Judge orders full release of
Bush's Guard records
Navy Times
By Matt Kelley
Associated Press
September 17, 2004
A federal judge has ordered the Pentagon to find and make
public by next week any unreleased files about President
Bush's Vietnam-era Air National Guard service to resolve a
Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by The Associated
Press.
U.S. District Judge Harold Baer Jr. handed down the order late
Wednesday in New York. The AP lawsuit already has led to the
disclosure of previously unreleased flight logs from Bush's
days piloting F-102A fighters and other jets.
Pentagon officials told Baer they plan to have their search
complete by Monday. Baer ordered the Pentagon to hand over the
records to the AP by Sept. 24 and provide a written statement by
Sept. 29 detailing the search for more records.
"We're hopeful the Department of Defense will
provide a full accounting of the steps it has taken, as the judge
ordered, so the public can have some assurance that there are no
documents being withheld,' said AP lawyer David Schulz.
White House officials have said Bush ordered the Pentagon
earlier this year to conduct a thorough search for the
president's records, and officials allowed reporters to
review everything that was gathered back in February.
Through a series of requests under the federal open records
law and a subsequent suit, the AP uncovered the flight logs,
which were not part of the records the White House released
earlier this year.
Both Bush's and John Kerry's service records in
Vietnam have become a major issue in the presidential race. New
records that have surfaced in recent weeks have raised more
questions.
Bush's critics say Bush got preferential treatment as
the son of a congressman and U.N. ambassador. Critics also
question why Bush skipped a required medical examination in 1972
and failed to show up for drills during a six-month period that
year.
Bush has repeatedly said he fulfilled all of his Air National
Guard obligations.
The future president joined the Texas Air National Guard in
1968, when he graduated from Yale. He spent more than a year on
active duty learning how to fly and then mostly flew in the
one-seat F-102A fighters until April 1972.
The pilot logs show a shift to flights in two-seat trainer
jets in March 1972, shortly before Bush quit flying. Former Air
National Guard officials say that could have been because F-102A
jets were not available for Bush to fly or because of other
reasons, such as concerns about Bush's flight
performance.
Bush skipped his required yearly medical exam in 1972 in the
months after he stopped flying in April. Bush has said he moved
to Alabama to work on the unsuccessful Senate campaign of a
family friend.
Bush never showed up for Guard service between late April and
mid-October 1972. He won approval to train with an Alabama Air
National Guard unit during September, October and November 1972,
but more than a dozen members of the unit at that time say they
never saw him there.
The only direct record of Bush appearing at the Alabama
unit's base is a January 1973 dental exam performed at that
base. Bush's Texas commanders wrote in May 1973 they never
saw him between May 1972 and April 1973, a time when his pay
records show he trained on 14 days.
Although military regulations allowed commanders to order two
years of active duty for guardsmen who missed more than three
straight months of drills, that never happened to Bush.
Commanders had leeway at the time to allow guardsmen to make up
for missed drills.
Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
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