Posted on 09/10/2004 7:06:51 PM PDT by ambrose
Posted on Fri, Sep. 10, 2004
Man named in Bush memo left Guard before document was written
BY PETE SLOVER
The Dallas Morning News
AUSTIN, Texas - (KRT) - The man named in a disputed memo as exerting pressure to "sugar coat" President Bush's military record left the Texas Air National Guard a year and a half before the memo was supposedly written, his own service record shows.
An order obtained by The Dallas Morning News shows that Col. Walter "Buck" Staudt was honorably discharged on March 1, 1972. CBS News reported this week that a memo in which Staudt was described as interfering with officers' negative evaluations of Bush's service, was dated Aug. 18, 1973.
That added to mounting questions about the authenticity of documents that seem to suggest Bush sought special favors and did not fulfill his service.
Staudt, who lives in New Braunfels, Texas, did not return calls seeking comment. His discharge paper was among a packet of documents obtained by The Dallas Morning News from official sources during 1999 research into Bush's Guard record.
A CBS staffer stood by the story, suggesting that Staudt could have continued to exert influence over Guard officials. But a former high-ranking Guard official disputed that, saying retirement would have left Staudt powerless over remaining officials.
The authenticity of the memo and three others included in Wednesday's "60 Minutes" report came in for heavy criticism Friday, prompting an unusual on-air defense of the original work. Experts on typography said they appeared to have been computer-drafted on equipment not available in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
And the family of the officer who supposedly wrote them, Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, who died in 1984, said it wasn't his nature to keep detailed personal notes.
In its network news broadcast Friday, CBS said the documents were supported by both unnamed witnesses and others, including document examiners.
Earlier, CBS anchor Dan Rather told The Dallas Morning News that he had heard nothing to make him question the legitimacy of the memos. He attributed the backlash to partisan politics and competitive journalism.
"This story is true. The questions we raised about then-Lieutenant Bush's National Guard service are serious and legitimate," he said, expressing confidence the memos are authentic. "Until and unless someone shows me definitive proof that they are not, I don't see any reason to carry on a conversation with the professional rumor mill."
The interview concluded before The Dallas Morning News determined the date of Staudt's departure, so that issue was not included. But a CBS staffer with extensive knowledge of the story said later that the departure doesn't derail the story.
"From what we've learned, Staudt remained very active after he retired," the staffer said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. "He was a very bullying type, and that could have continued."
In the "60 Minutes" report, Rather said of the memo's contents: "Killian says Col. Buck Staudt, the man in charge of the Texas Air National Guard, is putting on pressure to `sugar coat' an evaluation of Lt. Bush."
Staudt was the person Bush initially contacted about Guard service, and he was the group commander at Ellington Air Force Base in Houston when Bush arrived there to fly an F-102 jet. He later transferred to Austin, where he served as the chief of staff for the Air National Guard.
In the disputed memo, Killian supposedly wrote "(another officer) gave me a message today from group regarding Bush's (evaluation) and Staudt is pushing to sugar coat it."
It continues: "Austin is not happy either."
The CBS staffer said that the memo appears to recognize that Staudt has retired, since it differentiates between his displeasure and that of Austin, where he served his final Guard stint.
But another Texas Air National Guard official who served in that period said the memo appears to wrongly associate Staudt with his group command in Houston, and - based on that mistake - the memo distinguishes his views from that of the Austin Guard headquarters.
Retired Col. Earl Lively, who was director of Air National Guard operations for the state headquarters during 1972 and 1973 said Staudt "wasn't on the scene" after retirement, and that CBS' remote-bullying thesis makes no sense.
"He couldn't bully them. He wasn't in the Guard," Lively said. "He couldn't affect their promotions. Once you're gone from the Guard, you don't have any authority."
The report about the memos originally appeared to stir anew longstanding questions about Bush's Guard service, including whether he defied a direct order to take a physical exam, and whether his suspension from flying was partly for failure to meet military performance standards.
The campaign of Bush's Democratic rival, John Kerry, stood mostly mum, saying Bush should answer all questions about his service. Earlier this year, though, Kerry aides raised the exact points the memo seemed to address.
Bush has not commented publicly about the CBS report, and aides say his honorable discharge proves he fulfilled his obligations.
But the White House, which contends that all known records of Bush's service have been released, also took the unusual step of distributing the CBS memos to reporters the night of the broadcast.
"We don't know whether the (CBS) documents were fabricated or are authentic," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Friday.
Hmmm is right.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1211690/posts
Anatomy of a Forgery
By The Prowler
Published 9/10/2004 12:09:06 AM
More than six weeks ago, an opposition research staffer for the Democratic National Committee received documents purportedly written by President George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard squadron commander, the late Col. Jerry Killian.
The oppo researcher claimed the source was "a retired military officer." According to a DNC staffer, the documents were seen by both senior staff members at the DNC, as well as the Kerry campaign.
