Kerrey's versus Pollard's heroism PUBLISHED 5/1/2001
There has been only one Holocaust, but what the Nazi Holocaust demonstrated so well is that human deprivation occurs incrementally. It starts with simple massacres; you shoot the first innocent person and then you shoot the next set of people and after you realize that you cannot shoot enough people you look to more efficient methods such as gas chambers. This is why weapons of mass destruction are developed and why chemical warfare is so frightening. Saddam Hussein understands this. Bob Kerrey, former U.S. Senator and presidential hopeful, took the first step down this frightening path while a U.S. Naval Seal and stopped. On the other hand, Jonathan Pollard, the convicted spy, did not need to kill anyone to understand the consequences of weapons of mass destruction before he blew the whistle on what he saw cross over his desk at Naval Intelligence.
The rewards in America for covering up your sins or revealing the truth are indeed ironic. In this instance Kerrey received the nation’s highest award of valor while Pollard’s reward is going on sixteen years of hard time.
In war both sides commit atrocities, which is the whole point of peacemakers in attempting to prevent future atrocities. It is in the gray area of corrupt secret policies such as the ill-conceived CIA support of Iraq in supporting Saddam’s chemical warfare production that was ultimately aimed against Israel – a policy that is so incomprehensible to anyone who has relatives that lived through the Holocaust.
Were there only one witness to Kerrey’s atrocity, this cover-up would have remained with those who elected to follow their leader [which led directly to Kerrey’s Bronze Star that stated that twenty-one Vietcong were killed in this incident, a clear lie which could have been refuted at any time including the moment at which President Nixon personally awarded him the Congressional Medal of Honor]. What was going through his mind at that moment when the President of the United States was reading the commendation for heroism to him personally?
Is this public persecution of the whistle blower by the political elite and the press in America any different than that they imposed on Jonathan Pollard? The only difference is there was no corroborating witness and Pollard stands alone in revealing the conspiracy of the misguided CIA policy aimed at the Jewish State which ironically was probably used against U.S. soldiers during the Gulf War. Whose sin is greater; Pollard’s for violating an American secrecy law that could have lead to the death of hundreds of thousands of Israeli citizens to prevent another Holocaust or Kerrey’s sin, which clearly led to the murder of at least thirteen innocent people? Pollard has already spent 15 years, one-third of his life, in an American prison while Kerrey spent the same time in two of America’s most exalted political offices; knowing full well that he had lied while serving his country. Where is the justice in the American judicial system? Where is the forgiveness in Bob Kerrey’s heart?
