Did George H W Bush fly missions after he was rescued by the submarine?
Yes. According to Jon Meacham’s book, Destiny and Power: The American Odyssey of George Herbert Walker Bush (BOOK | KINDLE) -- which, I once again want to note is one of the best-researched, best-written biographies of any President -- Bush did fly at least one more bombing mission, over Manila Bay, after he was shot down by the Japanese on September 2, 1944. I don’t know if that was the only mission that he flew for the remainder of the war, but it very well could have been. As you noted, after he was shot down, he was rescued by an American submarine, the USS Finback, and he actually spent a month on the submarine. The Finback took him to Midway Island and then he was flown to Hawaii.
This is actually a clear example of Bush’s lifelong devotion to duty. Once in Hawaii, the Navy gave him the opportunity to return home to the United States for shore leave. Even though Bush had just barely survived being shot down by the enemy and rescued in the open Pacific Ocean and despite the fact that he and Barbara had planned to get married just a few weeks later, Bush wanted to return to his combat unit on the aircraft carrier USS San Jacinto. The bombing mission in the Philippines was in November 1944. Bush finally returned home in December and married Barbara on January 6, 1945.
Bush didn’t fly another combat mission following his wedding. He was stationed in the United States on training missions for the rest of the war. He had been scheduled to return to the Pacific theater in September 1945 for the planned invasion of Japan, but the Japanese surrendered following the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945.
