Did Bush ever fly a plane?

[gatorboy]

We have the pictures of him posing next to a plane and on paper it says he finished his flight training but did the man ever actually fly a fighter jet? Are there logs of combat time put in by him?

I only ask because people constantly joke about how dumb he is and it got me to wondering, "how can he be that dumb and have been a fighter pilot?" I mean there must be a higher need of brain power for that kind of job!

And pilots I've known love flying. They love it. Yet, after finishing his military duties he seemed to have simply dropped the idea of flying at all. The only link I can find that he did any flying what so ever is here:

http://www.seanet.com/~johnco/bush102.htm

With this quote:

"The guy didn't even know how to start the thing," Evans reportedly said. "That was a bad omen. Finally we get it started and roll down the runway, and he tries to take it straight up like a jet! We go into a stall, buzzcrs are going off. I say, 'Give it some gas!' We finally get it airborne, and he decides he better turn around and go back. I can tell he's nervous, but he says, 'Okay, Evvie, got it under control.' We come down and he lands half on the runway and half on the grass. And then he pats my leg and says don't worry, and he takes it up again. This time he's so scared he says, 'Hey, let's fly around Midland.' He had to get his confidence up. Somehow we got back safely. He's never flown again.


I'm actually very curious about this and wondered if there were any other links that showed if the man ever successfully operated an aircraft.

[Bucky]

1. His military record suggests in his 20s he was an excellent fighter jock

He'd have been a great asset in Vietnam, but specifically requested not to be sent over. No shame there, lots of guys requested non-VN assignments. Plus he was trained on planes being phased out (how convenient is that?)

You don't have to be book smart to fly a plane, just to have good reactions and a quick temperament. He's not the man he used to be. Quite a few commentators have noted how mentally "slower" he appears to be now in his late 50s as compared to his campaign appearances in his 40s while running for governor. Hard livin' will do that to ya, kids. Stay away from the strong stuff.

[xxqqqzme]

2. but I thought math skills

were necessary to pilot an aircraft? Considering he is a self confessed 'C' student...I'm curious

[Bucky]

3. I'm sure there's a correlation of math skills to plane flying, but not for

every single individual. The fact is that Bush got the domestic fighter jock billet in a time of war coz he was a big shot Republican's son. He got very strong performance reviews by his supervisors; he had a natural talent for flying a fighter jet.

Perhaps his natural mathmatics skills simply went untapped because he lacked the motivation and conation to apply himself at school. That's a fairly typical problem for some sons of priviledge. Flying a jet, on the other hand, can be quite fun, so it's natural that he'd show an aptitude for one and not the other.

And think about what it takes to control a hunk of machinery flying above the clouds at hundreds of MPH. It's a risk-taking enterprise. If any characteristic defines GWB, it's risk-taking. He was a oil man, a political operative, and a venture capitalist who consistantly failed in life and learned that there were no adverse consequences for failure. Daddy and his bin Laden buddies were always there to bail him out. Hell, he even lost the last election and still emerged a winner. No wonder God talks to him.

Now he's brought us all an elective war, the biggest risk of all, and the dude still can't see the downside of failure. And he won't see it until he loses yet another election

[JHB]

6. Piloting an aircraft? Math is unneccessary.

But navigating it? Sure as damn helps!

[sandnsea]

13. His military records?

I guess I just can't give as much credence to scribbling on paper as I can to John Kerry actually piloting a helicopter in Iowa.

[Bucky]

15. Huh? I'm talking about Bush's performance evaluations in TANG.

He was a good natural pilot from what I've read. That's why they should've sent him to Vietnam.

[sandnsea]

17. See #16

I'm not buying it, that's all.

[Lisa]

4. there's one terrible pilot!

Inattentive, overconfident, reckless -- yup, just the type of person you want to put in charge of an aircraft (747, Delta Dagger, or Piper Cub). Not!


p.s. a pilot friend tells me that Bush would have needed to do long division in his head, very quickly, in order to fly that jet (it was too early to have onboard computers). I guess his skill with numbers doesn't extend to managing the economy!

[Fescue4u]

5. Guys who fly jets or airliners are not automatically good at small planes

I've seen seasoned airline captains have a hard time flying a cessna first few times out.

