TnkrToad

Why would the bonus go up for RPA pilots, when 11Us had the second-highest take rate of all pilot types (after 11Hs)?

A few notes from the final ARP report that seem interesting: - It doesn't mention the fact that overall take rate decreased significantly from last year (59% in FY14 to 55% in FY15), despite lots more money being thrown at the problem. In FY14, only fighter bubbas were offered the 20 YAS ($225k) option, whereas this year all pilots were. - It makes no mention of the fact that the early take rate was significantly lower this year--28.9% (217/751) than it was last year--38.0% (283/745. This would seem a leading indicator of even-lower final take rates next year - Separations were way up as well; there were 73 normal separations out of 82 total separations in FY15--the last time this number was so high was in '99/'00 during the last big airline hiring boom - On an optimistic note, the 71% loss rate among eligible mobility pilots was a marked improvement from the previous year. In FY14, it was 101% (due to force shaping, I'm sure) Can't wait to see what the rated force managers do with the bonus next year. TT

I fully agree that reducing Phase III flying hours for the T-1 would be a bad idea. Like Griswold, I agree your per flying hour cost for the tanker seems awfully low. Please explain, though; how is it that dudes who graduate from both UPT and 135 FTU are unsafe? Have standards slipped that significantly? Not a trick question; it's been quite a while since I flew the might tanker so things might have changed from my day, but I never considered folks fresh out of Altus "a long way from being safe." Sure, there were were some who slipped through the cracks, but for the most part they seemed to do just fine. If Altus is consistently producing unsafe tanker copilots (which is what I gather from what you wrote above), that's a pretty damning accusation.

Dude, I've spent more than enough time in joint billets (and remember joint is spelled A-R-M-Y), so I've got a pretty darn good appreciation for the Air Force vs. Army ways of doing things. We're mostly talking past each other at this point. Bottom line, in my mind, the Air Force spends more time and money paying and training its RPA pilots, but uses its RPA pilots as RPA pilots way more efficiently than the Army. The added efficiency, from everything I can tell on this forum from AF folks, more than compensates for the higher per-individual cost of using officers rather than enlisted. I'll let the folks who actually fly Air Force RPAs duke it out with you over Air Force officer vs. Army enlisted training standards/relative responsibility/whatever other factors that come into play. If you guys in the Army can hire quality folks directly from civilian life, make them warrant officers, send them directly through fixed wing flying training (not have them serve as enlisted grunts first), and manage to keep them on active duty past their min commitments (despite the notable Army suck), more power to you. I personally have yet to read a rational, dispassionate, convincing argument in favor of changing the Air Force model to match the Army construct, so I remain convinced that enlisted or warrant officer pilots are a bad idea for the Air Force. Feel free to keep arguing your point, but I'm going to step away from this tit-for-tat discussion; neither of us is going to convince the other to change views. Cheers, TT

It's 30 Sep, so thought I'd update everyone really quickly: FY15 initial pilot take rate = 55.2% (slightly better than last year's 53%, but force management was also in effect last FY) -- According to last year's report, the take rate would have been 59% without force management. Also, don't forget many folks were given the 20YAS option that wasn't offered to many in the prior FY FY15 early pilot take rate = 29% (significantly less than last year's 38% early take rate) -- This seems an early indicator that take rates will really suck next year The two communities with the lowest take rates are: Fighter (47.8%) and C2ISR (55.3%) -- The two communities with the lowest early take rates are: Bomber (17.6%) and Fighter (19.6%) -- Bottom line, the retention outlook looks really bad for the CAF, but realistically is pretty bad across the board. Maybe a whole lotta folks are furiously working their computers and signing the bonus as I write this, and the numbers will significantly change. I suspect not. TT

