Leaderboard

How many of them have strafed danger close at night in the mountains, how many of them have landed at a blacked out LZ under fire, how many of them have faced incredible risk to self for the sake of the mission/a bro in trouble? Hell, on a normal training sortie I face about 1000 times more risk than a doc doing something that they couldn’t even fathom doing. Both groups of people are smart, but to act like flying is somehow easier or less important (especially in the mil) is pure dumbassery. General, you’re clueless. He’s not only bad at “comparative” math, he’s showing how much he/the AF values experience and everything you’ve done/sacrificed for the previous 12 years...which is not much. Overall, fail and par for the course.

1. Start saying no to dumb shit that doesn’t enhance the flying mission or breaks the squadron either personnel and/or materiel wise. 2. COCOMS need to be told go fuck themselves by their air counterparts when they ask for unnecessary stuff/people. 3. Every “good idea” from a shoe that takes time away from my day to do my primary job and does nothing to further the mission needs to be smashed before wing standup even ends. 4. Nobody is equal; be unapologetic about aircrew being more important to the mission than finance (doesn’t mean they’re not an important part, but the rack and stack of priority jobs to the mission is clear). Just because Amn snuffy is excited to go TDY for 2 months because he hasn’t been in years, doesn’t mean I should be, seeing as I’ve already been TDY 6 months so far this year. Shitty leadership sweeps that under the rug and placates to butt hurt snuffy when he laments pilots being prima donnas because they want to do 2 week swap outs and he doesn’t get to. Good leadership says “STFU and color snuffy” and lets pilots do the swap outs. 5. Fight for every possible way to reward people and increase QOL. Example: Shitty leadership could easily give bonuses, but personally decide not to because of some twisted personal view. If it’s legal, do it, no questions asked! Example: shitty leadership who pushes people to work arbitrary 12-14 hr days instead of saying “go home as soon as your day’s work is done.” I could go on, but what all of these things have in common is showing value to your people and their mission. Workers who feel valued (intrinsically or monetarily) and feel unrestricted in accomplishing their mission will have far higher job satisfaction. Here’s why this won’t happen in the AF - any leader who takes all this to heart will be fired tomorrow and replaced by a dickless yes man. The AF doesn’t want solutions or men with change on their mind, they want a carbon copy of the same dipshits who have been running the ship into the rocks for decades. Change is bad, the beatings will continue until morale improves.

Wait til people find out they let guys straight out of UPT instruct in T-38s. Minds will be blown. 🤯

If USAF leaders don’t give a shit about their people, why should the people give a shit about the USAF? Money talks, bullshit walks.

Study study study. Study alone and study together. Attitude is everything, walk into the flight room with a smile on your face eager to learn. You will be criticized, a lot, learn to take it and make yourself better. You’ll be good at something your classmate is not, help him out. Don’t be a BF. Unwind on the weekends, grill out and drink at someone’s house. UPT was tough but hands down one of the most fun times of my life because my job 100% was to fly and help my bros out. Also, realize that you’ll love whatever aircraft you end up getting. Best of luck, you’ll all do fine.

I'm all for doing a quality control check of UPT IPs. But that is a different issue than what MWS someone is coming from. Rushing a copilot through AC upgrade to PCS them isn't good, but that doesn't mean the guy with 2000 PIC hours wouldn't make a competent IP. I think we've placed too much emphasis on what planes people flew, and not enough emphasis on how well they flew them.

I'd rather fly fighters in the south than show up to airshows in the north saying, "I always wanted to be a fighter pilot, but..."

Hard truth: low chances at fighters in the ARC (scores, age, LOR sources meh); recommend open the aperture to heavies with a side of attitude change. Or you can not fly jets at all and keep riding the real estate desk to retirement, your call.

What does this tell us about the state of the Air Force? The problems are becoming so large and unmanageable that the only way for leadership to cope is to become apathetic toward them. Apathy allows you to treat everyone like a Harbor Freight tool that’s cheaper to replace than fix or maintain. He’s not the only one, I’m seeing the shrugs from leadership more often and it’s concerning. In fairness, these guys are human, too and are fighting a losing battle against a massively complex, out-of-control bureaucracy. I don’t believe they’re evil or malicious, just susceptible to the same feelings of resignation we are when we decide to punch. I bet they have these same conversations about their own leadership, all the way up.

Suck less more often and don’t bitch

Unless he's the type to be gunning for 4 BTZ to O-7, he should be laughing all the way to the beach.

You mean we're actually going to vet UPT and FTU instructors? We already screen out HPO types because it would hurt their careers. Now we're removing guys with Q3s or crappy training records. Guess there's a narrow band of not special, but not a dirt bag they are looking for. Good thing we fixed the retention problem and have a large pool of candidates to choose from.

Not really sure where to post this, thought it was pretty funny. ADMIN NOTE: Not a motivational poster, so moved to the WTF? thread...

