Doonesbury offers reward for proof Bush served

11.45am

WASHINGTON - United States president George W Bush has an unlikely ally in his effort to show that he did his National Guard duty during the Vietnam War: the often political and frequently irreverent Doonesbury comic strip.

The strip is offering US$10,000 ($14,700) to anyone who can show Bush served in the Alabama Air National Guard.

"That's right -- we're offering US$10,000 cash to anyone who can prove George W Bush fulfilled his guard duty in Alabama," Wednesday's strip said.

"So if you served with Mr Bush -- even if only in the officers' club -- we want to hear from you right now"

Readers were referred to the Doonesbury website where a witness registration form asks for online testimony. The site says the prize money is being underwritten by Doonesbury creator Garry Trudeau.

"Thanks to Bush's massive tax cuts for people who don't need them, GBT is flush."

The hitch is the winner will not actually receive the reward. Instead the website says the cash will be donated in the winner's name to the United Service Organisation (USO), which entertains American troops.

The strip first offered the reward on Monday and already there had been hundreds of responses, according to David Stanford, duty officer at the online Doonesbury Town Hall.

"We're only in day three and have already received witness forms from over 600 contestants, with more streaming in every hour," Stanford said in an email response to questions.

"We'll be carefully processing all of them, but what's immediately striking is that so many who've plunged into the depths of their 1972 memories have surfaced with accounts that involve automobiles, alcohol, aliens, secret ops and Elvis," Stanford said.

The White House had no comment on the contest, but Christine Iverson of the Republican national committee said laughingly, "It sounds like a stunt worthy of a comic strip."

Documents released earlier this month offered no new evidence to show that Bush actually turned up for National Guard duty in Alabama during the latter part of 1972, a period when Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe has accused him of being absent without leave.

- REUTERS