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More like Obama made an idiotic move by declaring a red line, but then when it was crossed, actually made the correct decision to reassess the situation and move forward in a logical manner not dominated by emotion or ego. In the time between the red line being "established", and confirmation that it had been crossed, the situation in Syria had fundamentally changed. ISIS surged and made huge gains in that time. To weaken the Assad regime with military strikes would have only served to bolster ISIS's advance, as Assad's government forces were their primary resistance at the time. Destroying the Assad regime would have left a power vacuum that ISIS would have been in the best position of all the militant groups to fill. The Obama administration could have never said as much, but Assad went from our chief enemy in Syria, to the lesser of two evils. As such, targeting him was a bad option, and allowing the Russians to help broker a WMD transfer was the best among a buffet of shit sandwiches. Yes, it was foolish to established a "red line". But all those in the partisan conservative camp that love to attack him over destroying U.S. credibility are short sighted, simple minded, and exploiting a political faux pas for political purposes while tacitly implying that they expected him to make a stupid move with respect to Syria just to keep his word. I'm no Obama fan, but I'm able to admit I was happy to have someone in the office mature enough to eat their pride in order to do what's appropriate despite the personal hit they may have to take. I have zero faith that we enjoy the same with the current administration. I hope active duty members are willing to sacrifice their lives for a Trump dick measuring contest, because 4-8yrs is plenty of time for foreign actors to affront his precious ego. Get the popcorn out if Assad has the balls to call Trumps "bluff" and use chemical weapons again. A personality such as Trumps would have no choice but to escalate the situation. Escalation means weakening Syrian government forces, which leaves 15 militant factions on equal footing to fill the power vacuum with none of them quite having the strength to truly accomplish it. Cue the quagmire. Hopefully the Joint Chiefs have heads on their shoulders and are able to hold onto Trumps reigns. I'm curious to see how this affects U.S. freedom of operations inside Syrian borders and airspace as up until now we were effectively the enemy of Assad's enemy and left alone to operate as necessary.

Peace talks were breaking out? In what alternate universe was that happening? France and others want to restart peace talks in Geneva, but I also want to do two chicks at the same time. Doesn't mean it's gonna happen anytime soon. Also, false flags do typically involve chemical weapons attacks against children now that I think about it...that'll really throw the investigators off the trail of who did it! If our IC says they believe Assad was responsible, I for one believe them. Everyone on here who serves should have a professional position of believing IC assessments unless proven otherwise - we bet our own lives on it. Doesn't mean they can't be wrong or haven't been wrong in the past, but we are on the same team here. These are our intel folks making the assessment. Blows my mind how many AD guys are conspiracy theorists toward our own government and then strap on jets to back up policies made from those very same intel assessments. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/06/world/middleeast/syria-bashar-al-assad-russia-sarin-attack.html?action=click&contentCollection=Opinion&module=Trending&version=Full&region=Marginalia&pgtype=article Worth reading instead of wasting your time on the Ron Paul conspiracy video. https://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2017/04/269543.htm Also this statement and Q&A with Tillerson and McMaster.

Trump gives no fucks about Obama's fake red line.

Isn't that something everyone is wishing their leadership would be doing? Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

Totally agree RAM. I want to be part of a winning organization and if the USAF was one, we would not have a retention problem. But I also understand we've been tasked with "unwinnable" missions. How to reconcile these seemingly incompatible factors? First, a winning organization means one built, soup to nuts, with winning wars as a clear and obvious function. That means rewarding people who are good at the mission, not assuming we're all equal and using non mission factors (party planning, masters, etc.) as delineators. In an ops squadron, my entire day should be focused on refining my lethality, and base agencies should be rated on their ability to support us. For example.... If a short notice deployment pops up and I need a guy to get CATM, CATM should jump through their ass to make it happen and be happy they found a way to enable our mission. That's what a winning organization looks like. One that is focused on successful prosecution of combat, not all the distractions we talk about. Second, if we're given impossible tasks whose pursuit hurt our readiness, I expect LEADERSHIP from the senior ranks to say so. Don't say morale is pretty darn good, say morale is terrible because our political masters have sent us on fools errands without an end state. Have some balls. Risk your career to speak the truth. If the ROE won't let us win, say that too. That is what a winning organization looks like. It's structurally built to incentivize combat success, and it's led by people who care about maintaining that organizational focus. I don't need a bonus, and I'd give up the one I have to work in a winning organization.