When I started rushing unit, the number one rule I heard from everyone I talked to about the process was “Don’t be a douche”. How do you think you’re doing in that regard? Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

Pipe down, snowflake.

How many doctors have 4 to 10 million dollars in training costs? Zero. He is an idiot. https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/research_reports/RR2400/RR2415/RAND_RR2415.pdf

Agreed... reworking of Goldwater-Nichols to put force providers on parity with COCOMs would be good. AFCongressman still lurking around this board?

In case it hasn't been clear enough. You have about 0 room to be picky with your scores and background. Check yo-self

Chair fly every flight ahead of time. Know that even though ELPs aren't in the syllabus anymore, you still need to know how to do an ELP.

Great story, thanks for sharing. Side note: the aerobatics champ was assigned to a bomber...lol, even in WWII there was no justice!

Side note: For y'all not familiar with Cal Worthington, just youtube search his commercials from the 70's. I was a young kid in SoCal from '74'-''77 and remember them vividly. "It's Cal Worthington and his dog Spot!" And... oh, by the way... the guy was a Great American. Read this blurb from his wikipedia page: "At the beginning of World War II, Worthington enlisted in the Army Air Corps. Commissioned a Second Lieutenant, he was the aerobatics champion at Goodfellow Field in San Angelo, Texas. He saw combat as a B-17 Flying Fortress pilot with the 390th Bomb Group, flying 29 missions over Germany. He was discharged after the war as a captain. Worthington was awarded the Air Medal five times, and received the Distinguished Flying Cross, which was presented to him by General Jimmy Doolittle. Worthington's military service was frequently revisited in the 21st century in aviation magazines, since he had trained pilots who would become some of America's first astronauts." In 2016, I was offered a job to fly Cal Worthington's Learjet 24 in Sacramento. Cal died a few years earlier and a local guy bought it. You have never seen such a pristine Learjet. It was fucking gorgeous. I ended up not taking the job (and still have emotional issues as a result). Long, uninteresting, and boring story so I'll leave it at that. But,... if that jet is still in the local area in a few years...

If anybody wants a synopsis of Maj Gen Wills briefing today at Vance.... - UPT is great work. (I don’t disagree, I happen to like it) - Retention is his problem, not ours. So we should do the best we can do teaching students. - He acted as if he had never heard of considering pro pay for pilots., when compared to doctors and how they get paid. He half serious asked how many of us new how to perform medical procedures as if they are on another level. I wanted to ask how many of them know how to fly but I’ll admit I don’t have the stones to do something like that. - He said that $35k was really good for the bonus. - He said they couldn’t compete with airlines. (I don’t disagree but they could at least try... somewhat) - He said if someone wants to get out that they should and he’s fine with that and wouldn’t try to get them to stay. Basically stating what’s done is done and not seeing if anything could be done to keep them in. - He said the way they can make things better is to get rid of the queepy stuff and gave an example of how many regs have been gotten rid of. I don’t know what I expected him to say. My opinion to how he discussed retention was that we shouldn’t worry about it and honestly that he doesn’t care that much. He, again in my opinion, said that we should be doing this for service and if we wanted more than that, we should seek greener pastures. Honestly pretty disheartening to hear how he discussed it thinking about future pilots. We can produce all the pilots in the world but if we don’t have any older/experienced guys around, we can never produce the the seasoned ACs/Flight Leads/IPs that the Air Force needs.

Guess I found my retirement job.

For starters, no one who isn't already an AC or Flight Lead should be eligible for UPT IP orders, instead of giving people orders and rushing them through upgrade. Maybe a scrub of FEFs before selecting them. Hell, maybe a boarded process like we implemented this year for ROTS/OTS/SOS instructors and recruiters.

^nomination for post of the year.

Good point, thank you. Point taken. I know of some guys who signed up for a regional before joining the ANG and came back four years later with a great seniority number waiting for them. I'm wondering whether that's my best option or if there are alternative strategies that the search function didn't turn up. As a contract pilot I can rush units whenever I want. One concern I have is being stuck on a regional schedule and not having the time to rush units; is this a valid concern?

