Tailhook 'injustice' righted

The Washington Times ^ | July 31, 2002 | Rowan Scarborough

[robowombat]

Tailhook 'injustice' righted Rowan Scarborough THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Published 7/31/2002

The Bush administration has overturned a Clinton administration decision and approved the post-active-duty promotion of one of the most prominent Navy officers caught up in the Tailhook scandal. Retired Cmdr. Robert Stumpf will be elevated to captain, six years after he quit the service in disgust when it blocked his promotion despite four inquiries that cleared him of wrongdoing at the notorious aviation convention.

"I conclude at this time that an injustice has resulted in not promoting petitioner to the grade of captain," wrote William Navas Jr., assistant secretary of the Navy for manpower and reserve affairs, in a July 23 memo. He authorized the Board of Correction of Naval Records to amend Cmdr. Stumpf's personnel file to show he retired as a captain, with date of rank of July 1, 1995.

Mr. Navas found "no error" in the decision by Navy Secretary John Dalton to stop Cmdr. Stumpf's advancement. But Charles Gittins, the pilot's attorney, sees it otherwise. "Secretary Dalton acted in response to improper political pressure from a few members of the Senate concerned with feminist backlash," the lawyer said yesterday.

The victory for Cmdr. Stumpf is both symbolically and monetarily rewarding. His career as a Navy pilot remains over, but the Navy is now saying the way he was treated was unjust. Plus, the 23-year officer will receive six years of back pay for the difference in a commander's and a captain's retirement pay, and collect a retirement check of about $500 more monthly. The ex-flying ace came to symbolize what some pilots and conservative groups saw as a "witch hunt" against naval officers who attended the 1991 Tailhook convention in Las Vegas.

Cmdr. Stumpf is now flying cargo jets carrying night-run deliveries for FedEx. But in the mid-1990s, he stood as one of the Navy's best fighter pilots. Decorated for 22 combat missions over Iraq during Desert Storm, the F-18 Hornet pilot commanded the prestigious Blue Angels flying team. The Navy selected him for promotion to captain and command of a carrier air wing, making his reaching the rank of admiral seem a matter of time.

The Senate unanimously approved his promotion to captain in 1994. But Mr. Dalton pulled his name off the promotion list and ordered what was the fifth inquiry into the officer's conduct at Tailhook, the name given an association of past and current naval fliers. Leery of another inquisition after previous inquiries cleared him, Cmdr. Stumpf retired. Mr. Gittins, his attorney, began a battle within the appeals bureaucracy to overturn Mr. Dalton's decision.

In June, the naval records board, a group of Navy civilian officials, recommended that Cmdr. Stumpf be promoted. On Monday, a Navy lawyer informed Mr. Gittins that Mr. Navas, a Bush appointee, had accepted the board's recommendation.

Cmdr. Stumpf issued a statement saying, "My family and I are exceptionally pleased by the Navy's decision. We hope this is the beginning of a measured re-examination of the injustices accorded to hundreds of naval officers whose promising careers were terminated prematurely during the shameful political hysteria following the 1993 investigations. "While it is nice to set the record straight after all these years, I sincerely regret that I was forced to leave active service before my tour of duty as a carrier air wing commander, a position for which the Navy had invested so much in preparing me. Likewise, it remains painful and frustrating to have to watch from the sidelines while my former colleagues prosecute the war on terror."

With hundreds of other Navy fliers, Cmdr. Stumpf attended Tailhook '91 to bask in carrier aviation's stellar performance in the Persian Gulf war a few months earlier. But the gathering was marred by drunken and lewd behavior by some fliers, sparking a full-blown investigation by the Pentagon inspector general.

The commander faced two issues: Junior officers in his squadron paid for a stripper to perform in a private hotel suite to celebrate a pilot's promotion. Cmdr. Stumpf also used an F-18 to fly to and from Las Vegas to receive a squadron award.

The Pentagon IG, a Navy board of inquiry, Mr. Dalton himself and a Navy admiral all looked into his actions and cleared him. A Navy captains' board recommended promotion, and the Navy sent his name to the Senate, which concurred.

But in 1995, the Senate Armed Services Committee advised Mr. Dalton not to promote Cmdr. Stumpf. A letter urging no promotion was signed by then-committee Chairman Strom Thurmond, South Carolina Republican, and Sam Nunn of Georgia, then the ranking Democrat. They said the Navy erred in not forwarding Cmdr. Stumpf's Tailhook file when the committee initially acted. The lawmakers said if they had seen the information, they would not have voted to promote.