Major muscle movement: The Army's RPA operation, relative to the Army's overall size, comprises a much smaller proportion of the service's overall operations, when compared to relative weight of effort within the Air Force. Really big green Army (compared to USAF) + small number of RPAs (again relative to Air Force) = much different organizational problem sets for the Army and Air Force. As you already noted, the Army is "swimming in personnel," at least with regard to RPA operators. I suspect this is the reason the Army doesn't yet have manning issues with its enlisted RPA pilot force; once the Army reaches the same level of productivity as the Air Force currently "enjoys," I imagine Army retention will start to decrease accordingly. Manpower equivalency: It is ridiculously expensive to maintain troops downrange, vs. keeping them home station. Two non-deploying Capts at Nellis are way cheaper than three CW2s and three E-6s operating on a 1:3 dwell . . . especially when one considers all the additional support infrastructure required to feed/house/protect those warrants and enlisted troops downrange. Read my prior post: If we ramp up OTS, we don't pay for 4-5 years of undergrad schooling, and don't worry about folks trying to get manned cockpits, because they were hired for and trained to fly RPAs. Warrant officers direct to fixed wing, manned aircraft: Similar to the enlisted RPA pilot retention argument above; you don't have a valid historical basis to work from. From what you've written, it remains to be seen what will happen with the Army's retention of its fixed wing aviators. The argument that the Air Force should just do what the Army does and use warrants to fly fixed wing doesn't fly (pun intended) unless you can show that the Army is successfully retaining folks who started their Army careers in fixed wing--and are willing to remain in the Army, despite the current hiring environment. The Air Force did ok for pilot retention, too . . . until the airlines started hiring like crazy. If you're saying that the Army has offered up its warrant officers to fly Air Force RPAs as individual augmentees, and the Air Force turned the Army down, this would be huge news. I would hope somebody with seniority on this forum would take this offer and run with it. My original statement still stands: enlisted or warrant officer pilots--for the Air Force--would be a ridiculously bad idea. I suspect the only reason it's being considered by senior Air Force leaders is that we don't have enough O-4 and O-5 types staying on AD (see the ACP discussion)--who, if they were on staffs, would be telling senior Air Force leaders how dumb the enlisted/warrant officer pilot idea is. TT

This is why I sometimes write long posts . . . short ones fail to include vital information. - "Full capacity" in the Army is very different from full capacity in the Air Force. Given the comparatively puny number of orbits the Army provides to joint warfighters relative to the Air Force, and considering how the Army has way more people than the Air Force to start with, the Army's effort to grow and maintain its RPA operator force can hardly be described as a major muscle movement. It is unsurprising that the Army is able to successfully grow a small, niche career field within its massive overall organization. - The underlying premise of the enlisted vs. officer pilot argument is that enlisted pilots are cheaper than officer pilots. This idea needs to be examined. The Army RPA construct is (unsurprisingly, it's the Army we're talking about here) manpower-intensive. A relatively small fraction of the Army's enlisted RPA operators are actually providing direct support to warfighter on a given day, because only those who are forward-deployed actually support combat operations. Those back at home station, in keeping with the Army's organic support model, are doing exactly squat for the warfighter. Meanwhile, proportionally and numerically way more Air Force RPA operators are fully employed in support of warfighters, while home station. - Riddle me this: How many Army enlisted RPA pilots would be required to provide the same level (60 CAPs and growing) of warfighter support), and how many more other troops would be required to house, feed, protect them, etc., at their forward locations? Unless and until you can prove that the aggregate costs associated with the Army model, on a per CAP basis--what really matters to the warfighter, is cheaper than the Air Force model (good luck with that), you need to at least be honest about the flaws in your basic argument. - I don't get what you're saying with, "Meanwhile you can't force guys out of fixed wing because it's not the Army an there is literally no upper limit to promotion since the community flow is so well managed compared to helo's." I'm not a smart man, but this makes no sense to me. If you're telling me that the Army sends some number of its officers and warrants directly into fixed wing, and has no problem retaining those individuals past the end of their initial commitments in today's hiring environment, I'm sure all of us would love to hear what the Army's secret is. Again, I suspect you left out some key data point/idea. Also, there is an upper limit to promotion in the warrant officer ranks. It stops at W-5. Officers can press on to O-10. Seems pretty clear to me there's a significantly lower upper limit for warrants, vs. officers. In fairness, that might be a distinction without a difference, since many are happy not to have their lives run by the Colonel's group. Not trying to get in a pissing contest here, but as stated above, trying to provide value-added info for those on the forum who care. I really look forward to hearing what the Army's secret for retaining its fixed wing pilots is, and if the Army's policies could be effectively translated into the Air Force. I'm not holding my breath, however. Fly safe, TT

