-- Pulled Strings to Avoid Vietnam, & Got
Favorable
Treatment
Most people have heard something about George W. Bush pulling strings
to get into the Texas
Air Guard. But the press, while reporting lots of details, has done a
poor
job of communicating how consistently and shamelessly Bush Jr. sought
and received favorable
treatment while he avoided Vietnam.
Furthermore, his story has repeatedly changed -- he has weaseled
like Clinton at his worst and even flat-out lied when explaining
what happened.
To put it in perspective, here are 9 ways Bush got favored treatment
in the service due to his
political connections (he was then son of a Congressman and grandson
of a former
Senator):
1) He got into the Guard by pulling strings,
avoiding the year and a half
waiting list;
2) He took a 2-month vacation in Florida after
just 8 weeks, (1 of 3
leaves), to work on a political campaign;
3) Bush skipped Officer Candidate School and got
a special commission
as a 2nd Lieutenant, without qualifications;
4) He was assigned to a safe plane (being phased out
of active service), the
F-102 ;
5) During flight school, he was flown on a government
jet to Washington for a
date with President Nixon's daughter Tricia ;
6) Bush got an illegal transfer (later overruled)
to a base with no
work;
7) He simply didn't show up for a YEAR, with no
penalty;
8) George W. skipped all his medical exams after
they started drug tests,
and was removed from flight status;
9) He ended his service 10 months early to go to
Harvard Business
School;
Here are the details:
1. Pulled Strings to Get In.
On May 27, 1968, George Bush Jr. was 12 days away from losing his
student draft deferment, at
a time when 350 Americans a week were dying in combat.
The National Guard, seen by many as the most respectable way to avoid
Vietnam, had a huge
waiting list -- a year and a half in Texas, over 100,000 men
nationwide.
Yet Bush and his family friends pulled strings, and the young man was
admitted the same day
he applied, regardless of any waiting list.
Bush's unit commander, Col. "Buck" Staudt, was so excited about his
VIP recruit that he staged a
special ceremony for the press so he could
have his picture taken administering the oath (even though the
official oath had been given by a
captain earlier.)
Bush and his allies have tried to deny this with several changing
stories, but Bush himself admits lobbying commander Staudt, who
approved him, and
court documents
confirm that close family friend and oil magnate Sid Adger called
Texas Speaker of the House
Ben Barnes, who called General James Rose, the head of the Texas Air
National Guard, to get
Bush in.
Rose, who is now dead, told his friend and former legislator Jake
Johnson that "I got that
Republican congressman's son from Houston into the Guard."
Staudt's unit, the 147th, was infamous as a nesting place for
politically connected and celebrity
draft avoiders. Democratic Senator Lloyd Bentsen's son was in the
unit, as was Republican
Senator John Tower's,
both of Sid Adger's sons and at least 7 members of the Dallas Cowboys.
2. Took a 2 month vacation in Florida after 8
weeks in the
Guard.
Just 8 weeks after joining, Bush was granted 2 months leave to go to
Florida and work on a
political campaign, the Senate race of Republican Edward Gurney. Bush
took a leave every
election season,
in 1970 to work on his dad's campaign, and in 1972 to work in Alabama.
3. Skipped Officer Candidate School and got a
special commission as
2nd Lt.
As soon as Bush completed basic training, his commander approved him
for a "direct
appointment",
which made him an officer without having to go through the usual (and
difficult) Officer
Candidate School. This special procedure also
got Bush into flight school, despite his very low scores on aptitude
tests -- he scored 25% on a
pilot aptitude test, the absolute lowest acceptable grade, and
50% for navigator aptitude. (Bush did score 95% on the easier officer
quality test, but then again
the average is 88%).
What made Bush's appointment doubly unusual was his total lack of
special qualifications. This
procedure was generally reserved for applicants with exceptional
experience or
skills, such as ROTC training or engineering, medical or aviation
skills. Tom Hail, a historian for
the Texas Air National Guard, reviewed the Guard's records on Bush
for a special exhibit on his service after Bush became governor.
Asked about Bush's direct
appointment without special skills, Hail said "I've never heard of
that. Generally they
did that for doctors only, mostly because we needed extra flight
surgeons."
Charles Shoemake, an Air Force veteran who later joined the Texas Air
National Guard and
retired as a full colonel, said that direct appointments were
rare and hard to get, and required extensive credentials. Asked about
Bush, he said "His name
didn't hurt, obviously. But it was a commander's decision in those
days."
Despite Bush Jr.'s weak qualifications, Col. Staudt was so excited
about the direct appointment
that he saged another special ceremony for the press,
this time with Bush's father the congressman standing prominently in
the background.
