Fri, Aug 6, 2004 6:20pm ET

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Swift Boat Vets chairman's evolving story about knowing Kerry in Vietnam

Retired Adm. Roy Hoffmann, chairman and co-founder of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, has changed his story about whether or not he actually knew Senator John Kerry in Vietnam.

May 6: "Hoffman acknowledged he had no first-hand knowledge to discredit Kerry's claims to valor and said that although Kerry was under his command, he really didn't know Kerry much personally." [Milwaukee Journal Sentinel]

August 4: "'I knew him well enough to know him," Hoffman said. 'He's the most vain individual I've ever met - aloof and arrogant.'" [Scripps Howard News Service]

August 5: Hoffman said, "We were on the same operations, we were operating within 25-50 yards of him all the time, and for them to suggest we don't know John Kerry is pure old bull." [The New York Times]

August 5: In response to Senator John McCain's (R-AZ) denunciation of the ad, Hoffman "said they respected McCain's 'right to express his opinion and we hope he extends to us the same respect and courtesy, particularly since we served with John Kerry, we knew him well and Sen. McCain did not.'" [Associated Press]

August 5: Hoffman said, "I knew him well, because I operated very closely with him and, uh, many of the operations, uh, most of the operations were-were conducted with multiple boats" - a dramatic shift from admitting no personal knowledge of Kerry three months earlier; it went unchallenged by his host. [ABC Radio's Sean Hannity Show]

In the Swift Boat Veterans' ad, Hoffman states, "John Kerry has not been honest." Well, he should know.

—K.B.

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