Leaderboard

You clearly don't know what it takes to fly precision loops to Van Halen, while taking all the 60 series.

Hopefully someone kicked some rudder because lead got lucky with having enough space to eject. Since everyone made it and are OK: Rejoin to the piggyback position? Is that a new Ace and Gary maneuver?

We've been down this road, and similar paths, constantly and consistently since the 1970s. I'll believe that Big Blue is serious about CSAR (and CAS) beyond the A-10 when the following things occur: 1. SPECIFICALLY, in-writing, designate a MINIMUM of FIVE squadrons (of the MDS of their choosing) that will take CSAR as a PRIMARY mission. These squadrons will take dedicated, three week (or longer) TDYs to Moody AFB to learn, refine, and become proficient in the CSAR mission so that when the last Hog flies West, the mission is so deeply ingrained in the PRIMARY focus that no stress or strain can erase it. Why 5? I'd argue that's the absolute minimum number for a somewhat regular AFFORGEN deployment rhythm. Welcome to the world of low-density, high-demand. Who's going to want to go into no-kidding combat without Sandys? They will also publish the recurring training events that will prove to the entire CAF that the commitment of NEVER leaving a comrade behind on the field of battle is alive, well, and preserved in the United States Air Force. This won't happen, because it hasn't happened. In order to do this, those five squadrons will have to give up other missions in order to focus on CSAR. It isn't a pickup game, and if we relegate it as such, we're breaking faith with our own. Period, dot, full-stop. So, what can we ask that F-16, F-15E, or F-35 squadron to give up in exchange for keeping CSAR alive at such a pace that our own don't lose faith in our ability to come snatch them from the Valley of the Shadow of Death on the worst day of their lives? Draw the line in the sand. Demonstrate the commitment. Spoken words are hollow. Write it. Sign your name to it and accept the accountability for the decision. If we're not willing to do that, to that level, then we have to get serious in another way. Alternative COA: Give the mission in its entirety to the US Navy. Carriers are near the fight and are mobile. Sign it all over if we're not willing to do what it takes and maintain the mission at the standard that was forged in the skies over Vietnam. The mission has been tinkered with and tossed around a few times, and every time that's happened, it hasn't been good. We had to relearn the TTPs in Desert Storm, and that only happened because enough A-1 vets were retained in the young Hog community to keep the idea alive. Draw the line and go big, or punt on fourth down. Doctrinally, the USN is the closest to the USAF CSARTF in terms of composition, so push it all over there. Zero's perfect solution because I have the pens: Get serious about what war has really been over the last forty years, and the elements that will endure REGARDLESS of the war we want to fight. Our track record on predicting future conflict is pretty terrible, so (as they love to say at Air University) use the past as prologue and keep the things that you've always somehow needed, even if you didn't want them. Get serious about the USAF commitment that's existed in this manner since the original Sandys made it clear that they would walk through Hell in a gasoline suit to bring a comrade home. That means extending the A-10 until 2035, with all that's needed for such sustainment-- depot, WIC, FTU, test, and spare parts. That timeline gives the service time to develop a proper follow-on A-10X. You can even bolt-on some after-market add-ons to make it a VERY formidable F/A-10X and take the low-end counterair vs the low-slow toys so that the super expensive machines can focus on their high-end fights. Better yet, call it the ATTACK-MULTI-role FIGHTER, or AMF. You could field it in no time since you've got a foundation that you know works-- put some new versions of the -34 on there that get 15K lbs of thrust or more, add on every means of plug-and-play munition, EW, and comm suite that already exists, and of course, keep the gun. Done. On the ramp by 2035 so that the last of the c-models can take their place in the boneyard. We need the pickup truck in an era where everyone just wants the sports cars. EVERY conflict since Desert Storm has proven that. Bottom line at the bottom is that there is a numbers game that we're losing and will continue to lose so long as we don't accept the harsh reality before us. Budgets aren't big enough to field an entire fleet of exquisite and VERY expensive fighters. You can't field an NFL team with all quarterbacks, but it's also damn near impossible to field a winning team without those high-speed, highly paid leaders who pass and carry the pigskin. You need linemen. You need knuckle-dragging brawlers. There's already not enough to go around, and the trend is continuing downward. If you're going to transfer the mission, DO IT RIGHT, and START DOING IT NOW so that the new guys can learn from the experts. If you think it's a pickup game and that you can re-learn it on the fly after your one upgrade ride four years ago, you'll be joining Jack in the Esfahan Hilton. We're already late.

Sample size of one school (unrelated to AF training) - vast majority of young CFIs suck (and we’ve ran through a lot in the last year, hired from all over the country). Their work ethic and maturity are significantly lacking is the best way to sum it up. Now add in their complete lack of experience and unwillingness to acknowledge that - it’s a recipe for bad decisions and poor instruction. I can only imagine this is plaguing these AF-contract flight schools. UPT is, for all the valid BGCs, vastly superior to a standard flight school, especially when trying to produce military pilots at scale.

