Right off the bat, the use of a superscript in the first memo for "111th" raises a red flag.
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No. 2 ________ and convening of a flight review board IAW AFM 35-13.
What is IAW etc and where is the followup?
I know some word processors can do superscript. I imagine some typewriters can do it as well. Doubt the army would shell out money for a frivilous tool like that. Especially since I still see people today in the military typing out memos on machines that can do it but don't use the function.
The 18 August Memo .. has a superscripted 'th' in 187th.
Try this in MS Word or other common WP .. type 187 .. space .. th .. then try it without the space.
Notice the continual use of spacing between numbers and 'th' in the memos.. not necessary on a typewriter as it won't auto superscript (it can't).
But I will admit I am confused on one point:
MSNBC says that copies of these same memos were provided by the WH? So what gives?
That's the key even more so than the type set as the letter imprints that strike the ribbon on any common typewriter are the same size whether you superscript or not.
MS Word, on the other hand, has an automatic default setting that superscripts and shrinks the little th's at the end of any numerical note. The forger probably typed 111th and it automatically superscripted without him even realizing it.
"Right off the bat, the use of a superscript in the first memo for "111th" raises a red flag."
I was a personnelman (typewriter commando) when I first enlisted in 1974, and used or at least saw every kind of typewriter in the military supply system back then.
A superscript was done by rotating the platen a half turn, then rotating it back to continue, but there was no way to make the chars smaller like MS Word does now automatically.
Except, perhaps, by using an IBM Selectric II, changing the type ball to a smaller font, then changing it back.
However, that wasn't done for the "th" up in the letterhead of the same memo.
As far as I'm concerned, the superscript is a dead giveaway. The fact that it only appears in that one place says to me that MS Word changed it automatically, and the forger didn't notice.
Another indication is in paragraph 3 of memo 3.
Back then, typists were taught to break and hyphenate words at the end of a line to preserve a more uniform right margin. Taking a whole word down to the next line and leaving a large indentation on the right didn't become common until word processors.
A military clerk would have broken the word, "forwarded."
...forwar-
ded...