NAVY VETERAN PRESIDENTS

The inauguration of Donald J. Trump as our 47^th President later today calls attention to the dwindling number of government legislators with prior military service and the impact this has on defense issues.  For the office of the President in particular, such experience has generally been considered a virtue as the incumbent is concurrently the Commander in Chief of American Armed Forces.  Thirty of our 47 Presidents came to that office as veterans.  Twenty-four had served in Army, state militia, Reserve, or National Guard units.  John F. Kennedy was the first to reach the Oval Office as a US Navy veteran on this date.

But even Kennedy tried to join the Army first.  Disqualified for back problems, he petitioned the Navy and went on to heroic service as a PT boat skipper in the Pacific.  Kennedy’s running mate, Lyndon Johnson, started his political career in 1937 when he was elected to Congress from Texas’s 10^th Congressional District.  Though he served on the House Naval Affairs Committee, like many he took leave from Congress to join the Navy in December 1941.  While on a bombing mission to New Guinea on 9 June 1942 his B-25, the “Heckling Hare”, dodged a Japanese attack–an action for which Johnson was awarded the Silver Star.  Johnson returned to legislative duties in July 1942 when President Roosevelt recalled all Congressmen to Capitol Hill.  Johnson ultimately achieved the rank of LCDR in the Reserves.

Richard Nixon joined the Navy in August 1942 as a LTJG.  He served two years in the Pacific with the South Pacific Air Transport Command in Bougainville and at Green Island.  Nixon was discharged in 1946 having reached the rank of LCDR.  Gerald Ford served four years in WWII as well.  He spent two years at sea as Gunnery Division Officer on USS MONTEREY (CV-26), from whose deck he was almost washed in a typhoon.  He later completed pilot training and was also promoted to LCDR.  George H.W. Bush served with VT-51 aboard SAN JACINTO (CVL-30) as a torpedo-bomber pilot.

Three Presidents have been graduates of our military academies.  Ulysses Grant and Dwight Eisenhower both graduated from West Point in 1843 and 1915, respectively.  Jimmy Carter is the only Annapolis graduate to reach the White House.  Carter was appointed to the Academy during WWII and graduated 59^th out of 820 in the Class of 1946.  He served aboard WYOMING (BB-32) and MISSISSIPPI (BB-41) until transferring to submarines in 1948.  While stationed on POMFRET (SS-391) he was hand-picked by ADM Hyman Rickover to fill the Engineering Officer billet aboard the new nuclear sub SEAWOLF (SSN-575).  However, after his father’s death in 1953, Carter resigned to manage the family peanut farm.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”   24 JAN 25

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Caro, Robert A.  Means of Ascent:  The Years of Lyndon Johnson.  New York, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990, pp. 35-45.

DeGregorio, William A.  The Complete Book of U.S. Presidents.  New York, NY: Dembner Books, 1984.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Fifteen Presidents had no previous military experience, but these include such greats as John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Woodrow Wilson, and FDR.  No Marine Corps officer has yet acceded to the office.  The only president with a prior Air Force connection is (the younger) George W. Bush, who served from 1968-74 with the Texas Air National Guard, logging 336 hours in the F-102A “Delta Dagger.”  None of Bill Clinton, Barak Obama, Joe Biden, nor Donald Trump are veterans, Trump having received a 1-Y classification during Vietnam, meaning he was qualified for military service only in a national emergency (in his case for medical reasons).

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                                     BAGHDAD MISSILE ATTACK

The decade following Operation “Desert Storm” was marked by Iraqi frustration over continuing United Nations sanctions and Coalition policing.  Then seemingly to rub salt in Iraq’s wounds, on 14 April 1993 a specially chartered Kuwait Airways Boeing 747 touched down at the Kuwait City carrying former President George Bush, his wife, his son Neil, three Bush daughters-in-law, former White House Chief of Staff John Sununu, former Secretary of State James A. Baker, and former Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady.  As a gesture of good-will facetiously dubbed “Operation Love Storm,” a grateful Kuwait welcomed the crafter of “Desert Storm’s” coalition.  At a state dinner hosted by Kuwaiti leader Sheik Jaber al-Ahmed al-Sabah, Bush received the Mubarak al-Kabeer (Mubarak the Great) Medal, Kuwait’s highest civilian award, named for Mubarak al-Sabah, a turn-of-the-century ruler.

But the night before Bush’s arrival, Kuwaitis had quietly arrested 14 agents who had entered Kuwait in possession of high explosives and detonators.  Among these were two Iraqi nationals, Ra’ad al-Asadi and Wali al-Ghazali, reportedly recruited specifically for the purpose of assassinating our former President.  A Toyota Landcruiser was seized in whose rocker panels had been secreted 80 kilograms of high explosives wired for remote detonation.  It was estimated by the CIA that had the bomb been set off, a four-city-block area would have been leveled.  In the event the car bomb failed, al-Ghazali wore a leather belt packed with explosives that he was to detonate after working through the crowds near the former President.  Al-Ghazali was reportedly paid the equivalent of $1300 US dollars for his work.

In the weeks that followed, a CIA, FBI, and Justice Department inquest discovered likely Iraqi involvement in this assassination plot.  The Clinton White House acted this night when targeting data were transmitted to USS CHANCELLORSVILLE (CG-62) in the Persian Gulf and USS PETERSON (DD-969) lying in the Red Sea.  Nine Tomahawk cruise missiles from the cruiser and 14 from the destroyer burst from their silos.  An hour later, the pre-dawn darkness of Baghdad was broken by the flashes of twenty-three 1000# warheads impacting at or near the Iraqi Intelligence Service compound, a six-story building two miles from the center of Baghdad.  US officials estimated the target to be completely destroyed in an action the Joint Chiefs of Staff characterized as “highly effective.”  Quoting an old American war cry, President Clinton warned the Iraqi’s, “Don’t tread on us… The Iraqi attack was an attack against our country and against all Americans.  We could not let such action against our nation go unanswered.”