Shack. The enlisted pilot concept is one of those dumb ideas that simply won't go away. Yes, we had enlisted pilots in the 20s and 30s, and also during WW II. The Army could get away with it, because (1) something called the Great Depression provided a powerful incentive for folks to stay on active duty, even if they were working for enlisted wages, and (2) those enlisted pilots were competing for active duty officer billets. Some of the best pilots during the interwar period were enlisted aviators. The other two primary members of Chennault's "Three Men on a Flying Trapeze" demo team were enlisted aviators . . . but guess what? They were reserve officers who, when their one or two-year active-duty stints were up, accepted the demotion to enlisted status to stay on active duty. On the days they flew in demo's, they wore their reserve officer rank. They got commissioned later on active duty, in conjunction with the wartime buildup. Don't forget that it was the Army Air Corps and Army Air Forces that had enlisted pilots. Of course the Army wanted its aviators to be enlisted, because if they became officers, they might end up running the Army. The Army couldn't wait for the Air Force to become an independent service after the war, lest airmen take over the whole organization. Imagine how much worse it would have been for the ground service, if all the enlisted pilots/navs/bombardiers were made officers. They might have more-senior and smarter (airmen typically scored 10 IQ points higher than their ground counterparts during the war) air officers commanding non flyers. Think of active duty enlisted pilots in the military as something akin to regional pilots in the commercial world. It's a neat idea, and it can work, so long as folks see it as a stepping stone to greater things. Folks have embraced the suck in the regional world, because they perceived a long-term future benefit (transition to major airlines). Short term pain, long-term gain. The problem for the Air Force is that the primary avenue for long-term gain for enlisted aviators would be the commercial RPA industry (or if we ever trained enlisted pilots of manned aircraft, the airline industry). At least if you train officers to fly RPAs, there's a more reasonable monetary incentive to stay in. Looking at ACP take rates, though, the monetary incentive is far from adequate. Creating enlisted pilots would strike me as ridiculously penny-wise and pound-foolish. We'd spend a whole bunch of time and money to train them, then they would simply get out at the end of their initial enlistments and take their skills to the commercial world. They'd be fools not to. Creating an Air Force warrant officer corps is equally problematic. The Army system works great, because that service primarily flies helos. Retaining helo pilots on active duty is much easier because, oddly enough, there are proportionally fewer lucrative opportunities in the civil sector. If there are any Army warrants who have gone directly into fixed wing, I'd love to hear what their retention stats are right now. They can stay in the Army, knowing that they'll run into a ceiling promotion-wise, or take their skills to the civil sector and makes way more cash than they ever could in the Army--while (even more importantly) not having to be in the Army. It would seem to be a helluva lot smarter to ramp up Air Force OTS production. Provide liberal bootstrap opportunities for medically-qualified enlisted folks and advertise extensively in colleges/universities for folks to earn their commissions and become RPA pilots. You avoid creating a whole warrant officer corps for a relatively niche career field, and you can get your officers relatively quickly and cheaply (especially since many quality enlisted folks already have their undergrad degrees, or at least are working on them). Of course, the Air Force doesn't like to read its own history. We'll probably try the enlisted pilot thing, realize it was a dumb idea from the outset and we should have known better . . . and scrap it, having further delayed getting the RPA pilot community healthy manning-wise. TT