I’m an equal opportunity hater - fuck em both!

Whoever made this is next level!

Pretty impressive landing roll. Actually a no roll. T/O is incredible as well. I’m not sure the tires even rotated fully.

We had a rental van in Germany year ago. We were flying down the autobahn when the dude in the passenger's seat rolled down the window....the combination of speed, airlfow and age on the van was just enough to tear the headliner loose.....BOOM....we were all suddenly sitting there covered in a cloud of insulation, it looked like a scene out of a movie, all we could do was laugh. Took us a while to get all the insulation out of our hair, teeth and flightsuits. The next day one of the guys super-glued the headliner back into place. We turned the van in a few days later and never heard a word.

I’ve returned a car OCONUS missing a door. Said “have a nice day” and left. Never heard about it ever again. Seen many GTC rentals returned all kinds of screwed up over my career, never seen or heard of anyone getting screwed (questioned by the CC is a different story).

I'm glad they didn't have a radar gun on the Destin bridge 40ish years ago.

Nope. Do it. What's the magic number? 4? Because I've been to 4 different CA cities and witnessed the horror show with my own eyes. None were SF.

Blancolirio said their airshow flying was an additional duty. Well, that should just about take care of the airshow demos in the Growler. Glad they all got out, but why a colossal waste of money and not a good look for Naval Aviation.

Look at the picture again. Dude shit in the street, not on the sidewalk. It's the little things....

Two has some spalining to do...parroting other holy cow lucky they all got out and didn't get tangled up. I thought it was AI at first...they were stuck together after first contact.

Blast from the past!

The central question was never whether Iran was a challenging environment. Nor was it whether Iran posed a serious threat, had the potential for nuclear weapons if they put their minds to it, fired ballistic missiles, or occasionally conducted special operations that targeted western citizens. All of that is true. The question was whether those conditions compelled the methods chosen — or whether they were invoked to justify choices that were poorly aligned with the United States’ own stated objectives.” He (smartly) doesn’t mention the clear “unstated” objective: to distract from other political difficulties that were becoming unmanageable. Once evaluated by that criteria suddenly everything starts to make perfect sense.

It’s the Navy way.

...and not a single pilot died. Worth it.

LGA > JFK

I think this sounds like a solution in search of a problem.

Have the F-16/15/35 doing the Sandy mission? Sandy 1 is a never ending helmet fire centered on finding the survivor, authenticating the survivor, protecting the survivor, and making the final go/no-go call. Sandy 2 has to manage comms to keep track of all the players while executing the FAC gig to defend the survivor. Sandy 3 needs to find a way in and out for Pedro/Jolly and troll the route for threats as the helo transits. All Sandys need to be down up close and personal doing "Hover Cover" with eyeballs on the pickup ready to deliver ordnance quickly on pop up threats to the helo or survivor. Doing that at 400+ knots up in the Bozosphere is not going to work. Doing that at low altitude at 400+ knots won't be any easier and certainly not an improvement over the A-10.

Believe Moose has previously identified himself on this board (view post history). Although the change in tone from ~10 years ago and this kind of writing below make me wonder if his account was hijacked, or maybe he wasn't who he said he was initially.

There are always USAFE AND PACAF jobs popping up that don’t require SDE or IDE in res. If you’re after multiple years of adventure OCONUS (and adding to your TAFMS), no need to do school to make that happen. Also, only have had one guard wg/cc who did in res school, the rest did SDE in correspondence.

In a just world, lawyers wouldn't exist, and they certainly wouldn't be involved in combat. Combat is supposed to be brutal beyond the pale to the point that anywhere a combatant hides is a valid target until there are no more targets or until the enemy gives up. America seemed to have forgotten that fact somewhere right around 1946. Somewhere along the line we decided to be "nice" when we use military force, which is how you end up with a military doing 'nation building'...the complete opposite of it's function.

We need about 300% more Growlers…but yeah, let’s burn some on airshows for no good reason. Dumbasses. Glad they’re all alive.

Shifting back to a more tactical discussion it appears the Saudis and UAE are VERY upset by the latest attacks from Iran. Pakistan has now joined the Saudis and there is talk of a ground incursion into Iraq to target the threat vector directed at the Kingdom. Saudi has recalled 50,000 reservists. Pakistan has deployed a squadron of fighters and thousands of troops to the Kingdom...next few days are going to be interesting.

Timing and spacing was good. Two, your PLF was a little off. I saw feet, butt, head. Remember to roll on your side next time.