The pilot had one strong committee ally, Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican and a former Navy combat pilot. Mr. McCain fought strenuously for Cmdr. Stumpf in closed-door committee meetings in 1994 and 1995.

In June, he sent a letter to Navy Secretary Gordon England endorsing a retroactive promotion. "Cmdr. Stumpf was subjected to a humiliating, highly unprofessional investigation regarding the events at the 1991 Tailhook Association Symposium," Mr. McCain wrote. "Although this matter called for a serious, meticulous, by-the-book investigation, solid officers such as Cmdr. Stumpf instead were interrogated unfairly and effectively denied due process. It is well past the time for the Navy to right this wrong."

Mr. Dalton heeded the committee's advice and took Cmdr. Stumpf off the promotion list. But a second Navy promotion board again recommended him for captain. Mr. Dalton then ordered a new "fresh look" investigation. Fed up, Cmdr. Stumpf walked out of an interrogation at the Pentagon and retired.

Navy officials strenuously defended Mr. Dalton's action. They said he publicly backed the pilot but had no choice but to order a new investigation when the Armed Services Committee advised him not to promote the pilot.

Copyright © 2002 News World Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.

[robowombat]

Cmdr Stumpf's sin in pc town was that he relentlessly attacked the basisless persecution of many Na vy and Marine aviators during the Tailhook frenzy. This brought him into direct conflict with civilian navy Dept bureaucrats who were happy to destroy the naval avaition branch to please excrement such as Pat Schroeder. These gutless and treacherous types mounted a full court campaign to destroy his career. What is interesting is that Thurmond was gotten to in some way so that he signed off on this outrage. I suspect RINO staffers convinced a man in his dotage that the accusations were true by greatly inflating the supposed sins of Stumpf. This would make perfect sense to RINO's forever attempting to position their party to get votes from those who would vote for hitler rather than a Repub. In this case McCain was certainly on the side of the angels, which, unfortunately can't be said for most other members of the Repub Senatorial contingent.

The vermin that largely concocted the tailhook affair and kept it alive to the great detriment of the Navy and the nation are still slithering around in DC and will strike again when another rat administration and gutless RINOs give them the chance.

[Republican_Strategist]

Clinton's Bin Laden-gate - Mother of all Scandals

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Obviously a story NOT from Hillary's village.

[aculeus]

Bump for a good deal.

[Savage Beast]

I have supreme confidence in President Bush, am confident that he did the right thing is this case, and am confident that this officer was innocent and did nothing wrong.

However--if my understanding of the Tailgate incident is correct, it was inexcusable. If innocent and unsuspecting women were molested by officers of the U.S. Navy, the guilty men should have been punished.

Such behavior is definitely unbecoming an officer or a gentleman. Furthermore it is criminal and ought to be.And tolerance of such behavior is dangerous.

If members of the military behave in this way toward American women on American soil, how might they behave toward foreign women on foreign soil and expecially toward enemy women?

This has nothing to do with some feminist agenda or frenzy. Such behavior toward women has never been acceptible and is not now.

This is from no prude. If they had done this to willing women, I would have no objection. If they had hired willing prostitutes or sexual "entertainers", I would have no objection.

However, if these men molested innocent and unwilling women, there is no excuse and they should have been punished for it.

The public should have no tolerance for such behavior.

Is my understanding of the incident incorrect?

[robowombat]

