Sen John " USS Forrestal " McCain......
Mr Rodent.....Poor Mr Rodent....how come
John McCain and the relevant camera footage
were " Whisked " away.....
Ponder his explanation above.....
Below is accounting from other members that were
on the deck....
" Some of those who were on the Forrestal and other persons familiar with
the ordnance told me that because the rocket did not hit McCain’s craft, only
actions by the pilot could have caused any bomb to fall from McCain’s Skyhawk.
These sources — who spoke under the condition that they not be publicly
identified — agree with each other that, if any bomb fell from the McCain airplane, it
was because of actions that he took either in error or panic upon seeing the fire on
the deck or in his hasty exit from the plane. Two switches in the cockpit of a Skyhawk
need to be thrown to drop such a bomb, according to the sources.
Whatever the circumstances of the fire’s origins, McCain did not stay on deck to
help fight the blaze as the men around him did. With the firefighting crew virtually
wiped out, men untrained in fighting fires had to pick up the fire hoses, rescue the
wounded or frantically throw bombs and even planes over the ship’s side to prevent
further tragedy. McCain left them behind and went down to the hangar-bay level, where
he briefly helped crew members heave some bombs overboard. After that, he went to the
pilot’s ready room and watched the fire on a television monitor hooked to a camera
trained on the deck.
McCain has never been asked to explain why he claims that the Zuni rocket struck his plane.
If a bomb or bombs subsequently fell from McCain’s plane as he has said, it seems to
strongly suggests pilot error, and if a bomb or bombs did not fall from his plane, it suggests
rash disregard for important facts in his accounts of the accident.
There is plenty more about this story that raises questions about McCain’s truthfulness
and judgment. In the first hours after the fire, he apparently did not claim to have been
injured. New York Times reporter R.W. Apple, who helicoptered out to the ship the day
after the tragedy and sought out McCain as the “son and grandson of two noted admirals,”
never mentioned him being wounded, although he reported on him more than on any
other crew member. This would be an odd omission on Apple’s part if McCain indeed
had been wounded, given that service wounds are usually highlighted in such reports
during wartime. McCain’s own father, after seeing his son several weeks later, sent a
letter to relatives and friends about the fire saying, “Happily for all of us, he [John] came
through without a scratch.” A week after the fire, McCain made a statement in which
he said that when he was on the hangar deck he noticed that he had a wound on his
knee and small shrapnel cuts in his thigh and shoulder. He was not treated in sick bay,
however, and he tells a story in “Faith of My Fathers” that seems to be at variance with
the facts. He writes that he went to sick bay to have his wounds treated but when he got
there, a “kid” who was “anonymous to me because the fire had burned off all of his
identifying features” asked him if another pilot in the squadron was OK. When McCain
replied that he was, the “kid” said “Thank God” and died before McCain’s eyes. McCain
said that experience left him “unable to keep my composure,” and that is why he left sick
bay without being treated. "
