Two MOH Winners say Bush Didn't Serve

In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

From one of Kerry's accused war criminals...


"I committed the same kinds of atrocities as thousands of others
in that I shot in free fire zones, used harassment and interdiction fire,
joined in search and destroy missions, and burned villages. All of these
acts were established policies from the top down, and the men who ordered
this are war criminals."

"I would like to talk on behalf of all those veterans and
say that several months ago in Detroit we had an investigation at which over
150 honorably discharged, and many very highly decorated, veterans testified
to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia. These were not isolated incidents
but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of
officers at all levels of command."

John Kerry, April 1971


Yeah, ain't war a bitch.

And, wasn't it amazing how many of those "honorably discharged and
...highly decorated..." assholes turned out to be wannabes and
neverweres.

Just last month in Nashville, I met with seven hundred combat aviators
from that conflict who wouldn't urinate on Kerry if he were aflame.


One interesting thing I've noted is that Vietnam vets who fought
hand-to-hand combat seem to overwhelmingly be far less retroactively
gung-ho on the war than those who flew fixed wing far above. Why do you
suppose that is?


--Mike

Michael Wise wrote:

In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

...
What did we get out of it? We changed the way we organize, train and
fight our wars. We lost one F-105 for every 65 sorties over N. Vietnam
in '66 and '67. We lost one fixed wing aircraft for every 3500 sorties
during Desert Storm. We lost one fixed wing aircraft...period, in
Iraqi Freedom for 16,500 sorties. We learned some lessons.

Do you suppose the fact that Iraq didn't have the advantage of real-time
super-power support (from the Soviets) in the form of arms, training,
and "advisors" has anything to do with it?

nevermind the fact that the US didn't really have air superiority over
vietnam, nor
did they have the benefit of having waxed almost all the SAM batteries
already, nor
did they have AWACS aircraft to tell their fighters where the Migs were 200
or 300 miles
out. Yeah...learned some lessons... learned how not to do it next time. And
how not to do it
is against someone as capable as themselves again. Go after the small
enemies, then your president
can look good on tv. ignore the big fish that'd kick yer arse again.

(WalterM140) wrote:


Up until WWII and perhaps the Korean War as well, we used
to be the world's good guys. Nowadays, a billion plus Muslims look on us
with a
clearly jaundiced or suspicious eye, as well as many others of our former
friends and admirers. What happened to bring that about?

The Bush 43 administration.

If you are old enough to think back, you will recall that the US was declared a
Great Satan under the Carter Administration, and ever since.

Walt
(Apparently born yesterday

-- Charlie Springer

In article t,
"Steven P. McNicoll" wrote:


He only gave it to the USO after unsuccessfully waiting for months for
somebody to come forward with some credible evidence. When
nobody did, he turned the money over to the USO even though there
was no winner.


But someone did come forward with some credible evidence. Did Trudeau make
the donation in the name of John Calhoun or did he renege on his promise?


http://makeashorterlink.com/?F22924488


Former Guardsman: Bush served with me in Alabama


So a single person who boasts of being a "staunch Republican" and whose
name was given to the press by "a Republican close to Bush" and who
claims to have witnessed all these appearances which nobody else can
recall constitutes credible evidence on your planet?


--Mike

In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

On Thu, 10 Jun 2004 18:08:22 +0000 (UTC), Jim Yanik
wrote:

I got a 6 month "early out" in 1974 from the USAF.I jumped at the chance to
get it,was the first one to apply on my base.(LG Hanscom Fld,Ma.)

My advice is don't run for political office.


Not unless its on the Republican ticket. ; )


--Mike

"Kristan Roberge" wrote in message
...


Michael Wise wrote:

In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

...
What did we get out of it? We changed the way we organize, train and
fight our wars. We lost one F-105 for every 65 sorties over N. Vietnam
in '66 and '67. We lost one fixed wing aircraft for every 3500 sorties
during Desert Storm. We lost one fixed wing aircraft...period, in
Iraqi Freedom for 16,500 sorties. We learned some lessons.

Do you suppose the fact that Iraq didn't have the advantage of real-time
super-power support (from the Soviets) in the form of arms, training,
and "advisors" has anything to do with it?

nevermind the fact that the US didn't really have air superiority over
vietnam,

air superiority: That degree of dominance in the air battle of one force
over another that permits the conduct of operations by the former and its
related land, sea, and air forces at a given time and place without
prohibitive interference by the opposing force.
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/dod...a/a/00291.html
It appears that by that definition (though maybe you are not using the
definition agreed to by the US military branches) we did indeed have air
superiority--can you identify any targets we wanted to strike that we were
prevented from striking, whenever we so chose?

nor
did they have the benefit of having waxed almost all the SAM batteries
already,

An unfortunate political decision, but regardless, having ADA and SAM's does
not by definition deny us 'air superiority". Though you are getting a bit
warmer here--the US did learn a lesson in regards to taking down the IADS,
instead of letting some politico back DC decide it was not a worthwhile
target...

nor
did they have AWACS aircraft to tell their fighters where the Migs were
200
or 300 miles
out.

