“FAILURE TO SATISFACTORILY PARTICIPATE”
As far as ARPC would be concerned, Bush now had an entire twelve month period that could not be accounted for. The ANG Chief of Military Personnel for the state of Texas was disavowing responsibility for Bush’s actions and whereabouts during that period. His flight rating had been suspended, and he had not trained in specialty for that entire year. No duty whatsoever is recorded for eight of those twelve months, including a nearly six-month stretch where he had shown up for duty not a single time. And there was clear and unequivocal evidence of fraud for those periods of duty for which Bush had been credited and paid. ARPC would also have access to Bush’s payroll and “points” records, and would have noticed that Bush had failed to meet the attendance criteria for “satisfactory participation” for two straight fiscal years.
It is not difficult to imagine how Bush’s records, and the “report not available for this period” response from TXANG, would have been interpreted.
From AFM 35-3, Chapter 14, Para 14-5
ARPC was looking at the record of a deserter, whose desertion had been aided and/or ignored by the Reservist’s superior officials, and then covered up by the chain of command of the Texas Air National Guard. TXANG had ignored the instructions in the Notice of Correction, and permitted Bush to continue to be paid as a pilot despite his lack of pilot qualifications. Bush had announced to his unit, well after he would had made his decision, that he was leaving Texas. Then, he simply disappeared, and had taken no steps to find another unit in which to serve, or another job that he could do as a member of the Air National Guard. A single letter dated September 5th, 1973, asking to be discharged, was the only evidence ARPC had that Bush continued to exist after the day he told TXANG he was leaving.
Under the laws, policies, and procedures governing ARPC, Bush had “failed to satisfactorily participate” as a member of an Air Reserve component. As someone with an unfulfilled Military Service Obligation who had served fewer than 24 months on active duty, that meant only one thing—that Bush would be ordered to active duty as a punitive measure.
However, there was a catch. In order for ARPC to order Bush to active duty, Bush had to have undergone a physical examination during the previous 12 months. And according to the journalists who examined Bush’s medical records, there was nothing in those files after 1971.
From AFM 35-3, Chapter 14, Para 14-5d
glcq.com
So before APRC could order Bush to active duty for “failure to satisfactorily participate”, it had to give Bush 15 days to “report to the nearest medical examining facility for medical examination.” And when Bush did not show up, ARPC would have ordered Bush to a “special tour of active duty” to accomplish the medical exam.
And when Bush did not show up for that, he would be considered a “deserter”.
ALL ROADS LEAD TO A MEDICAL EXAMINATION
Before continuing the examination of the procedures that would have been followed based on Bush’s records, it should be pointed out that “all roads lead to a medical examination.”
Assuming for the moment that Bush was not classified as an “unsatisfactory participant” by ARPC, ARPC still had to “determine his current status and … award an appropriate Availability Classification Code and assign the individual to the appropriate Reserve section.” In order to do this, ARPC needed to know Bush’s physical qualifications.
All members of the Air Force whose jobs required “flight status” were required to get a physical examination each year within three months prior to their birthday. Those not on flight status were required to get a physical examination at least once every four years and were required to submit a certification of physical fitness to serve each year. The periodic physical examination for those not on flight status required exams within eight months prior to the 27th birthday of all members of the Air Force.
From AFM 160-1, Attachment 15-1 (medical examination schedule table)
George W. Bush turned 27 on July 6, 1973. His last physical was in 1971.
Thus, regardless of what ARPC wanted to do with Bush, it was absolutely necessary that Bush get a physical examination before they could make any decisions. And ARPC would have instructed Bush to accomplish that physical examination, and when he did not get that physical, ordered him to “special active duty.”
The absolute requirement for a physical examination and annual certification of physical fitness is one of the “choke points” in Bush’s military records. All possible outcomes required that ARPC determine Bush’s physical qualifications. In order to achieve that, ARPC would have first “instructed”, then “ordered” Bush to get a physical examination. We know, from Bush’s records, that no such examination was ever accomplished. Thus we know that Bush failed to obey a direct order to appear for active duty.
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF SEPTEMBER 15TH
The “effective date” of September 15, 1973 for Bush’s change to “Inactive Status” is significant for two reasons. The first is that, based on Air Force policy and other documents in the Bush files, the change in status could only have occurred retroactively based on actions taken by ARPC pursuant to Bush’s service in TXANG.