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  29 JUN 24

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Associated Press.  “Kuwait Continues Bomb-Plot Trial of 14:  Agent Testifies on Plan to Kill Bush.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 28 June 1993, p. A-11.

Associated Press.  “`They Told Me to Kill Bush,’ Iraqi Says.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 6 June 1993, p. A-17.

Condon, George E., Jr.  “U.S. Missiles Blast Baghdad:  Plot to Kill Bush Avenged.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 27 June 1993, p. A-1.

Farrell, John Aloysius and John W. Mashek.  “Clinton Wins High Marks in Raid Polls.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 29 June 1993, p. A-1.

Reuters.  “Executions Considered on Plot on Bush.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 25 September 1994, p. A-29.

Reuters.  “Kuwait Charges 16 with Attempt to Assassinate Bush.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 10 May 1993, p. A-7.

Reuters.  “Kuwait Gives Bush its Highest Honor:  `This was a Very Moving Day,’ Ex-President Says.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 15 April 1993, p. A-20.

Reuters.  “Kuwait Nabs Iraqis Reportedly Targeting Bush.”  San Diego Union-Tribune, 26 April 1993, p. A-10.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Bush also toured Kuwait University during his three-day visit, where he was presented a plaque and an honorary degree by the Kuwaiti Education Minister, Ahmed Al Mubai.

Most correctly, international law forbids retaliation, reaction, retribution, and revenge, and the United States never officially takes these actions.  However, Article 51 of the United Nations charter grants any nation the right to take all necessary actions toward its own self-defense.  The US justifies events such as the above with our right to self-defense in preventing future similar episodes of terrorism.

The Kuwaiti investigation eventually turned up 17 individuals implicated in the plot against former President Bush.  Six were convicted and sentenced to death, seven others were sentenced to varying prison terms.

It did not go unnoticed by Congressional Republicans that Clinton’s decision to strike at Baghdad coincided with a sagging 39% public approval rating.  Following the missile strike, Clinton’s rating shot up to 50%.  Such “rally events” generally boosted Clinton’s approval rate an average of 8% for 10 weeks.

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                                                  PILOT DOWN!

By September of 1944 the Allied advance across the Pacific reached the Bonin Islands, an 1800-mile-long chain that includes Iwo Jima.  At 0715 this morning, a squadron of Grumman TBF Avengers took off from USS SAN JACINTO (CVL-30) to strike a Japanese radio installation on another of these islands, Chichi Jima.  During the 71-mile flight to the target the Avengers were picked-up by the enemy’s radar, and the anti-aircraft batteries were ready when they arrived.

One of the pilots steadied his aircraft on its bombing run until he felt the sudden lurch of a flack burst slamming his fuselage.  Flames began licking the cockpit and neither the tail-gunner nor the navigator responded.  The pilot regained control for the moment and finished his run, but by the time he pulled up, his plane was engulfed in aflame.  Bailing out was the only option, but not before he nursed the Avenger past the island’s beachline.  His parachute landed four miles from shore near a life raft dropped from another plane in his squadron.  Now seeing a Japanese boat depart the beach in his direction, he furiously paddled out to sea while his airborne buddies strafed in his defense.  This may well have saved his life, as it was later learned that the Japanese island commander believed his troops gained strength by eating the flesh of their enemies.  Several American POWs had already been cannibalized!

For three hours he bobbed in the raft, watching the beach.  Then the waters parted as USS FINBACK (SS-230) broke the surface–a “lifeguarding” submarine for just this purpose.  Three weeks later he took well-deserved leave, during which he married his high school sweetheart, Barbara Pierce.  For todays and other brave actions in the war he was awarded the Navy’s Distinguished Flying Cross.  The whole event may have passed without much fanfare as commonplace in 1944.  Indeed, who could have anticipated that LTJG George Herbert Walker Bush would one day become President.

Bush enlisted in the Navy on his 18^th birthday, 12 June 1942, with the goal of becoming a pilot.  A year later, 9 June 1943, he was commissioned an Ensign and entered pilot training at NAS Ft. Lauderdale.  He was assigned to VT-51 in Norfolk and was shortly deployed with Task Force 58 in the Pacific.  He flew his first combat mission over Wake Island on 23 May 1944.  He logged over 1200 flight hours, 58 combat missions, and 118 carrier “traps.”  He twice survived being shot down, the first coming in his TBF Avenger nicknamed “The Barbara” during the Battle of the Philippine Sea on 19 June 1944.  He, and his son, George W. Bush, were our last Presidents with prior military service.

Watch for more “Today in Naval History”  8 SEP 23

CAPT James Bloom, Ret.

Department of the Navy, Naval History Division.  Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol 2 “C-F”. Washington, DC: GPO, 1977, p. 405.

Hyams, Joe.  Flight of the Avenger:  George Bush at War.  New York, NY: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1991.

Morison, Samuel Eliot.  History of United States Naval Operations in World War II, Vol 14  Victory in the Pacific.  Boston, MA: Little, Brown and Co., 1960, p. 10.

ADDITIONAL NOTES:  Though American voters have traditionally favored presidential candidates with prior military service, four of our last five Presidents have reached the Oval Office as non-veterans.  On 9 December 2002 Secretary of the Navy Gordon England announced that our tenth Nimitz-class nuclear carrier, CVN-77, would be named USS GEORGE H.W. BUSH in honor of the elder Bush.

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