"More than a couple people heard about the papers," says the DNC staffer. "I've heard that they ended up with the Kerry campaign, for them to decide to how to proceed, and presumably they were handed over to 60 Minutes, which used them the other night. But I know this much. When there was discussion here, there were doubts raised about their authenticity."
And considering this is in the Dallas paper, I have a feeling he'll find out about it....
Posted on 09/09/2004 11:57:05 PM PDT by litany_of_lies
The two memos refer to a flight physical and a flight review board, both IAW ("in accordance with") AFM 35-13. But that would stand for "Air Force Manual" 35-13, and manuals are guidelines only. They have no regulatory authority. No one takes a physical exam, flight or not, IAW a manual. Manuals relate to operational procedures, not enforcement of standards. Especially would a "flight review board" not be convened IAW a manual. Enforceable regulatory authority in the military derives only from two sources: the Uniform Code of Military Justice and orders. Regulations are a type of written order issued under the authority of a flag-rank officer. (In the Army, for example, regulations are issued under the authority of the Chief of Staff down to installation-commander level.)
What governs official procedures or requirements for physicals is a regulation, not a manual, because a regulation is an order and a manual is not. A regulation has much the same effect as law. Regulations are governing documents that must be adhered to, not advisory publications that permit ad-hoc deviations, as manuals do.
So I browsed over to the Air Force's official web site for its publications, http://www.e-publishing.af.mil/. There I searched for AFM 35-13 without success. The intelligent search engine recommended using only the numbers, so I searched using only 35-13. Result:
35-13 has been rescinded or superceded by another publication. Additional information is available at Obsolete Publications.
So I went there and discovered, sure enough, that there was an Air Force Regulation 35-13, but no AF Manual 35-13 is listed. AFR 35-13 was superceded in 1990 by AFI36-2605 (Air Force Instruction, i.e., the same as a regulation).
So I Googled AFI36-2605 and voilá! Here it is.
This instruction implements Air Force Policy Directive 36-26, Military Force Management, and Department of Defense Instruction (DODI) 7280.3, Special Pay for Foreign Language Proficiency. It prescribes all procedures for administering the Air Force Military Personnel Testing System and Foreign Language Proficiency Pay (FLPP) program.
Which is to say, this publication has nothing to do with flight physicals.
From all this I conclude that the Killian-signed documents are forgeries, forged by someone without a very good knowledge of military correspondence or Air Force publications or procedures. Based on the Air Force's own online library of current and obsolete publications, I conclude that there never was an Air Force Manual 35-13, although there was an AF Regulation by that number. But a lieutenant colonel would never have made such a fundamental error as using "AFM" twice when he meant AFR.
Furthermore, it is likely that whatever AFR 35-13 governed, flight physicals wasn't it. My contention is buttressed by two points:
A. AFR 35-13's successor publication is a personnel management instruction (regulation).
B. This online copy of a senior NCO's routine reassignment orders, dated 1954, which cites AFR 35-13 as an authority for the transfer. A publication governing personnel assignments doesn't also govern enforcement of flight physicals.
So the forger said the physical was to be done IAW a manual, not a regulation, and named a manual that never existed anyway, and used a numeric that belonged to a personnel-management reg, not a flight-standards reg.
enjoy
The Dallas Morning News is being a little bogus here.
I am not talking about the article. I am talking about how they make it look like they look at their records and found this info out. That they did it on their own.
Don't buy that for a minute. Just earlier this week, they ran with this issue.
Now they want their halo because they are pointing out the flaws.
Well, as a gentleman who called into WBAP this morning mentioned......Dan Rather is not the only one who has some explaining to do about this fraud CBS story. The Dallas Morning News needs to come clean with it's readers as well.
A printed apology is in order.
May I used your 'thick plottens'? I just love it!!!
GOTCHA
Definitely... the rest of the media owes an apology for blindly repeating CBS' charges without any independent fact checking of their own.
go hogs.
beat the horns.
GO Freepers
Stomp the career out of Rather
btt
The only exception I have seen to this is the "Gray Beard" General Officers, and even then their influence is only a mentoring of someone, not excerting any influence. Retired military are just that, retired.
ping
This url helps to make it clear what was done! Thank you for posting it!
Legally speaking, they showed "reckless disregard", at the least.
LOL!!! Is Kerry on the way to save the CBS==Colluding Balderdashing Scumbag crew?
Bwuahahaha! That is SO funny!
Sheeh, when did our forged memo go out stating the official FR uniform is pajamas? I feel so - shabby - in my shorts and T-shirt now.
This is pretty laughable. It's nice to watch them squirm and lie and keep digging themselves deeper and deeper.
Bump
Drudge has this up now!
I wonder where the CBS staffer got that information on Staudt from. I can't get over the left's willingness to promote second and third hand info as fact, yet they repeatedly refuse to accept anything the Swift Boat vets have to say because "They weren't on Kerry's boat." It boggles my mind.
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