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

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).


Thanks for filling me in, Ed. Did it say what else he flew? Just curious.

v/r
Gordon
====(A+C====
USN SAR

Donate your memories - write a note on the back and send your old photos to a
reputable museum, don't take them with you when you're gone.

On 06 Mar 2004 20:26:41 GMT, (ArtKramr) wrote:


I think back to the days of my training in Texas. Every instructor we had was a
combat veteran who completed his tour of duty and came back to instruct. My
Bombing instructor was a veteran of 25 missions with the bloody 100th bomb
group. He flew them from England to Berlin without fighter escort taking
horrible losses. He not only tought us our basic job, but he let us know what
it acutually was like in combat and all during my tour of duty his training
resulted in the fact that there were no surprises for us in combat except
for the time we are attacked by an ME 262. I find it interesting that Rumsfeld
was an instructor who had never been to combat. I don't see that as a change
for the better in flight training.


Arthur Kramer

When a maximum mobilization war is on, you've got a lot of combat
veterans available to put into the training business. It was US policy
to limit combat exposure and rotate people out of the operational
units. Some other countries didn't do that.

But, Korea, Vietnam and the intervening conflicts haven't been maximum
mobilization wars. That means there weren't enough combat vets to put
into training, particularly at all levels. Interestingly enough, I was
running Air Training Command undergraduate flying training assignments
from '70-'72. That was a period of drastic production adjustments as
Nixon's Vietnamization policy instituted in '68 was cutting
requirements for bodies to fill combat pipeline cockpits. The Navy
walked into Pensacola one Saturday morning and sent several hundred
pilot trainees home or to other duties. Some were within two weeks of
graduation.

The AF chose another route. We kept everyone in the training pipeline,
but reduced acquisitions--stopped recruiting and reduced opportunities
for ROTC and AFA graduates to enter flying programs. But, we had a lot
of folks in training who needed seats when they graduated. The answer
was for each command to take a % of grads equal to their % of total
pilots in the AF. That meant Training Command had to absorb 28% of
pilot training graduates--immediate plowback into instructor pilot
duty upon graduation.

It wasn't an optimum situation, but it also was workable. With combat
experienced leadership at the flight commander level, a properly
trained recent graduate could be an effective instructor pilot at that
level.

Similarly when I went through my first operational training course, a
lot of the instructors were combat vets, but a lot weren't. Graduates
were going direct to the war, while experienced in the airplane
instructors weren't getting to go.

When I was halfway through my first combat tour, guys who had been my
instructors in F-105 training were showing up in the combat theater. I
was the experienced one and they were the new guys.

Bottom line is, we can't always have the "ideal". And, even guys who
want to get to war can't always get there when they want.



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

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

Subject: Rumsfeld and flying
From: Ed Rasimus
Date: 3/6/04 2:07 PM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

On 06 Mar 2004 20:26:41 GMT, (ArtKramr) wrote:


I think back to the days of my training in Texas. Every instructor we had
was a
combat veteran who completed his tour of duty and came back to instruct. My
Bombing instructor was a veteran of 25 missions with the bloody 100th bomb
group. He flew them from England to Berlin without fighter escort taking
horrible losses. He not only tought us our basic job, but he let us know
what
it acutually was like in combat and all during my tour of duty his training
resulted in the fact that there were no surprises for us in combat except
for the time we are attacked by an ME 262. I find it interesting that
Rumsfeld
was an instructor who had never been to combat. I don't see that as a change
for the better in flight training.


Arthur Kramer

When a maximum mobilization war is on, you've got a lot of combat
veterans available to put into the training business. It was US policy
to limit combat exposure and rotate people out of the operational
units. Some other countries didn't do that.

But, Korea, Vietnam and the intervening conflicts haven't been maximum
mobilization wars. That means there weren't enough combat vets to put
into training, particularly at all levels. Interestingly enough, I was
running Air Training Command undergraduate flying training assignments
from '70-'72. That was a period of drastic production adjustments as
Nixon's Vietnamization policy instituted in '68 was cutting
requirements for bodies to fill combat pipeline cockpits. The Navy
walked into Pensacola one Saturday morning and sent several hundred
pilot trainees home or to other duties. Some were within two weeks of
graduation.

