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I will support age 60-whatever when there is meaningful testing that filters out pilots. Too fat? Bye. Can't handle *complex* surprise EPs in the sim? Bye. Can't pass a real medical exam from a random AME? Bye. Comparative cognitive testing from your previous attempts shows a decline? Bye. And not just for 65+, all pilots. But right now this is about guys who aren't ready for retirement, many of whom are convinced their particular struggles make them uniquely deserving, wanting more. My ability to retire early is affected by how soon others retire. So if the 65+ crowd can make a financial-based argument, so can I. But mostly I'm just tired of the Baby Boomers upending every system for their financial advantage then acting shocked that other generations don't appreciate being left the tattered ruins of a once functional societal pact.

One of my favorite parts of that story was their squadron commander calling an Eagle squadron commander up there who's squadron hadn't gotten any kills yet (through no fault of their own) and offered to come by and give some advice on air to air work.

Definitely a political issue, like everything else going on out there. In something that's near/dear to many of us, just look at BRAC and where they choose to base things. If you could care less, the go ahead and do so. They jealousy seems to be more of the pro-67 crowd toward those against. Some of the loudest proponents of this thing got to where they are today because everyone ahead of them retiring at 60 and 65. Now that they're at the top, they just want an additional 2 years at the top. Some of the loudest supporters accuse "junior" of just wanting "25 years in the left seat of a WB." Many of these guys have already been at this airline longer than the entire career of the average newhire from when I was hired. I think all they look at is the kids getting hired today in their early 20s. Never mind that a vast majority of this generation was hired in their mid-late 30s. They also seem to think that none of these guy had it bad because what they experienced happened before Delta. They also seem to think that there will be no more black swans...it's all rainbows and unicorns from here on out! There is nothing hypocritical/jealous about being for maintaining the status quo.

I haven’t watched it, and I’m certain Hollywood goes over the top, but leaking, tattered, and burning US bombers limping home was a daily occurrence, as were contrails. Read “Black Thursday” sometime, 291 B-17’s launched on Schweinfurt, 60 shot down and 17 returned and had to be scrapped due to damage.

Glad I held onto my boeing stock

What ever happened to the US's stance of "If you start a fight with me, I'll finish it" ??? Seriously. Now it's "please don't start a fight...please please please please...ok fine I have enough dead Americans now and my populace is rather pissed...I'll strike something NEAR you, please don't hurt me" This weak dick foreign policy needs to go.

🤣 🤣

Something about a broken clock…

I mis-drilled the wrong hole once, it cost a lot. Don't recommend it.

Aside from the few at the top, this gets a vast majority of the group delayed pay/QOL, which I guess is great if you want to work until you die. I certainly wouldn't call having to wait two more years for all QOL/Pay increases a good deal.

Not eligible for bonus, not eligible to promote, and will deploy if combat coded...wow. Sounds like a great deal!

Alright guys, settle down...not everyone at once!

Numerically the egalitarian thing (especially for the much larger age 60 to 65 jump kerfuffle) would have been for the age extension to be enforceable on DOHs AFTER the govts' ratification date aka grandfathering. Alternatively, the other fair alternative, if they were arguing in good faith, would have been to implement without fencing, but support the extension of immediate recall rights (with full seniority restoration of course) to those previously mando-retired who were still younger than 65 (minus reasonable training footprint) by the govt's implementation date [December 13 2007]. ...And maddafacking crickets is what you hear when you proffer the latter. Tells me all I need to know about people's so called "sincerely held beliefs" on the age discrimination crusade front. In the end I don't think it's a generationally unique reflex, which is why I prefer a more all-inclusive terminology. I call them Twixers: Because no matter what you ask them, the answer is always Two for me None for you... 😄

We always had good bars. In tankers and helicopters. We had one Charlie Church CC who banned alcohol in my tanker sq, so we went to the sister squadron's bar for his tenure. In helos, we always had good bars. One of my squadrons' bar was the biggest room in the entire building. You are airmen, drink some god damned beer when you land. Dont tell the bobs anything.

Worth the time:

Well put, quoted for truth. There are good and bad individuals within every group, and I'll note Huggy is a good one. That said, has there been a generation more greedy or who wrecked things more for their kids than boomers? The phenomenon seems unique to the US by the way, Latin America is full of older generations working to leave things better for their kids. I get it older CAs, you want an extra million bucks before retirement regardless of the impact on others and it makes you feel better to pretend we're all as shallow. Whatever. But don't expect me to endorse it or support it.

