US Air Force Faces 500 Fighter Pilot Shortfall

Maybe they should stop seesawing back and forth between hiring almost nobody (like when I applied 5 years ago) and suddenly not having enough people :bang:
 
This is a trainwreck that the AF could have seen coming for a long, long time. All of the indicators were there; the "little people" have been screaming about it for at least the last 5 years. Hell, Welsh himself knew about it when he was USAFE/CC years ago.

The AF is so busy smelling its own farts, breaking its arm patting itself on the back, calling itself "the greatest Air Force in the history of the world," that they're completely unable to step back, identify future/looming threats, and make an honest assessment of themselves. Given that, it isn't tough to understand why the trainwreck is here and the leadership (I mean, management -- there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of leadership going on here...) is surprised by it and caught on its heels.

The AF has a lot of phenomenal, hard-working people. These are the people who are keeping the service functional despite the blue-kool-aid guzzing careerist sycophants that infest most of the levels of leadership above the squadron.

So far as I'm concerned, HAF can choke on the problem they've created.

Good JQP article on the issue:
http://www.jqpublicblog.com/that-time-gen-welsh-didnt-think-morale-was-pretty-darn-good/
 
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Hacker15e said:
This is a trainwreck that the AF could have seen coming for a long, long time. All of the indicators were there; the "little people" have been screaming about it for at least the last 5 years. Hell, Welsh himself knew about it when he was USAFE/CC years ago.

The AF is so busy smelling its own farts, breaking its arm patting itself on the back, calling itself "the greatest Air Force in the history of the world," that they're completely unable to step back, identify future/looming threats, and make an honest assessment of themselves. Given that, it isn't tough to understand why the trainwreck is here and the leadership (I mean, management -- there doesn't appear to be a whole lot of leadership going on here...) is surprised by it and caught on its heels.

The AF has a lot of phenomenal, hard-working people. These are the people who are keeping the service functional despite the blue-kool-aid guzzing careerist sycophants that infest most of the levels of leadership above the squadron.

So far as I'm concerned, HAF can choke on the problem they've created.

Good JQP article on the issue:
http://www.jqpublicblog.com/that-time-gen-welsh-didnt-think-morale-was-pretty-darn-good/
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This sort of lack of forethought is not limited to the AF...........just sayin'..
 
av8tr1 said:
Ah fire birds, one of my favorite movies when I was a kid.

I am the greatest!

Now I would be embarrassed to admit I was in that movie too...but was still awesome for a 18 year old wanna be rotor pilot.
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I'm a big fan of the poor cinema, but holy cow, did that move blow. I'm ashamed to say I spent real money to see it.

If your going to dabble in the poor cinema, at least make it interesting:

(NSFW, btw)

http://cinemassacre.com/2010/10/13/inframan/

Richman
 
BobDDuck said:
You're looking at this backwards. If the WOs can't get enough pilots, the easy to solution is to reduce the number of pilots leaving.
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I think the plan is to shrink the WOs via flows. They certainly don't seem willing to pay us what the other regionals are getting.
 
trafficinsight said:
This is an entirely different kind of flying.... Altogether.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk
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Not to be a jerk, but an airplane is an airplane is an airplane. I've flown plenty of high performance aerobatic aircraft, and also flown specialty aircraft with a lot of extra sensors and computers and screens to look at while flying single pilot IFR. So don't make it sound oh so "different" and elite. Plenty of civillian pilots could handle it just fine.
 
chrisreedrules said:
Not to be a jerk, but an airplane is an airplane is an airplane. I've flown plenty of high performance aerobatic aircraft, and also flown specialty aircraft with a lot of extra sensors and computers and screens to look at while flying single pilot IFR. So don't make it sound oh so "different" and elite. Plenty of civillian pilots could handle it just fine.
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Flying is the easy part.

Being able to employ the aircraft as the weapons system it's designed to be, throughout it's full range of capabilities and mission sets, efficiently and effectively, against a variety of threats attempting to prevent you from doing same; is what separates those who can, from those who can't.

So yeah, it is different and elite. That's why not everyone does it, nor can do it.

That in and of itself, is a little bit more than just some single pilot IFR.
 
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MikeD said:
Flying is the easy part.

Being able to employ the aircraft as the weapons systems it's designed to be, throughout it's full range of capabilities and mission sets, efficiently and effectively, against a variety of threats attempting to prevent you from doing same; is what separates those who can, from those who can't.

So yeah, it is different and elite. That's why not everyone does it, nor can do it.
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I could do it no problem... Now where's my stinkin' f-22 Uncle Sam!?
 
chrisreedrules said:
Not to be a jerk, but an airplane is an airplane is an airplane. I've flown plenty of high performance aerobatic aircraft, and also flown specialty aircraft with a lot of extra sensors and computers and screens to look at while flying single pilot IFR. So don't make it sound oh so "different" and elite. Plenty of civillian pilots could handle it just fine.
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Spoiler alert: It's not the flying part that they get paid the "big bucks" for. That has to be just like breathing and happen in the background when you aren't actually thinking about it.
 
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It's not the airlines causing pilots (or enlisted) to leave. It's the toxic, • culture that the AF has become. Multiple deployments and remote tours aside, the whole attitude of "whole airman" concept where you can get beat out on promotions because although you excel at your job but didn't spend enough of your free time doing volunteer work in the community, spending 50% of your duty day reading pointless power points or undergoing training about how not to rape someone, or make one mistake and your career is ruined is why everyone is bailing from the AF. Civilian career opportunities are just the icing on the cake.

This guy says it better:

http://www.jqpublicblog.com/dear-boss-2009-version/
 
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chrisreedrules said:
Not to be a jerk, but an airplane is an airplane is an airplane. I've flown plenty of high performance aerobatic aircraft, and also flown specialty aircraft with a lot of extra sensors and computers and screens to look at while flying single pilot IFR. So don't make it sound oh so "different" and elite. Plenty of civillian pilots could handle it just fine.
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You kinda missed the joke.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk
 
av8tr1 said:
Ah fire birds, one of my favorite movies when I was a kid.

I am the greatest!

Now I would be embarrassed to admit I was in that movie too...but was still awesome for a 18 year old wanna be rotor pilot.
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Great movie. The bearded scary enemy heli pilot gave me nightmares.
 
NovemberEcho said:
It's not the airlines causing pilots (or enlisted) to leave. It's the toxic, *I don't have the education to emote without using a curse word* culture that the AF has become. Multiple deployments and remote tours aside, the whole attitude of "whole airman" concept where you can get beat out on promotions because although you excel at your job but didn't spend enough of your free time doing volunteer work in the community, spending 50% of your duty day reading pointless power points or undergoing training about how not to rape someone, or make one mistake and your career is ruined is why everyone is bailing from the AF. Civilian career opportunities are just the icing on the cake.
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Not sure why Welsh does not get it as he has been around long enough to witness earlier cycles. The first massive run for the door by his buddies was '78-'80 when he was a FAIP at Willie. The next was '84-'87+. And back then TDY was considered a good deal. Between '80 and '82 they were begging us to come back and foolishly some of us did only to pull the handles again in '85. Heck, he should have joined us as he would be a retiring Delta captain about now.
 
Springer said:
Not sure why Welsh does not get it as he has been around long enough to witness earlier cycles.
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I think Welsh gets it, but is smart enough not to admit that we have a culture problem that, combined with a large airline hiring drive, is pushing folks out. The service chief is a politician. Saying "the ship is burning" to Congress only gets you more inquiries into why the ship is burning. I do not believe Congress is the least bit interested in spending less on acquisition programs in favor of military personnel.
 
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