Rumsfeld and flying

Stephen Harding wrote:

We ended up being stationed in Tachikawa, Japan with him for
3 years and got there via SS President Roosevelt, a President
lines luxury cruise ship (without Dad since he had to fly the
plane there)! My mother should have spoken up much earlier!]

Just out of curiosity, when were you there? I spent amost 4 years in Japan, the
last three of which were at Tachikawa.

George Z.

"George Z. Bush" wrote in message
...
Kevin Brooks wrote:
"George Z. Bush" wrote in message
...

"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 6 Mar 2004 16:38:43 -0500, "George Z. Bush"
wrote:


If you will return to my comments, you will see that I never in any
way
found fault with the fact that he was able to and did in fact pursue
a
complete military career in the Reserve forces right up through
retirement.

However, snide remarks about red herrings aside, this'd be the
appropriate
place to repeat my question. Are you suggesting that a Navy 0-4 or
0-5 on
flying status during the period from say 1968 through 1975, who is
as
gung ho a warrior as our present Sec/Def obviously is, could not
have
found a way to make a more direct contribution to our war effort in
Viet
Nam if he had wanted to than by staying current in the active
Reserves?
That suggestion is insulting to the numerous Reserve and ANG fliers
who
managed to find their way into active units committed to prosecuting
that
war, some of whom were undoubtedly in your own unit at one time or
another.

So, S2F pilots are a critical resource and a Navy reservist who is
serving in Congress should resign his seat, request activation and go
drone around the boat. That simply doesn't make sense.

He resigned his Congressional seat in 1969, so amend my time span to
read
from 1969 through 1975. Did you mean to say "drone around the boat" or
was
that just a figure of speech or slip of the tongue? Are you suggesting
that
our Senator from Arizona ended up in the Hanoi Hilton, along with
numerous
other Navy pilots, because they got lost shooting touch and go's off
their
carriers? Characterizing their contributions as "droning around the
boat" is
a put down, and I hope you didn't really intend it that way.

Uhmm..that Senator from Arizona was not flying S2F's, either, was he?

Nobody said anything about specific equipment qualifications. We all are
aware,
or should be, that people transitioned from one type of equipment to
another
quite commonly, as the needs of the services demanded.

Let's see, a forty-something guy who has in all likelihood been off flight
status altogether for some time...yeah, that is real likely to happen...


......Ed's point stands, while you are heading off in another direction.

Funny, I had the impression that you were the one wandering off in another
direction.

No, you felt the burning need to toss McCane into the mix--why, I don't
know.



If you can serve in Congress and still meet Reserve qualifications you
are both contributing to the nation and helping the defense
establishment. Can't see how that's any sort of strike against the
man.

I concede that, so let's limit the discussion to when he was no longer
a
Congressman.

And pray tell how, if he *was* still in a flight status (I don't think
he
was--USNR types often give up their primary specialty when they leave
active
duty and enter into the reserve realm due to their location, or the lack
of
reserve billets in their particular specialty; my brother-in-law left
active
duty as a submariner and served his reserve career out without ever
again
doing any duty on a sub), how would he have been able to get an active
duty
tour in Vietnam (or environs) flying an aircraft that was not essential
to
the war effort, protecting against a North Vietnamese threat that did
not
exist (i.e., they had no submarines for him to hunt)?

Eh? Oh, that's right; according to you reservists just pick and choose which
aircraft Uncle sam is going to pay (big bucks) for them to requalify into,
right?



But, we can certainly find a lot of SecDefs on both sides of the
political spectrum without ANY spit-shined brogans in their
closet--dare I mention Les Aspin, Robert Strange McNamara, Robert
Cohen, etc?

Talk about red herrings. I see you're not reluctant to toss a few
around
when it suits your purpose. By way of comparison, how many of those
you
just mentioned were Reserve or ANG fliers on flying status during
whatever
wars they were involved in supervising? That would be a valid
comparison.....what you just did was toss our a bunch of apples and
dared
us to compare them with an orange. Not the same thing, and you know
it.

My point was that if we are setting criteria for SecDefs, we should
acknowledge that a lot of folks held the job with absolutely no
military experience at all. None of those I just mentioned were
Reserve or ANG fliers, which was precisely my point.

