Leaderboard

Never heard of AMC, huh?

So nobody cares that Biden is limiting flights from South Africa? It's only racist/xenophobic when Trump does it, right? https://thehill.com/policy/international/africa/583204-us-to-restrict-travel-from-south-africa-and-seven-other-countries

Somewhat true when considering moving to other AF platforms, at least in the last few years. We have had the occasional pilot go to a "special" flying assignment but that was a good career move. I can't think of too many in the past few years that have gone to other flying assignments without intending to return. One thing to consider about the U-2: if you decide to do it and get accepted, you better be sure you want to be there. No one forced you to go... and you won't get much sympathy if you get there and decide you don't like it. It's a self-inflicted wound. We offer you a lot of chances to take a hard look at the good, the bad, and the ugly about U-2 Life. So get leave, buy an airline ticket, and go spend a couple of days at Beale to check it out before you apply. p.s. Keep in mind, the U-2 Program is overmanned. Obviously. As evidenced by the fact that some genius at AFPC decided they didn't qualify for a pilot bonus. So don't come to the U-2 "for the money". And don't come there because we have the T-38A. Come there because you want to be a high-altitude Recce Pilot in the cockpit of a U-2. In a pressure suit. By yourself. If that isn't your primary reason for going, then save everyone a lot of hassle and look elsewhere.

But hey, no more mean tweets, so we're all safe now.

Oh I know, but making it difficult for them makes me happy. One of the biggest assholes I knew in the -135 community made it to FedEx, even tried to run for a union rep, but wasn’t voted in due to his USAF reputation.

It will always be a new variant. Like a new flu every year. I’m over it.

In my opinion, it extended much further down than just the top level GO/FO leadership. Long but interesting anecdotal story. When I was a young staff officer I was assigned to be my command's GSOS lead (Global Special Operations Synchronization, it's how SOCOM is supposed to prioritize where it puts SOF, feeds into the GFM process). BLUF is its a multi-phase process with a lot of data collection/processing and in person PPTs to a board. During my second year doing doing this, SOJTF-A J35 was presenting their Campaign Plan for the conference (presented to a board of 6 O-6s from SOCOM), SOJTF-A team was made up of an O-6 and several O-5s and civilians. The SOJTF-A team VTCs in and has this very bright, optimistic "this is the year we turn it all around, X years to stem the tide, XX years to seize the initiative, we're gonna take it to them with this new strategy, etc, etc, etc). I think they even used the word "defeat" in some of their presentation. The O-6 board receives the presentation, asks a few minor questions, then says great job, go get'em, we really appreciate you", or something to that effect and starts to move on. That would've been the end of it except for 1 O-5 Army Strategist (extremely intelligent guy who was about as cynical as they come) in the audience. He stands up in this room full of 50 people with god knows how many others in VTC land and politely asks what's different about this year compared to all the other years in the Stan (this conference was in early 2018). When SOJTF-A says they don't understand his question, he expands by saying what they've presented looks remarkably similar to his 2005 experience, which also mirrored the time he was there in 2009, while not differing all that much from the strategic plan in 2011, seemed shockingly similar to his deployment in 2013, and he didn't see all that much change from 2015-2017. He then asked how on god's green earth they were going to seriously degrade or possibly defeat the enemy with a fraction of the resources previously available and an ANA that wasn't that much more capable and suffering a record high number of casualties. The crazy/really eye opening moment to this whole thing was that the SOJTF-A guys just sat there dumbstruck, like they couldn't believe anyone wouldn't believe in or would dare question their plan. They literally had no answer. I seriously think several of them honestly believed the nonsense they were presenting. The O-6 board quietly ruffled through their notes or stared at their hands. The O-5 strategist shook his head and sat down. Will always be one those random moments in my career I'll never forget and the moment I knew we could've been in the Stan for another 20 years and it wouldn't have changed the ultimate outcome one bit.

95% and 0%, respectively.

Tough to do. Even one of the biggest assholes who sunk many of career, after a concerted blackball campaign at all of this top choices, was still able to make it to one of his last options.

It’s for those in the MAF who either didn’t get what they wanted out of UPT to go to their first assignment allowing them to “right a wrong” or by wanting to get promoted into leadership and not by flying skill. This is done by: 1. Not be a good pilot. 2. Become an exec. 3. Fly less as a lackluster pilot. 4. Solely upgrade because they’re the Sq/CC’s “HPO.” 5. Cross flow into another MAF aircraft where they won’t fly much because now they’re usually an ADO and solely upgrade for their career progression, not their skill. Here’s an example of a douchebag Phoenix program product. https://www.afcent.af.mil/Units/379th-Air-Expeditionary-Wing/Biographies/Article/2274232/colonel-jeremy-e-williams/ Terrible program that promotes terrible aviators into leadership positions.

