To be a veteran, all you have to do is serve for 4 years.
No, all you have to do is serve, be it for a day or for a decade. The time doesn't matter.
Serve here is the key word. A reservist, for example, would not be a veteran. Although "serve" is the root of the word reserve, being a reservist does not count for active duty unless your unit is called and you report for duty, at least according to the PBS reports that focus on the sorry state of our veterans' services. Someone who signs up in the regular army or navy, then is discharged a day later whether honorably or dishonorably, is a veteran. Someone who signs up for the national guard or reserves, and is in it for 30 years, but who never gets action, is not a veteran, by the current definition of the Veteran's Administration.
But all that is off topic. The question only asked whether holding the office of president qualified one as a veteran. Clearly this was never the intent of the founders. Of course, it is possible to be both a president and a veteran. This was the case of George Washington, and most recently in the case of George H. W. Bush, and maybe even in the case of his son. It was never clear to me whether the Bush the Younger was a veteran. I know he was called to "active duty" at some point while he was in the Air National Guard, but my impression of his service is based mostly on an episode of Family Guy and not on US Department of Defense records, so I'm a bit mystified.
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