We are not setting criteria for SecDefs....we are talking about one in
particular who's quite hawkish these days but apparently was far from
that in
those days. AAMOF, if you look into what others have reported of
comments
made by Nixon and members of his staff about Rumsfeld, they apparently
considered him far too dovish in those days to suit their tastes.

Having served his active duty committment, and then going on to serve
the
rest of his career in the USNR, makes his somehow "far from hawkish"?
That
is an illogical statement.


It returns to the issue about whether there is a relationship between
active and reserve component service, between officer and enlisted
service, between peacetime and wartime service, between combat and
combat support service, between home base and deployed service, etc.
etc.

Well, maybe that's what you want to use as a basis for arguing, but I'm
not
in the mood for fish tonight, so I guess I'll pass.

Why? You have already strongly inferred that his prior active duty
service,
coupled with his subsequent reserve service, is somehow lacking. So why
not
have the balls to jump all of the way into the water and say it?

I don't recall that I made any kind of point about it piquing my
curiosity.
What of it? Is it not permitted for some reason? In plain English, some
Nixon
staffers (if not Nixon himself) considered him a dove during the war while
the
shooting was going on, and now he's clearly a hawk and running the show.
The
dichotomy certainly does interest me, not to mention the timing of the
change.

Again, fish or cut bait. Have the gonads to say what you really mean instead
of trying to dance around the issue. Either you think his combination of a
complete active duty tour followed by years of reserve service was honorable
or not. I am guessing that if someone were to say, ask you why you felt
hunky-dory flying trash haulers instead of transitioning into combat
aircraft during either Korea or Vietnam you'd (rightfully, IMO) be a bit
testy. But yet you expect a guy who has finished his active duty
committment, and voluntarily stayed on in the reserves for many more years,
willing to answer his country's call *if* it is given, has something to be
ashamed of?

How many drilling Naval reservists were called up to serve in Vietnam? Only
one that I can recall of (the actor, Glenn Ford, did a short tour). Unlike
the army and air force reserve components, which did indeed use reservists,
both on active duty and, in the case of the ANG/USAFR, in reserve status, in
Vietnam, there is no record that i can find of any mobilization of naval
reserve units during the conflict. Why? Because they did not need them, for
one thing.



Some people got to see the elephant and some didn't. I was there
involuntarily the first time and got to see more of it than many, but
not as much as some. I was voluntarily there the second time, but will
quite honestly tell you that it wasn't about patriotism.

I've got no problem with people who served but didn't get to go
downtown.

Am I out of line asking, then, how you feel about the criticism of
Kerry over
his service in the theater, very often from people who weren't anywhere
near
Viet Nam when the shooting was going on? Any defense for his
contributions,
whatever they were? Or doesn't that count as downtown?

Kerry's personal service, and the manner in which he obtained his early
return from his combat tour, would never have been a subject of
discussion
had not he himself tried to impugn the Guard service of the current
President. When he did that, he opened the door to the questions of just
how
he received not one, not two, but three seperate flesh wounds,

That'd be three more than the President, or anybody half a world away,
got.

So what? Your concern was over the (gasp!) temerity of people questioning
Kerry's service--which would have been unlikely if he had not first opened
the door. And then whined when the issue flopped and questions regarding his
own actions during that timeframe started arising.


.....and how he actively worked to secure his own early return from the
theater under a Navy
rule that stated an individual who had suffered three wounds of *any*
severity level could be returned from the theater, "after consideration
of
his physical classification for duty and on an individual basis". It was
not
a hard-set three wounds and you are out policy. Now how does that
wording
apply to a guy who suffered a grand total of what, one or two lost duty
days
for *one* of his three wounds?

He satisfied the published rotation requirements. Anybody who thought
they were
too generous did a disservice to his fellow servicemen by failing to bring
it up
at the time.

Two of those wounds with no duty days lost...a whopping *four* month long
tour...and applied himself for that early redeployment...curiouser and
curiouser...


.....Not to mention the question of whether or not Kerry himself
actually
performed any reserve duty after his later (again
early) release from active duty. As to his contributions...is that what
you
call his testifying that US troops were conducting widespread atrocities
(using a speech drafted by RFK's former speechwriter, no less, and based
upon the since discredited, and Jane Fonda sponsored, "Winter Soldier
Investigation" "testimony") and criminal acts, accusations which were
never
validated even after further investigation by the services?