The direct appointment process was discontinued in the 1970s.
4. Assigned to a safe plane -- the F-102 -- that
was being phased
out.
As Bush has been quick to note, National Guard members do face the
chance of being called up
for active duty, though few actually did during the Vietnam war.
So what a lucky break for Bush that he was assigned to fly the F-102
Delta Dagger, a plane
already being phased out. In fact, the Air Force had ordered all
overseas F-102 units shut down
as of June 30, 1970 -- just 3 months after Bush finished his training.
Since training is so airplane specific, Bush was guaranteed from the
beginning to be safe from
combat.
Bush's campaign has even used his training on the obsolete plane to
justify his early discharge, almost a year before his scheduled
discharge, since other F-102
pilots were also being released early.
But they can't answer the obvious question -- why spend so much money
to train
a National Guardsman for 2 years on a plane that was already being
phased out, at a time when
the Guard was letting F102 pilots leave early due to oversupply?
5. Celebrity Political Date.
During his flight training, Bush's celebrity showed in a couple of
ways. Most famously,
President Nixon sent a jet to pick up the young
flight student for a date with his daughter Tricia. Alas, the
potential political marriage and
dynasty was not to be. Also, the commencement speaker at
Bush's graduation ceremony was -- his dad, Congressman George Bush Sr.
6. Illegal, overruled transfer to a base with
no
work.
In 1972, Bush once again wanted to work on a political campaign, this
time in Alabama. He
applied for a transfer to a nearly defunct base with
no active training or work, the 9921st Air Reserve Squadrom at Maxwell
Air Force Base in
Alabama. Bush's supervisors approved, but
a higher headquarters overruled them, noting that the unit had no
regular drills.
Lt. Col. Reese Bricken, the unit's commander, told the Boston Globe
"We met just one
weeknight a month. We were only a postal unit. We had no airplanes.
We had no pilots. We had no nothing." Even Albert Lloyd Jr., a
retired Air Guard colonel who is
helping the Bush campaign clarify the candidate's service,
told the Globe he was mystified why Bush's superiors at the time would
approve duty at such a
unit. Lloyd was personnel director of the
Texas Air Guard from 1969 to 1995.
Now, the officer who did that has stepped forward and very directly
admitted that he tried to
get the easiest possible assignment for Bush.
The personnel officer in charge of Bush's 147th Fighter Group,
now-retired Col. Rufus G.
Martin, says he tried to give Bush a light load when he told him to
apply to the 9921st Air
Reserve Squadron in Montgomery, Ala.
Martin said in an interview that he knew Bush wasn't eligible for the
9921st, an unpaid, general
training squadron that met once a week to hear lectures on first aid
and the like.
"However," he said, "I thought it was worth a try. . . . It was the
least participation of any type of
unit."
7. Just didn't show up for a year -- with no
punishment.
National Guard records and Bush's own supervisor's and friends show no
sign of him attending
any drills or performing any service for nearly a year, from
May 1972 until May 1973. This period began with Bush moving to
Alabama for a political
campaign.
He later applied to transfer to a base that had no work; the transfer
was first approved, then
cancelled. Bush did nothing for several months; then in September he
applied to transfer to Alabama's 187th Tactical Recon group for 3
months. This was approved,
but the unit's commander, General William Turnipseed, and his then
admnistrative officer,
Kenneth Lott, have both said that Bush never showed up. "Had he
reported in, I would have had
some recall, and I do not," said Turnipseed. "I had been in
Texas, done my flight training there. If we had had a first
lieutenant from Texas, I would have
remembered."
Bush claims that he did some work in Alabama, but can't remember any
details. “I can’t
remember what I did,” he said. “I just—I fulfilled my obligation."
Despite 2 years of searching through hundreds of records, his campaign
has been unable to
find any record
of Bush's service there, nor could they find a single fellow
serviceman who remembers his
presence. The best they could produce was an ex-girlfriend from
Alabama -- Emily Marks
--who
said George told her he would have to do some Guard duty later that
year (1972) in
Montgomery. But all that confirms is that he knew of his obligation.
In December 1972, Bush returned to Houston and was scheduled to resume
duty there. But in
May 1973, Bush's supervising pilots wrote in his annual efficiency
report:
"Lt. Bush has not been observed at this unit during the period of the
report" (i.e. through April
30, 1972). Bush described one of the supervisors, the late Col. Jerry
Killian,
as a personal friend, so it's likely he would have noticed Bush and
given him the benefit of the
doubt. Later that month,
two special orders commanded Bush to appear for active duty. He
served 36 days of active duty
during May, June and July before leaving the Guard early.
