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> The High Flyers
>
> By David H. Hackworth
>
>Beautiful Guam didn't sink last week. But there were so many U.S.
>military aircraft at Andersen Air Force Base that the Pacific islanders and
>military folks stationed there thought the island just might go down like
>the
>Titanic.
>No, this giant Air Force armada wasn't there for contingency purposes
>because of all the anti-American rhetoric blasting out of communist China.
>Nor to move U.S. combat troops to South Korea to reinforce our garrison in
>that land of never-ending conflict.
>
>Their mission was solely to support Bill Clinton's diplomatic and
>goodwill trip to southern Asia.
>
>An Air Force officer stationed on Guam says, "I saw more C-5A and C-17
>aircraft here than I've ever seen in one place in my entire 15-year
>career."
>
>The air fleet at Guam is but a portion of the total aircraft tasked to
>support the president and his humongous entourage of security and
>communications people and the various strap handlers who made up the most
>bloated traveling circus an American commander in chief has ever had.
>
>On this safari to the Taj Mahal and points east, even Clinton has
>outdone Clinton.The officer says, "This boondoggle will cost the Air Force
>alone over $50 million and limit its ability to execute its regular
>operational missions. There are 354 scheduled airlift sorties to support
>this White House mission -- enough to transport two Army divisions with all
>their stuff anywhere on planet Earth."
>
>When Clinton travels, he moves with a cast of thousands. A lifetime
>government employee who's never signed a payroll check except on the back,
>he clearly likes to do things big if he isn't personally picking up the
>tab. A conservative estimate is that his globe-trotting recklessness in the
>past eight years has cost the taxpayers pretty close to a cool billion
>bucks and along the way ripped the guts out of the Air Force air-transport
>fleet to boot.
>
>Since Desert Storm, the fleet has flown its wings off on military
>operations all over the world in support of the Pentagon's nonstop
>Robo-Globo-Cop and Meals On Wheels lunacy. The air fleet is badly strained,
>and many veteran flyboys and girls say it's broken from trying to do too
>much
>with too little for too long.
>
>Most of the aircraft are old and worn. The magnificent crews who fly
>and maintain these old dogs are equally burned out. But as long as American
>citizens don't scream bloody murder, members of Congress -- who, by the
>way,
>very much enjoy Air Force VIP aircraft carting them around the world on
>their
>many junkets -- certainly won't do their due diligence.
>
>Hopefully, the Air Force brass will rebel and ask Secretary of Defense
>William Cohen, who has a penchant for zipping around in plush military jets
>himself, to tell "Traveling Bill" to knock it off. Whoever sounds off
>first, citizens or brass, it's time we got rid of the flying spectacle
>that's stealing dollars from spare parts, taking funds away from war
>training and wasting bucks that could be used to get low-rankers off food
>stamps.
>
>Bill's other half, Hillary Rodham Clinton, has the Air Force travel bug
>as well. For months, Hill's been whipping back and forth from Washington,
>D.C., to New York state one to five times a week via Air Force VIP
>Gulfstream jet. Aircraft-running expenses for one round trip is $5,096,
>not including costs for air and maintenance crews, a reinforced squad of
>Secret Service troops and an Air Force security sergeant with a
>bomb-sniffing dog.
>
>For sure, the first lady's entitled to use military aircraft. But her
>travel these days seems mainly about working the system to get Candidate
>Clinton and supporters to New York for her shot at the U.S. Senate.
>
>Several Air Force generals are having a hard time biting their tongues
>over her blatant abuse of military air assets and the attendant waste of
>tax dollars. My spies tell me it might not be long before a general roars,
>"Enough already. Take the Delta Shuttle for your political stuff and let
>the 89th Airlift Wing do its assigned job."
>
>Congress needs to have a hard look at the high-flying Clintons and
>ground them before the people clip the wings of both the lawmakers and the
>Clintons in November.
>
>
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon May 01 2000 - 05:30:05 PDT