Never heard of My Lai, I guess.

My Lai was a terrible stain, and one which we admitted to. WSI has been
rather thoroughly discredited, on the other hand. Actually, the services did
attempt to investigate the accusations made during that little Jane
Fonda-sponsored (yes, she indeed did sponsor that "event") circus, and found
that *none* of the claims panned out--"witnesses" used false identities,
claiming to be combat vets when they were later found not to have been,
stories were created from thin air (one "witness", when approached by
investigators, admitted that his claims had actually been created by his
"Nation of Islam" buddies back here in the states), etc. I'd recommend you
read "Stolen Valor"--rather in-depth coverage of how the WSI just did not
stand up to the facts. But of course you won't read it--it would destroy
your cherished myths.

snip

As for his
testimony, he testified only as to so-called atrocities that he had heard
other
servicemen testify to under oath,

LOL! No, he used WSI "testimony", which was NOT conducted under any
legitimate oath, and which has been thoroughly discredited. Further, it
turns out his own testimony before that congressional committeee was
actually drafted for him by Adam Walinsky, a former speechwriter for RFK
(see Bukett, who while only discussing Kerry in passing does mention that
little tidbit).

along with his personally taking part in free
fire zone operations, which he considered to be an atrocity.

Yeah, and he also considered the use of .50 cal machine guns as an
"atrocity"--go figure.

As for reserve
duty after his early release, I don't remember it being questioned.....I
imagine
he did about the same as Bush did when he got out of the Texas ANG early.

Nice dodge! Mr. Kerry has questioned the President's duty performance in the
reserves, and folks like you (specifically) have parroted those claims and
requests for *proof* of his drill attendance. But oddly enough, you demand
no proof of Kerry's performance of any required reserve duty during the time
after his own *early release* from active duty. I guess the goose and the
gander get different treatment in your eye, eh?



.....I do have a problem with people who aggressively avoided any
kind of service,

I could provide a list of people who fit that bill who come from both
sides
of the aisle and, I, like you, have a problem with them. BTW, as a
sub-category, I gather that you don't have a problem with military
people
who one way or the other avoided the possibility of serving in a
combat
theater? Mr. Rumsfeld might find his name on my list there, not
because he
never got there, but rather because he didn't try when he could have as
opposed to how hawkish and war-like he became subsequently when he was
quite
safely entrenched behind a desk in Washington, D. C. or a Naval Reserve
outfit in the Washington suburbs.

By then he was a reservist who had already done his turn in the active
duty
barrel. You get no points for that attack.

That doesn't matter in the least, since that is precisely the
point.....that he
could have even as a reservist but didn't.

"Could have"? You claim the Navy was so hard up for personnel (especially
former S2 pilots) that they actually needed his active service at that time?
Or that reservists who have already performed an active duty tour, and have
not been called up for further active duty, have some obligation to run out
and yell, "Me, me! Send me!"? You *do* understand that the reason we have
reserve forces is so that people who have normal, full-time civilian
occupations serve their country when *called* upon?

Becoming a hawk isn't hard when you
know that you won't have to expose yourself to the potentially painful
possibility of having to pay the price.

Illogical construct. Oddly, I don't recall you attacking Clinton when he
took the rather dove-like Somalia mission and turned it into a "Get Aidid"
fiasco--where was your indignation about Clinton becoming so hawkish in view
of *his* personal military service history?



.....with people who undermined their brothers-in-arms,

I think we can admit to a difference of opinion there. I don't
consider
people who attempted to shut down a war that apparently could not be
won as
undermining their brothers-in-arm when, in fact, they were only
attempting
to save the lives of those of their brethren still engaged in a losing
war.
I wasn't one of them at the time, but with the benefit of hindsight, I
can
see where I was wrong and they were right.

Whoah. Firstly, Kerry's conversion to raving anti-Vietnam critic came
only
after he found he needed an "issue" that would get him some
publicity--read
BG Burkett's "Stolen Valor", published (1998) well before the current
political campaign began:

"Kerry did not return from Vietnam a radical antiwar activist. Friends
said
that when Kerry first began talking about running for office, he was not
visibly agitated about the Vietnam War. "I thought of him as a rather
normal
vet," a friend said to a reporter, "glad to be out but not terribly
uptight
about the war." Another acquaintance who talked to Kerry about his
political
ambitions called him "a very charismatic fellow looking for a good
issue."