I’m sure these are all poor, tired, huddle masses yearning to be free and not any connection to the CCP and their ideas. The landowner (legal immigrant from Yugoslavia) who got arrested for shooting his gun in the air and the lady who speaks Spanish and says she doesn’t even run into a single Spanish speaker some days is mind blowing.

Ha! If this describes any of you, self report and turn your man card in immediately!

If you don't have an honorary squadron commander, get that program up and running. A few local big wigs leaning on local businesses to each chip in a bit and you'll be a significant way there. You'll also likely have an easier time making the bar a self-help process and purchasing morale stuff with a GPC. Find a pilot in the squadron that is good at woodworking/construction (actually good, not 'I put together my IKEA desk after only 3 attempts' good) and that would be a huge help also.

Can we please stop giving Boeing contracts? https://www.defensenews.com/air/2024/02/05/boeing-pushes-back-t-7-plans-due-to-faulty-parts/ KC-46, new VC-25, T-7... When was the last time they gave us a solid aircraft?

It's not going anywhere. The population is more interested in what they can get from the government, and they will elect politicians based on it. Neither Trump or Biden claim any intention of fixing the deficit caused by these giveaways. Any threat to global stability is a threat to the governments' ability to continue the domestic handouts, so they will keep their head in the sand. Ironically, the obsession with short-term stability is going to guarantee the deterioration of conditions long-term.

Let me guess: a Slife initiative?

For this upcoming Friday... On 6 Feb 1991, then-Capt Robert Swain Jr. of the Air Force Reserve’s 706th Tactical Fighter Squadron (pictured above as a colonel at his fini flight) made the first air-to-air kill in an A-10 Thunderbolt II during Operation DESERT STORM. The event, depicted in art below, began after Swain was attacking Iraqi tanks on the ground and noticed two distant objects flying further afield. After one of his wing-men marked these two Iraqi Bo-105c helicopters with smoke rounds, Swain flew in to try and take them down with missile fire. When he realized the helos were too small to lock onto with his Maverick missiles, he switched to the A-10’s 30mm nose-mounted cannon, the GAU-8/A Avenger, and successfully took one of the helicopters down that way. At retirement—as the 439th Airlift Wing commander—Swain had flown more than 3,500 hours and 51 combat missions. (Photos: USAF; Artwork by 2nd Lt Katie “Kat” L. Justen)

37th! There've been some not too chill times like early wakeups and late days, but I have genuinely enjoyed every single moment of it and even sitting in a class where I'm about to fall asleep and bored out of my mind I'm still like "damn this is the coolest thing ever." For SA purposes for y'all, I was prior RPA and already had a medical clearance and a PPL so I wasn't required to go back for anymore medical testing or to IFT again. If anyone has questions about URT feel free to reach out. Last year I found out my RNTLD and base 30 Jan which was about two weeks after we heard the selection results. I originally had a RNLTD of 6 May to Columbus with a 6 Jun class start date. I worked as the person who sent out RIPs to people as my casual job, and at least at Columbus, all of our RNTLDs were exactly one month prior to the projected start date. I moved my PCS date up to 1 April because I wanted to escape my last base as quickly as possible and so I got to Columbus 6 Apr. Once I got to CAFB, I was given about a month without any type of casual job to get settled and in-processed. During this time, my only responsibility was to go in and sign a piece of paper at 0800 on Tuesdays. After that month, I started my casual job of working as a transition manager which are the people that in-process all the students who get to base. It was super chill, our schedule was to work 2-3 days a week for a 4 hr shift. For a casual job, you could be a TM like me, or do anything else the base needed like being a sqdn/group/wing exec, working SF, doing drug tests, being a scheduler in a flight room, working the pharmacy, etc, it all depended on manning numbers when you arrived. If you showed up and told the trans flt/cc that you had a casual job in mind then they normally put you in that role. People that showed up with either a class start date or IFT within a month generally didn't get casual jobs since they wouldn't have the time to get spun up/spun down before they left. Most casual jobs let their people go 1 month prior to start dates so you just kind of hang out, and then class activities start 10-days out before your class date. My 6 June class start date got moved back to 11 Sep but I think these days people's dates are generally staying the same and not moving. We were in preflight (academics and sims) from 11 Sep to 13 Dec during which you generally have classes and sims most days out of the week. The schedule isn't terrible at all, we'd have maybe 3-4 hrs of class 3/5 days a week and a sim 2-3 days a week as well. When you didn't have a class or a sim, you were free to do whatever you wanted and be wherever you wanted. I did most of my CBTs from at home plopped on my couch. It's very self-paced and self-guided but the sim IPs and classmates are always available if you need them. I've heard one thing that differed CAFB from the other UPT bases was that as soon as you finished preflight you hit the flightline, i.e. the class ahead of me finished preflight and then the next day had their dollar rides. Because the flightline was so backed up though, my class finished preflight and then had 6 weeks of nothing before we had our dollar rides. But the class behind me only had a few days, so it apparently is really dependent on your squadron and how backed up the flightline is. Now that we're on the flightline, we're on formal release and have been told to expect to be on formal until at least we all pass our trans check which I think is a month or 2? With formal, expect to be in the flightroom for 12 hrs a day before getting released. This past week our schedule was 0530-1730. I never thought I'd say it but those 12 hrs go by fast. We're flying normally 3 times a week and have a USEM event (emergency procedures standup, shotgun questions for the room, classes, etc) generally every day. We have a pretty generous "be able to get back within 15 mins" so we're cleared to go to the gym, study elsewhere, lunch, etc as long as you're able to get back quickly. Again, this stuff is all pretty CAFB and sqdn dependent, but I know that when I was in y'all's shoes last year I was hungry for every bit of info I could get my hands on.

