Leaderboard

I was a snacko once as a Lt Col, and I was the best goddamn snacko that squadron ever saw.

13 years later. I've since flown two MDSs in two MAJCOMS, retired, and am now flying for a civilian cargo outfit. I stand by my statement.

I see you've met life. Lesson #1, it doesn't give a shit about your plans. You'll be fine, just stay on top of it. Consider reevaluating your finances. Make sure you have a steady plan, that allows you to save, pay down your debt, have insurance, invest, all those things that will keep you from "accidentally" getting in too much debt to start with. Although it's tempting to pay debt off ASAP, you also have to get on a financial plan you can stick with or you'll find yourself in this situation over and over. Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

Pension here, GI Bill there... Hell, we used to be able to claim laundry while TDY...now I have to fight to get paid for an UBER.

It's just the frog slowly boiling. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network Forums

Agreed. Like I've said before, we've got 2 O-6 selects who are retiring well before their promotion dates, both 11B, both great leaders and IPs. And in the other shortage we often neglect, we have a MX officer who was selected for O-6 who has also opted to retire instead.

It's demeaning? Tell that SNAP to quit whining and make corn and god help him if that beer fridge goes empty. I don't give a fuck what his rank or previous experience was. Guess as a Maj I should stop helping take out the trash, carry in beer from the car, and ocassionally make corn...yep that menial shit is beneath me! Unrelated, I Google AFPAK hands to see what this thing was, and it appears to be one of the worst deals out there. ~3 moves in 4 years, a year in one of the shittiest countries on this planet, and 4 years out of the tactical world. This is the furthest thing from "opportunity" I can imagine. Good luck Chang in bagging some poor bastard for this deal.

Having served staffs from MAJCOM, HAF, to OSD I have not seen the bloating of rated officers that is continually mentioned, actually quite the opposite. We absolutely MUST have a rated influence in the training, equipping and strategy development apparatus, again we MUST have that influence. The bloating I have seen is with civilian and contractors who continuously shuffle and delay paperwork between multiple redundant offices.

Tuesday the 18th

Our scheduling shop practices was like your throttle technique on TR-1......that was one of your gems.

Depends on your definition of healthy, what the bean counters consider healthy to make their stoplight charts green or what we need to get the mission done. The C-17 is 105% manned on paper except they reduced our crew ratios from 3.0 to 2.5 and closed 2 squadrons. Yet our mission taskings havent decreased anywhere close to reflect our current manning, but according to AFPC we are overnmanned.

No, no, no, no, no.... you forgot. Leadership from on high, "You can be replaced." People got the message, and acted accordingly.

Yea, missionary vs doggy vs reverse cowgirl can be a tough call sometimes. Not sure if the Koran calls out a preference...

Southwest calls AMC's bluff just weeks before the big meeting? 1,000 hours PIC *preferrered*

I was a snacko and I became a DG WIC grad. What's your point? That snacko is below some people? But only people coming from other AFSCs? Those are the people who need the humility lesson that comes with being a snacko. I'm a patch and deployed as an exec. Was it demeaning to make the general's coffee every morning? Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network Forums

I'll gladly support trimming some military earned benefits (not entitlements thanks) when I start seeing other unearned entitlements (welfare) in society getting trimmed as well.

Page 49 of attached document Strange Bedfellows in Afghanistan: New Prospects for a Negotiated Settlement with the Taliban FAO Journal_fall16.pdf

If you met the board prior to Apr, it was re-routed through the new process, regardless of the SAF/PC's board original decision. That is why you guys have not heard anything since your package was boarded in Mar. New process is AFPC-HAF/A1PP-TFAM Board-SAF/PC board...in a nutshell; maybe a minor stop at a desk, but overall that's the new process. The first packages ran through the new process ~1-2 weeks ago. Sounds like this week/next week is when the Mar packages that we're already boarded will go through the new process. Essentially, us Mar approvals have been sitting in the A1PP hopper for 1-1.5 months while HAF got their shit together on the new process. AFPC seems to have zero SA on HAF actions; I only know this info due to the bro network (via myself and my SQ/CC). So, all I can say is keep on waiting, but bro level gouge indicates answers should be this week or next for those of us who got caught up in this bullshit. Here's to hoping the answer is the same the second time around!

One might ask why the Air Force has chosen 24 years as make-or-break for general, the earliest of any service.

"May the odds ever be in your favor"