I'll probably take some grief for this, but technically, there were thousands of WMD shells found in Iraq after the 2003 Gulf War, at least according to the NY Times. Now, these weren't part of an active program to produce new weapons, but they were there...

Honestly that was my biggest problem. Being told over and over again that we're all the same and contribute equally. I'm not saying pilots have to be treated like divas, but when you're competing a 11F and a loggie in the same bucket, and then pass over the fighter dude who was 1000x more costly to train in the name of fairness, then your flying organization is hopelessly fucked. That would be like a hospital firing neurosurgeons and cardiologists to make room for more accountants and HR people because they had more volunteer hours and face time with the administration. The brass is starting to painfully admit that the line pilots are their rainmakers. Hopefully the young dudes get a better deal than we got. But I do reserve the right to take such joy and happiness in seeing these generals squirm and suffer in the process.

WTF are you babbling about?

You'll be fine. Lots of couples have done it before in the past. Lots of spouses put their foot down against moving to del rio to continue focusing on their own career ambitions, which totally makes sense.

They were doing this when I was there for SOS. Solution? Buy a second hat...(ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer) Some non flyers in my class were happy to call out flightsuit wearers on the leg pocket not being zipped. They weren't so happy when they got called out by the staff for not having their ABU cargo pockets buttoned. "But it's where I store my cover, and buttoning it makes it hard to get my cover out." Ironic.

Taking away the bonus for pilots wouldn't change a thing. The only people who take the bonus in its current form are those who were going to stay in anyway.

Would have been good SAR training if he dumped it in the Potamac and parachuted into S.E. DC or Anacostia. P.J.s going into hostile enviroment especially if they are Republicans. Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G530AZ using Baseops Network Forums mobile app

Huh? Suck my thumb? Don't post an article? Never contradict anything you post? OK Hot Shot! Never claimed to be an expert. And it's pretty presumptuous of you to say something like "I don't think you realize" when you have no fucking idea what I do or don't have background in. NYT was one of several open sources I could have cited that simply showed that WMD were found in unexpected places, although NOT part of the claimed ongoing weapons program that actually didn't exist. As I stated in my first post, "I'll probably take some grief for this..." because to state there were "no WMDs" is technically false. There were. Just not the ones we thought would be there.

Most of us Luke guys do, especially since they told us the beacon and the radio may or may not work..... It was also mandatory to fly with one at my last CAF squadron.

Why didn't he assess the situation and "eat his pride" prior to establishing the red line is my only point. And my first post should've said "Mad Dawg" instead of Trump because I have every reason to believe Trump pretty much asked Mattis what his response should be (as he should). But sorry, no... Obama doesn't get any partial credit from me for "taking a step back" from the situation after a foreign government gasses its own citizens. And if we're talking about the rise of ISIS being a major reason why Obama couldn't be stronger in his stance, I'm just going to blame him for that one as well because he went against our military leaders' advice and pulled out of Iraq for the sake of his 'legacy' (fvcking tired of hearing about his legacy as well). Saddam was an evil piece of sh!t who tortured his dissidents into submission. If you're fine with accepting the necessary evil of dictators being in charge and violating human rights for the sake of "peace in the Middle East" that's your opinion. We're by far the greatest nation on Earth, so personally I think we can do better than that. Edit to Add: The reason I'm so forcefully behind the missile attack and somewhat giving credit to Trump is because I believe Trump has enough sense to rely on Mattis's good judgment. A vast majority of our previous presidents (Republican and Democrat) have ridden on the backs of military leadership for so long that they thought themselves capable of assessing military situations on their own, contrary to military opinion... And it pretty much destroyed a lot of good hard military work and progress. Examples: Obama in Iraq/Syria and George H.W. with not ending Saddam's bullsh!t when he had the chance.