The left only cares that they have someone in office who will champion their progressive causes…calling Trump a racist was just to motivate their left wing base and attempt to have some in the middle feel guilty for originally supporting Trump. If not for double standards, the left wouldn’t have any standards at all.

Looks like Salvation Army is feeling the pinch after going all in with the systemic racism bs…and now they’re backpedaling. https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/salvation-armys-woke-racism-guide-tells-white-americans-racism-is-systemic-and-colorblindness-is-harmful?cmpid=fb_fbn&fbclid=IwAR3iyCDvOcWW0pRD-fyFmuq9qi2GN7ojez0IXCPzl0SIOcVznYxCeNgAinE

GO-hate is my favorite kinda WIC-hate. The level of self-own in AFSOC is epic. Chuck

“These WIC guys choosing to be away from their families for six months spending blood, sweat, and tears to figure out how to build, teach, and lead their communities in a fight against China…well, they don’t jerk me off even though I’ve highly encouraged it, so fuck them!”

Go U-2s. Gets you out of MAF, keeps you operational, and you get to fly the U-2 and the T-38.

"AFSOC has ruined Air Force special operations"

Morale took a big hit when the current big boss handpicked every sq cc in AFSOC based on personal loyalty. This has resulted in leadership that prioritizes falling inline and not biting the hand that feeds instead of advocating for their squadrons. I dont see it getting better anytime soon.

Would you tell us more about what is happening? Many of us have no clue about this subject.

The situation at AFSOC is horrible but NO ONE CARES. The system encourages what has happened and the internal AFSOC politics made it even worse. There was a big purge of AFSOC O-6s a few years ago but nothing really came of it other than some very talented people ran for the door. You would think Big Blue leadership would pay attention when the sitting Group Commanders of your two premier AFSOC Wings bail at the same time. Both were on the Wing/CC list and they said nope...adios. Wait until the CAT 5 hits AFSOC....the current guy is horrible, so convinced he is right he do anything to preserve his legacy including getting rid of all the AC-130's...sadly this is not a joke. The incoming dude is pure hate, a vindictive cult of personality who will salt the earth behind him. Both have lined up their DOJ's (inside joke), and puppets who will continue to do their bidding to perpetuate the evil. I still talk to many folks on the inside and there is one overriding theme from all of them...dark dread. It will take AFSOC a generation to overcome, if it ever does.

People should read "The Law of Self Defense: A Guide for the Armed Citizen" It's by Andrew Branca, a lawyer that specializes in self defense. If you carry a weapon you MUST read it.

You are correct, I focused on 06s because that's what the discussion was about. I did mention some of them are good dudes. Same with retired E8/9s, some continue to think their clothes should be ironed for them. Some, like Rich, contribute to the mission. I've drank many beers with Rich, many war stories were shared and a good time was had. Wait until you meet Rich's replacement, E9 all the way. See above. I think I've mentioned this before but back in the day you could call an E9 Sergeant. We would call a Chief that deserved it a Chief but call an E9 Sergeant, some knew why. One retired E9 shoe clerk was belittling aircrew instructors and was promptly reminded who the "rock stars" were. A retired O6 site manager did that. I got to admit I felt kind of proud about that.

I know for a fact that it's a problem in AFSOC, can't speak to other commands so maybe it's better other places. I've heard second and third hand that it's becoming a problem in other commands but I have no evidence of that. To your point on leadership "understanding" opt outs, that's probably a pretty tough thing to make happen with any regularity unless attitudes about leadership and what it means to serve change in the AF. O-6 assignments are handled in a separate system from the rest of the rank and file. Believe it or not, a lot of O-6s that are thinking about getting out don't show their cards until they have to, just like the guys on line. I would imagine that telling a guy like Slife or his most probable successor (CAT 5) that you're opting out of command but want to continue serving isn't going to go very well. Guys like that have serious difficulty processing that someone wouldn't want a command opportunity; the risk of vindictiveness through a shitty deal or assignment is simply too high for a lot of O-6s to be long term honest brokers about their goals/intentions.

