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Problem solved, then

It works great, a lot better than MAAPTK’s tanker pairing. The old board is still on the wall for historic significance.

No fighter pilots on staff is having noticeable effects from what I’ve experienced. The high dollar LFEs are run mostly by boomer civilians with no concept of modern tactics; the conclusions are pre-drawn and mostly centered on proving they need more billions for an acquisition. The bureaucratic requirements are through the roof, then executed horribly leading to delays and frustration. The AOCs are run by “not my job” civilians, boomer guard ABMs, and like FLEA said, cross-trained 13Os that have no business planning or executing an air campaign. Acquisitions have been totally handed over to snake oil salesmen, because there is no one left in staff with the talent or energy to know otherwise. This is what happens when you take your best prospects, spend millions on them to mold their brains into the world’s best by a years-long process that only exists in mil aviation, then let them walk out the door when their commitment is up. It is a criminal waste of taxpayer dollars.

This entire war is amazing to watch. Russia’s only off ramp to return to normalcy is if the FSB kills Putin and his successor says, “yeah, he was a crazy asshole, good riddance, now who wants to buy some oil?” I’d put $69 on it happening within the year.

It’s not a bad chunk of change for those of us who love our jobs and the people we serve with. Doubly so if you’re a U-2 guy without a Guard option! (unless you’re cool with flying something lame)

Ghost of Kiev is better thought of as the Ukrainian resolve personified.

America so desperately needs someone that can unite us. Political infighting is fucking us over. The Russians are absolute paper tigers, especially in a conventional offensive. The dangerous part is they would resort to nukes when backed into a corner. Like a homeless guy with a hand grenade. I love our Intel guys, but lately too many bros have bought into scary intel baseball cards with long range threats. A sniper rifle out ranges a platoon of Marines, but that’s not going to keep them from advancing.

Watched the entire Putin speech. He essentially feels disrespected by bigger nations, gets visibly emotional, and repeats the classic “we have no other choice” line about invading Ukraine. Said that if he didn’t, then Russia will cease to exist. Shades of Napoleon, Tojo, and Hitler. Small penis confirmed.

“Where’d this fucking monkey come from?!?”

The SpaceX suits are completely for show. They can’t turn their helmets, for one, so they can’t look sideways, which is useless in an airplane. The suits are designed to be strapped into a rocket where you stare forward and watch the touch screens telling you everything is ok for a 20 minute flight. There’s no parachute harness or LPUs, which would all go over the top of this suit. I don’t know if this helmet and suit combo would survive a rapid d from sea level to a near vacuum, but it sure doesn’t look like it and I bet they never tried.

There’s a whole lot of people out there who evangelize about the life decisions they made, which often seems to be rooted in insecurity about said decisions. The “Bro why would anybody want to be in the Air Force,” guys are almost as bad as the blue Kool Aid drinkers that scoffed at the guys who constantly deployed and got no strats. The most opinionated on both sides just seem to be fishing for reinforcement from the crowd. It never comes across as understanding of a different guy’s perspective, and it certainly isn’t humble. At the end of your life, the amount of money you have doesn’t really matter as long as your family is safe and secure, just as your personal list of military accomplishments will seem pretty unimportant in the grand scheme of things.

The Instagrams and Pilot Network FB page got awfully quiet in March 2020, now they’re back to scoffing at anyone staying on AD. Short memories.

The old saying goes that you build credibility in teaspoons and lose it in buckets. I’ve run across Minihan a few times, seems like a good dude. But he has a lot of work to do to reverse the enduring culture built by the likes of Johns and Allardice.

Man I wish LM had the ability to animate stuff like that for systems academics. But they’d charge a billion dollars and just subcontract this guy to do it.

Fuck that guy! I saw some of the same shit happen with dudes that were never around in front of the boss because they were deployed and TDY constantly. You did the right thing and you should be proud of that work. Fuck those guys, too! But I’m guessing that was a MAF unit, and yeah that’s different because the whole culture is eaten through with queep cancer.

I also know some warrants - in the guard no less - and I’m not sure what extra bullshit a commissioned officer would have. They still have a training shop, Stan/eval shop, etc. It’s not like they show up, fly, and go home; they still have to run their own squadron like anybody else. To be completely honest, all the extraneous bullshit duties in the AF (CFC, voting, awards/devs, volunteering, UFPM/PTL) were always demanded by the enlisted leadership; the officers never wanted anything to do with it. Officers should focus on flying, training, tactics, and the future direction of all of it.

A bachelor’s degree isn’t required for the technical operation of a jet on the day of execution. Back when I was a crew aircraft guy, I was pretty sure a reasonably competent flight engineer could’ve chair flown the whole operation in his mind, so all that’s left is to teach him how to land and do AR. For more complex tactical jets, well many NATO nations seem to get by with 20 year old non-bachelors pilots, though their education system is different. Things begin to fall apart when you move farther left of execution and things get less “technical operator” and more “leadership and coordination.” Plenty of enlisted folks help with mission planning and design, but they’re not leading MPCs and deciding how we’re employing billions of dollars worth of jets in peacetime or how we’ll win or lose in wartime. Nor - when you look even farther left in the timeline - are they responsible for the organizing/training/equipping part where we decide how the next war will be fought and what capabilities we need to buy, test, and develop. Officers do that, and those officers must have tactical and technical street cred from the beginning to end of their careers. Should every CSAF know how to tactically kill people and also know what it’s like to almost be killed by you own jet? Absolutely. Absofuckinglutely. BL: Are there enlisted dudes that are capable of being trained to fly the hell out of the jet? Yes! But the mistake is keeping them enlisted (or making them warrants) rather than doing the right thing and paying them more by commissioning them. As for the college part - yes, it expands your thinking well beyond being a technical operator, which is the critical requirement for the left of execution stuff above.

Does congress have to approve reenlistment bonuses and other career pays?

Seems like some pretty low scores. Are we hiring dummies

The phone numbers listed are their office phones, which is really only a punishment for base comm airmen when they have to change them all. Names…well at some level it’s ok to call out an officer by name. 0-6 and above, yes. Publicly calling out a captain by name should only be done in cases of extreme need…

In the bar?

The squadron bar is kinda like a social media platform. You say something dumb enough in the bar and you’ll get shouted down by the bros. Keep saying dumb shit, and they’ll change the door code and not let you back in. If the Bobs who own the bar decide not to change the door code and keep letting the clown talk, the bros will eventually leave and nobody likes the bar anymore. Either way, the Wing Commander isn’t coming to arrest you for just being a douche in the bar.

I’m sure the threat of SCODs is what’s driving Putin’s decision to retrograde troops from the Ukrainian border.

Logically, this should end all annual awards, right? CGO OTY is the dude with the highest strat, done. No 1206 required, no bullshit boards.

Nah, idiots are idiots. This is one that thinks he is cool, but what’s way worse is that people with the ability to manipulate the minds of millions are feeding off of an idiot’s actions in one direction or the other. Narcissistic douchebags and the people they influence divide America, nothing else. They shouldn’t be engaged.