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So on Memorial Day weekend, CBS decides to honor American war dead by focusing on a tragic accident, and using it as a soapbox to turn military personnel, veterans, and the public against one another. Couldn't find any MOH or Silver Star types to hold up as examples of sacrifice and patriotism? Couldn't talk about the kids who made the valiant choice to take the fight to the enemy in OIF/OEF instead of crying in a closet on campus? Couldn't talk about the brass balls it took to fly into downtown Schweinfurt, Route Pack 6, Belgrade, or Baghdad? Couldn't just honor the sacrifices made on behalf of the American public? I guess that would have been too hard. You stay classy CBS.

If you can conduct CAS from a box in Creech you can do it in a B-1. With just the info from the story, the JTAC passed bad/confusing grids. That’s the root cause. I’m guessing the crew trusted the JTAC to much/wanted to help asap and didn’t question the confusing/wrong grids. Seeing IR strobes would have probably helped the crew realize they had bad grids but it’s not why these guys died. Lot of similarities to the AC-130 incident with the doctor without boarders incident in the ‘Stan. If you fly something that makes things go boom and don’t think you could get caught up in the heat of battle and make a mistake you are dead ass wrong. Just like the Swiss cheese analogy for aircraft mishaps these frat incidents can be looked at the same way. And ya, shame on CBS, run this story another week, so many better stories they could report on for Memorial Day weekend.

Nothing...but that’s not why we do what we do (which of course I know you know that and aren’t implying otherwise). Of course the irony is not lost on me when some chief who hasn’t fought a second in his life gets a bronze star on his way out of CENTCOM. I had to argue directly to the one star wg/cc at BAF why the JTAC I wrote a MSM for deserves it...official recognition is broke and that was the day that cemented my decision to go Guard (certainly not the only reason, just the 1069th reason).

Ejection over bearing sea, 2012 (japan to Alaska coronet). Handed off OSC to the 135 once we had done everything useful we could. They stayed overhead and did a handoff with another 135 that came from AK. Between the two crews they maintained OSC and coordinated with various assets to get our bro picked up. Weather was shit, so finding him was difficult...no doubt their efforts helped make a positive end to the story.

Slow Clap... https://www.cbsnews.com/news/u-s-service-members-seen-with-maga-patches-on-jumpsuits-at-trump-speech/ Standing, hats off, slow clap... Well done, gents.

The beauty of having a CAS flexible aircraft is that you have options. Not just with sensors and vis lookout but with different weapons. I know I can put down a mark with a rocket, 20mm or 30mm if I have questions. And that’s after the myriad of other ways I can check friendly positions. A B-1 costs as much per hour as 4 x F-16s or A-10’s so this decision wasn’t a “it’s good force economy” For me this was a lot of contributing factor with the root cause being wrong asset, wrong time in the wrong role. Plotting/tracking the friendlies is a basic CAS skill set. If you think this is the first time that dudes called in air strikes on their posit you are wrong. Happens more often than you know however good CAS pilots stepped in and broke the chain before pickling. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

Damn, it’s almost as if CAS is the detailed integration of Ground and Air forces to avoid fratricide when forces get “close” and are fighting requiring a specialized skill set and weaponry. Shocking that a low level supersonic nuclear bombing platform asked to do the job had issues. Now some will say these are dickhead comments but I’ve tried CAS in a crewed B-1 type environment and it was tough. Need a hillside leveled in the Stan or some BOC, B-1 is great. Have a complex deconfliction problem requiring CAS and CAS weapons, you probably want a CAS aircraft with good vis, those weapons etc. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

From the cheap seats, if I ever go down, please come get me ASAFP! I don’t care if you’re AF, Army, Italian, or Bernie Sanders. I’ll be the guy curled up in the fetal position weeping softly.

Nicely done. Obviously nothing can match the fact you helped save a fellow pilot through solid action and teamwork, and I know that's all that matters to you. I'm curious what formal recognition you got from the AF for it, if any. Air Medal? Aircrew of Distinction in an ACC writeup? Something?

