Gen. Clark was being generous in his comments and could have pointed out what a Military "screwup" McCain really was. Everyone seems to want to forget McCain holds the Navy record for almost sinking the USS Forrestal and causing the deaths of 134 Sailors due to a careless pre-flight mistake he made on a hot launch. He would have been court martialed for the screwup but sons of four star Admirals are not usually CMed in the USN. McCain's time as a POW certainly didn't provide any training other than to keep your mouth shut or risk getting the crap beat out of yourself. I think on balance Gen. Clark's experience and Military rank trumps anything McCain can offer.

Garbage. Provide some actual evidence.

Just looked up on the USS FORRESTAL and mc cain was one of two people suspected of the fire--the other LCMDR Fred D White perished in the ensuing fire and chaos. In an attemp to extinsh the blaze aircraft with ordinance was dumped overboard eliminating any evidence of who actually screwed up. He is still a warmonger and WILL escalate attacks on other countries as his predecessor did. But no proof on the FORRESTAL

Clyde Turbo

I agree with you 100%. Whether or not General Clark has a grude or not with Senator McCain - it should not matter but would have been better to have left his feelings out of any comments made.

I do feel, however, that too much of Senator McCain's militay and civilian life has been kept out of the public. I feel General Clark had the right to say what he wanted and from what I have been reading, people should be questioning Senator McCain and his motives and constant use of his military service for his gain.

I might add - other brave soldiers, heroes in my estimation, were also wounded and killed. General Clark and Senator McCain might have sustained wounds and endured captivity but what about those who were tortured alive, thrown into pits and left to die? This happend to a relative. The military lied about the circumstances of this soldier's death - it wasn't until fellow soldiers came forward some twenty years later that his mother was able to find closure.

I am sick and tired of Senator McCain and his whining - he was a soldier, well, so were a lot of other brave men and women. Get on with your campaign and stop blaming Senator Obama for your problems.

His aircraft was hit by a mis-fired missile on the Forrestal. How could he possibly be responsible for it? You are insane.

NO PROOF OF THAT he walked away so if the missle hit his aircraft I SERIOUSLY DOUBT he would have walked away seing it was loaded with missles, I'm quite sure 1 or more would have ignited. NOT SAYING he started it but seems a little screwy to me.

If you're saying "something screwy" is going on, WHAT exactly are you implying. The missile that started the whole thing came from an F-4, not an A-4, like McCain's. McCain barely escaped with his life. Not everything explodes Hollywood style. I've seen aviation fires--take my word for it. Besides, most of the incident was captured by the Forrestal's flight deck cameras. To say something in this was McCain's responsibility is to join the tinfoil-hat crowd.

I have no idea if it's true or not......my cousin was with VF 142 on the Big E late in the war (72ish) and he said everyone knew McCain was at fault. They were on station with the Oriskany and it was still being talked about.

It's been a rumor/myth ever since. Now... he won't say anything about it. Either way.

I found this:

Surviving crewmen and those who investigated the Forrestal fire case reported that McCain deliberately 'wet-started' his A-4E Skyhawk to shake up the guy in the F-4 Phantom behind his A-4.

In McCain's case, the 'wet-start' 'cooked off' and launched the M34 Zuni rocket from the rear F-4 that punctured the Skyhawk's fuel tank, knocked the M-65 1000 lb. bomb off it's 500 lb. rated mount, and touched off the explosions and massive fire.

McCain was 1st off the Forrestal - before any wounded - and taken to the Oriskany.

Truth or myth...it's the basis for the stories that have floated around all these years.

Even the "wet start" story WAS TRUE, McCain doing that is not responsible for the incident. Correlation and causation are not the same thing. That I went for a walk and it started to rain doesn't mean that walking causes precipitation.

The mishap was established to be due to the F-4's ordnance mistakenly already being hooked up when it was switched to external power, causing some stray voltage to trigger the weapon.

Military ordnance is generally very stable until triggered by its fuze. If the heat from an extra-flaming start by an adjacent aircraft were enough to cook it off, you wouldn't even be able to store it.

I have a feeling that OspreyPilot and I won't agree on much, but I have to back him up here. I've seen the video of that incident as part of my damage control training and it was ABSOLUTELY NOT McCain's fault.

One of the reasons that fire was so destructive was due to poor DC. For example, there was not adequate C2 for fighting the damage. They tried to use both water and AFFF on a Class B fire at the same time, and the water prevented a proper foam blanket from forming. Nobody was wearing proper PPE. That sort of thing. It was a mess all around, and a large part of what we do now came from the lessons learned on that day, but it was not McCain's doing in any way. He just happened to be caught in it. Like the sinking of the USS Indianapolis, it was a terrible tragedy that we learned from.

Just as a disclaimer, I'm still not planning to vote for McCain, but there really isn't any dirt you can dig up in his military record. It's about as spotless as they come. Unless Obama hires Rove, McCain's military service should be pretty much safe.

Which just goes to show how easy it is for rumors and myths to be perpetuated.

I'm glad to know this seems to be one those events.