Given his flip-flop on the medals-tossing issue ("They weren't really
mine"), this adds up to a man with political ambitions who jumped on the
VVAW bandwagon as a way of getting himself recognized, not because he
came
home with a burning ambition to get US troops out of Vietnam. Had the
latter
been his objective, why did he resort to making unsubstantiated claims
about
widespread atrocities?

I don't think the claims he made were unsubstantiated, since they were all
based
on sworn tesitimony

No, they were not. Please show us where the WSI testimony was "sworn". Then
tell us hwy, when investigators approached those who offered up "testimony"
at WSI, they backtracked and claimed that thier own knowledge was
secondhand, or that they had amde up thier stories. Come on, you have made
the claim that WSI testimony was legit--got anything to back that up?

of returned servicemen who had either participated in those
activities or had observed others doing those things.

Nope. When asked about it by investigators, they invariably either fell back
upon "well, I *heard* this story...", or even, "well, this guy from Nation
of Islam actually was the one who told me to say that..." Or, even worse,
they founfd that the indivisual in question had never served in combat, or
even in Vietnam. Peruse pages 10-136 of "Stolen Valor" (heck, even a decent
websearch will find articles disputing the validity of WSI).

As for it being
widespread, I think that would be your characterization of it, not his.
Show me
a transcript where he's quoted as saying that everybody was doing that
sort of
stuff. I don't think one exists, but take a stab at it if you think it's
worth
the effort.

God, you are so *easy*... from his testimony:

"...****not isolated incidents but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis
with the full awareness of officers at all levels****...We fought using
weapons against those people which I do not believe this country would dream
of using were we fighting in the European theater or let us say a
non-third-world people theater..."

Yep, sounds like he is being rather widesoread to me. Interestingly, his
campaign staff now refers to dodge the issue of whether or not Kerry still
stands by the WSI accusations...
"A spokeswoman for Kerry's campaign, Stephanie Cutter, said Friday, "If you
look at that testimony, he was reporting what he had heard at the Winter
Soldier investigations. He was reporting this. Does he stand by what he
heard? Since that day, it has been widely reported that terrible things
happened in Vietnam. If you read the testimony in its entirety, you see that
he was paying great tribute to those who were serving."

www.capecodonline.com/cctimes/forkerry22.htm

Gee, is it just me, or did she never answer her own question , "Does he
stand by what he heard?"


....And why did he have that speechwriter draft his testimony?

I don't know why he would do that, if in fact he did.

Adam Walinsky was his name; wrote speeches for RFK. It was no secret that he
and Kerry were close (Kerry, a private pilot, reportedly flew him around to
attend antiwar meetings), and Burkett does include that Walinsky drafted his
testimony, and rehearsed him on it. No denials from the Kerry camp.

Perhaps he just wanted to
make sure that what he said would be accurate, and not colored by the
emotional
strain of giving such testimony.

LOL! Yeah, that's a good one--do a Google on "Winter Soldier Investigation"
and then come back and tell me Kerry was seriously concerned about
"accuracy". Geeze.

Brooks


.......and with people who claim to be something that they are not.
(Those
aren't all the same person in any of my statements.)

And there's another category of people whose names would fill our list
and
who come from both sides of the aisle. Is there any point in pursuing
that?

George Z.

"Mike Marron" wrote in message
...
"D. Strang" wrote:

It's just phenomenal the amount of **** in Art's brain.

Even more phenomenal is that he always ends up getting all the
attention that he so desperately seeks. Just like Tarver,

Why do you bring me into your childishness, Marron?

"Jim Baker" wrote in message
...

"ArtKramr" wrote in message
...
Subject: Rumsfeld and flying
From: "Pete"
Date: 3/6/04 9:51 PM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id: wLy2c.2040$iy.1385@fe2

You don't always get to choose/volunteer, and the needs of the military
outweigh...

The Marines who stormed the beaches of the pacific got what they
volunteered
for., The airborne that held Bastogne got what they volunteered for.
The
Air
Corps that took devastating losses over Berlin and Ploesti got what they
volunteered for., The Suubmariners got what they volunteered for.
Maybe
some
of those who didn't volunteer didn't try hard enough. Think that is a
possibility?


