receding into the distance. When he looked to the major for confirmation, the major shouted, “We are in Cambodia.”Toliver knew it was one of the great scoops of the war, if he could get it nailed down. When he got back to the TOC, he discovered Terry Smith outside, pacing back and forth in his own frustration. It seems Smith had been briefed on the situation but wanted an eyewitness account. Toliver had the eye-witness account, but needed the briefing. So he and Smith traded information and then each raced to file their stories, Toliver dictating his dispatch by phone from the Delta.Those of us in the Stripes bureau – which was then headed by Specialist 5 Philip Mc-Combs, later of the Washington Post, and included Specialist 4 Jack Fuller, who went on to win a Pulitzer Prize at the Chicago Tribune – knew instantly that it was an explosive story, but doubted Stripes would print it based on the say-so of an enlisted man. This led to a plan by which we would file a copy of Toliver’s story to Stripes headquarters in Tokyo and then get a copy of it to UPI, which would file its own account and put Stripes on the spot.I was assigned to help run the carbon copies of Toliver’s story to UPI’s office in downtown Saigon that night. It was after curfew when we encountered a road block en route. I can’t remember which one of us was driving, but we knew that if we stopped, we risked being turned back. So we careered on through, only to have one of the white-uniformed South Vietnamese cops empty a revolver or some other weapon – either into the air or at the back of our International Harvester Scout – as we zoomed past.Our scheme worked. UPI filed a report about Toliver’s report. The way we heard it at Stripes is that Terry Smith, who landed a terrific dispatch on Page 1 of the Times, got rocketed by the editors at 43rd Street, who were startled that the story was also on the UPI wire. And Stripes got its own story to the GIs. It was met with firm denials by the highest levels of the South Vietnamese command and, as I recall it, in Washington as well.The denials were duly reported by the GI daily. It quoted the South Vietnamese brass as saying the battle had taken place inside Vietnam. However, Stripes added, its reporter, Specialist 4 Bill Toliver, had flown over the operation with a map in his lap and had witnessed the action from the air. Only in America could there be such an institution – a GI newspaper prepared to contradict the highest levels of the chain of command.Which brings me to Senator Kerry. I carry no brief for him, and I don’t know whether he did or did not spend Christmas on his swift boat in Cambodia. His recollection that he did is being questioned by others who served on the swift boats at the time and is denied up and down the chain of command. But I will say this for Mr. Kerry. The fact that the military chain of command denies a unit is inside Cambodia isn’t dispositive. Take it from Bill Toliver.

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