AF Boots Decorated Pilot for Being Gay
May 20, 2009
Military.com
An 18-year Air Force officer and fighter pilot is being booted under the Pentagon's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy on gays, the officer revealed last night during a prime-time television interview.
Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, an F-15E Strike Eagle pilot assigned to Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho, appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, where he called an investigation board's finding that his homosexuality harmed unit morale, good order and discipline "absolutely false."
"About 4,000 people are assigned to Mountain Home Air Force Base, and only about 10 people on the entire base even knew of my case up until this very moment," he said. "Those were my immediate chain of command, a couple of attorneys in the legal office, and a couple of officers in the Office of Special Investigations. Not one single person that I'm assigned with in my squadron, or that I fly with in my fighter squadron, knew about this case until this moment."
Fehrenbach said that when the Air Force first made its case against him and moved to have him discharged he just wanted it over with.
"I was devastated, absolutely devastated. The Air Force has been my life. I was born on an Air Force base. I was faced with the end of my life as I knew it," he said. "I wanted a quick, quiet, fair, honorable discharge."
But he said he decided to fight the discharge because he believes the policy is wrong, and that his fighting it might help other people.
He said he has been disappointed that President Barack Obama has backed off on his promise while a candidate to end Don't Ask, Don't Tell.
In a statement issued yesterday by the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, SLDN Executive Director Aubrey Sarvis called the Air Force's move to discharge Fehrenbach "an utter waste of talent."
"The Colonel has a sterling combat record, does a fantastic job for his country every day and has all the medals and job performance evaluations to prove it. He did not disrupt unit cohesion or good order. But the bottom line is he's gay, so he's out," Sarvis said.
Fehrenbach's discharge comes two years before he would have been able to take a 20-year retirement.
Fehrenbach said he has nine Air Medals, including one for valor for assaulting an Iraqi ambush position while under heavy anti-aircraft fire during the first days of the invasion. He told Maddow that he and his wingman spotted a dozen armored personnel carriers laying in wait for advancing U.S. troops on their way to Baghdad.
The wingman's plane suffered a malfunction which made it impossible for him to accurately fire his weapons, Sarvis said, so in addition to unleashing his own he guided the wingman so that he could fire on target, as well, all while under fire.
The two knocked out the ambush, he said.