Arthur Kramer

Here's a thread within the thread that you may just be ill informed about
Art, since it's been 50+ years since you've been in the military. There's
no "volunteering" to go to war in the USAF. You go where your unit is
ordered to go. As a pilot, there's almost no chance to cross train into
an
aircraft that is flying in a war from one that is not. Take this for the
truth it is from someone who served 20 years on active duty and missed DS
because his aircraft wasn't involved.

INOP

It took another ten years and a buyout to change things.

"ArtKramr" wrote in message
...

JB
Bomber Pilot (ret)

That is the first rational post on the subject yet. Thanks. What did you
fly?

Have some respect Art, Baker is a retired B-one operator. He has posted
here for years and you should be able to remember the aircrew here at ram.
One of those that kept the airplane flying until it could be made to work.

Ed Rasimus wrote:
On Sat, 6 Mar 2004 18:32:43 -0500, "George Z. Bush"
wrote:

I concede that, so let's limit the discussion to when he was no longer a
Congressman.

I'm not saying it comes into play, but have you ever heard of "duty
and travel restsrictions"? Limitations on duty postings for folks who
have recent experience with certain levels of classified information
(the sort of thing a congressperson might have.

In all honesty, I hadn't even thought of that. However, do we know that those
restrictions applied in his case or are we just supposing that they might have.
I do have some sort of recollection that there have been elected officials who
have resigned their offices and entered the military during times of war.
Unfortunately, no name comes to mind at the moment.


.....AAMOF, if you look into what others have reported of comments
made by Nixon and members of his staff about Rumsfeld, they apparently
considered him far too dovish in those days to suit their tastes.

So, are you having a problem with Rumsfeld because he is too hawkish
or too dovish?

Both....it's the reason or explanation for the change that interests me.

Am I out of line asking, then, how you feel about the criticism of Kerry over
his service in the theater, very often from people who weren't anywhere near
Viet Nam when the shooting was going on? Any defense for his contributions,
whatever they were? Or doesn't that count as downtown?

No defense for his contributions at all. Four months in theater of a
one year tour? Three PHs with no missed duty? Beaching his boat under
attack, thereby removing his mobility? Going ashore to dispatch a
wounded peasant already shot with a .50 cal? Then rushing home to tell
tales about the atrocities being committed wholesale by American
service men?

I guess if you were his boss, you'd have courts-martialed him. His boss chose
not to. So what purpose is there in your second guessing him? You're hardly
qualified to do that since you were neither a Naval officer nor a competent or
qualified swift boat commander. Do you really think that being a fighter jock
gives you all those skills and aptitudes?

I think we can admit to a difference of opinion there. I don't consider
people who attempted to shut down a war that apparently could not be won as
undermining their brothers-in-arm when, in fact, they were only attempting
to save the lives of those of their brethren still engaged in a losing war.
I wasn't one of them at the time, but with the benefit of hindsight, I can
see where I was wrong and they were right.

A war that "could not be won" not because of lack of military
capability, but because of lack of political will--primarily as a
result of a confederation of draft dodging students, moralistic
professors, attention seeking movie stars and pandering politicians.

You're absolutely correct. It's been said many times that we won every one of
the goddam battles in which we engaged the enemy, but couldn't win the war
because we weren't allowed to.

We could have won the war in '66 when we started to get serious and we
demonstrably DID end the war in eleven days at the end of '72.

.......and with people who claim to be something that they are not. (Those
aren't all the same person in any of my statements.)

And there's another category of people whose names would fill our list and
who come from both sides of the aisle. Is there any point in pursuing that?

Yes, there is a point in pursuing it. I am demeaned by every dirty,
bearded, fatigue-jacketed, drug-addled wannabe who claims to be a
Vietnam vet and has become the stereotype of what happens to men who
experience war.

Well, that's where you're wrong. Every one of those dirty, bearded,
fatigue-jacketed, drug-addled Vietnam vets left this country as clean-cut
American kids. Many of them may well have been volunteers as well. We as a
society are responsible for failing to adequately equip them to cope with the
conditions we were going to throw them into. If they were weak-willed to start
with, they should have been weeded out and not sent there to be destroyed by the
experiences they were exposed to. You can't blame the victims for having become
victims. Who in his right mind would consciously choose to come back so badly
damaged if they could have handled it or otherwise avoided it?

