Rumsfeld and flying

"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 6 Mar 2004 11:47:39 -0500, "George Z. Bush"
wrote:

You might not have read the full bios. While he spent three years on
active duty, he then spent a full military career continuing to fly in
the Naval Reserves until retiring with the rank of Captain (O-6).


Ed Rasimus

I was aware that he had stayed in and retired as an O-6. I guess you didn't
notice that the lump in my cheek was caused by my tongue rather than a case
of
the mumps. Maybe I should have included my homemade smiley sign to signify
that
I didn't want my comments taken too seriously. (^-^)))

BTW, since you brought it up, don't you ever wonder how he got through the
entire Viet Nam War without any active service during it, considering how
much
of a warrior he turned out to be as a civilian? Most of the rest of us who
wanted to do our bit in uniform found ways to make it happen.

Is that your tongue again or do I smell a herring?

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.

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.

George Z.



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