Dow Jones Interactive

ARTS & LIFESTYLE
Book Review; Vietnam expose leans on scant evidence
THOMAS M. KEANE JR.

02/04/2003
Boston Herald
All Editions
038
(Copyright 2003)

"The Education of Lieutenant Kerrey" by Gregory L. Vistica (St. Martin's Press; $24.95)

Just before midnight on Feb. 25, 1969, Lt. Robert Kerrey led a cadre of Navy SEALs on a covert mission to the Vietnamese town of Thanh Phong.

An hour later, 25 people lay dead or dying. All were civilians; almost all were women and children.

For more than 30 years, the events of that night were kept hidden. Kerrey (not to be confused with Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kerry) lived what seemed a storybook life. He won the Medal of Honor. Back home in Nebraska, he went into business, becoming a multimillionaire. From there, it was politics: governor at age 38, U.S. senator at 44. Charismatic and dashing, he gained national notoriety for a long romance with actress Debra Winger. He ran for president in 1992, left the Senate in 2000 and was named head of the New School in New York. From there, many figured, he was well positioned to run for president in 2004 or 2008.

Then it all came undone. Vistica, a well-regarded reporter, uncovered Kerrey's secret and broke the story in 2001. It provoked a storm of media coverage and, arguably, ended any chance Kerrey had of becoming president.

Vistica has now turned his scoop into a book, in which he makes an explosive charge. The carnage at Thanh Phong was not, as Kerrey would have it, an unintended consequence of the SEALs returning fire directed at them. Rather, Vistica says, it was unprovoked. Kerrey and his team rounded up civilians and murdered them, making Thanh Phong a deliberate atrocity along the lines of My Lai, he said.

That claim rests on thin evidence: One disgruntled SEAL and a Vietnamese witness who has since recanted. Other SEALs on the mission support Kerrey's version. Moreover, it detracts from the underlying theme of this book: War exerts a devastating effect on those who fight. Kerrey, Vistica says, was unalterably changed by that night, by "the terribly corrosive power of secrets."

Looking at Kerrey's life - millionaire, senator and squire to beautiful women - that proposition might not seem self-evident. Yet, Vistica argues, Kerrey's run for president was marred by deep ambivalence over his war record. And Kerrey's almost confessional conversations reveal a man who is profoundly anguished by his actions in Vietnam.

It's potentially powerful stuff. But not in Vistica's hands. He is a dull writer, who can make even a tense battle sequence seem tedious. The book itself is confused and meandering, and sometimes seems to be more about Vistica than Kerrey.

Too bad. War is a sordid, even depraved business. Vistica's book, more sensationalist than thoughtful, could have helped us understand that - particularly relevant today as we prepare to ask more young men and women to fight.

Thomas M. Keane Jr. is a columnist for the Herald.