The feminization of the Air Force (and I assume the other services) has been going on for some time now. I think it was a couple years ago that I looked at the male vs. female promo rates to O-4, O-5 and O-6 for the previous four or five promo boards. Bottom line, I figured out that though promo rates for females only seemed slightly higher than those for males, the cumulative differences over multiple promo cycles added up. I calculated that a female O-3 had 37.3% chance of making O-6, and a male O-3 had a 30.2% chance. That means that females were 24% more likely to eventually make O-6 than their male counterparts. Anecdotally, it often seems like the high-power dual-military couples I know, the husband separates/retires and flies for the airlines, while the wife stays in, due to her greater Air Force career prospects. This is crazy to me, since (again in my experience--that's all I can speak to) I've not found females to be substantially better officers/aviators than their male counterparts--they're certainly not 24% better. With clearly more emphasis from senior leaders on pushing/promoting based on gender and other factors, I can only assume that the disparity will only increase. This social engineering has gotta stop. TT

I think you and I are in violent agreement, but we have different audiences in mind. - For those individuals on this forum who are (or will soon be) making the decision whether not to punch, of course they can read from this discussion that the near-term outlook is not great in the Air Force and make plans accordingly. It's a great time to forego the bonus in favor of greener pastures in the civil sector. If you want to get out, go for it. More power to ya' - For those on this forum who, for whatever reason (they're senior leaders, Lts a decade away from bonus eligibility, or just morbidly curious) care about the long-term future of the Air Force, I like to think I'm providing a degree of value-added insight. I haven't seen anyone else discussing what seems to me to be a very low early bonus take rate on this forum, even though I think it's significant. I'd love to hear how the Air Force is doing with keeping people past 20--a metric which I think bears directly on the discussion of ACP bonuses--but either nobody on this forum knows, or if they do they're not talking There have been folks on this forum who were/are/claim to be associated with rated force management and/or senior AF leaders. As such individuals contemplate this year's take rate, I hope they'll consider the low early bonus take rate (and I suspect low retention of aviators past 20 yrs) as a "canary in the coal mine" and use this data (along with other relevant data points) to adjust future years' rated management programs to make them effective. If our senior leaders fail to do what they can, within the scope of their respective authority, responsibility and human endurance, to address problems within the rated force . . . then go back to bullet point one--it's a great time to get out. I, for one, hope for the good of the Air Force and our nation that--between better bonus options, more sane personnel policies, reversing social engineering efforts, etc.--more quality folks will decide to remain on AD. TT

Low take rates would be bad news for everyone: - Let's say we go back to the late 90s/very early 2000s. Take rates went as low as 28% and as high as 42% (averaged 33%) between FY97 and FY01 -- Today's senior leaders were those who took the bonus and/or stayed in past 20yr retirement eligibility during that time of increased airline hiring -- It took 9/11 and the '07-'08 financial crisis to get the take rates back to the mid-60s, where it remained from FY03 to FY13 - If you haven't liked the Air Force's leadership decisions over the past decade, when we've had pretty healthy retention of quality individuals to fill command and staff billets, then I doubt you'll like when we pick our commanders and their staffs based solely on "last man standing" Perhaps in the long run, the shock of bleeding talent will force Big Blue to adjust it policies in such a way that adequate numbers of quality individuals will want to stay in and keep the service moving forward. Tim Kane's Bleeding Talent (as just one example) was published in 2012, which means he identified and started writing about the problem well before that, and JQP's blog has been going for a little while now . . . but I've seen little movement thus far toward addressing fundamental problems that drive folks out of the service. As I've said in a different thread on this forum, senior Air Force (and more broadly senior military) leaders aren't the only issue; they can only do so much to unscrew what our senior civilian leaders have done to discourage mil service. Bottom line: low retention rates now + slow/ignorant AF bureaucracy + even more ignorant civilian leadership - another major crisis (9/11 style attack or financial downturn) = significant Air Force leadership & culture problems for the foreseeable future On a more optimistic note, if take rates next year are high (or at least indicate a significant improvement), that would be a sign the Air Force is doing something right, and is taking meaningful steps to address fundamental concerns within the force. TT