The events at the Tailhook meeting were grossly exaggerated for political purposes. The incidents of true misconduct versus drunken boorishness were few. Each Tailhook meeting produces a host of willing female volunteers anxious to party with naval aviators. The partying is vigorous and loud. This meeting was no different. In fact the level of uproar was considerably below that of some past events. These actions were manipulated consciously by feminazis in governmant, among congressional staffers, and in the media to drum up a political firestorm whose target was the all male naval aviator community. This campaign had been planned in advance and a few female officers had agreed to participate in Tailhook to then bring forth carefully developed accusations of how truly awful male naval aviators were. The goal of this conspiracy, and that is exactly what it was, was to politically humiliate and demoralize the naval flag officer cadre and particularly the naval aviation community. The reason for doing this was to break down what had been until then a solid wall of resistance by the Navy to admiting females to combat air units and general entrance into billets afloat. The poster girl for this effort was the female flag lieutenant to the commander of Naval Air Station Patuxent River. A tall strikingly attractive blonde this officer was the perfect vehicle to carry the message of how horribly she had been treated by other male officers at Tailhook. The only problem was that after several months of celebrity explaining to sympathetic congressional types such as Ms. Schroeder how she had been physically assualted and degraded by beastly naval avaitors some ants in the form of videos turned up at the pc picnic. These pictures showed the young woman throughly enjoying the physical attentions of several aviators.Then there was the admiring message she wrote on the poster of the officer who was offering "leg" shaving sessions for interested females. The activities of this officer was one that had been highlighted as an example of the awfulness of the sexists pig naval aviators. Now this curious activity escapes me but appears to be or have been popular among naval aviators and their female admirers. In this case the young lady who had reported in such detail about her degradation penned a note on the sign in front of this officer's room which offered leg shaving. The note, as nearly as I can recall, went something like this "Oh God Jack(or Jim or whatever his name) you made me see Heaven". Not exactly the remarks of outraged womanhood. These revelations sunk this female's career as spokesperson for woman in the Navy and sunk her career period.

The efforts of two or three massive IG and OSI investigations of Tailhook could only turn up a handfull of documentable cases of misconduct and fewer yet of real statutory violations. In spite of this a lot of careers were ruined for just attending the convention and the morale of the aviator corps was severely dented. Oh yes, woman did get to go to comabt air flight school.

[Enterprise]

One would have to try to unearth the whole incident again, but as I understand it, the main allegations were made by two women. One woman was a willing participant who had attended more than one tailhook party and knew it's reputation for bawdiness, but brought the incident to light because she was angry about something unrelated to the party. Another woman flatly lied about what happened, she ADMITTED that she lied and was never disciplined. A lot of men were unjustly punished in the feminist backlash.

That being said, I no longer remember if any "innocent" women were harassed. Hopefully someone will have a better recall than I do and may be able to post a short synopsis.

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

Although I generally can't stand McCain, he is right on this issue.

[Vineyard]

Please don't weave in facts and fiction to draw a conclusion.

There were thousands of aviators who attended the gathering, but perhaps dozens (up to 100?) might have been guilty of behaving like Frat. Boys. A few might have committed wrong-doings that were criminal.

But in the Clinton-era, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who attended Tailhook that year had his record scrutinized before being allowed to be promoted. There was an implied burden of proof that the person had to prove innocence, or he was presumed guilty.

THAT WAS WRONG!!!

The Tailhook Incident was started when a female LT aviator complained about her mistreatment. (Paula Conklin?) But she also had committed "frat boy" type activities, and would have been guilty of conduct unbecoming of an officer if there had been an investigation of her. For example, she went to a "Hospitality Suite" where aviators would shave the legs of attractive women. Paula had her legs shaved ... all the way up. She signed a flag there .. "You made me see God; the Paulster .." alluding to the nature of the shaving experience being a bit more than what would be appropriate!

Most of the alleged problems were between consenting adults. There were probably many hookers there, and also some consenting "groupies" looking to score with real-life Tom Cruise Top-Gun aviators. The problem was way blown out of proportion, and was primarily geared to justify forcing the Navy to put women in combat.

Am I justifying what went on ... HELL NO. I was disgusted by the Tailhook incident. As a Reserve Naval Officer, the actions by a few hurt the entire Navy. As a former submarine officer, I belonged to a community that is close to the opposite of the partying spirit exemplified by the aviators. But to smear an entire community for the improper actions of a few (by a Congress that has members guilty of far worse!! Think Ted Kennedy & Chris Dodd) is just plain anti-American and wrong!

Short summary: the reporting was long on hype, short on facts, smeared an entire community with a "guilt by association." AND CAPT Stumpf, USN(Ret) did not go to any improper activities - i.e. - he could prove that his attendence was limited to general functions out in the open, and he never went to the floor with the hospitality suites that sponsered improper conduct, and never engaged in improper conduct. So his being smeared was a tactic worthy of a McCarthy-ite admirer.

Mike

[Tallguy]

To answer your question: I don't know. There were so many different aspects of the "Tailhook Scandal" it was hard to figure out exactly what the crimes were. The one event that sticks out in my mind was the molestation of the female aviator, which was inexcuseable.

