guineapigfury

Actually it doesn't. I assumed they were pretty good at deploying the B-1s and just couldn't handle doing something different. I've come to the belief that maybe we should just have one pre-deployment center with a massive warehouse where you show up three days before your rotator to knock out all your ground training and pick up all your gear.

There was no single incident, just a continuing pattern of support agency epic failures, particularly for our deployers. I left prior to the transition, so I can't speak to how changing the wing patch affected the squadron.

MQ-9s weren't on your list, but if you're graduating UPT soon there is a non-zero chance you'll be stuck flying them in a few years. 1. Ops tempo: awful, I routinely worked 70+ hours a week. Deployments: not enough, I only got 1 that lasted 5 months. It was a nice break from the misery of home station. 2. Lifestyle/Family Stability: You'll sleep in your own bed, but 1/3 of the time you'll be sleeping in the middle of the day. If your absolute number one goal is to avoid deployments and TDYs, MQ-9s have got you covered. It seemed like someone was getting divorced every couple of months, but you never know what's really driving those. 3. Community Morale: Zero to very low. I'm shocked no-one at my last squadron killed themself. Things were/are that bad. We have a retention crisis that will not be abating any time in the foreseeable future. 4. Advancements & Future of the Airframe: There are two tracks in MQ-9s: one for the shiny pennies who parachute in to be SQ/CCs and DOs and one for the unfortunate bastards flying the line. If you're looking for any kind of career broadening (staff/instruct at UPT/white jets) you can forget it. These things aren't going away so you'll have job security. 5. PCS locations: Ugh. Two undesirable locations in New Mexico. Vegas is your most likely option. There is also Ellsworth AFB, SD which is a lovely location with a terrible wing if you're in the MQ-9 squadron. After my time there, I wouldn't shit on the 28th BW if it was on fire. YMMV. On the plus side there are Guard & Reserve locations all over, which is nice.

I picked up mine in Nov 2011 at the Baltimore FSDO.

If the bonus goes up, here's my prediction: Year 1: Max Money for Fighter Pilots and maybe Drone Pilots. Year 2: Max Money for Fighter Pilots, Drone Pilots and maybe everyone else. Year 3: Max Money for all Pilots when Fingers realizes "Oh shit, I'm out of pilots" and "I'm retiring in 6 months, I don't give a fuck"

I used to fly KC-135s and I have some friends who've flown C-5s. I'll caveat that this is all AD gouge and may be stale. The cargo mission involves a lot of flying from point A to point B, with a wide selection of As and Bs to pick from. The tanker mission involves a lot of taking off at point A then refueling someone and then landing back at point A with a less wide selection of As to pick from.

That's what I've got and it's magnificent. Strong recommend.

They're fighting it because administering a system to monitor every single servicemember's lease or mortgage will cost more than just giving people a flat rate. We have data on this system (OHA); there is no need to run this experiment. We already know that if you don't let people keep the "unspent" BAH, they will go and find a more expensive place. This already happens with literally every servicemember living offbase overseas. We are about to take the shitty system where we buy new flat screens every September and multiply it buy the number of servicemembers living off base in the CONUS. I propose a different solution: let us keep our current BAH and I will report to the nearest US Mint with my flamethrower and incinerate several million dollars. The net result will be the same fiscally.

That's why those services won't be in the contract, they'll be agreed to by handshake. This is a bad deal for the taxpayer, but at least the maids and landscapers won't be hurting for work.

My prediction is that this will be one big nothing, just like DADT repeal. We all do a one-off CBT and get back to work. Can't figure out someone's wacky pronouns ... try Rank LastName or callsign. We're looking at something like 1/3 of 1% of servicemembers here, I have a difficult time seeing how there will be too much fuss.

Firing, firing squad ... let's not get quibble over grammar.

pour encourager les autres

No it isn't. The EU will make a show of telling off the UK, realize that 17% of Europe's economy walking out the door is a bad thing and then invite them to take a deal similar to Norway's. The UK will then gladly accept that deal.

They also have goat NCOs in their Army. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Windsor_(goat)

The 18Xers are TDY, they're being forced into a hotel. 92T0s are PCS'd to their UPT base and the rules for that are different. For reference, the F-16 students are PCS'd here and may live wherever they like.

I believe HMN is getting a new Wing/CC soon, hopefully the lodging policy will change. The way they sold it was as if students were sitting at the on-base hotel on alert, waiting for the call to go do an EP sim. I would have a lot more respect for the outgoing CC if he had said "My hotel is rundown. I need money to fix it and the only source for that money is people using that hotel. Therefore I am requiring you to stay there because I need the money." On the plus side, taking away normal lodging options from FTU students should acclimate them to the fact that the USAF does not care about quality of life for RPA aircrew.

Too late. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/23/the-brexit-contagion-how-france-italy-and-the-netherlands-now-wa/

Not sure that attached staff guys helping out is a valid COA. I've seen situations go from "nothing to see here" gathering PoL to impacts in less than 2 minutes. A guy flying twice a month probably cannot deliver that consistently. There isn't always time to do a seat swap or even send a safety observer. We could put those guys to use doing transit or on a quiet line, but sometimes even your best crews are worn out and they need the easy flight for the night.

I think letting people come back in from civilian life to take what maybe the single most important job in the USAF (SQ/CC) would breed enormous resentment. If we want people to gain experience and come back, we should expand the sabbatical program. If the sabbatical becomes normalized and valid path for high performers to take (analogous to a school slot), I have no objection. If that took the form of going in residence to a top notch civilian school to get a relevant degree, that could be an amazing benefit for the Air Force. However, I'm not sure that separating and reentering would or should give people any extra looks at promotion other than slipping a couple yeargroups to the right. You're right that MQ-9s are dysfunctional for a multitude of reasons, but outsider leadership is one of the very few variables we can actually control. RPA commanders of any sort should have to be 11Us or 18Xs with at least 1000 RPA hours. Also, to the max extent possible they need to have some blood on their hands (N/A for Global Hawks).

I think it would aggravate the problem of risk aversion. If you start hiring CCs off the street you're reducing the number of slots for career officers. Now they're squabbling over an ever shrinking piece of the pie. The rational response is to micromanage your people so nothing ever goes wrong on your watch. Why develop your people, we'll just hire leaders from Facebook. YGBFSM. If you want to see how this concept would work out, look at the nonstop clown orgy that is the MQ-9 community. Good people flying the line with little to no hope of career advancement led by shiny penny outsiders without relevant experience ... it's going as well as the retention numbers indicate.

Let's take people with zero miltary experience and start them as Group Commanders, what could possibly go wrong? There is a much better fix mentioned in the article: filling these hard to fill spots with GS personnel. That solves the pay issue and mitigates the lack of military experience by keeping them out of uniform.

My decision to separate next year keeps getting easier.

Then there is hope. I can't tell you how happy this post makes me.

I'm the last guy to defend Big Blue, but the last bunch of UPT directs were told they could leave then allowed to do so. We'll see.

I started UPT 9 years ago, we had 32 IIRC, then 3 additions for phase 3 from Whiting. I think of those we graduated 26 on time. 2 Washouts, 1 Medical DQ, 2 washbacks, and the Qatari guy had to go home for his arranged marriage and rejoined a later class.