While this FY's overall take rate remains low, what seems even more significant is the low early take rate thus far of just 22.5%. - Last year, 283 pilots out of 743 eligible signed up early for the bonus, for a total early take rate of 38.1% of eligibles. Only 100 more FY15 eligibles have signed up this FY, so almost three quarters of this FY's bonus takers were folks who signed up for the bonus last year - Thus far this FY, only 168 pilots out of 746 FY16 initial eligibles (22.5%) have signed up for the bonus. If next year follows this year's trend, where the majority of takers sign up early, we could be looking at an overall take rate of 30-40% next year. Welcome back to the late '90s Bottom line, unless a whole heckuva a lot of folks have been waiting 'til the last month to sign up, next year is shaping up to be pretty ugly for bonus take rates. I hope I'm wrong. TT

Methinks getting rid of "up or out" would be easier if someone bothered to tell decision makers why it was originally instituted. It's not Friday, but here's the history lesson: - WW II created a huge number of officers from a very small number of year groups (basically six: mid-1939 to mid-1945), much like WW I did before it - The situation was especially bad in the Air Force, because the interwar Army had so screwed over the Air Service/Air Corps for manning before '39. The AAF had to grow way faster than the ground Army did during the war, which led to even bigger year-group imbalances within the air arm -- At its wartime peak of 2.4M in March 1944, all but maybe 1% of the AAF had less than 5 years of mil service. This created a huge "pig in a python" personnel-wise, since it would be decades before those folks were forced to retire due to age restrictions. -- The net result was that the Air Force would essentially have been filled by same five or six year groups' worth of folks, which would have left no room for new blood--with the fresh ideas and energy that young officers bring to the fight - Up or out policies sought to address this concern by forcing attrition at the senior ranks and those with higher time in service, in order to make more room for younger year groups that were the future of the Air Force In short, the Up or Out system was built because too many people wanted to stay in, which led to imbalance within the service. What we have now is the exact opposite problem--too few want to stay in, especially those in high-demand career fields. The overall problem is no longer getting rid of dead weight and making room for new talent as it is retaining quality so there can be some level of experience and stability. The problem set today is 180 degrees out from the circumstances that drove up-or-out. The solutions should be significantly different, as well. The problem is that fixing military personnel policies won't fix our civilian leaders' cluelessness wrt appropriate use of military force, inability to comprehend military culture, or incapacity to get along and overcome budget impasses in congress. Civilian-driven missteps are a major factor in discouraging quality individuals from remaining on active duty. I am an optimist at heart, and I take this discussion as a positive sign that our senior civ & mil leaders are least acknowledging there is a problem. I have little hope that we will fix our hemorrhaging of talent, though, until we quit with the social engineering efforts and attacks on military culture which discourage voluntary service. TT

No argument here. I fully agree that the AF tends to select folks for senior leadership way too early. I've observed before on this forum that many of today's senior leaders were folks who took the bonus and/or elected to stay on AD in the mid- to late-90s when we last saw a major airline hiring spree. Plenty of great folks stayed in too and have been working to keep this ship afloat, but I figure Rat got to the position he did in no small measure because a lot of his competition got out. Poor retention leads to limited options, which leads to a greater likelihood of crappy leaders getting selected for command. What concerns me going forward is that our leaders have typically had graybeard O-4/O-5 types who were not on the command track who had the will and ability to tell these guys that their decisions/policies sucked, and why. My impression (accurate or not) is that such graybeards hardly exist anymore on AD. I get that the Rat-esque types are impervious to logic, but some are good folks who are simply inexperienced/in over their heads and need help. I remember General Horner talking about how he depended on a bunch of passed-over O-4s to run the Desert Storm air war. If the only aviators we retain past 20 yrs service are (1) careerists bucking for O-6 and (2) O-5s sitting in cushy jobs at Hickam/USAFA/other sweet locations where they're happy to stay on AD so long as they don't have to move, then the negative impact of toxic and/or clueless leaders will be amplified. Simply retaining enough raw numbers of aviators via the bonus and other programs is no panacea, but at least it could give true reformers some help and breathing room. The stats for this year's bonus aren't promising (barely over 50%, with a month to go). If retention of folks past 20 is trending significantly downward, we can count on more Rat's in the future.

