THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 8, 1994 TAG: 9410080289
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A9 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAVID M. POOLE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ARLINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 68 lines
Breaking his self-imposed silence on Oliver L. North, former Navy Secretary James Webb on Friday said the Republican candidate has too much ethical baggage to serve in the U.S. Senate.
``Over the years, many people who have known Oliver North well have marveled at the exaggerations and misrepresentations he has brought to the public arena,'' Webb said during a press conference at the Iwo Jima Memorial with U.S. Sen. Charles S. Robb.
``You can't build ethics in government if you don't have ethical people in government.''
Webb, a classmate of North's at the U.S. Naval Academy and Naval chief under President Reagan, said he was saddened that several former Reagan administration officials who still privately voice reservations about North's fitness to serve have publicly endorsed him.
``The message they're sending is that conduct which has betrayed the public trust can be excused when political expediency is at stake,'' said Webb, who declined to name names.
Campaigning in Salem, North shrugged off Webb's comments as ``sour grapes'' from their Naval Academy days when North beat Webb in the Navy boxing championship.
``How old are these sour grapes - 26, 27 years?'' North asked.
Webb had refrained from making public statements about North after the then-Marine emerged as a central figure in the Iran-Contra scandal in the 1980s. North was convicted of three felonies: destroying documents, providing misleading information to Congress and receiving an illegal gratuity. An appeals court later overturned the convictions on grounds that North's immunized testimony before a congressional panel in 1987 may have been used against him.
Several other former military officers - including retired Marine Col. Roger Barnard, Robb's commanding officer in Vietnam - turned up at the Iwo Jima Memorial to set the record straight.
In the mid-1960s, Robb was assigned to a ceremonial post in the White House, where he met and married Lynda Johnson, the daughter of then-President Lyndon B. Johnson. In 1968, Robb went to Vietnam as a Marine captain to command a rifle company.
Barnard said Robb served with distinction in combat despite efforts from above to keep the president's son-in-law out of harm's way.
William Cowan, a Naval Academy graduate who served three years in Vietnam, took issue with North's past embellishments of his military record.
Cowan referred to a New York civil trial in 1985, when North testified under oath that he served two tours in Vietnam, commanded a company and worked in special operations. Cowan said North served one term in Vietnam, commanded a platoon and was not involved in the ``black world'' of intelligence.
North declined comment. ``I'm not going to get down in the gutter with Chuck Robb,'' North said. ``This isn't about my service. This isn't about his service. It's about his lousy service as a U.S. senator.''
The third Senate candidate, independent J. Marshall Coleman, gave a speech in Williamsburg on Friday in which he blasted North's pattern of inaccurate statements.
``As (Sen.) John Warner notes, with each passing day, the distance between what is true and false in the public's mind, and what is true and false in Oliver North's mind, grows further and further,'' Coleman said. MEMO: Staff writer Dwayne Yancey contributed to this report.
KEYWORDS: U.S. SENATE RACE CAMPAIGN CANDIDATES by CNB