I am not being disrespectful to the dead.
I've heard the "war hero" designation used in the most astonishing cases, and to my way of thinking there are -very- few war heroes.
The majority of our servicemen and servicewomen are good, competent, qualified, and trustworthy, descriptors like that.
A hero is a different class, and may have nothing to do with any special traits, but the hero is in a special place and a special time, and does something that saves a person or two (personal hero) or a larger or much larger group (national hero).
I'm kind of making up my definitions on the fly.
To be heroic, the person has to call upon reserves of courage, and put himself at high or extreme risk of death in order to save other people or advance the mission in an extraordinary way.
To achieve heroism the actions need to be above and beyond the call of duty, and not something that a serviceman would be expected to do in his normal duties.

Being shot down and/or captured does not come anywhere near heroism. Surviving torture does not make a hero.

Society seems to be willing to change basic definitions in order to find somebody to admire.
Maybe we don't have enough real heroes?

Article makes it sound as if he inadvertently hit switches as he (like anyone would) scrambled out of the plane.

You'd think ordinance would have red flip covers on them.

The part that is telling - is hiding below decks rather than trying to help during an emergency, bailing out to go to Saigon immediately without notice, 3 months holiday in Europe after requesting transfer to stay off the Forrestal, and burying his conduct with outright lies in the intervening years.

So, something like refusing an early release from a POW camp where you knew you would continue to be subjected to torture and solitary confinement, extreme privation, poor/non-existent healthcare, etc.

Are service members generally expected to endure torture in the course of their normal duties? Just wondering....

Does surviving torture that you could have opted out of make you a hero?

Do you have any support for the wild assertion that you're making with this statement?

Read the Truthdig article. Read " A Maverick Revisited." Read the Unz review.

He bailed out, ran and hid rather than try to help anyone with firefighting or rescue efforts.

Gross negligence at best.

He saved his own ass, then left the ship without permission, requested transfer, never went back.

You're making a pointed argument. I do not know the details that you are referring to. Not only the details, but the source(s) of that information. Share, and I'm open to learning.


If they are captured, yes, to the best of their ability.


I don't think that it makes a hero.
It may be brave and/or selfless though.

I read the Truthdig article. It seems like they were super hung up on whether the first two (or was it one?) bombs to cook-off fell off his aircraft or the one next to him.
Could it be that his station during general quarters was actually in his squadron ready room below deck, and not fighting fires on the flight deck? I'm not sure running to escape a raging inferno qualifies as gross negligence, nor am I convinced that had he immediately turned back to assist that anyone would have been saved.
But hey, at least you aren't one of those crazy people on the internet who claim McCain personally started the fire by improperly starting his aircraft engine.

That's fair. Its fairly common knowledge that McCain was offered a release early in his captivity due to his father and grandfather being fairly senior officers in the Navy. The reasoning for the offer varies, depending on the account, but the bottom line is that McCain refused released and continued to be tortured and otherwise mistreated (along with his fellow POWs) for the duration of his captivity. His reasoning was simply that he knew that his leaving earlier than anyone who had been captured before him, or those who were more seriously injured would have dealt a serious blow to the morale of his fellow prisoners.


But you would agree that capture by the enemy would generally be considered an exceptional or extraordinary circumstance, yes? There's a reason that a DUSTWUN report generates the kind of response from the military that it does.


So bravery and selflessness in the face of an armed enemy are not heroic? Interesting.

I wasn't aware of this story.
I was also able to find sources that discredited all the anti-McCain articles.
Again, I am left scratching my head about what is true and what is spin, propaganda.


I'm going to be looking at this as Devil's Advocate:


His other option would have been to burn to death or die in an explosion. So far, he did ok in my book.


Ran- that's understandable.
Hid- that's probably not true, based on my time in the navy. There are very few places to "hide."

The little bit that I read indicated that most of the assigned firefighters died or were incapacitated with the fire/explosion, so the people left battling it were anyone and everyone able to lend a hand.
Rank means very little in a bonafide emergency, so if he were capable and in the right position, he should have joined in fighting the fire. I'm not sure how we can pass judgement inside a he said/ she said (with license) back and forth like this.


A quick read of the articles could lead to the conclusion that an admiral's son was getting out of trouble based on preferential treatment, but man, the cost of trying to do that and failing would be extreme.
I'd need more hard evidence before I could convict.

I think that that is what we are questioning here: Common knowledge.
Common knowledge seems to be twisted by almost everyone to try to make their own point of view seem incontrovertible.
Have you watched the news recently? I haven't, but I remember it.


You're venturing into Strawman Argument area. I didn't say that it happens commonly or regularly or is an expected outcome.
There is no reason to try to convince me to agree with you if we are operating under different definitions.


Interesting.
It's interesting that you ignore my definitions.
In your defense, I am fairly confident that you would have an easier time finding definitions, even legal and official definitions that would agree with your view.
The title "Hero" requires something more than bravery and selflessness to me.
I believe that I understand your view, and I admit freely that I do not know enough about the details of McCain's history to claim one way or the other.
You're tactic in this discussion so far has been to ignore my definition and then claim surprise that I still agree with my own definition.
I've been taken to task a LOT here on WaGuns because I disagree strongly with the use of the word "coward" for guys like the 9/11 hijackers. I don't like changing the definition of a word to fit an agenda like this... I'd rather see a brand new word invented.

I'm naive as all get out about a lot of things... This very well could be one.
I used to think that the USA was getting better and better all the time. Why did I think that? Because I have an idealistic streak, and I assumed that "we the people" were always trying to do what is right and good, and that went for the politicians too, in my little fantasy world.

This whole debate is why I wrote what I wrote way earlier. McCain was OK until the Presidential run. Something broke in his head then, maybe a bit before..........

I asked the question "What made McCain a hero?" as an honest question.
I do not know the details of his captivity.

30 years ago I would have assumed that any official document was as accurate as humanly possible, and if incorrect, would be corrected as soon as better information was available. Things have changed. The world has changed.

OOps: Edit to correct. I didn't ask "What made McCain a hero?"


My question "How was he great?" was not to imply that he wasn't. I genuinely wanted to know what he had done to deserve high accolades. Being a POW and treated poorly or worse doesn't meet my definition of being great or heroic.
Olympia173's reminder that he was offered "early outs" and yet refused does make me think about it a bit more. It's admirable... selfless, all that.
Did his captors make it clear to anyone else that he was offered early outs? Where do we know this information from? Common knowledge doesn't work for something like this, I think. Just asking for a reliable citation.

such as?
The first definition of the word is: a person noted for courageous acts or nobility of character:
He became a local hero when he saved the drowning child.

I already covered that Earl. The common definition is too broad for my personal use. By an easy reading of that common definition, there are hundreds of millions of heroes.
I subscribe to a much narrower definition. It is my own. I asked for details about what McCain did that made him qualify as "great".