Anyone seen stats on how many are staying past 20? If so, I'd be curious to hear what the trend is. My guess is it ain't good. Those who took the bonus and stuck it out 'til 20 are free agents (barring other ADSCs they incurred beyond the bonus). If retention of those folks decreases significantly, simultaneously with low bonus take rates (still sitting at just 50.6%), I really gotta wonder where Big Blue is going to get competent O-6 and above commanders and staff officers to lead the organization. Considering all of JQP's blog posts about leadership problems we already have, I shudder to think it likely to get worse as quality folks see greener pastures in the airlines/elsewhere when they reach 20 (if they even make it that far). I hope, as the Air Force contemplates next year's bonus (and rated force management writ large), they consider the long-term outlook for retaining quality folks--not just to fill cockpits and staff jobs, but senior leadership positions. If not, seems to me the Air Force will be taken over by helicopter pilots (they seem to be the only pilot group taking the bonus), then non-aviators--by default.

So, the article says that the increase will be met with "the Army contributing as many as 16 and the military's Special Forces Command pitching in with as many as four." I assume Special Forces Command is SOCOM . . . which means either the 160th or AFSOC--which (last I checked) belong to the Army and Air Force, respectively. I assume the 160th won't add an additional 4 CAPs beyond whatever it provides now, especially if it continues to operate under the same organic model it currently employs--which would mean AFSOC will get to take on that additional requirement. Some thoughts: - The Army's plan to expand its RPA fleet by 16 CAPs within 4 years will demonstrate how invalid the organic model is. They'll destroy their RPA community if they keep them forward-deployed in theater, collocated with their users. Hopefully they'll "see the light" and move toward the Air Force distributed ops model . . . of course, if they go with the distributed ops model, then they'll largely invalidate their excuse for maintaining their own, separate RPA fleet. - SOCOM's plan to provide an additional 4 CAPs within 4 years indicates that AFSOC will get the "opportunity" to grow its RPA fleet even more. The 160th won't cover the additional 4 CAPs SOCOM has promised, so the Air Force won't get a break from COCOM requirements--they'll just shift the requirement from ACC RPAs to AFSOC RPAs. The reduction in Air Force CAPs will be more shell game than reality - The plan to have contractors provide 10 more CAPs seems equally suspect; most likely the operators for those CAPs will be prior-mil folks, enticed away from the service by better pay & QOL in the civil sector. Even if the Air Force grows its RPA community numerically, it'll be awfully difficult to grow its experience base--at least in the near term I'm spitballing with all the above--I know little beyond what the article says and prior discussions on this board--but the DoD's math just doesn't add up. Anybody have additional insight into how the RPA expansion plan might realistically work? Is anyone optimistic that the Army will finally get a clue and abandon the organic support model? TT

Good point. Given the overall budget, it seems an off-the-shelf, IFR-capable GA aircraft for 11Xs in RPA billets and (I would add) nonflying staff billets would be a reasonably cheap way to maintain pilot skills & thus shorted initial qual/requal training in much more expensive jets. If nothing else, the USAF could fund X hrs a month in a similar aircraft at the base flying club or local airport.

Having personally known three people who were very directly and personally impacted by T-3 crash fatalities, I'm glad the Air Force bulldozed them. I didn't know about the NPTS fatal crash (in an unmodified Firefly, I presume) until I read it above, but that tends to confirm my feelings. In the grand scheme of things, the money the Air Force forewent by not selling the T-3s to civilians was budget dust for AETC. Better to have the peace of mind that nobody else was going to die in an airplane multiple AD pilots refused to fly.