Mark the day and the hour. I agree with nsplayr 100%. All of this False Flag conspiracy sh!t has to stop. Seriously. It's bad enough listening to Ron Paul say how ending the drug war will magically solve the illegal immigration crisis (hint: it won't). I, for one, think the missile strike was a good call. It serves many purposes. It tells Syria that we're not tolerating their crap any more. It tells Russia that they can't just cover up the massacre of innocent people in Syria... but most importantly, it sends a message to the Chinese premier (currently in Florida) that the US is no longer a paper tiger, and Lil Kim might be next.

Understand that your husband's number 1 priority during UPT must be UPT. He'll be spending 80+ hours per week on that, especially near the beginning. That won't leave much time for staying in touch. If "long distance relationship" means 1 long phone conversation on the weekend, y'all will be fine. If "long distance relationship" means multiple phone calls and texts per day, y'all will probably have a bad time. You being busy with school is probably for the best. Him being a non-drinker is a non-issue as long as he's cool with being the DD. Good luck to the both of you!

You see, a pimp's love is very different from that of a square...

I mean, I hear ya, but honestly you're kidding yourself if you think CNN has some kind of monopoly on bullshit or slanted takes on news events. Your exact same critique could be said of Fox News or MSNBC or a handful of other networks depending on your political views. As another example, probably no one on TV makes me madder than Stephen A. Smith, but I'm not gonna throw the baby out with the bath water. Re: a choice, don't watch cable news at all. Don't watch CNN in particular. Don't pay for a cable bundle. Call your cable company and tell them you want unbundled, a la carte channels, I'm right there with ya on all these points.

I love how this is code for "fuck you" around here.

No, He's not. I'm mostly in Karl's camp but the bonus does keep a few people in: fence-sitters and path of least resistance types that might have had an ok opportunity on the outside. More importantly it keeps them (and the ones that would have stayed past initial commitment regardless) predictable for a period of time. Many would 7-day opt a shit deal without a bonus; the bonus eliminates that option by tagging them with an ADSC. I get it; it's cool to talk about how if everything were great in the AF no one would care about the bonus, but that's hyperbole. Our pay/rank system is antiquated. I'm worth more to the AF as an 11F than a similar-aged SkyCop, LRS officer or personellist. So are doctors, lawyers and other career fields that are incentivized. Once the wide-eyed 20-something ideals of slaughtering ISIS and fighting for your country grow old and you've got a family to love and provide for, financial stability and QOL start to trump kicking ass for most. Sure, some (a few) would be overcome with pride to work for our organization if it were really top-notch and they'd do it for pennies on the dollar. Most would not.

So you didn't take the bonus but have an opinion on my rationale for taking the bonus? And you think my opinion is crazy? Thanks for your service.

PG county is no joke. These pix went out on twitter and I'm pretty sure they're not our guy. He spent very little time "isolated". Edit to add: local news is running with the pictures, so at least they think they're legit.

This is the BGen Grosso who, as the Director of Force Management and Policy at the Pentagon, certainly oversaw and endorsed all of the nonsensical force shaping that occurred under her watch. Lots of manpower resources were paid well to leave. Sad that she was promoted to MGen, then went on to be the Director of the USAF SAPR office, which produced another star. Now as a LtGen she is back to clean up the mess she oversaw, which will certainly produce another star. People like this in leadership positions combined with the complete lack of accountability for failed decisions and policies are at the heart of what is wrong with the USAF today.

This is called the ANG and AFRC Gina.... Stop screwing the ARC by treating us like AD on the cheap and learn something from us. Give us more people and more funding. Give us more full-time AGR manning with a $35k+ bonus. Give our leaders REAL leadership positions. Stop trying to push us out of the picture while harping the "Total Force" bullshit... it's gotten old. Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

Possibly a long shot but does anyone have pictures of what on-base housing looks like for a married O3 no kids. It's hard to believe the Vance Hunt page has nothing considering that is the most important reason to have a website.

I'll grab the popcorn... Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network Forums

While Ron Paul can be a divisive guy, I think he brings up some good observations: Does anyone believe that on the eve of peace talks, just after the White House said the Syrian people should choose their own leaders, that Assad would launch a gas attack to turn the whole world against him? We don't either. We're back to the same lies that got us into Iraq. Do we never learn to question the propaganda? Our take in today's Liberty Report: Syria Gas Attack: Assad's Doing...Or False Flag? https://youtu.be/LULzvg1gA5U