[Lisa]

12. Bush had to learn basic flight skills on a small plane ...

... but notice that he was so overconfident that he decided he could remember everything and didn't need a trial flight -- and didn't even bother checking out the controls beforehand! Totally in keeping with his character.

For the record, most of the jet pilots I know do NOT swagger around as if they are the only ones who deserve wings!

[TrogL]

7. OK, now I'm spooked

http://www.seanet.com/~johnco/bush102.htm

Right at the bottom is says Dubya may have flown this plane.



Recognize it?

It's a King Air.

:tinfoilhat:

However, if he can't land a Cessna without soiling his drawers, he's never going to be able to handle a big turboprop twin.

[trof]

8. It takes nerves of steel,

lightning reflexes, raw courage, highly technical capabilities, a keen intellect, failproof judgement, and the eye-hand coordination of a combination professional juggler and neurosurgeon to fly a fighter.
Or at least that's what I used to tell 'em back in the day.;-)

This was mine:


That was his*:

[oldsurfer53]

9. Military Pilots Should Know....

....since flying fighters in the military requires learning formation flying I find it real interesting that there hasn't been a single pilot come forward to say he flew on *'s wing.

Formation flying is challenging and requires trust between wingmen, they tend to never forget who flew on their wing and their abilities.

I'm no military pilot and spent my time in the Army as a ground pounder <'67-72'> but I've never had a conversation with current nor former military aviators who flew fighters where they couldn't recall who was on their wing.

[trof]

10. A telling point.

And you're right about remembering wingmen and leaders.
It's easier for a lead to kill you than for a wingman to kill you.

Interesting that many of Kerry's old crewmembers are campaigning for and with him and dumbya* has...?

[gatorboy]

11. Kick!

I'd be curious to see if there is any actual log of him flying at all after his training. No flight logs? Control tower workers that might remember him? Anything?

[seabeyond]

14. test score to get in, there were 150 applications ahead

and he took the entrance exam to get in. had a score of 25. also read at one time when checking out this time of his life, there was also a white out and the number 25 written on the white out. so if they had to change his number to make it into the national guard, had to get at least a 25 and they changed to that number, how low was the number on his test.

who knows how much they carried him thru the academic part of flying. i am sure he is reading impaired probably why he never got good grades, and probably very adept in doing hands on and good at that.

he was reported to be a good pilot, then again, since they were helping him out who is to know, maybe was really bad and not that he didnt take physical, but they didnt want him flying planes.

we dont get to know the truth

[sandnsea]

16. I agree

They've done so much fudging with his records, I don't believe any of it. If he flew, he'd have buddies to back him up. I don't know anybody who doesn't remember the names of their military buddies.

He sure has plenty of people telling Yale stories about him, where's the Guard stories?

[gatorboy]

18. Sure he's been declared a superb pilot.

Why, Instructor Pilot Colonel Thomas G. Lockhart, had all these nifty things to say about him:

http://www.wigmusings.com/Archives/Anti_Gore_Coalition/bushs_instructor_pilot.html


"George W. Bush put himself totally into the task of becoming the best aviator in the class. His unit flew Century Series jet fighters, which required the best pilots."

"Cocky? You bet!!! That was the attitude that saved England during the Battle of Britain, when a small cadre of British fighter pilots turned back the German onslaught. "Never have so many owed so much to so few," were Winston Churchill's words describing the RAF victory. This standard is part of the heritage of every fighter pilot."

"He was extremely competitive and eager to learn every thing about his machine and the enemy's tactics. He was quick to pick up the flying skills necessary to maneuver an aircraft into a position to shoot down an enemy aircraft."


He was such an incredible combat pilot that he was...kept from combat. Which is confusing considering in the first paragraph, Lockhart says, "The atmosphere at this training base was somber and dead serious, as the student pilots were all either going to Vietnam or subject to being called up for combat duty as members of a Guard or Reserve unit."

[Bucky]

19. There are plenty of guard stories and plenty of guard records...

except for that missing period from 1972-1973. He has a year missing from his service, not six years. The record is clear, Bush was more than fit and capable for service in Vietnam. The only place where we don't know what he did was during his temporary reassignment to the Alabama air guard. That's when he was AWOL.