The incredible majority of warriors are successful
people who have served their country and lived normal productive
lives.

Yes, indeed. I think I am one of them and can identify with that definition.

......Failure to identify the liars and poseurs is abrogation of my
responsibility to tell the truth and stand up for what I believe in.

You may wish to deny it, but you still have to accept responsibility for turning
those young Americans into the liars and poseurs you obviously despise. They
didn't arrive in Nam that way for the most part. All I do when I look at them
and what happened to most of them is to count my blessings that something like
that didn't happen to me. A little bit of that kind of humility might stand you
is some good, if you'd allow it to.

George Z.

On Sun, 7 Mar 2004 14:22:16 -0500, "George Z. Bush"
wrote:

Ed Rasimus wrote:

I'm not saying it comes into play, but have you ever heard of "duty
and travel restsrictions"? Limitations on duty postings for folks who
have recent experience with certain levels of classified information
(the sort of thing a congressperson might have.

In all honesty, I hadn't even thought of that. However, do we know that those
restrictions applied in his case or are we just supposing that they might have.
I do have some sort of recollection that there have been elected officials who
have resigned their offices and entered the military during times of war.
Unfortunately, no name comes to mind at the moment.

My quote above starts with "I'm not saying it comes into play..." IOW,
I don't know but have given a valid possiblity--no more, no less.

And, "some sort of recollection....no names come to mind" does little
to bolster your argument.


.....AAMOF, if you look into what others have reported of comments
made by Nixon and members of his staff about Rumsfeld, they apparently
considered him far too dovish in those days to suit their tastes.

So, are you having a problem with Rumsfeld because he is too hawkish
or too dovish?

Both....it's the reason or explanation for the change that interests me.

Maturity, growth in the job, increased understanding, a cataclysmic
attack against the United States....

Am I out of line asking, then, how you feel about the criticism of Kerry over
his service in the theater, very often from people who weren't anywhere near
Viet Nam when the shooting was going on? Any defense for his contributions,
whatever they were? Or doesn't that count as downtown?

No defense for his contributions at all. Four months in theater of a
one year tour? Three PHs with no missed duty? Beaching his boat under
attack, thereby removing his mobility? Going ashore to dispatch a
wounded peasant already shot with a .50 cal? Then rushing home to tell
tales about the atrocities being committed wholesale by American
service men?

I guess if you were his boss, you'd have courts-martialed him. His boss chose
not to. So what purpose is there in your second guessing him? You're hardly
qualified to do that since you were neither a Naval officer nor a competent or
qualified swift boat commander. Do you really think that being a fighter jock
gives you all those skills and aptitudes?

As a career military officer I know what a PH is and what it requires.
I know what a combat tour of duty was and what it requires. I know
from two COMPLETE tours of duty in the war what the ROE were, what the
responsibilities of an officer are, what integrity is, what a
free-fire zone was, and, surprisingly, what a Swift boat's
capabilities are.

.......and with people who claim to be something that they are not. (Those
aren't all the same person in any of my statements.)

And there's another category of people whose names would fill our list and
who come from both sides of the aisle. Is there any point in pursuing that?

Yes, there is a point in pursuing it. I am demeaned by every dirty,
bearded, fatigue-jacketed, drug-addled wannabe who claims to be a
Vietnam vet and has become the stereotype of what happens to men who
experience war.

Well, that's where you're wrong. Every one of those dirty, bearded,
fatigue-jacketed, drug-addled Vietnam vets left this country as clean-cut
American kids.

You are so eager to refute you don't read the statement you are
refuting carefully. "...wannabe who claims to be a Vietnam vet."

You've been pointed several times at Burkett's very relevant work,
"Stolen Valor". You'll find that despite what you read in the liberal
media and the revisionist movie making of Oliver Stone, that the
stereotype is quite false.

In general, those who left this country as "clean-cut American kids"
returned as clean-cut American men.


