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The rally outside University of Wisconsin-La Crosse's Veterans Memorial Stadium was part of the "Tour of Honor," a four-day,
800-mile swing through Wisconsin that will take a group of veterans from Superior to Madison to show support for Kerry.
The veterans said they were spurred to speak out by recent television ads by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, questioning Kerry's accounts of his tour of duty and the medals he received in four months as a Navy lieutenant and swiftboat commander.
"Where I have a problem is the people who are saying that weren't there," said Lou Ellingson of Eden Prairie, Minn., who also was skipper of a swift boat during Vietnam War.
Richard Trussoni of Chaseburg, Wis., was there, as part of Kerry's crew on several swift boat patrols.
"His own crew members back him up," Trussoni told the roughly 50 people at the rally.
Trussoni and others also noted Kerry did not request the medals he received — the Bronze Star, the Silver Star and three Purple Hearts. A superior had to recommend him for those citations, Trussoni said.
"John Kerry, I knew him personally as an honest man," said Trussoni.
"If anyone stands up and says someone has lied to get their medals, I'm sorry, but they have defamed not only the person ... but the entire process," said Dave Adams, who was a Air Force security dog handler in Thailand from 1967 to 1971.
The fact that President George W. Bush has yet to condemn the ads, despite calls from Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona as well as leading Democrats, led Adams to "question that commander-in-chief's integrity and ability to command and lead this nation."
The White House and Bush campaign maintain they have never questioned Kerry's service, but they stopped short of calling for the ads to cease running in battleground states like Wisconsin and Ohio.
Steven Noblitt of Onalaska said Kerry earned his support by working in 1997, along with McCain and former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole, to bring back his uncle's remains from Laos. Capt. Patrick Harrold of Leavenworth, Kan., had been missing and presumed dead since December 1969, but the wreckage of his plane wasn't found until 1993.
"He was more like my older brother," Noblitt said of his uncle, who was 24 when he was killed.
Earlier Friday, the veterans had stopped at Arcadia's Memorial Park. Today, the group will be joined in Green Bay and Waukesha by Max Cleland, a former Georgia senator who lost both legs and an arm in a grenade explosion while in Vietnam. Cleland introduced Kerry to accept the party's nomination at the 2004 Democratic Convention.
Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, a former Navy fighter pilot, was to have appeared in La Crosse Friday but cancelled on a scheduling conflict. On Monday, Harkin called Vice President Dick Cheney "cowardly" for questioning Kerry's war record when Cheney received "five deferments during Vietnam."
That comment drew a harsh response Friday from state Rep. Terry Musser, R-Black River Falls, himself a Vietnam veteran.
"President Bush does not question Kerry's service in Vietnam, and neither do I," Musser said in a statement distributed by the state's Republican Party. "However, Kerry's protest actions after coming home from Vietnam deeply hurt a number of vets, including myself. Simply put, we will never forget."
