BOSTON (Reuters) - President Bush (news - web sites) fell short of meeting his military obligations during the Vietnam War and was not disciplined despite irregular attendance at required training drills, The Boston Globe said on Wednesday.
In a probe of the president's service in the Texas Air National Guard, the newspaper said Bush appeared to have broken his contract with the U.S. government by not joining an Air Force Reserve unit when he moved to Massachusetts from Texas in mid-1973.
The military records of Bush and of his Democratic opponent John Kerry (news - web sites), who was decorated for service in Vietnam, have featured prominently in the campaign for the presidential election on Nov. 2.
Republicans have made Bush's leadership of what he calls a global war on terrorism central to his campaign.
In February, the White House released hundreds of pages of Bush's military records that showed he was absent for long periods of his final two years of National Guard duty but said nonetheless he met service requirements.
However, the Globe focused on documents Bush signed in 1968 and 1973 in which he pledged to meet training commitments or face a punitive call-up to active duty.
The Globe said in July 1973, before Bush left Houston to attend Harvard Business School, he signed a document saying: "It is my responsibility to locate and be assigned to another Reserve forces unit or mobilization augmentation position. If I fail to do so, I am subject to involuntary order to active duty for up to 24 months... "
Bush spokesman Dan Bartlett told the Washington Post in 1999 that the future president had served at a Boston-area Air Force Reserve unit after leaving Houston. But Bush never joined a Boston-area unit, the Globe said.
"I must have misspoke," Bartlett, now White House communications director, was quoted as telling the Globe in a recent interview.
"HONORABLE DISCHARGE"
White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan, responding to the Globe report on Wednesday, said, "The president was honored to serve his country. He met his obligations, and was honorably discharged."
The Globe also looked at a 1968 pledge by Bush in which he committed to "satisfactory participation" in Guard training.
But the newspaper said he performed no service over a six-month period in 1972 and nearly a three-month stretch in 1973 -- erratic attendance that could have prompted his superiors to discipline him or order him to active duty in 1972, 1973 or 1974.
Instead, Bush's unit certified in late 1973 that his service had been "satisfactory," the Globe said.
The National Guard and reserves, rarely called up during the Vietnam War, came to be regarded as "draft havens for relatively affluent young white men," the Air National Guard says in a history on its Internet site.
Former Texas Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes, a Democrat, is scheduled to appear on CBS' "60 Minutes" on Wednesday night to discuss how he helped Bush get into the Guard in 1968, the network said.
In a videotaped speech recently posted on the Internet, Barnes told an Austin, Texas political rally: "I got a young man named George W. Bush into the National Guard when I was lieutenant governor of Texas and I'm not necessarily proud of that ... I thought that's what people should do when you're in office: You help rich people."
The Pentagon (news - web sites) on Tuesday released 17 pages of what it called newly found records that showed Bush flew 336 hours in a fighter jet, most recently in April 1972, and ranked 22nd out of 53 pilots when he finished flight training at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia in 1969.
The pages did not resolve the dispute over whether Bush completed the service as required.
Democratic National Committee (news - web sites) Chairman Terry McAuliffe said the details about Bush's service undermined his credibility. "These new documents show that the president did not serve honorably," McAuliffe said, accusing Bush of either lying about his record or suffering "some kind of severe memory loss."
A pro-Kerry group, Texans for Truth, plans to run television commercials this week questioning Bush's Guard attendance. A group backing Bush, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, has said in its own commercials that Kerry lied about his Vietnam war record.