Sniper SE is digital HD and a much better product. Your OT bros have got to know about this. However, AATC is working on color Litening, which I’ve heard is pretty awesome (yes, some of you can go ahead and laugh...it’s a big deal for us poor CAF guys!)

Maybe too much 1206s and not enough vault studying eh pawnman? Lightning > sniper? 😉

Agree that units will interpret differently; I'm just passing along info here. That's what A1 told me and as a commander that's how I will use the reg. Hopefully others will as well.

What he said! Wait, actually yes please do switch...then send us your Snipers.

We should just have the Army try and develop it. That’ll make the Air Force want its Then you guys can steal it at the Pentagon level, fly it around for a year or two, kill it, and transfer the money to Viper/Eagle/etc. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Not as good as sniper. Don’t do it. For the incident, talk to some JTACs in the know...they do not put the B-1 crew as RC. That said, don’t even drop BOC without at least a quick assessment of friendly positions (map, etc.) If you hit the pickle button without 100% SA on all friendlies, you are taking a lot of risk and putting the deconfliction onus on one man. Sometimes that risk may be worth it, but many times it’s not, even in the midst of a nasty gun fight. A 30 sec QC may have saved several lives.

I’m not talking A-10 level, but it most certainly can be effective. Most of the MQ IQT course is centered around 9 line CAS. Granted, that is mostly for a building block for the bastardized way they typically utilize a 9 line, but any MQ-9 crew most certainly can do traditional CAS, and they have been since the -1s first got hellfires 15 years ago. Not arguing, I’m a former drone guy, I’ve worked enough with the bombers in the stack to get a taste of the challenges that bombers have delivering weapons danger close. Bombers have been utilized for pretty much the entirety GWOT, with a fairly high success rate. While a bomber is probably not your best choice for CAS for a variety of reasons it most certainly can put warheads on foreheads if the guys on th e ground need it.

Ok, so what does that mean for any other drill that you don't want to come in for? For example, crew member returns from a deployment two weeks before a UTA. He/she does his "PMCR" that we don't really get, but sometimes we do have a week of orders after we return, and now this person wants out of UTA because they haven't been home for the last 4-5 weekends. This isn't a family emergency. The individual isn't going to get paid for not showing up. What constitutes an "excusal". I can tell you my unit excuses people all the time and not just for family emergencies. This. Any drill needs commander approval to RUTA/RD but there is no limit (other than the specific case for getting paid but not showing up that I mentioned).

There's a little bit of discussion on it in this thread from back when the episode originally aired if you're interested: https://www.flyingsquadron.com/forums/topic/1825-b-1-bone-questions/?page=7 Would be a true statement, except that you can't conduct CAS from a box at Creech. At least not yet. That is assuming you mean high quality, effective, CAS.

If this is the guy that I’m thinking about... similar stories. He is a really good dude and definitely didn’t deserve the treatment he got from the assclown 4-Star. I wrote that guy a letter to his FEB detailing his performance in UPT and how he would be more than fine in a crew asset. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

I wish this was made up but deploying to Afghanistan last year, we had to have the Velcro rank for our multi cam ball caps that were allowed in the AOR. By a simple oversight, a lot of the “silver” rank was threaded with blue thread instead of the approved black thread. We didn’t notice, and frankly didn’t care because in the grand scheme of things, who really gives a fuck? Well apparently the deployed leadership gives a fuck and shortly after they noticed our transgressions (about a month into the deployment), we were given black sharpies and told to fix ourselves. I used to think the only thing certain was death and taxes, but apparently “shoes gonna shoe” is also a certainty.

