Ron Davies - 21 Jan 06 - 05:47 PM

"Most of the men Bush took instruction with in learning to be a pilot were going to Vietnam."

The above statement by Ron is a BOBERT FACT - It has absolutely no basis, like the propaganda campaign that never was this is a figment of Ron's imagination, but it can be easily debunked.

Ron has been challenged on this on a number of previous occasions when he has made this claim, with the result he has not once come up with any detail to back it up. He refers to the "teasing" that Lt. G.W. Bush got about a request relating to a scheme called "Palace Guard". Ron did those reporting this also tease Fred Buckley? The stage of training he was in at the time was at an Operational Training Unit where he and his fellow students were learning how to 'fight' their aircraft - Delta Dagger F-102A's. Now all his fellow students in this unit would be learning the ins and outs of flying and fighting this one type of aircraft, OTU's do not fly mixed types it is not an efficient use of equipment or manpower. His Training officer turned down the request of both Bush and Buckley for three reasons, the first was lack of operational experience (500hrs minimum after having been passed as operational were required), the second was that the aircraft type he was training on were being withdrawn from theatre, finally the third reason was that the "Palace Guard" scheme was being cut back.

Previously Ron has made the statement about the vast majority of pilots going to Vietnam. As I have previously pointed out to Ron from figures available from the Pentagon, at the height of the war in Vietnam, the maximum number of US Troops of all services and branches of those services was about 550,000 in 1968. The official strength of the US Armed Forces at the time was 3.5 million, so even every single person serving in Vietnam would not make any "vast majority" - True Ron?? Now let's take a look at the half million odd that were there. The "vast majority" to use Ron's terms would be infantry and logistics units, as there was no question of disputed air superiority over the area you can accomplish quite a lot with very few aircraft. In 1968, Ron, the "vast majority" of US Air Force, Army, Marine, ANG and US Navy pilots were servicing the requirements of a little thing called the "Cold War", i.e. keeping an eye on Russia.