Sen. McCain’s campaign has wasted no time in stressing his military career as a qualification for leading this country. They have claimed his ability to lead our armed forces, even his character was developed as a combat aviator in Vietnam. After a little reading, I now wonder if his “war career” isn’t a little embellished by his staff.
I see things on that site that I’m not buying into, like his losing 5 aircraft. One or two might have been his fault – but not all five. Even so, losing a single plane can’t be a good career move for a pilot.
Here’s one of the more interesting items I found there and the one I’m questioning with this thread. 28 medals in 20 hours.
20 total hours of combat. 28 medals? Is that the norm for a fighter pilot or did he get a little (large) free pass due to his father and grandfather?
(I can’t search, so I’m hoping this isn’t a repost)
If you are counting ribbons rather than medals, he must has a bunch of standard stuff. VN service ribbon, Air Medal (doe the Navy have those?), Navy Expeditionary Medal, SW Asia Service Medal, Good Conduct Medal (probably enlisted only). Add in a couple of Air Medals, a Purple Heart, a POW Medal (Ribbon?), Flying Cross, you can get up to 28 pretty easily I suppose.
I imagine that at least one of those aircraft was the A-4 he was in aboard the USS [del]Forestfire[/del] er… Forrestal. Where, basically, his aircraft was destroyed by friendly fire, and a fire, while he was waiting to take off.
In those circumstances I do not imagine he could have done anything to prevent the loss of that aircraft.
The web site made no specifics for the four accidents that caused him to lose aircraft, but if they’re counting that A-4 as one of the number he killed, and I have to assume they would, I am not ready to give them much more credence on that issue.
(I recall a wonderful, but probably not true, story. A senior Luftwaffe officer does the transition course to the Harrier. He makes a hard landing, damaging the aircraft. Walking away he is heard to mutter, “Twenty-two British aircraft destroyed.”)
Well, fighter/strike pilots DO have a very low ratio of time “on the line” vs., say, infantrymen, that is to be expected, one would have to run a comparative vs. the average carrier strike pilot of the time, normalizing for actual sorties flown and length of total career.
If he’s implying that McCain claims all those decorations/awards are for outstanding achievements in Vietnam service, I’d call “Cite?” – surely some McCain fans may be under the impression that is so but I doubt “White Haired Guy” is making the claim himself.
So maybe what he is stating is that rattling off a list of medals and commendations is not in itself evidence of the man being some Great Commander, which is a fair call. McCain had a full carreer as an officer outside his 'Nam service, graduating from Annapolis in 1958; after repatriation being returned to active duty until retiring 1981. Aviator, Academy grad/legacy, 22 years service, frontline experience – awards would tend to pile up. The “fruit salad” on any senior officer’s or noncom’s chest will include a few “for showing up”/“been there, done that” awards, and awards given collectively to the unit or group, and those that are for above-average results in a post or mission, but not necessarily heroism.
And his wikipedia entry says it’s 17 awards and commendations, but that sort of discrepancy could be a matter of ignoring multiple instances of the same award. Does his own Bio page include the actual list?
As has been said, you get awarded medals for all sorts of things that aren’t combat related. My friend is an Air Force JAG whose entire overseas deployment consists of eighteen months in Japan. He has seven or so medals.
Three awards of the Navy Achievement Medal
Joint Meritorious Unit Award
Navy Unit Commendation
Navy “Battle E”
Good Conduct Medal
National Defense Service Medal
Armed Forces Service Medal
Navy Sea Service Deployment Ribbon
Navy & Marine Overseas Service Ribbon - 2 awards
NATO Medal
This is for five years of active duty and no combat at all - lots less than McCain.
And that reminds me of a joke a co-worker used to tell all the time. The answer is: I shot down 5 Messerschmitts during the war. The question is: Why was I thrown out of the Luftwaffe?
15 medals for 0 hours of combat and just being in Vietnam for the Navy.
13 medals for being shot down and being a POW.
0 medals for the other 19 hours of missions.
I imagine most naval aviators have a similar pattern. You win medals for being there, and for specific missions, not just for going up and shooting routine stuff.
