From CBS News, 5/4/04:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/05/03/politics/main615317.shtml
Gaps Remain In Bush Guard Service
WASHINGTON
By Beth Lester,
CBS News Political Unit
As the back and forth over military service continues, the Bush and
Kerry campaigns are engaged in an increasingly personal battle over
who served and how.
The continuing questions have prompted a new CBS News investigation
into the first military records shakedown of this presidential
campaign: the drawn-out battle for the records of President George W.
Bush.
The missing military records include a bevy of forms, logs, pay stubs
and evaluations from Mr. Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard.
CBS News' evaluation of all the documents released by the White House
confirms that the records have several holes.
One important question concerns a required physical that President
Bush missed in 1972.
Because of his absence, Mr. Bush lost his flying wings.
Air National Guard regulations require that "the local commander who
has authority to convene a Flying Evaluation Board will direct an
investigation as to why the individual failed to accomplish the
medical examination."
But there are no records of an investigation or of any requests to
complete one.
There are various possible explanations.
Perhaps the investigation was never concluded or never forwarded up
the chain of command.
The regulation says the commander "will" direct an investigation but
it does not require the completed report to be forwarded up the chain
of command.
The commander "may" do so, but it is not required.
The report could have been lost at lower levels.
Or perhaps, as journalist James C. Moore suggests in the liberal
online magazine Salon, Mr. Bush thought the grounding would end his
obligation to the Guard and was happy to let the matter drop.
Or maybe, also a Moore speculation, there was a drug or alcohol
induced reason for Mr. Bush's absence that he and his superiors wanted
to avoid publicizing.
In 2000, Mr. Bush said he missed the physical because his family
doctor was in Texas.
But, as Time magazine reports, Air Force surgeons must perform the
physicals and there was no surgeon shortage in Alabama.
In March 2004, the White House said Mr. Bush did not need the physical
because he was not flying.
Regardless of these speculations, there is no record of any
investigation in Mr. Bush's file.
As Moore concludes, "A pilot simply did not walk away from all of that
training with two years remaining on his tour of duty without a formal
explanation as to what happened and why."
As for the highest profile issue, the available files do not clear up
the "missing" section of the president's National Guard service.
From May 1972 through May 1973 there are highly irregular records for
his attendance at required drills, reports Walter Robinson in the
Boston Globe.
During that time, Mr. Bush had been given permission to move from his
home base in Houston to Montgomery, Ala., to work on a Congressional
campaign.
Until February of this year, no documents existed to suggest that Mr.
Bush performed any duty in either Texas or Alabama during those
months.
Pay stubs released in February show that he was paid for enough days
in Alabama to be judged "satisfactory," but that he did not do any
duty between April 16 and October 28, 1972, and that he failed to show
up for training in December 1972, February 1973 and March 1973.
There is nothing in the records from that key period beyond those pay
stubs -- no evaluations from either Mr. Bush's Alabama supervisors or
his Texas ones.
In fact, Mr. Bush's Texas evaluators wrote on May 2, 1973 that, "Lt.
Bush has not been observed at this unit during the period of report.
A civilian occupation made it necessary for him to move to Montgomery,
Alabama.
He cleared this base on 15 May 1972 and has been performing equivalent
training in a non-flying status with the 187th Tac Recon Gp, Dannelly
ANG Base, Alabama."
But no Alabama records exist.
And Mr. Bush's official discharge papers include no evidence of any
duty between May 1972 and October 1973, when he left the Guard.
_____________________________________________________________
Where was Georgie?
Harry
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