(HTML version) by Charles Knight, PDA Commentary, September 2000. George W. Bush campaigned for the presidency saying the “military suffers from back-to-back deployments, poor pay, shortages of spare parts and equipment, and rapidly declining readiness.” In evaluating this claim it is worth examining each of the four specifics that Governor Bush offered as evidence. This commentary provides a guide to the pertinent evidence as collected, organized, and analyzed by the Project on Defense Alternatives in its 1999 study of readiness issues in the Air Force.