Maybe not to the degree that we have now, but we did have these nifty things
called EC-121's...

Yeah...learned some lessons... learned how not to do it next time.

I don't know about that; yes, we did learn from the mistakes we made (which
is why we are the best, right?), but everything we did was not a mistake.
LBII seemed to be on the right track, and accomplished its goals. The first
truly effective use of heavy bombers in support of tactical ground units on
a widespread basis, the use of modern PGM's, effective use of helicopter
gunships (to include use of reliable ATGM's from helos, during the 72 Easter
Offensive IIRC), and the most effective use of heliborne airmobile assets up
to that time, etc.

And
how not to do it
is against someone as capable as themselves again.

Well, after we get finished with round one, the opposition tends to not be
very effective at all; witness ODS.

Go after the small
enemies, then your president
can look good on tv. ignore the big fish that'd kick yer arse again.

And which fish would that be?

Brooks

Michael Wise wrote:
In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

From one of Kerry's accused war criminals...


"I committed the same kinds of atrocities as thousands of others
in that I shot in free fire zones, used harassment and interdiction fire,
joined in search and destroy missions, and burned villages. All of these
acts were established policies from the top down, and the men who ordered
this are war criminals."

"I would like to talk on behalf of all those veterans and
say that several months ago in Detroit we had an investigation at which over
150 honorably discharged, and many very highly decorated, veterans testified
to war crimes committed in Southeast Asia. These were not isolated incidents
but crimes committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of
officers at all levels of command."

John Kerry, April 1971


Yeah, ain't war a bitch.

And, wasn't it amazing how many of those "honorably discharged and
...highly decorated..." assholes turned out to be wannabes and
neverweres.

Just last month in Nashville, I met with seven hundred combat aviators
from that conflict who wouldn't urinate on Kerry if he were aflame.


One interesting thing I've noted is that Vietnam vets who fought
hand-to-hand combat seem to overwhelmingly be far less retroactively
gung-ho on the war than those who flew fixed wing far above. Why do you
suppose that is?

Maybe because they were fighting different kinds of wars. They each had their
own peculiar and different kinds of hell, but generally speaking, the one aloft
was a whole lot cleaner and smelled a whole lot better than the one on the
ground.

George Z.


--Mike

Regnirps wrote:
(WalterM140) wrote:


Up until WWII and perhaps the Korean War as well, we used
to be the world's good guys. Nowadays, a billion plus Muslims look on us
with a
clearly jaundiced or suspicious eye, as well as many others of our former
friends and admirers. What happened to bring that about?

The Bush 43 administration.

If you are old enough to think back, you will recall that the US was declared
a Great Satan under the Carter Administration, and ever since.

(Apparently born yesterday

-- Charlie Springer

That was true, but in those days, it was mostly by Iran acting alone because of
our involvement with the late Shah. Nowadays, just about the entire Muslim
world has joined in, minus a handful of Islamic governments whose viability is
tied to their relationships with our government.

George Z.

On Sun, 13 Jun 2004 05:27:27 GMT, Michael Wise wrote:

One interesting thing I've noted is that Vietnam vets who fought
hand-to-hand combat seem to overwhelmingly be far less retroactively
gung-ho on the war than those who flew fixed wing far above. Why do you
suppose that is?


There could be a number of reasons. First, the number who today claim
"hand-to-hand combat" seems unfortunately to be drastically inflated
by thousands of poseurs claiming to be something they were not. See
Burkitt's "Stolen Valor" for some astonishing tales.

Of those who served on the ground, the proportion of career to draftee
and officer to lower-rank enlisted could change the perception of
events. Of ground vets from Vietnam, I have seldom encountered any
that went so far as John Kerry in their condemnation of their fellow
warriors. I know of none that have called their service traitorous,
their actions and those of their comrades criminal, or their service
dishonorable. Maybe I don't travel in the right circles.

As for those who flew "far above", you might want to consider the
sustained loss rates of the Rolling Thunder participants in comparison
to those "hand-to-hand" combats. Or, maybe check the proportion of
POWs between the ground and air combatants.


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

On Sun, 13 Jun 2004 05:11:46 GMT, Michael Wise wrote:

In article ,
Ed Rasimus wrote:

...
What did we get out of it? We changed the way we organize, train and
fight our wars. We lost one F-105 for every 65 sorties over N. Vietnam
in '66 and '67. We lost one fixed wing aircraft for every 3500 sorties
during Desert Storm. We lost one fixed wing aircraft...period, in
Iraqi Freedom for 16,500 sorties. We learned some lessons.

Do you suppose the fact that Iraq didn't have the advantage of real-time
super-power support (from the Soviets) in the form of arms, training,
and "advisors" has anything to do with it?

You might want to check out the equippage, advising, training and
doctrine in place at the start of Desert Storm before repeating that
bit of revisionism. Some analysts even contend that the failure of
Soviet militarysupport so clearly displayed contributed to the
collapse of the SU.


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