Many of them may well have been volunteers as well. We as a
society are responsible for failing to adequately equip them to cope with the
conditions we were going to throw them into. If they were weak-willed to start
with, they should have been weeded out and not sent there to be destroyed by the
experiences they were exposed to. You can't blame the victims for having become
victims. Who in his right mind would consciously choose to come back so badly
damaged if they could have handled it or otherwise avoided it?

We as a society are responsible for nothing of the kind. Individuals
are responsible for themselves. Sherman thought "war is hell" but Lee
said "it is good that war is terrible, lest we come to love it too
much."

The wannabes are not folks who were there--that's the definition of
wannabe! The number of people who today are claiming to have been
SEALs, SF, POWs, decorated warriors, etc, or simply using a made-up
background of participation as excuse for their victimhood is
astonishing.

......Failure to identify the liars and poseurs is abrogation of my
responsibility to tell the truth and stand up for what I believe in.

You may wish to deny it, but you still have to accept responsibility for turning
those young Americans into the liars and poseurs you obviously despise. They
didn't arrive in Nam that way for the most part. All I do when I look at them
and what happened to most of them is to count my blessings that something like
that didn't happen to me. A little bit of that kind of humility might stand you
is some good, if you'd allow it to.

I don't have to accept responsibility for a liar and poseur. You don't
seem to understand that these are not people damaged by an experience,
but damaged people who claim an experience they didn't have!

I've got nothing to be humble about in that regard.



Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
Smithsonian Institution Press
ISBN #1-58834-103-8

In article , "Dave Kearton"
wrote:

"Howard Berkowitz" wrote in message
...
| In article ,

|
|
| So how is Rumsfeld avoiding combat if he's flying ASW duty, but he and
| his squadronmates were part of a strategic deterresnt against Communist
| forces?


| ASW pilots that sank subs in WWII rarely were shot at in the
| Atlantic theater -- the weather, distances and aircraft reliability
| were
| far more an issue. So is attacking a submerged sub seeing the
| elephant?
|
|


Very minor nitpick Howard.


ASW crews in the Atlantic were routinely shot at in the latter part of
the
war and some were shot down by their quarry.


From late '43, the anti submarine weapons became more common and more
effective. U-boat crews often felt they had a better chance of
survival
if they stayed on the surface and engaged the aircraft at over 2,000m
with
20mm and larger.


I am aware of Doenitz putting extra AA on some subs, and especially the
Bay of Biscay, but my impression was that while subs hit a few planes,
so many subs were lost quickly that Doenitz quit this quickly. I'm
certainly willing to be corrected on this.

In article , "Gord Beaman"
) wrote:

Howard Berkowitz wrote:



Assuming he was an ASW pilot, where would he have seen combat?
Certainly, after the WWII ASW people retired, there was no one who saw
actual combat in that specialty, except a few Brits at the Falklands.
Did lots of ASW pilots participate in pindown, just-short-of-war
operations? Without question, in the Cold War.

Given that there were no airborne combat with subs between 1945 and
1982, how would you get people with experience in the current systems,
against a much more capable threat?

You don't need to be firing live ammo, dropping live depth
charges and torps to get experience in using all the latest
gadgets and gizmos Howard.

It's a much practiced skill. World wide competitions are held in
the science by almost every Armed Force in existance.

I agree completely. That's why I question people who say an ASW flight
crew member was "avoiding combat."


Matter of fact you likely get more skill in their use when you
aren't worried about getting yer goodies blown off. ASW is about
99 percent work and skill in detection and localization and 1
percent in the coup de grace.

Doesn't take a lot of skill to drop a string of 8 mk54's at 50
foot spacing across a sub from 50 feet when you know exactly
where he is. Tends to ruin his day too .

Now, if you wanna have a beer in the mess with him tonight you
substitute 8 SUS (signals underwater sound) for the Mk 54's and
do so...
--

-Gord

George Z. Bush wrote:
Stephen Harding wrote:


We ended up being stationed in Tachikawa, Japan with him for
3 years and got there via SS President Roosevelt, a President
lines luxury cruise ship (without Dad since he had to fly the
plane there)! My mother should have spoken up much earlier!]


Just out of curiosity, when were you there? I spent amost 4 years in Japan, the
last three of which were at Tachikawa.

Yeah I remember you said you were there.

We were in Tachi from ? 1962 through August 1965. My Dad was
LtCol with the 22nd TCS flying the C-124. He retired on coming
home.


SMH