Current AFPAK Hand and while I don't regret volunteering, I cannot recommend this program. It is a great but backwards idea. Instead of taking experts, teaching language and culture and placing them in like billets in the field, the program teaches experts language and culture to fill whatever billet, irrespective of previous experience or validity as most organizations viewed Hands as a free body to fill a slot. This is especially true post 2014 but talking to several cohorts, it has always been applicable and if you look at other programs out here, they all say the same thing. The "real" advising billets are filled by contractors or other programs. For example there is a 11H pilot who instead of flying with the Mi-17s or MD-530s is in targeting. Mi-17s are advised by 6th SOS and MD-530s are advised by contractors. In fact contractors have better personnel management (to fulfill the contract), more continuity (typically stay longer than military tours) and no career penalty (no unchecked the boxes). Or several months ago there was a 12M weapons officer who instead of flying with the C-130s was in policing. C-130s of course are advised by multiple ARC squadrons. I can only think of a few people (voul and non-voul) who actually like their assignment, we do so little advising that it is more than a joke that the most useful language we use is English and I have yet to meet a Hand who honestly thinks this country is going to become better. In exchange all of the carrots mentioned are at best half truths. Many volunteer to have an advantage for FAO (RAS in the Air Force) or FSO (State). However the AF unlike every other service treats RAS as broadening, not a career field change, so you'll still be off track from your normal progression. FSO is obviously not guaranteed and means separating from the AF. Others volunteer for NDU/NIU (IDE in res) but you still need to be "picked up" off your boards for it to count, otherwise it is just another masters. Promotion rates depend on the service, community and board. The other services, especially the Army, use AFPAK Hands to get rid of their worst officers so that affects promotion rates. Within communities, specifically fliers, I can't imagine not flying for four years is an advantage although by the time most have met thier first or second gate they may have already topped out anyway. Boards are all different and you can't compare a O-6 board one year with an O-5 board from another. To be fair the program's performance is average and most of these problems are endemic to everything in Afghanistan. No mission. No personnel management. Even if we were doing out performing the rest of the country, Gen Petraeus himself said (or echoed) that reconstruction and advisement only works when there is a modicum of stability and good governance. I want the program to be better. It was a great idea, I enjoyed learning two languages and don't mind deploying for two years, but there are reasons there is a reported 50% 7-Day Op and 80% separation at the end of the program. SIGAR is finalizing a report on AFPAK Hands, likely recommending to at least change if not end the program, not that we ever concur with those recommendations. Rumor also has it that the Army, Navy and Marines each recommended ending it as well, with only the Air Force (which has the highest volunteer rates) dissenting, not that that will happen either. I'll leave you with excerpt from Foreign Policy https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/10/18/our-generals-failed-in-afghanistan/: "The premier example of this mismatch between what military leadership said we were doing, and what the bureaucracy was actually prioritizing, can be found in the story of the AfPak hands program. The program was launched by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Mullen, and lauded as the key to shaping Afghanistan by creating a cohort of expert officers from across the services that would have the language skills and experience to build the kind of long-term relationships needed to build an effective Afghan security apparatus. While a priority for the Chairman, the effort was never embraced by the services. Despite the fanfare and stated importance of the program, mismanagement and mis-utilization were rampant as this specialized cadre encountered personnel systems unable to support non-traditional career paths. Caught between career managers that saw the program as a deviation from what officers “should” be doing – leading tactical units – and a deployment system that often led to random staff assignments instead of partnered roles with Afghan leaders, the program quickly became known as an assignment to be “survived” if not avoided altogether. A leaked briefing from the Army G-1, the service’s head personnel officer, to the Chief of Staff of the Army in 2014 confirmed that the AfPak Hands program had become a dead end for military careers. Officers who had participated in the program were being promoted at a fraction of the rate of those who had not. There are only two explanations for this outcome: Either the Army was sending sub-par officers to serve in the program, or officers were being punished for deviating from the traditional career track. Whichever it was, both explanations reveal that the effort to train and advise the Afghans was simply not a priority for the Army. Similar challenges faced those who served on Security Force Advise and Assist Teams. These teams, like the AfPak Hands program, were always ad hoc and widely considered assignments to avoid, as they did not align with traditional career paths. And in the end, the rigidity of the military’s 1950’s-era personnel system simply overwhelmed any desires to prioritize the counterinsurgency mission. Centrally managed and organized around rigid career development templates, this personnel system does a magnificent job of sustaining a peacetime military that is prepared to fight and win tactical battles at the onset of a conventional war, but is not built to go beyond placing square pegs in square holes."

I seem to remember, just before the 11F issue crested the horizon, when OGs were actually saying that RPA stink was the coin of the realm; in just a few years it will be tough to get on the command list or make O6 without it. FISH ON!

I forwarded the AFPAK Hands email directly to Gen Everhart's "Why are we losing so many pilots" inbox.

hey man take this however you want IDGAF, but in most of your posts you come across as a huge ass hole

I agree, if you are going to do the courthouse, earlier is better. Can you get him added later and get it all done? Yes, but the less I have to deal with MPF and Finance the happier I am. It can be a pain. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network Forums

Stop Loss always has been (and still is) on the table. It has to be. U.S. citizens are depending on military pilots, some reading this forum, to defend this country and their right to L/L/PoH. We must sustain an appropriate posture to our enemies in this interconnected world. Stop loss, if invoked, becomes a patriotic duty. I sincerely hope we have a few patriots left in the pilot ranks. Your personnelists are working day and night at the highest levels to solve this problem by any other means. Those personnelists are heroes in my book, and I believe they will be successful. However, if they are not successful & Stop Loss is invoked, it will be easier, and shorter, if service members remember their core values & jump on the bandwagon. Young people- do not be disheartened by the negativity on this blog. The future of our Air Force and our country is bright, and you are the beacons. Thank you for serving.