Thought I'd provide a quick update for anyone who cares: - FY15 Initial Pilot take rate: Overall--49.6% -- General: 33.3% -- Fighter: 42.9% -- Bomber: 48.6% -- SOF: 50% -- Mobility: 50.5% -- Unmanned: 51.2% -- C2ISR: 53.8% -- Rescue: 77.1% Note: 77% of the FY15 initial eligibles took signed the bonus early last FY. The number of those taking the early bonus this FY don't look promising. See below. - FY15 Early Pilot take rates: Overall--17.6% -- Fighter: 11.6% -- Bomber: 12.5% -- Mobility: 15% -- SOF: 19.7% -- General: 20% -- C2ISR: 29.7% -- Unmanned: 40% -- Rescue: 48.8% Note: The relatively high number of Unmanned and Rescue early takers indicates that AFPC is actively processing early bonus packages. The low (<20%) early take rates for fighter, bombers, mobility and even SOF don't look good for next year's program.

The point of recommending a joint unit is that it either 1) actually helps increase capacity, or 2) demonstrates that the Army isn't all that serious about supporting ground forces downrange . . . and if the Army doesn't even care about ground forces it's hard to say the Air Force isn't doing enough. - From our Army brethren who frequent this forum, I gather that the Army has quite a few former Kiowa warrant officer types who 1) are now free agents, and 2) would apparently be happy as clams to do the RPA mission. If that is in fact so, and given that these guys are already aviators, it sure looks like a great way for the Army to help support its own folks downrange, while taking care of their own folks. - If the Army balks at the idea, even though from what I can tell it makes too much sense, then they can explain to the geographic COCOMs why they don't want to support downrange ground forces with the excess capacity they apparently have. It furthermore makes it easier for the Air Force to pull back on the number of CAPs we're supporting: if the Army not only (as discussed above) is holding a bunch of its availability in the CONUS because of their misguided organic support concept and they furthermore refuse to do what they can by providing manpower to Creech/Cannon/wherever, then it's much easier for Big Blue to turn down COCOM requirements and give its folks some breathing room (or at the very least counter the narrative that says the Air Force doesn't care about guys on the ground). Seems like a reasonable COA to me. The Army cares about ground troops and I'm an optimist, so I think this idea might work. TT

The simple answer is that the Army way is grossly inefficient, and in a time of huge budgetary constraints, is moronic. The Army concept, as I understand it, is that their RPAs are organic to their divisions, and hence their RPAs deploy and redeploy with the rest of the divisions they support. Like most Army programs, this makes their RPA operations way more manpower-intensive for the effect achieved, and puts more boots on the ground in harm's way when they are being operationally employed. While it's really neat that they use enlisted and/or warrants to operate their RPAs, the fact the operators deploy to theater rather than remaining at home and conducting split ops inherently makes the Grey Eagle way more costly on an effects per dollar basis than Air Force RPAs. Bottom line, this RPA discussion reflects differences between the Army and Air Force approaches to aviation that go way back to the interwar period. We figured out in Northwest Africa in 1943 how screwed up penny-packeting of airpower was, and George C. Marshall's approval of FM 100-20 in July or so of that year should have helped settle this issue, but we're still fighting the same battle seven decades later. I would love to see an apples-to-apples comparison between Army Grey Eagles and Air Force Preds/Reapers: given the total cost of manpower, equipment, bandwidth, whatever in the Army's and Air Force's respective programs, how much does one hour worth of CAS orbit cost? I suspect the split ops method is way more efficient, and thus provides way more operational effects to the deployed warfighter than the grunt way. Here's a suggestion, since as I understand it a huge amount of our RPA ops support ground units: - Make Air Force RPA squadrons joint organizations - Train Army warrant officers to fly Air Force RPAs - If feasible (again, I'm not an RPA guy), equip Air Force Preds & Reapers with the same auto land system the Army uses, since apparently it will save both airframes and downrange manpower The Army warrants would be intimately familiar with ground force commander requirements, it would preclude creating a whole new warrant officer corps in the Air Force (the only viable career field in the Air Force where warrants might be used is RPAs), and all those Army Kiowa pilots would have somewhere to go. Edited because I accidentally posted before I finished my thought.