Good question and not the easiest problem to solve. Disclaimer: I declined command with prejudice two years ago so this a is topic that I have fairly strong feelings about. Second hand info, so take it FWIW, but I've been told that our MAJCOM/CC has stated that AF leadership is fairly concerned about this. Long term projections/trends aren't good; supposedly there's a real possibility that there won't be enough qualified O-5/6s in the coming years to fill all the required command billets. At any given point AFSOC has about 110 or so O-6s; about 3 years ago there was an O-6 blood bath where 42 of them punched in the same year, was a rude wakeup call. From what I can tell there's another big wave of O-6 retirements currently under way. I honestly don't know why AFSOC was surprised this happened, we're coming into the era where you have people who've been at war for their entire career. Once you make O-6 you're a company man and your control over your future is often times much diminished, and in the last couple years your chances of an undesirable 365 increased dramatically (admittedly this risk is probably diminished now). I'd agree with your pitch that there is and probably needs to be a middle ground. I personally know several guys in the last two years who made O-6 and still retired prior to getting 3 years TIG. If the AF tries to push guys/gals into commands they don't want, I'm of the personal opinion it'll be a lose/lose for everyone involved. The people in question will most likely just retire so we'll lose the talent, or they'll stay and do a job they don't want, which means they people they're leading could suffer. In my small corner of the AF: 1. I think we could do a better job about being open with guys/gals about what their future looks like if they're on the command track. AFSOC does a horrible job IMO giving guys on the command track feedback on the DT results/discussions. Almost everyone is in the dark until if/when they get a hiring phone call. That makes it very difficult to prog out family life or have any idea about what your future holds. 2. I think we could also open up DO and CC slots to more non-school selects/line guys (not just top 10-15% people). I know plenty of bros in the ops units that would've made great commanders and would've been interested in serving in that role but never got the looks or opportunity cause they weren't put on that path as a Captain. This would serve to widen the command gene pool and not limit senior leaders' choices for command billets to careerist twats. One of the better CCs I've had was one of these guys, always a line dude, no school or jt staff and was a great commander during a challenging year for the squadron. 3. I believe keeping productive O-6s that decline command would be win for the AF and for those individuals. I worked with/around a decent amount of worthless/not smart/downright cockbaggish O-6s during my time on staff. Every guy on here has probably seen things come out of at least the MAJCOM that were uninformed/bad policy/caused issued at the ops units. Letting good O-6s go to staff lets those guys/gals continue to serve and leverages their experience where it could have positive effects at the squadron level. Standing by spears/thoughts.

I think it's been said here before, but this certainly illustrates the point. We weren't in Afghanistan 20 years. We were in Afghanistan one year, repeated 20 times.

Believe it or not, I have an Atta-Boy for AFPC with a big personal victory. I dropped RPAs by choice out of UPT 9 years ago and re-categorized as an RPA dude in 2016. I've loved the mission and people I've worked with, but life/career/family priorities changed big time for me in 2018 (O-6+, progression, and box checking quit being the goal). In light of that, I've been pushing hard for 1.5 years to get back in the cockpit by any means possible to learn a new mission, breath some fresh air, have an adventure, and challenge myself as an aviator (while keeping family, health, and personal priorities higher than they'd been). I hit a lot of road blocks (and sacrificed what my military career had been if I'm honest), and I was in full on cards out Palace Chase job hunting mode. After being told no for a year, AFPC and my SQ/OG leadership made me an offer to return to fly on AD with the other UPT Direct dudes who were 3 years out of UPT. I've kept it close hold because it's been word of mouth only for 6 months...but they sent me to SERE, I'm flying in a T-1 refresher course right now, and I have orders for PIQ in the -135. I'm super stoked for the new opportunity and moving to Fairchild. Thanks to the bros here on Baseops that helped me navigate through Palace Chase options, cross-training, and AFPC stuff. School is out of the picture and making O-5 isn't likely (not sure promoting is the best option for me at this point anyway)....but I'll be taking a 3 year bonus along with the initial qual ADSC. And being a free agent taking it assignment by assignment is awesome so far. I have no idea what I'll be looking to do in 3-4 years, but I'm pumped to be flying again and there are ALOT of varied options I'm excited thinking about.

For a while he refused to pick someone to be a Squadron CC unless they were BPZ to LtCol, that was his pass fail test of leadership and fed his plan of trying to build as many AFSOC GOs as possible. That TTP went up in smoke when AFSOC started getting hammered on promotion boards and he ran out of BPZ folks. The incoming CAT 5 is just as bad in other regards. He HATED the Weapons School (although he surrounded himself with patches anytime he deployed), he actually stood up and clapped when another O-6 WIC hater suggested we close the AFSOC WIC at a senior officer meeting. As a Wing/CC he tried to shame his SQ/CC patches into not wearing their grad patches..."I should know you are a graduate by your performance." One of those CC's caved (Pavelow Dude imagine that), he ended up on the fast track and is now a sitting Wing/CC. That current sitting WIng/CC has pulled all references to WIC from his official bio and exhibits many of the same narcissistic traits as his handler.