Posted on 10/13/2004 9:48:00 AM PDT by MindBender26
"In my case, I had a regular commission and an active duty requirement of five years. In reality, I completed almost 8 years on active duty and resigned my commission in 1972 and went directly into the Standby Reserves. I didn't receive my HD until Feb 16, 1978."
It's funny that you would submit a resignation and be released from active duty, but not get your discharge until 78. Normally, with a regular commission, you'd have gotten your discharge at the same time you got your 214, at release from active duty.
How so? Were you a commissioned naval officer? I received the same letters as Kerry putting me into the Standby Reserves and then my discharge letter and certificate. I was an O-3 when I left active duty and received my HD as an O-4.
Check out Kerry's letters and you will see some explanation on the Reserve system. I received the same boilerplate letters.
http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/jkerry/trnsfr2stndyrsrv.pdf
http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/jkerry/hondisres.pdf
The same way Clinton did.
BTTT
Thanks for thread MB26!
This is why he won't sign form 180.
Thanks for the information about the dishonorable discharge. It has been hinted that it may have been something in between a dishonoable and an honorable, like a general discharge. What do you think?
"How so? Were you a commissioned naval officer?"
A mustang, actually. Started as a personnelman, went to OCS. Did a total of 25 years active and reserve. Retired as an O4.
"Check out Kerry's letters"
Thanks for the links. The second one, the letter from New Orleans, did clear something up for me.
When Kerry's Ready Reserve obligation expired, he was automatically transferred to the rolls of the Standby Reserve. Routinely, a board of officers reviewing the list of officers in Standby Reserve status decided to honorably discharge him.
Kerry was USNR from the start, so nothing is out of the ordinary there.
However, I don't think an officer with a USN commission who completes his active service obligation and resigns his commission would be transferred to the Standby Reserve. Are you sure that, rather than resigning, you didn't merely request release from active duty?
"I received the same boilerplate letters."
Are you sure your commission wasn't USNR? What was your commissioning pipeline?
"It has been hinted that it may have been something in between a dishonoable and an honorable, like a general discharge. What do you think?"
The documents that Kabar linked to don't indicate that.
If he had been administratively discharged, he wouldn't have gotten those letters.
They are silent as to his security clearance, but if those letters are authentic he was allowed to complete his Ready Reserve obligation and was routinely discharged as part of a periodic review of the Standby Reserve rolls. Nothing discreditable is indicated.
The only thing that puzzles me are the black rectangles. As many of those documents as I've seen (and prepared) I can't imagine what would need to be blacked out there.
How long would standby reserve last after discharge. Shouldn't he have recieved his discharge in '72, not '78? My husband recieved his discharge immediately, but was kept on standby reserve. Kerry was a reserve officer whose unit was called up. I don't know how that works.
My DD214 says resigned in Block 11a and Completion of Required Service in Block 11c citing my BUPERS orders. Block 14 states "Accepted a Reserve Commission and Records Forwarded to USNTC, Bainbridge, MD 21905.
"How long would standby reserve last after discharge. Shouldn't he have recieved his discharge in '72, not '78? My husband recieved his discharge immediately, but was kept on standby reserve. I don't know how that works."
You must first distinguish between **release from active duty** and discharge.
When a USNR person is released from active duty, he is still in the reserves, in one status or another. He might be ready reserve, drilling two days a month and two weeks in the summer, or he might be Standby Reserve (which is now called IRR), not drilling at all.
If your husband was in the Standby Reserve, then he did not receive his discharge immediately. What he received was a DD-214 and orders releasing him from active duty.
"Kerry was a reserve officer whose unit was called up."
Well, no. The reason he was USNR is that the Navy is very stingy with USN commissions.
If you graduate at the bottom of your class at Annapolis, you're USN and almost guarateed to go 20 years, unless you really tromp on your hooter. If you graduate at the top of your class at Notre Dame and get an ROTC commission, you're USNR and have no job security at all.
The services have a thing called variously "The West Point Protective Association," the "Annapolis Protective Association," and I don't know what the zoomies call theirs. What it is, is the king of all good-old-boy networks. Regular officers get preferential treatment over reserve officers in virtually every area. When you have a USN commission you are permanent, a pro. When you have a USNR commission you're just the day labor.
With rare exceptions, such as honor graduates, everyone who is commissioned out of ROTC or OCS is given a USNR commission. In time of war, when they draft doctors and nurses, they are given USNR commissions. I don't think I've ever heard where Enswine Band-Aid got his, but I'm presuming it was OCS.
So, at risk of being drafted, he applied for OCS, was accepted, stuck it out, and was commissioned an Ensign, USNR. When he applied for OCS, he agreed to a service committment...so much active duty, and so much reserve time. Since it was during Viet Nam, I'd guess he signed for at least 4 years active. The Navy was turning people away back then, because so many people thought it preferable to eating mud with the grunts, so they could demand and get a 4 year committment.
After his active duty and Ready Reserve obligation was over, he would be automatically transferred to the Standby Reserve rolls. Most people wouldn't feel any action was called for at that point, because it feels just like a discharge. No more obligations.
Periodically, the rolls of the Standby Reserve are reviewed, and officers are selected for discharge. Not surprisingly, he was one...of many. There just doesn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary here.
WHAT'S KERRY HIDING?
"I had a regular commission through the NROTC Program, also known as the Holloway plan."
That's one I don't remember. Upon graduation from ROTC you were given a USN commission vice a USNR commission? That program must not have lasted too long.
"Block 14 states "Accepted a Reserve Commission and Records Forwarded to USNTC, Bainbridge, MD 21905"
Aha, the lights come on.
You were discharged USN and immediately accepted a USNR commission. That change in status explains it. If I'm not mistaken, you voluntarily acccepted the reserve commission.
"WHAT'S KERRY HIDING?"
I don't know, especially since a senator should have been powerful enough to have absolutely anything purged from his record.
Not legally, of course, but power isn't about legality.
But there just doesn't seem to be anything irregular about these discharge documents.
Then why was Kerry given another discharge from service in 1992?
There's got to be something wrong some place in the docs or he'd have released his complete Naval Records!!! Not releasing his records make him look guilty as hell...and because of not releasing them....he is probably guilty as hell!!!
THANKS.
Sent to my email list.
"Then why was Kerry given another discharge from service in 1992?"
Dot's a dern gud kvestion, Gilda.
Unless the docs linked by Kabar are forgeries, I haven't a clue.
"There's got to be something wrong some place in the docs or he'd have released his complete Naval Records!"
Logic practically puts a gun to your head and demands that conclusion, doesn't it?
My knee-jerk reaction was, "bad fitrep." But if a US senator couldn't get a bad fitrep disappeared out of his service record, well...hard to believe.
So, what could it be? Letter of reprimand? Adverse personnel security finding? What could possibly be in there that he couldn't have made disappear over the past 30 years?
An honorable discharge in '78 would not have necessitated a board of review, either. There's something there that is not right. The rewrite of the discharge would also explain the rewrite of all his medals.
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