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


"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
.. .

If you return to the bios, you'll note that upon graduation from NROTC
(pretty serious commitment and additionally indicative of getting a
college degree without some sort of inheritance or paternal
influence), he fulfilled his active duty commitment in the '50s (after
Korea, before SEA). He could then have drifted out of service upon
completion of ready reserve requirements, but he didn't.

He appears to have moved down a pretty impressive career path before
SEA heated up. The fact that he simultaneously maintained his reserve
qualifications is adequate for me.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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. I do have a problem with people who aggressively avoided any
kind of service, with people who undermined their brothers-in-arms,
and with people who claim to be something that they are not. (Those
aren't all the same person in any of my statements.)


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