Amazingly, Bush was not disciplined in any way for his absence, and
received an honorable
discharge. Under Air National Guard rules at that time, guardsmen who
missed duty could be
reported to their Selective Service Board and inducted into the Army
as draftees.
8. Skipped all his medical exams after they
started drug
tests.
In April 1972, the military started including routine drug tests in
servicemen's annual physical
exam, including
urinalysis, questions about drugs and "a close examination of the
nasal cavities" (for cocaine).
According to the regulation, the medical took place in the month
after the serviceman's birthday. For George W. Bush, this meant
August 1972.
It was May, 1972 -- one month after the drug testing was announced --
that Bush stopped
attending Guard duty. In August 1972,
he was suspended from flight duty for failing to take his physical.
(Click here to see the document.) A Bush campaign
spokesman confirmed
to the London Sunday Times that Bush knew he would be suspended.
"He knew the suspension would have to take place." Bush never flew
again, even though he
returned to his Houston base where Guard pilots flew thousands of
hours in the F-102 during
1973.
The only barrier to him flying again was a medical exam (and his lack
of attendance).
Careful readers will recall that when Bush issued his partial denial
of drug use, he said (or
implied) that he hadn't used them since 1974,
but he pointedly refused to deny drug use before then, i.e. during his
military service. Several
sources have also indicated that it was in December, 1972
-- 4 months after his medical suspension --
that a drunk Bush Jr. challenged his father to a fist fight during an
argument over the son's
drunk driving. (He had run over a neighbor's garbage cans.) Shortly
thereafter,
Bush Sr. arranged for his son to do community service at an inner city
Houston charity.
Bush's campaign aides first said he did not take the physical because
he was in Alabama and his
personal physician was in Houston.
But flight physicals can be administered only by certified Air Force
flight surgeons, and some
were assigned at the time to Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery,
where Bush was living. The staff now admits that this explanation was
wrong.
9. Left service 10 months early.
Even after that easy stint, Bush couldn't fulfill his obligation. He
quickly made up the missed
days he had to and applied for an early release, before he
had to take his next annual physical exam (with drug test.) While the
official discharge date
was October 1, 1973, Bush's last day in uniform was
actually July 31 -- a full 10 months before the end of his 6-year,
part time commitment. Al
Gore also requested and received an early discharge (from the Army, in
his case) to go to
school.
Weasel words; his story keeps
changing.
When asked about his service, Bush has lied, changed his story
repeatedly, and weaseled in a
manner eerily reminiscent of Bill Clinton.
First of all, he has flat-out lied. In his official autobiography,
''A Charge to Keep,'' Bush said he
flew with his unit for ''several years'' after finishing flight
training in June 1970. His campaign
biography states that he flew with the unit until he won release from
the service in September
1973, nine months early, for graduate school.
Both statements are lies. Bush only flew with the 111th for one year
and 10 months, until April
1972 when he was suspended for failing to take his medical exam (and
drug test), and never
flew again.
Then there is his Clintonesque weaseling and word choice.
Bush and his campaign claimed that no Bush family or friends pulled
strings. Under pressure,
this changed to
"All I know is anybody named George Bush did not ask him [Ben Barnes]
for help." By that he
meant, himself or his dad. Of course, it later came out in court
that a close Bush friend, Simon Adger, had asked Barnes to get Bush
Jr. into the Guard, and that
Barnes did so, via General Rose.
Now's it's not even clear that a George Bush didn't ask for help.
When pressed, the former
president's spokeswoman (Jean Becker) said he is "almost positive"
that he and Mr. Adger never
discussed the Guard matter. "He [Bush Sr.] he is fairly certain - I
mean he doesn't remember
everything that happened in the 1960s..." In any case, Bush Sr. and
Adger were very close. Ms.
Becker
acknowledged that "President Bush knew Sid Adger well. He loved him."
Adger may have
needed only a hint.
Furthermore, George Bush Jr. admits that he knew Adger socially at the
time, and further
admits that he lobbied
Col. "Buck" Staudt, the commander of the VIP unit Bush joined. Staudt
claims that he, not
General Rose (who he later replaced), was the one who made the
decision on admissions
anyway.
Bush Jr. admits that he met Staudt in late 1967, during Christmas
vacation of his senior year,
called him later, and -- in Bush's words -- "found out what it took to
apply."
When asked how Bush came to call Staudt, his spokeswoman Karen Hughes
said he "heard from
friends while he was home over the Christmas break that ... Colonel
Staudt was the person to
contact."