Under Air Force policy, AF 526 “points summaries” such as the one which discloses Bush’s change to “Inactive Status” had to be sent to members within 60 days of the date of a discharge (“complete severence from military status”.) The AF 526 was prepared on January 30th, 1974, meaning that the order changing Bush’s status could have occurred no earlier than December 1, 1973, two months after Bush had been officially discharged from TXANG.
But Bush was still under the command of TXANG on 9/15/73, and was not officially discharged until October 1, 1973. Thus, it can be proven that the reason for the change to “Inactive Status” was related to Bush’s service as a member of TXANG.
From AFM 35-3, Chapter 14, Para 14-12
But September 15 is significant for an even greater reason in that is not a date that is related to any event in Bush’s military career. Instead, it is related to the reporting requirements under the Selective Service Act for draft-deferred members of the Guard and Reserves. .
From AFM 35-3, Chapter 14, Para 14-14
Members had to be certified once a year as “satisfactorily participating” in the Guard or Reserves in order to maintain their draft-deferred status using, a DD Form 44, which was sent to each member’s local draft board. This annual requirement had an effective reporting date of September 15 of each year.
It should be noted that, although DD44s certifying “satisfactory participation” for the years prior to Bush’s “Alabama year” were among those documents released by the White House, no copies of DD44s with an “effective date” of September 15, 1972 or September 15, 1973 were released.
From CFR Title 10, Sec. 100.3(d)
DD44s were also required whenever a member had completed his Military Service Obligation (and was thus no longer eligible for being drafted) or when he “could not be located” or had been discharged.
Under Federal law at that time, a Reservist or Guardsman could only be certified for priority induction through the Selective Service System for failure to “satisfactorily participate” if an order to involuntary active duty through the Reserves had been issued, and the member had not appeared and could not be located. And as noted above, the status of a member with an MSO could only be changed to “inactive” if they were being “completely severed from military status.”
A CONVENIENT WORD FOR “DESERTER”
The lack of any documents in Bush’s medical files after 1971, and the fact that ARPC absolutely had to know Bush’s medical/physical status in order to do its job, make it clear that efforts must have been made to reach Bush, but were unsuccessful.
Every member of the Air Reserve Forces was required to maintain a current mailing address at which he could be immediately contacted in the event of a national emergency. This address was known as the “Home of Record” (HOR). According to the Bush documents, his ARPC files contained at least five different HORs in the period that Bush was under the authority of ARPC after he had quit TXANG.
Only one of these addresses (the very last one) is an actual street address where Bush would receive mail once he had moved to Boston.
When someone was not responding to mail, APRC was required to make a reasonable effort to locate a “missing” member before taking punitive action. If mail to Bush was being returned as undeliverable at any particular address, other addresses would have been tried. Mail would have been sent to all possible addresses where Bush might have been reached, before he was officially designated a “non-locatee.”
“Non-locatee” was the term used by the Air Force when it had a deserter on its hands who had an unfulfilled MSO. Rather than go through the complications required to court-martial a member for desertion who had not shown up in response to an order to active duty, ARPC had an equally effective, and far less cumbersome, means of dealing with the problem. By certifying a “deserter” to the Selective Service System for immediate induction, that member was subject to criminal prosecution within the civil court system if he failed to show up when ordered to do so.
As noted above, Bush’s change in status to “Inactive” could only have been accomplished if he was being discharged from the military. That could only be accomplished if Bush was considered a “non-locatee” and certified for induction through the Selective Service System. The “address sequence” found in Bush’s records provide collaborating evidence that Bush could not be located (see Appendix 2).
HOUSTON, YOU HAVE A PROBLEM
The same people who saw to it that Bush would not be drafted to serve in Vietnam would be sure to take the necessary steps to prevent Bush from being inducted through the Selective Service System despite Bush’s failure to fulfill his obligations to the United States Military. These people couldn’t care less about military discipline or national defense—their roles were to ensure that the children of Texas’ rich and powerful families remained out of harm’s way. Perhaps there were one or two members of Bush’s local draft board with a scintilla of integrity, but it only required one corrupt official to set the wheels in motion that “rehabilitated” George W. Bush.
We don’t know the precise mechanism that resulted in Bush’s being given an honorable discharge from the United States Air Reserve Forces. Certainly, when there is no accounting for an entire year of a Reservist’s service, when that Reservist has no record of any training for months at a time, and when that Reservist has refused to take not only his mandatory flight physical but the physical required of all Reservists, an “honorable discharge” should be impossible to receive.
We do know that strings were pulled, not just because there was no way that Bush deserved an honorable discharge, but also because of what happened next. |
