To sleep – perchance to dream *

Well, last week, I woke up to a new record low for the area.  38 wonderful degrees.  The workout session even involved turning off the fan, I was getting cold.  So, Fall must be upon us.  In that light, this week's foodie vector contribution will be Cassoulet!

I've made this several times and it was PDG everytime.  Now that I've retained ownership of the foodie vector at Chant du Départ, back to this week's post.

Yesterday as I was perusing links on the interwebz, I came across this.  The Air Force is allowing 1500 retired Majors-Lt Cols to "unretire" and return to the active duty.  Hence the title of the post.  One of my recurring dreams is that I'm back in a fighter squadron and on the flight schedule, but something precludes me from actually getting airborne.  Sometimes it's that I can't find my flying boots.  Other times it's that I can't find a lineup card that hasn't already been used.  Weird, I know.

Could it be me?
Source

So, interested, I click on the link to find the devil in the details.   I don't qualify. First, I'm above the max age (60).  Additionally, I've been gone more than 5 years (rapidly approaching 20), and I'm medically disqualified now.  Bummer!  

But....there was a brief period yesterday where all was good and I was finally in command of an F-15 Squadron taking off at Dawn to smite the enemy.  It was a glorious feeling, if fleeting.

Because...I realized that these retreads were going to fill desk jobs to free up active duty guys to go and smite the enemy.  Nothing wrong with that per se, but.....

The Air Force has changed enormously in the last 20 years.  I had to quit reading John Q. Public, it was getting too depressing, it made me too angry.  

So after that brief flight of fancy, I realized that even if I could go back.  I wouldn't.

Here's why. 

Our fearless leader, aka Sarge, has been hitting on an issue that has been on my mind for years.  His last two post's ( here and here) hit about major symptoms of the problem.
The second link above contained a comment that I believe to be spot on:

My theory is that once the war is over generically speaking) the officers who have seen the most combat are heartily sick of it and return to civilian life. Those who spent the bulk of their time "in the rear with the gear" stayed in and became generals and advisers to politicians. Those who had learned nothing from the last war rose to command the bloody debacles of the next.

I've mentioned before my belief that this is the basic problem with the Air Force.  It has been a problem for years before my time.  Rewatch the movie "12 O'Clock High", specifically the opening scenes before Gregory Peck takes command, as an example.  (I know, Movie? If it wasn't historically accurate, the movie most likely wouldn't have been made. Nor would the Air Force (and Army) have used it as a leadership training film back after Carter and before Clinton.) However, due to a combination of factors, primarily declining force structure and political policies that were/are, whether intentionally or unintentionally, destructive, the death spiral is nearly complete.

I believe this all stems from a structural problem.  

Line Officers (Officers in Combatant units) in the Army and Marines start out their careers (after training of course) in charge of enlisted personnel in their units.  LTs command platoons with an NCO to actually run things and keep the LT from screwing things up too badly.  This continues all the way up the chain.  They compete for promotion with others who are doing the exact same type of thing.  Command units intended for combat.

The Navy has a somewhat similar structure.  Line Officers are given charge of a section on a ship, with enlisted folks actually doing the work.  Even pilots on carriers are given duties to supervise enlisted.  (I'll grant that there are probably exceptions to this.)

No, not the Air Force, however.  With the exception of Medical, Chaplains, and Jags, every officer is a Line Officer.  Fighter Pilots are Line Officers, which is as it should be. but so is a Personnel Officer. The mission of the Air Force is to "Fly, Fight and Win" (or it should be.  It's actually "The mission of the United States Air Force is to fly, fight and win...in air, space and cyberspace." How do you fly in cyberspace?)

Ergo, Aircrew perform the mission of the Air Force.  That is the definition of Line Officer.
Why then are Personnel Officers Line Officers? Finance Officers, Logisticians, Engineers ...  I could go on for hours.  All are Line Officers.

Do not misinterpret what I'm saying.  All those functions are important, necessary and hard work.  The mission of the Air Force could NOT be performed with out the efforts of all.

My gripe is that I'm competing for promotion against them.  Which, on the surface, seems like a "so what?".  Well...

