WASHINGTON, Sept 1 (AFP) - Two former US senators close to Democratic presidential contender John Kerry on Wednesday called on influential White House adviser Karl Rove to resign, accusing him of involvement in a campaign to discredit Kerry's Vietnam War record.
Former senators Bob Kerrey and Max Cleland were firing back at comments made by Rove on Tuesday, when President George W. Bush's top political adviser said Kerry's 1971 Senate testimony recounting allegations of abuses committed by US soldiers "tarnished" their reputations.
The two Democrats, who are both Vietnam War veterans, also accused Rove of being connected to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group of former Vietnam War sailors who have released television spots accusing Kerry of exaggerating his military record.
"I just think Karl Rove has been in enough political campaigns to understand how separate you need to be from these independent efforts, and he just ended that separation and should resign," Kerrey said in a conference call organized by the Kerry campaign.
"He likes the fact that (the television spots are) on and may in fact have had enough to do with it that he ought to resign and get out of the campaign," Kerrey said.
Cleland added that Rove was "the strategist behind George Bush going after four Vietnam veterans in the last four years."
He said the veterans who were attacked were Senator John McCain during the 2000 Republican presidential primary, Senator Bob Smith of New Hampshire during his failed re-election bid in 2002, Kerry this year and himself two years ago during his failed re-election effort in Georgia.
"Karl Rove was behind it all," Cleland said. "It's part of his smear campaign ... to tarnish the records of service of Vietnam veterans, and now he's doing it again."
Rove's comments to CNN Tuesday were related to Kerry's 1971 testimony before the US Senate, during which he recounted stories of alleged atrocities committed by US servicemen in Vietnam.
Rove said neither his uncle, who fought in Vietnam, nor the men under Kerry's command, "should be so quickly tarnished as being war criminals as Senator Kerry did in his testimony in 1971."