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George W. Bush: military pilot (part 2)

In 1972, the 111th FIS transitioned to a new aircraft, the McDonnell-Douglas F-101B Voodoo fighter. According to Colonel William Campenni, then a lieutenant in the squadron: ""The Bush excusal in 1972 was further facilitated by a change in the unit's mission, from an operational fighter squadron to a training squadron with a new airplane, the F-101, which required that more pilots be available for full-time instructor duty rather than part-time traditional reservists with outside employment.

"The winding down of the Vietnam War in 1971 provided a flood of exiting active-duty pilots for these instructor jobs, making part-timers like Lt. Bush and me somewhat superfluous. There was a huge glut of pilots in the Air Force in 1972, and with no cockpits available to put them in, many were shoved into nonflying desk jobs. Any pilot could have left the Air Force or the Air Guard with ease after 1972 before his commitment was up because there just wasn't room for all of them anymore."

Lt. Bush logged his last flight in a F-102A in April 1972. (The 336 hours he had logged after graduating from flight training averaged out to about 12 hours a month, more than enough to stay sharp for flying, even at the intensity expected of a jet fighter pilot.) Then, on May 15, 1972, he "cleared" from Ellington to work on a senatorial campaign in Alabama. He expected to transfer to an inactive reserve squadron in Montgomery, but was turned down because an "obligated Reservist can be assigned to a specific Ready Reserve position only." The "absent without leave" and "deserter" charges leveled at Bush by political opponents involve this, his fifth year of service in the Air Guard.

To judge by recently released pay records, he did no military service in the summer of 1972, and on August 1, 1972, he was grounded for missing his annual flight physical. Then, in September, he was assigned to the 187th Tactical Reconnaissance Wing in Montgomery. This outfit too was transitioning to a new airplane, and may have had none on strength at the time. Bush's pay records credit him with 6 days' service in October and November, presumably in Montgomery. In the recent hoo-hah about his Guard record, several officers have come forward to say that they remember seeing or working with Bush at Dannelly airbase outside Montgomery. In his annual fitness report, his home-field rating officer noted that "He cleared this base [Ellington AFB] on 15 May 1972 and has been performing equivalent training in a non flying status with the 187th Tac Recon Gp, Dannelly ANG Base, Alabama." And he was certainly at Dannelly on January 6, 1973, when he had a signed and dated dental exam.

He spent most of that winter in Houston, working as a counselor with black youngsters. (Among the other web-log canards about Bush is that he rented a Cessna and took some of his youngsters flying. As the story is told, his handling of the aircraft was so erratic as to cast doubt that he'd ever qualified as a pilot. This rather overlooks the fact that it's impossible to rent an aircraft for a solo flight without at least having a student certicate and current medical, and rare to rent one without actually being checked out in person by a flight instructor.)

In any event, he was paid for 6 days in January, 2 in April, and 14 in May, for a total of 28 days' service during his fifth year--actually better than his fourth-year record. (There are no entries on Bush's 201 file of any time served during his fifth and sixth years in the Air Guard, giving web-loggers an opportunity to allege that he was AWOL for these two years. Some claim to have documents proving this allegation, but when I try to retrieve them, I get a "404" error or else the document says something else entirely. In any event, he indisputably did serve additional days beyond what is shown in the 201 file.)

In March I got this email comment from Stephen Prestwood: "Contrary to popular belief, Guard units do not necessarily drill one weekend every month, but rather average 2 Inactive Duty [training] days per month.... If a unit drills 4 days in one month, it probably would not drill the following month. Having been assigned in mid September it is reasonable to assume that Bush's first Drill in Alabama would be in October. The ARF Statement of Points Earned shows that Bush was credited with 2 Inactive Duty days in October and 4 Inactive Duty days in November. Therefore, it would be reasonable to assume that his unit did not drill in December. Bush is credited with 6 Inactive Duty days in January. Again, one would expect that his unit probably did not to drill again until April when Bush is again credited with 2 Inactive Duty days.... Looks like perfect drill attendance to me."

Updated: Here's a summary of the points Bush earned for each year of his National Guard service. He exceeded the minimum requirement each year, and over six years he earned three times as many points as was required of him:

May-68 to May-69
Minimum Annual Requirement - 50
ANG Points Earned by Lt. Bush - 253

May-69 to May-70
Minimum Annual Requirement - 50
ANG Points Earned by Lt. Bush - 340

May-70 to May-71
Minimum Annual Requirement - 50
ANG Points Earned by Lt. Bush - 137

May-71 to May-72
Minimum Annual Requirement - 50
ANG Points Earned by Lt. Bush -112

May-72 to May-73
Minimum Annual Requirement - 50
ANG Points Earned by Lt. Bush - 56

Jun -73 to Jul-73
Minimum Annual Requirement - 50
ANG Points Earned by Lt. Bush - 56

In May 1973, Bush took his last physical, which identified him as a "crew member on flight status," so he evidently wasn't grounded during his final year in the Guard. The pay records credit him with 5 days' service in June and 19 in July, for a sixth-year total of 24 days. According to another account, his last day in uniform was July 30, 1973.

Meanwhile, Bush was accepted at Harvard Business School, to begin classes in September. On October 2, 1973, he was transferred to an inactive unit in Colorado, and on November 21, 1974 he was formally discharged from the military. By my calculations had served the equivalent of 25 months on active duty, over a period of six and one-half years. (Perhaps the penalty for beging released from the Air Guard six months early was to serve an additional six months in the inactive reserve.)

The FAA records show that Bush doesn't have a current medical certificate, hence can no longer act as pilot-in-command. Whether he ever flew an aircraft after leaving the Air Guard isn't certain, though there's an unsubstantiated story that Karl Rove recalled flying with Bush when he first campaigned for governor of Texas. If so, that would have been in 1994. (Possibly Bush merely took the controls on that occasion, as he did when he landed on the Abraham Lincoln in 2003.)

If I were judging Bush on his career as a military officer, I would be inclined grade him much as his Yale professors did--with a "gentleman's C," which in this era of grade inflation would probably translate to a B-plus. His first three years seem exemplary; the last three, minimal, though far more distinguished than his opponents allege. I can't of course judge him as a pilot, except to doff my hat to anyone who handle a 16-ton warplane at 800 mph. By the time Bush left the Guard, 70 pilots had been killed flying the F-102. As fighter pilot Ed Rasimus points out: "Every time you kick the tires and light the fire in a single-engine, single-seat Century Series jet, it can kill you--all by itself without help from an enemy."

Please send email if you can shed any further light on this subject. Thanks! -- Dan Ford

Related files:
Convair F-102A Delta Dagger
Some notes on National Guard training