The investigation went overboard when they siezed the hotel records and started investigations on all active duty personnel that were listed as registered guests. It is my understanding that nobody could place Cdr. Stumpf at the scene of the assault. In my opinion, that's lazy police work and it lead to a media witch-hunt.

[PhiKapMom]

Said this from the beginning that these women who showed up at this convention should have known what they were getting into. Always thought this was a political witchhunt orchestrated by hillary clinton and her minions to embarrass the men in the United States Navy and get more women promoted.

The anti-military agenda of hillary clinton and her minions were on display from Day One of her husband's administration. The Tailhook Convention and their behavior allowed hillary clinton to push her anti-military agenda even more.

NOTE: Always remind anyone you know that hillary clinton is anti-military!

[SMEDLEYBUTLER]

Tailhook 'injustice' righted

[nina0113]

Your understanding is not correct. There were no unwilling women involved. The closest thing to an unwilling woman is one who was certainly not innocent.

The pilots were asking women to volunteer to run a gauntlet of feeling-up - incredibly trashy behavior, but voluntary. One woman got partway through & decided she didn't like it after all, so she complained about everything else that was going on too - the voluntary legshavings by pilots of women, followed by voluntary stubble-checks (I believe by tongue).

The woman who changed her mind had been specifically warned that the pilots were drunk & that there was a lot of trashy behavior going on, & was advised to avoid the entire floor of the hotel. She chose to attend anyway, IIRC in a black leather mini-skirt.

Many of the exact details have escaped me after all this time, but the whole career-wrecking Tailhook scandal was a railroad job. But the legend of near-rape lives on.

[Enterprise]

That was my impression after the affair. I believed that the overwhelming majority of the women knew of the reputation of the Tailhook Conventions and were only too happy to join in the activities.

[fly_navy]

Justice delayed is justice denied.

As someone who attended a couple of Tailhooks (not the one in question), I have no doubt things got a little out of hand. But this was the first "Hook" after the Gulf War, and a lot of guys were blowing off extra steam, glad that they were alive, and saluting a few guys that didn't make it back. Not to excuse the boorish behavior, but Bob Stumpf didn't deserve to pay with his career.....and from all accounts, he didn't participate, or encourage it....and may not even have been present on the 3rd floor.

[wtc911]

I thought that it was the unacceptable conduct of some of the Officers and Gentlemen that, to use your word, concocted the tailhook affair. If you want to live in a world where a uniform buys a get out of jail free card and entitles the wearer to the privelege of groping and assaulting any woman he wants then have the courage to state so and see how that flies with the people on this forum.

If the officer in the article was wronged then it's a blessing that it has been made right...as for the rest, their behavior was exactly like that of the animals in NYC's Puerto Rican day parade three years ago, if you're ok with tailhook you can't object to this incident. There were over fifty women who were assaulted at the hotel in the "gauntlet". The Navy brass tried a cover-up. The bozos who were guilty and caught probably got off easy with ruined careers. But, they have only themselves to blame, or have we become like the left and blame the victims?

[wtc911]

There were no unwilling women involved? What the heck are you smoking? Do a bit of research. You'll find that over fofty unwilling women were accosted and/or assaulted. Do a search on Naval Lt. Paula Coughlin, an Admiral's Aide. If any other group acted this was, like a frat party on freak night, you'd be crying out for blood.

[robowombat]

There was a claim that as many as 50 females had gotten molested by the guantlet grpers. I never saw any confirmation of that other than in press reports that recycled the pc line on Tailhook and the awfulness of the all male anaval aviation community.

[wtc911]

Read the Navy's own reports...do a search for Lt. Paula Coughlin....the truth is out there....if you're interested...

[BluH2o]

Clinton's Secretary of the Navy John Dalton was viewed by many sailors as having done more damage to the Navy than Japanese Admiral Yamamoto managed in all of WWII.

Dalton came to the job from a string of failed Texas S&L's that cost taxpayers $100 million. He then ended up as an executive of Stephens Inc., a Little Rock investment banking firm. There he became a FOB, and a key Clinton supporter, helping finance Clinton's run for the WH. He was subsequently appointed Secretary of the Navy in 1993 by Clinton. Now you know the rest of the story!