Military records as such are questionable at best, a neighbor that served during WWII has Army records indicating he was born a year later than he was. The CG sent me an envelope during the 90's containing all of the originals of most of my pay records and training records, this all part of the infamous reduction of paper work act passed by congress. Many more records were destroyed by fire at the St. Louis military records center. Tons of paper files are generated each month by regular, reserve and guard components across the world and squirelled away for the benefit of future generations of journalists that don't even know what they are looking at half of the time. A retired Alabama Air Guard Colonel has stepped forward saying he recalls Bush setting in his office during this period studying flight manuals and air safety publications during the period in question and I wouls hazard that his memory is just as good as that of Rassman and kerry's swiftboat crewmen from the same era. I would almost say that the possibilty exists that those records still exist someplace, filed away in a dusty box in the back of some hangar or a trailer on an air base. You and the AP can beat this to death for the next 4 years if you wish, but why not discuss something more recent, like kerry's pitiable performance as a Senator for the past 19 years. His continued antipathy towards the military and intelligence community and his decided leanings toward communism. It is also interesting to note that one of his relatives has a multi-billion dollar contract with the Vietnamese government for real estate development and that China donated heavily to his campaign in Mass. the last time around. Is nobody interested in a U.S. Senator being financed by a foreign government? And what about his infamous anti-gun stance, regardless of recent clips of him waving shotguns around or tripping through the brush supposedly hunting pheasants, just a few talking points beyond the Viet Nam years.
i feel sorry for you GA. it must be a real pain in your arse that you have such a bad candidate in mr ketchuphead that all you can do is direct your venom against the BEST candidate . you are just like ketchuphead neither of you can speak to issues of the present. sad indeed
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Good friends are like butt cheeks some crap might come between them ,but they will always come back together
ga, I don't know if you served at all yourself but for those that did and those that want to learn here comes a few simple facts.
When a service person is discaherged the first thing they do is check and balance their pay records, leave time etc.
They prepare a DD214, dicharge paper. On the DD214 it shows days of service, merits and demerits and a bunch of other things like assignment locations and service related skills and how those relate or convert to civilian skills. How detialed this document is depends on the skills and effort put forth but the clerk who prepares it and the commander who approves it. Not the person who recieves it.
The last thing you get AFTER YOU COMPLETE your entire obligation, is your discharge paper. It will be either Honorable or otherwise.
Bush has an Honorable Discharge and a DD214 with no demerits.
That is it. If a person is too simple minded or so hateful to accept that fact, I will pray for the salvation of their rotting soul and decaying mind. Do not let hate, spite and anger twist your life into some ugly creature that dwells in the likes of ted kennedys belly. Riase up and see the light.
Bush has an Honorable Discharge and a DD214 with no demerits
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Now you have to picture a combination of PeeWEE Herman and Wally Cox but with less muscle tone, trying to be intimidating None of this is funny! Message edited by Cougar Mag -- 1/7/2005 1:16:42 AM >/b]
But the newspaper said he performed no service over a six-month period in 1972 and nearly a three-month stretch in 1973 -- erratic attendance that could have prompted his superiors to discipline him or order him to active duty in 1972, 1973 or 1974.
Instead, Bush's unit certified in late 1973 that his service had been "satisfactory," the Globe said.
This is the newspaper's opinion and a convenient one at that since it is the Boston globe--John Kerry's hometown newspaper. If you read and think about this statement, it says that Bush's superiors "could have" been prompted to discipline him and yet didn't. why? could it be that they viewed ALL of the facts instead of just the carefully selected facts in this article? Could it be that they examined this issue without worrying about a presidential election? Could it be that they did their job and exercised leadership skills? I'd say Bush's superiors are in a far better position to judge whether he completed his service satisfactorily or not instead of a bunch of dirt digging enquirer wannabes at the boston Globe.
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Jesus Christ--The reason for the season!
If you can read this, thank a teacher. If you can read this in English, thank a veteran.
If you're certain you know everything, there's little opportunity to learn anything.
Very well said Log's,
I may have missed it but I have never heard anyone, anywhere, mention Bush,s or Kerry's DD214.
As of July 1 2004, in Kansas they are no longer available to the public because they have the persons Social Security # on them but every state has their own rules on this.
Can anyone tell me where to find this info. I know some people that would be interested.
Trust me everyone.... I was a Yeoman in the Coast Guard for 17 years! Do you know how much paperwork and military records I processed??!?! When you either discharge or re-up again or retire, a DD-214 ALWAYS gets printed up. There are 8 copies and the pages get distributed to the service HQ, the VA, the Dept of Labor, original and page 4 to the serviceman, etc...etc....
Kerry and Bush's DD-214 are NOT available to the public due to the privacy act since they contain SSN's. But at least you know they exist and someone could be able to verify the data!
New Questions Raised on Bush Military Record