Ok gents, fess up. Who ordered the child-bride LBFM who’s barely scraping 5’1” in 5” stilettos first from the center on the right? 😂 Right after your last tour in PACAF probably huh? She could nurse milk directly from the SQ/CC’s wife’s titties while they’re both standing fully upright! I’ll refrain from making fun of you further if I can have her number…

Not sure on how current UFT drops are working work, sorry. Having done the process twice previously though, here's how it went for me: Back when I went through Nav school with Magellan, we were a class early in the FY and my flight commander was quite gregarious and had made great relationships with the folks at AFPC, who happened to be co-located at Randolph. He apparently regularly went over there, brought candy, beers, told tall tales, charmed the ladies, etc.; god bless you Capt. Gerry. Long story short, when our drop came up he had us all fill out dream sheets a bit earlier than typical, and then went over to AFPC and tried to acquire the jets we wanted. He succeeded wildly! Everyone in our class got their first or second choice, understanding that folks who kinda knew they were near the bottom didn't ask for the moon. He then released the final class ranking and aircraft list the day before the drop and said, "Look, I got you all what you wanted, but you are free to change your minds. We'll pick in rank order from these airplanes. Good luck!" Our class held fast to our dream sheets and basically everyone walked away happy. It was a great night! I got hammered at the Auger Inn in volleyball shorts and a sports bra (Olympics themed drop night haha), eat your hearts out gents 😘. When I went through URT more recently I was a Guard guy so who cares how it went, right? I already had my assignment; problem solved. But for the active duty kids they got to rank MQ-9 or RQ-4 #1/#2, and for MQ-9 got to list I think a top three locations (e.g. Shaw, Creech, Cannon, etc.). My flight commander there (who was much less cool) then did some voodoo based on his judgement, what was available, class rank, etc. and we all just found out when we were called up in no particular order at drop night. He never even released our actual class rankings other than the DGs at graduation. Most people were fine, especially since the range of choices was much smaller to begin with, but the problem IMHO one of the dudes who was a DG (i.e. either #1 or #2 overall in our class of I think 23 studs) didn't even get his top aircraft. The flight commander in an executive decision assigned him to MQ-9s at Creech when what he really wanted was RQ-4s. Truly puzzling to (mildly) crush the dreams of a guy who worked his butt off and performed extremely well. OTOH another guy (not a DG but a top third performer) got the first-ever MQ-9s to Hurlburt so he could be close to his kids that his ex had anchored to NWFL. I got hammered at the Auger Inn once again dressed up as a woman (Captain Marvel for an Avengers theme), so there's a bit of a trend-line here... May the odds ever be in your favor!

I hope she makes it thru UPT just fine. I also hope she makes a profile on BODN and gives all you ninny nannies a shit ton of ball bustin'. If so, she wouldn't be the 1st pretty lady to fly well. Google it. There's the T-bird, Malachowski, Kim Campbell who landed a battle damaged A-10, and not to mention the scores of WASPs, a few of whom I met at while staying a few nights before Oshkosh at my in-law's neighbor's house. As for the media, the called her a Soldier. WTF, over?