The AF chose another route. We kept everyone in the training pipeline,
but reduced acquisitions--stopped recruiting and reduced opportunities
for ROTC and AFA graduates to enter flying programs. But, we had a lot
of folks in training who needed seats when they graduated. The answer
was for each command to take a % of grads equal to their % of total
pilots in the AF. That meant Training Command had to absorb 28% of
pilot training graduates--immediate plowback into instructor pilot
duty upon graduation.

It wasn't an optimum situation, but it also was workable. With combat
experienced leadership at the flight commander level, a properly
trained recent graduate could be an effective instructor pilot at that
level.

Similarly when I went through my first operational training course, a
lot of the instructors were combat vets, but a lot weren't. Graduates
were going direct to the war, while experienced in the airplane
instructors weren't getting to go.

When I was halfway through my first combat tour, guys who had been my
instructors in F-105 training were showing up in the combat theater. I
was the experienced one and they were the new guys.

Bottom line is, we can't always have the "ideal". And, even guys who
want to get to war can't always get there when they want.



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


Interesting stuff. I remember that we had only one non-combat instructor at Big
Springs. But he wasn't a flying instructor he was a navigation (DR) classroom
instructor and he stood out as not having any battle experience. And he often
made the mistake of saying to us, "and that is how it is in combat" and an
entire class would say under their breath, "how the hell would you know? Those
who flew an fought just seemed to get a higher level of respect than those who
never fought. But there was a war on so I guess that explains it.


Arthur Kramer
344th BG 494th BS
England, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany
Visit my WW II B-26 website at:
http://www.coastcomp.com/artkramer

"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
...
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

"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.

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.

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.

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.

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?

.....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.

.....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.

.......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.

In article ,
(ArtKramr) wrote:

Subject: Rumsfeld and flying
From: Howard Berkowitz
Date: 3/6/04 10:20 AM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

My former father-in-law was a Naval aviator flying close air support
during Korea. During Viet Nam, however, I suppose you could say he "got
out of combat" since his assignments included service test pilot at
Wright-Patterson, Sixth Fleet duty

He went to war and saw the elephant. He was one of us. Every thing after
that
is gravy.


Oh, I agree he did, and had the nightmares to go with it. But that
wasn't my point. That he was on a combat platform during the Cold War
doesn't mean that he was avoiding combat. In like manner, I won't say
that a SAC pilot, on airborne alert for what would have been missions
against the fUSSR that would have had extremely high casualties, was
avoiding combat.

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?

I don't agree with Rumsfeld on every policy, but I have no reason to
think he doesn't have personal courage. On 9/11, his first response to
the impact was to try to run to the area and see if he could help in
rescue, and was quite properly pulled back from doing so, because
one-half of the NCA doesn't belong on the front line as multiple attacks
are happening.

In article ,
(ArtKramr) wrote:

Subject: Rumsfeld and flying
From: (BUFDRVR)
Date: 3/6/04 12:07 PM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

You served with honor. So did the SecDef. You had one situation, he
had another. Don't attempt to demean him or others to fit your agenda.
Or, at least if you do, then keep the ROE consistent.

Uhhh...Ed....let me introduce you to Art Kramer....


BUFDRVR


I think back to the days of my training in Texas. Every instructor we had
was a
combat veteran who completed his tour of duty and came back to instruct.
My
Bombing instructor was a veteran of 25 missions with the bloody 100th
bomb
group. He flew them from England to Berlin without fighter escort taking
horrible losses. He not only tought us our basic job, but he let us know
what
it acutually was like in combat and all during my tour of duty his
training
resulted in the fact that there were no surprises for us in combat
except
for the time we are attacked by an ME 262. I find it interesting that
Rumsfeld
was an instructor who had never been to combat. I don't see that as a
change
for the better in flight training.


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?

In article ,
(ArtKramr) wrote:

w?
Those
who flew an fought just seemed to get a higher level of respect than
those who
never fought. But there was a war on so I guess that explains it.


I don't know if your last sentence was serious or sarcastic. But yes, it
does explain having combat-experienced instructors available. That
wasn't a choice for many years thereafter.