So, hypothetically, let's compare two hypothetical OPRs (Officer Performance Reports).

OPR A.  Lt Juvat has successfully completed F-4 RTU and is on path to Flight Lead.  He is qualified in both Pave Spike and Maverick weapons systems and is Nuclear Certified.

OPR B.  Lt Mrs. Juvat leads the promotions branch for the Personnel Office in charge of 20 enlisted.  During this period, she developed a new system for processing OPRs 50% faster than before.

Which has the better chance of promotion?  The person who has completed 50-60 missions spending countless hours studying, reading, practicing, briefing and debriefing and can now basically build a Maverick, Pave Spike or a rescheduled sunrise?

Or the person who processes paperwork and has 20 enlisted working for her.

Unfortunately, the promotion board is composed of Line Officers from all AFSC's.  Most of whom think Maverick was a television show from their childhood.

As opposed to:

So, it's difficult to explain to someone who doesn't fly, why it's important to retain pilots in general, fighter pilots specifically on active duty especially if there's no war on, and we're in a force reduction period, and....(Well, let's not go into the SJW aspects of current personnel policies) 

Since it's very difficult to compare and contrast a 10 meter bomb at 6 O'clock dropped on a practice mission with 50% faster real world OER processing, it's very easy for the non-rated members of the board to vote differently on whom to promote. Since failure to promote is also grounds for termination, this has become a big portion of the AF's problem now. 

The second conundrum has acquired a new term, "queep", BITD it was called NFBS.  The first two words of the acronym being "Non-Flying".  A select group, most of whom graduated from a school located between Denver and Colorado Springs, realized that the road ahead wasn't being the best fighter pilot (bomber...Transport....whatever!), but it was being the best at non-flying quantifiable "things" like Highest United Way contribution rate, best time on the 2 mile run etc.  

You know, things that really make the Air Force a fine combat organization.  

And it worked.  As a scheduler, we had a semi-official term for these folks.  Seagulls. You had to throw a rock at them to get them to fly.  But, they were ALL OVER United Way!

The Seagulls got promoted. (Back when TAC had stars on their sleeves, gold for combat time and silver for non-combat, it was VERY easy to identify these people.  Which is why the stars on the sleeve quickly went away.  Ras and Vegas had, IIRC, 4 and 3 gold stars respectively indicating over 1500 and 1000 hours combat time.) 

And......

The Seagulls promoted folks just like themselves. Who promoted folks just like themselves.

And the cancer grew.

Now we've got Seagulls in leadership positions with Non-judicial as well as Court Martial authority making the rules.

Those rules don't include being the finest combat ready aircrewman in the world or training or leading them.  

Nope. Managing or ruling them, maybe.

That whirring sound just outside the USAFA Chapel is Robin Olds, spinning in his grave.

If it were up to me, the Line of the Air Force would be much like the other services.  Officers who held an AFSC as a Combatant, would compete for promotion against like officers with like Officers on the board.  Officers with different skill sets (i.e. Personnel, Finance, etc.) would compete for  promotion against others in that category.

Because promotions no matter how delineated, devolves into a numbers game ("My Bomber pilots constitute 20% of the folks up for promotion, we should get 20% of the promotions"), failure to promote for a line officer would no longer be grounds for termination.  After some number of non-promotes, their commission, at their discretion and retirement/separation as an option, would be  transferred to a warrant officer's commission with the same courtesies, effective rank and pay where they could stay until 20.  Most of the Fighter Pilots (as opposed to pilots of fighters) I knew would have jumped at the chance.

This next proposal will really annoy non-combatant officers, but.....When drawdowns come as they always do, non-flying billets would be filled with rated officers. This would retain the Service's combat capability until the next expansion came and they were returned to their flying billets.  It was called Rated Sup (rated supplement) in my Dad's day.  He hated it, but he did return to flying. 

I didn't.

So take that fact and my opinions expressed herein under advisement.

Would this solve the Air Force's problem?  It would be impossible to do worse than the people in charge are doing now.



* Hamlet, Act-III, Scene-I