I can’t explain that, because I don’t know. What I do know is as follows: 1) We have an artificially higher gas tax, by a significant amount. I don’t know why because our roads are terrible and they’re turning them into bike lanes. 2) My electricity rates are increased at a rate that is greater than the advertised rate of inflation (but are likely what actual inflation rates are.) 3) Trash fees, which were previously apart of property tax, just became an additional fee of $600/year. 4) $19,000 a year in state income tax at roughly $300k a year. 5) 1% property tax on a $1m home (median) is a lot. Plus community taxes. 6) We’ve created the fastest high speed rail… That doesn’t exist. 7) Probably lots of “Learing” Centers.

So 19AF can now solely focus on continuing to gut the UPT enterprise

Yeah.. not holding my breath

On the tanker in a fighter...meh. Take an under-powered Gunpig to the tanker and hold position for ten minutes while you onload 35-40K. Your CG dramatically shifts WAY aft and you fall ever further behind the power curve with the throttles bent forward and bleeds off as you refuel to 10K over max peacetime weight. That is not just a combat situation, that is every ocean crossing...each one is done with a waiver. AR in the Gunpig is no joke and not a pickup game. Does that translate to the six ship diamond pass in review 18" from another jet for a show then march to the crowd line in your overly tight blue or red jumper...probably not. The most precise flying I've ever done was not in formation but was to ten feet of altitude and one knot of airspeed shooting 27M from the friendlies (one knot can make a 10' miss on the ground), basically across the street as the team was about to be overrun. Had another shoot on night three of OEF shooting in nearly 70 knot winds...imagine the defensive egg on its side, going up wind is great as everything slows WAY down and your bank angle gets low, downwind is like riding a bucking bronco, 45+ degrees of bank, maneuvering three dimensionally as you try to put the thing on the thing and push the trigger. Anyway, matters nothing more than a fun conversation, USAF is run by an Eagle dude again and the last thing he will do is surrender ground to the other than the fighter tribe. We have FAR bigger problems to solve right now.

Well yeah obviously, you've demonstrated particularly unbiased judgment of anyone involved with this administration. It should be no surpris that the only ones you like are the ones you agree with. Tulsi is one step away from becoming a Joe Rogan conspiracy theorist. And at this point anybody who brings up Epstein should be disregarded immediately as either too dishonest or too blinded to trust their judgment or assessment of, well, anything. Just another social-mania at its finest.

At least a few minutes most flights. On the tanker (especially in the weather), battle damage checks, coming up initial in places that don't have tac initial, and if you are hitting the weather without the time/ability/desire to get everyone into a trail formation. My first pond crossing I spent most of the first 5 hours in fingertip because the weather was garbage and if you lost sight you're diverting to some random Pacific island that you don't want to land a fighter on. Flying fingertip while racehorse is a serious challenge.

I’m too lazy, so here is AI… Cuba is considered a national security threat by the U.S. government primarily due to its proximity to the U.S., its intelligence alliances with adversaries like Russia and China, and its support for hostile actors in the region. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Missile_Crisis here is a link to the Cuban missile crisis for a brief synopsis on the historical threat associated with Cuba. Let me know if you have any more questions!

Nothing will change until the mission doesn't get done in a messy and embarrassing way

Interesting how your takeaway point here is that “I could see the democrats abusing this” as opposed to “I see active abuse occurring right now in only one party that I do or do not agree with.” Making invalid hypothetical comparisons is a fallacy.

"hard to replace". Give me a break.

One of the things I miss about the 717 is no LGA or JFK.

Bid avoid LGA solves that problem.

I hope they sent a camera down that hole before the heavy equipment was moved close to it.

Valid. I've seen the other side of the coin in AFSOC where they moved too much iron to the RTU. Syllabus events are rarely waived and most studs come out (sts), full up rounds. I can't believe we continue to use terms like "buy risk" for things that cost us blood.

I think you mean the AF as a whole or the US in general.

Eh, it'll be the problem of the Sq/CC, DO, IPs, and eventually the loves ones of the pilots that don't receive the training required by an ever watered down syllabus.

So the exec mafia can get around the WIC.

Iran is waiting until the midterms. Trump wants an off-ramp, which is why he apparently had a heated discussion with Bibi yesterday.

Continues the trend of kicking the can all the way to the ops units. Pretty soon someone is going to propose we just dont do UPT or FTU....they can learn over Iran.

Ultimately we just won’t have the airframes. As we’ve done now for the last few dozen acquisition programs we’re going to build the absolute bare minimum number of T-7s and then ponder, along with the great mysteries of the universe, why small fleet dynamics are once again biting us in the ass. Vipers were built in big numbers for their time and ludicrous numbers by today’s standards. Meaning.. they’re some of the most maintainable aircraft we have, and because of that, very low impact on the force to use to run a demo team.

Except more cool...