UPDATE: More on the Alston Wrinkle to The Swift Boat Story

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Here's what Hindrocket, at Power Line, says about the fast-breaking developments in the story below:

[I]t seems an almost inescapable conclusion that Alston never served under
Kerry. This is consistent with the statement, reported in this
article about Alston's mother, that after being shot in the head and
shoulder he "lived and came home."

Hard as it is to believe, it appears that David Alston's speech at the
Democratic Convention was a lie from beginning to end.

The issue could be conclusively resolved, of course, if Alston allowed
his military records to be released. My guess is they would show he never
returned to combat, and certainly never served on PFC-94 after January 29, 1969.
But, just as the press has let John Kerry get away with refusing to authorize
the release of all of his military records, no pressure will be brought to bear
on Alston to show that the story he told at the convention, and in a Kerry
television commercial, was anything other than a fantasy. Like so much of what
Kerry says about his service in Vietnam.