I sure wouldn't trade Pensacola for Sheppard

It’s not hurt feelings, it just looks ridiculous when you say flying fighters is a dream and you know you can’t be picky, then say that you aren’t going to apply for units in the south (which is like a third of the guard/reserve fighter units that actually hire off the street). Then you go on to say you’re thinking AD, which gives you even less control over living in places that aren’t “nice”. And it looks even worse when Eagle is nice enough to give you the time of day to give advice and your response is basically, “well I wouldn’t want to work with you anyway”. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

That checks. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

I know what you mean about turning down flying F-15s with the Louisiana Guard. They are definitely not even close to being acceptable or even worth applying to. I mean I turned down a BJ from a 9 the other day just because she wasn’t a 10. Live your dream man, don’t let anyone tell you otherwise! Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

so you only want to fly fighters - but you're not willing to be stationed in certain places because they aren't "nice" - got it. Applying to active duty will be the best option for that! goodluck BRO

As a former PIT IP, who actually volunteered for AETC even though my Commander was saying it was a career killer, I understand the elimination of blanket waivers. Sometime back in 2015-2016ish timeframe I saw a huge uptick in “waiver guys” coming through and it was a huge problem. My issue though was the guys that were RPA, MWS CoPilot, then AC upgrade enroute (if at all) to UPT IP. Talk about a recipe for disaster. These guys were coming in as senior Captain/Majors and had never signed for a manned aircraft before. Depending on attitude they struggled through PIT and then had multiple issues on the line. One guy was so stressed that he started drinking his problems away and even started showing up for work drunk/hungover. So while I get them trying to fix it, you don’t do that to people who have already PCS’d bought a house, etc., all under the name of eliminating “blanket waivers”. We used to say “People Always” or some stupid catchphrase like that. It’s become apparent that the AF organization really doesn’t give a $hit about the “people”. And while an organization can’t “care” about people, it reflects the vision and intent of the people who are in charge/making decisions and policies. I’m so sorry for all those affected by decades of poor management and absentee leadership. When you get tired of the race, hit me up and hopefully I can help you find a truly better life for you and your families. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

Didn’t the AF just say something about how White jet is going to be highly valued now and a virtual requirement for higher leadership?

The problem is cyclicle. You need UPT IPs to make MWS pilots. You need MWS pilots to make MWS ACs. You need MWS ACs to make UPT IPs. You don't fix one area without fixing all of it.

AETC wants it's cake and to eat it too. We (C-17s) have just enough experienced IPs to keep our crew force current and in a acceptably proficient state to meet current deployment requirements. We can't give up 4-6 experienced ACs/IPs every PCS cycle to fill AETC's insane must fill bill. It is a vicious cycle but when there are real world users that need support day in and day out, AETC is going to get the people we can do without.

numbers look pretty good. Have you spent time visiting squadrons yet? If not, that will be the biggest thing you can do to stand out in a good way. Also, dont limit yourself...apply everywhere and visit as many as you can...and dont forget to bring copious amounts of whiskey to every visit 😉 Good luck brother!

No one is body shaming. From what I am reading people are calling out people for what appears to be inability to meet professional required standards. And possibly because of being a woman some automatically get offended. Everyone wants equal treatment. We call out men who seem to be exceeding standards. Well even though the physical standards aren’t equal, when someone calls out someone else it isn’t body shaming or anti feminism. People who say it’s body shaming don’t understand there is such a thing as objective truth. Or don’t want there the be objective truth. Bottom line, said individual doesn’t look to be in professional standards.

The hilarity here is that the same shitty 11F’s that are being complained about will be the ones who are shipped back to UPT after a 2 year touch and go in a fighter. From my little slice of the AF, my U-28 bros that went to 38’s (after ~2000 combat hours as evaluators) would all have ended up in fighters if not for the poor planning of being 2008 college graduates. But those guys are now not “good enough” to teach a guy how to fly tac and extended trail. I don’t get it.

11R simply not pictured (EDIT, ground abort, no show)

Putting the C-172 on the list and leaving off the J-3 Cub is unforgivable!

Go fuck your face. The author of that "sob story" is one of my buddies and one of the most patriotic, humble, well-liked dudes I've known in my years in the AF. Not many people here have had assignments cancelled after: signing papers for a house, wife finding a GOOD job, and enrolling kids in school mere days before it starts. I don't care what you've been through, that's tough on anyone. Now, because one GO thinks heavy drivers aren't capable of teaching tac form, he has to do it all over again, but now he gets to pull his kids out of school mid-year and enroll them somewhere else. His post should be something we can all rally around as another feather in the "Big Blue gives zero fucks about us" cap. Most of us in his situation would punch at the soonest opportunity, middle fingers in the air. But knowing the author, he will take the kick in the junk and keep moving forward because he cares about Mother Blue and legitimately wants to fix this cluster fuck and leave it in a better place.

You do.

"Desperate Applicant" doesn't seem to be that desperate after all. Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

For reference, it's definitely an uphill climb. You would not be competitive for an interview in our squadron. (age and scores) Like someone else mentioned there are a lot of younger applicants with better scores. BTW, no one knows what it's like to be a fighter pilot except fighter pilots. I guarantee it's not what you think it is. Saying you are only interested in flying fighters is short sided at best. I'd overhaul that attitude - even if you only apply to fighter units.

Not to be a jerk, but you’ll need to consider retaking the AFOQT. Majority of competitive fighter applicants have 90s across the board, not just in the Pilot category.

Looks like there are hurt feelings on here. It's an opinion, I don't want to live in the south.