George W. Bush: a deserter, or just AWOL?
Published January 26, 2004
To be "AWOL" means to be absent without leave from a branch of the military. "Desertion," on the other hand, is a "prolonged absence." You can be AWOL for 30 days. After that, you are a deserter. The military is a show-up sort of business. When you don't show up--you get court-martialed.
There are peacetime desertions and wartime desertions. Wartime desertions are generally considered worse.
In the early 1970s, young George W. Bush was a wartime deserter.
This is not a matter of opinion. It is a matter of fact. It is backed up six ways from Sunday by solid documentary evidence, witness statements and research by journalists.
The short version is this: In 1972, Texas Air National Guard Lt. George W. Bush, an F-102 pilot, either failed or failed to show up for his medical exam and drug test. George W. Bush has apparently insisted that his military records be sealed, so we don't know whether he failed the medical exam and drug test or just skipped it, but what is certain is this: he was suspended from flying.
Then, basically, he failed to show up for a year of part-time Guard duty. Just didn't show up. He had no permission not to show up, mind you. Just didn't.
Normally, the military doesn't like it when pilots in whom it has invested much expensive training just fail/skip drug tests and then don't show up for duty. Usually, a court-martial and the brig come into play in these situations. (Did I mention W. was the son of a Congressman, who pulled strings to get his son safely in the Air Guard in the first place?)
It's true that George W. Bush was never convicted of desertion. It's also true that the Hollywood image of desertion (a soldier fleeing a battlefield in cowardice) does not apply here. Bush never got anywhere near a battlefield. He wasn't capable of committing that kind of desertion.
But that George W. Bush was guilty of desertion--and in more than just a technical sense (i.e., "missed a few meetings," the RNC spin)--is virtually undeniable. It's not an opinion. It's the only reasonable conclusion from the facts.
Personally, I don't care if young George W. Bush was snorting cocaine off the bellies of prostitutes instead of doing his Air Guard duty. His desertion adds some hypocrisy to the more recent Operation Flight Suit, but in the big scheme of things Dubya's lost youth (even though it lasted until he was 40) is not the most pressing of national issues.
But when, on a nationally broadcast debate, one of the top three news anchors in America, Peter Jennings, states unequivocally that the claim that George W. Bush is a deserter is "a reckless charge not supported by the facts," there is a problem.
A fact being irrelevant is not the same thing as a fact being untrue. Michael Moore is a liar if he says Bush is a deserter when Bush was not in fact absent from duty without permission for more than 30 days.
But if Bush was absent without permission for more than 30 days...well, shouldn't we at least proceed based on the facts? Do we start calling people liars because we don't like the facts they cite?
- George W. Bush: a deserter, or just AWOL?
- Published: January 26, 2004
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- Section: Politics
- Writer: Brian Flemming
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Comments on this articleComments
Hmmm . . . the number of posts seen across the 'sphere (left side only) on Bush a "deserter" makes me wonder is there is an central blog that sends out talking points everyday.
Anyway, I have no expertise in matters like this, so I read people who do, and it seems as if the case is being way overstated.
I felt this way during the Clinton years, and I feel this way now, there is enough to blast the President on, that there is no need to overreach to make a point.
You libs piss me off. You cry over soldiers who die in Iraq (many of whom are National Guard folks) , but then say GW wasn't really in the military because he was in the National Guard.
What about your hero, Clinton? He went overseas and then protested war?
Gore had bodyguards.
Dean got 4F because of a bad back, but then spent the war skiing.
Bill Hobbs, a Tennessee journalist, has covered this AWOL issue in painstaking detail. Go to: http://billhobbs.com/hobbsonline/cat_was_bush_awol.html
He also links to FactCheck.org of the Annenberg Public Policy Center, who also refute the charge in some detail:
http://factcheck.org/article.aspx?docID=131
Lastly, the Reverend Donald Sensing recently had a post where he explains clearly and simply what "deserter" means in military terms and why Bush doesn't qualify. Rev. Sensing was an artillery man in the Army for many years. You can read his post here:
http://www.donaldsensing.com/2004_01_01_archive.html#107495313186595111
Enjoy!
Here is what the NY Times had to say about the Bush Awol charges. I like reading anything political but I don't have respect for authors like Franken or Moore who have a consistent habit of making up facts to support their views.Had Moore been honest he would have stated that Bush left his duties in the National Guard to work on a Senate Campaign. What he in fact said was that Bush went awol which is a crime and not true. At no time was he listed as awol and he had his commanding officers permission to leave.
Michael Moore has also publicly stated on cable TV that he thinks the Bush administration is hiding Osama bin Laden. Obviously the remarks of a biased man trying to soil a president rather then that of a reasonable man exploring the facts.
The New York Times 11/3/03 explained:
"On Sept. 5, 1972, Mr. Bush asked his Texas Air National Guard superiors for assignment to the 187th Tactical Recon Group in Montgomery [Alabama] 'for the months of September, October and November,'" so Bush could manage the Senate campaign of Republican Winton Blount.
"Capt. Kenneth K. Lott, chief of the personnel branch of the 187th Tactical Recon Group, told the Texas commanders that training in September had already occurred but that more training was scheduled for Oct. 7 and 8 and Nov. 4 and 5."
After the Bush AWOL story had percolated for months, Col. Turnipseed finally remembered another glitch in his story: the fact that National Guard regulations allowed Guard members to miss duty as long as it was made up within the same quarter.
And, in fact - according to the Times - that's what Bush did.
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They don't refute it because they are incapable of believing that their Boy King could be anything but perfect (a perfect drunk-driving, coke snoting, AWOL, smirking liar making him the ideal GOP president).
Of course, the GOP will be out smearing the Dem candidates but that's ok, hit them and conservatives are the thinnest skin SOB's on the planet. :-)