She says that Bush doesn't recall who those "friends" were. But we
know that Sid Adger was
also a friend of Staudt's, served with him on the Houston Chamber of
Commerce's
Aviation Committee, and in 1967 held a luncheon honoring Gen. Staudt
and his unit for winning
an Air Force commendation. In fact, both of Adger's sons also joined
General Staudt's unit, in 1966 and 1968 respectively.
Bush and his staff also claim that he vaulted ahead of the Air Guard
waiting list because he was
willing to fly an airplane, and there were openings.
There is nothing to support this claim, however. For one thing, the
F-102 was being phased
out at the time and F-102 pilots were being released from service
early,
as indeed Bush himself was. And Tom Hail, a historian for the Texas
Air National Guard, says
flatly that there was no pilot shortage in the Guard squadron at that
time.
Bush's unit had 27 pilots at the time he applied; while they were
authorized for 29 pilots, there
were two more already in training and one awaiting a transfer.
Bush also weasels on whether he was avoiding combat or not. He has
stated on several
occasions that he did not want to be an infantryman, and acknowledges
that he came to oppose
the war itself.
He claims that he joined the guard to fly planes, and would have
been happy to go to Vietnam, but ignores the obvious choice of the Air
Force or the Navy --
which his dad, a genuine war hero, joined. Furthermore, when he signed
up for the Guard,
he checked a box saying "Do not volunteer for overseas service."
Later, he made a perfunctory
application to transfer to a program called "Palace Alert", which
dispatched F-102 pilots
to Europe or the Far East -- and just occasionally Vietnam -- for 3 or
6 month assignments. But
Bush was not nearly qualified, as he must have known, and was
immediately turned down, and the F-102 not used overseas after June,
1970 in any case.
And, as noted above, his story also changed on why he refused to take
a medical exam --
including a drug test - in 1972. (The refusal
ended Bush's flying career.) His staff first claimed that he didn't
take the physical because he
was in Alabama and his personal physician was in Houston.
But flight physicals can be administered only by certified Air Force
flight surgeons, and there
were surgeons assigned at the time to Maxwell Air Force Base in
Montgomery,
where Bush was living. His staff now admits that that explanation was
"wrong", without saying
where it came from or what the real reason was.
Draft & National Guard Sources
Here is an excellent web site with actual photos of the military
documents from Bush's career:
http://www.cis.net/~c
oldfeet/document.htm
"2
Democrats: Bush Let Guard Down", By George Lardner Jr. and Howard
Kurtz,
Washington Post, November 3, 2000; Page A22
Questions
remain on Bush's service as Guard pilot ,
By Walter V. Robinson, Boston Globe, 10/31/2000, pA14
"1-Year gap in Bush's Guard duty", by Walter Robinson, Boston Globe,
May 23, 2000
"Ex-Lawmaker Says He Helped Bush Join the Guard in Vietnam War", by
Jim Yardley, New York
Times, September 27, 1999
"Barnes moves to block questions about Bush, Guard", by Ken Herman,
Austin
American-Statesman, September 9, 1999
"Records of Bush's Ala. Military Duty Can't Be Found", by Wayne
Slater, Dallas Morning News,
June 26, 2000 pA06
"Friends: Barnes was asked to help get Bush in Guard", by George
Kuempel and Pete Slover,
Dallas Morning News, Sept. 8, 1999
"Texas Speaker Reportedly Helped Bush Get Into Guard", by George
Lardner, Jr., Washington
Post, Setember 21, 1999 pA04
"Bush's Air Guard career an unusually easy flight", by Richard
Serrano, Los Angeles Times
(reprinted in the San Francisco Chronicle), July 4, 1999 pA-6
"At Height of Vietnam, Graduate Picks Guard", by George Lardner Jr.
and Lois Romano,
Washington Post, July 28, 1999 pA01
"Bush flies into an air force cocaine cloud", by Tom Rhodes, The
London Sunday Times, June 18,
2000
"Ex-Pol at Center of Bush Flap", by Michael Holmes (AP), Washington
Post, September 8, 1999
"Barnes says he urged Guard slot for Bush", by Pete Slover and George
Kuempel, Dallas Morning
News, September 29, 1999
"Adviser asked Barnes to recall Guard details before Bush joined
race", by Pete Slover and
George Kuempel, Dallas Morning News, September 26, 1999
"Bush Worked Campaign While in Guard", by Chris Williams (AP),
Washington Post, May 23,
2000
"Gtech settles Littwin lawsuit", by Ken Herman, Austin
American-Statesman, October 30, 1999
Gtech paid Littwin $300,000 and got a strict confidentiality agreement
from him.
-- djia (s.d@f.c), February 27, 2001.