So...your solution for solving very real manning issues in the Air Force RPA community is to tell Army ground units that they will only get support from Army RPAs? You're right; it definitely would reduce the workload for the Air Force. I'm not sure all your deployed Army buddies would be happy with the natural consequences of your plan, however.

Do you have a better idea for rapidly increasing RPA pilot production, while meeting COCOM requirements?

If so, this would be a very big deal. The Air Force has a crappy track record for getting guys into geographic COCOM command billets. Prior to Breedlove (USAF), the only other AF officers to serve as SACEUR/EUCOM Commander were Norstad (from '56-63) and Ralston ('00-'03) . . . and Ralston got the job as a booby prize for not becoming CJCS (long-term adulterous affairs have a way of scuttling leaders' ambitions). As it is, Breedlove is only the second Air Force general in the post in over 50 years. What would really be crazy is if PACOM ever had something other than a Navy admiral in command. Until John McCain finally retires from the Senate, though, I'd say the chances of that happening are somewhere between slim and none. If you're looking for some interesting reading, though, check out H.R. McMaster's Dereliction of Duty; Air Force general Jake Smart was scored as the best qualified to take command during the Johnson administration, but shady dealings prevented that from happening. TT

- Actually, I'm talking about folks with 8 year commitments who were treated like this. Don't confuse length of commitment with COCOMs' insatiable appetite for airpower - Command should never be a perk of staying on AD. Selecting commanders by default--whoever bothers to stay in gets to lead a group of steely-eyed killers--strikes me as a recipe for disaster - We don't all agree that a de facto warrant officer program is a good idea. While it's awesome that the ARC provides a relative wealth of talent & experience, to be called on when necessary, keeping the ARC focused on tactical-level excellence and the AD even more focused on getting folks through SUPT/RTU/SOS/WIC is no way to build a competent, professional force capable of executing air/space/cyber power at the operational and strategic levels If we are going to have the Air Force that our nation needs, we need to adequately retain and highly train enough long-serving professional AD USAF officers--from an appropriate cross section of AFSCs--to execute the mission. I don't see your plan meeting this intent. Alternate COA: - Targeted promo rates, based on AFSC: helps ensure folks with proper backgrounds are represented in leadership and important staff positions. Also provides added incentive for quality individuals to crossflow to RPAs/wherever the AF is hurting - Targeted bonuses, based on AFSC and year group: for those who have needed expertise but do not desire command, it offers a way to keep them on AD & hence contributing to the mission -- Part of the frustration you might have sensed in my earlier post stems from HAF/A1 cluelessness. A particular community might be adequately manned overall, but that does not mean certain year groups within that community aren't being/haven't been crushed. Straying away from my 11M diatribe, when/if the RPA community ever reaches 100% manning, ask one of the O-5 types at that time how healthy they think their community is. The few grey beards they have will have been overworked for the majority of their careers, and the FNGs will be stacked like cord wood in the squadron and fighting for additional duties. Doesn't sound like a healthy organization to me. - Rather than cutting the AD service commitment for SUPT (which would further drive up AD training costs--constantly training FNGs then sending them to the airlines and/or ARC), take measures to minimize admin queep: 1) eliminate valueless training/reporting/surveys/etc., and 2) hire additional admin personnel to cover any necessary yet burdensome admin requirements that are left I could go into a whole history lesson about how a microcosm of the plan you're suggesting was tried with the Army Air Corps in the 1930s (train lots of folks, keep them on AD for short period of time, send them to the Reserves, keep a totally inadequate number of long-serving professionals on active duty), and how that led to disastrous wartime results, but it's not Friday and I've already spent too much time on this post. Airpower über alles, TT