A tangled web indeed: On Saturday, retired Col. Kenneth Cordier, a Vietnam veteran and a member of Mr. Bush's steering committee to help reach out to veterans, resigned from the committee over his appearance in one of the commercials. Mr. Cordier was also a Bush supporter in the 2000 election. In his television interview today Mr. Odell was asked about apparently contradictory statements by a member of the group, George Elliott. Mr. Odell was shown an advertisement in which Mr. Elliott says that Mr. Kerry has not been truthful about what happened in Vietnam. Mr. Odell was then shown an October 1996 campaign video for Mr. Kerry in which Mr. Elliott praises him. "The fact that he chased an armed enemy down is not something to be looked down upon, but it was an act of courage," Mr. Elliott says in the earlier video. Mr. Odell was also shown statements by another member of the group, Adrian L. Lonsdale, who in an advertisement says Mr. Kerry "lacks the capacity to lead." In a 1996 news conference, Mr. Lonsdale spoke of the "bravado and courage of the young officers that ran the Swift boats," and said that "Senator Kerry was no exception." "He was among the finest of those Swift boat drivers," Mr. Lonsdale said. When asked to explain the apparent contradictions, Mr. Odell said that Mr. Elliott and Mr. Lonsdale were defending Mr. Kerry "against lies that he was a war criminal." Mr. Odell did not elaborate on the tapes, saying that he did not want to speak for the other veterans. But he did say that the members of veterans group all have the same opinion when it comes to John Kerry..Support for Mr. Kerry recently arrived in the form of a 1,750 first-person article by William B. Rood, a Chicago Tribune editor who served in Vietnam alongside Mr. Kerry. The article, which was published on the Tribune's Web site on Saturday in its newspaper today, disputes the attacks on Mr. Kerry's war record and breaks Mr. Rood's 35-year silence about his experience in Vietnam.