It is UFBelievable to me as well. I knew this type of stuff on my first night TGP sortie as did everyone else but then again in a jet with a basic CAS friendly design (being able to look outside) you could match your IR pointer on the pod to the flashing IR markers on the ground and even if you’d never been told, it’d be 100% obvious in 1 second. Again, root cause was sending a airframe not suited for the scenario because we got complacent in having anything bomb capable slinging a PHM and declaring it an awesome CAS asset (Thanks Welsh) I remember my first time running a TGP in the back of a Learjet, daytime trying to find targets coordinating with the pilot and another guy in back while getting SA from the small window outside. Complete sh-tshow and my hats off to the bone guys that can do it but drove home that even at 100%, it’s a limited concept. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

If he turns a slide green...or less red....then it’s a win for management. stop trying to apply logic, common sense, or reasonability to things. It’ll only give you a headache

Dude, the honest answer to that is that was probably one of the very few times a B-1 has ever had to deconflict “close” fires in a complex situation and it went bad. 100% of the tine I saw employment was either BOC or a BOT well away from any friendlies with no time constraints. I’m not knocking you guys. You do a helluva a job with what you can. You are just SEVERELY limited by your airframe in any slightly complex CAS scenario. Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

This is actually one of the scenarios they now use for B-1 CRM classes. Plenty of blame to go around, but I will say it's a bit of a foul that the Army basically pushed the B-1 crew under the bus and the Air Force gave essentially no response. The reality is that the JTAC calling in the strike lost SA on where his people were, pure and simple.

"And another balloon of marijuana slipped from his anus." NOW it's a party!!

Valid for a kill, kill called

I don't see the problem.

Hey guys, I was totally ready to sign up for 9 more years of OPRs, PT tests, PCSs to shitty places, deployments to shitty places, a useless 365 resulting in missing seeing my kids grow up, crappy leadership, crappy support agencies, flying falling apart aircraft that are twice my age, creating trackers to track the other trackers, hustling strats to make O-5, 1206s, POCing some change of commands, getting chiefed for morale patches, commanders calls, SAPR briefs, resiliency training, my wife putting her career on hold for just another decade, my kids needing to go to 9 schools to graduate HS, sitting Sup/SOF, being forced to volunteer for BS to fill up OPR blank space, and some other crap I don’t want to think about. I was totally gonna keep doing all this shit. But then I heard another pilot say STS 6-9 times. So I’m getting the fuck out now.

YMMV. That’s great if you can do it. I’ve also had bosses that loved to clear folks off at 1400 on Friday, only after a handful of 2-3 hour meetings during the week (and then wonder why work is not getting done). Mentoring a Mx LT who was going up to be a group exec captured the dichotomy between Ops and non-Ops when it got down to leaving at the end of the day. She, for the life of her, couldn’t figure out why people would dare stay beyond 1630 (aside from career advancement). Then I explained how much work goes into a 6.5 hour night tac, or how much time is spent constantly staying green on all of your mobility requirements, GT, Big Blue AF requirements, ground jobs, etc. PME and studying your airframe? You can do that on your own time. Face it, most of us on this forum work two jobs. When you throw in the litany of appointments and mobility requirements, or schedule a full training day of mandatory fun, there’s not much time left on the clock.

Tell the shoes to fuck off.

Must be nice. People wouldn't be taking to Congress about it if they were content with the status quo. But I guess we can just try increasing the bonus some more, maybe that will help.

I'll caveat the follow with the fact that this is my personal opinion and not necessarily how others will view it, so take it for what it's worth... I've sat on numerous ANG UPT interview boards and been in the military long enough to know that you are the only one looking out for you. Interview at both and see what happens. If you get both, then you'll have a decision to make and I would go with the one that fits you best. We completely understand that we may not always be the first choice of everyone, but I will still pick the best possible candidate. Personally, I respect the honesty if a candidate is upfront about their desires, but I also understand if they hold their cards close. Either way, that's why we pick an alternate. Best of luck!

Where else would it go before crashing into a building?

Yes. That 30 minutes every three months will really erode their tactical proficiency. Again, this is why the support officers outperform flyers on promotion boards. Because flyers scoff the things that promotion boards value. Those LTs writing 1206s are 1. getting some form of recognition from their boss every quarter and 2. learning to write 1206s so that when they are the FLT/CC or ADO, they can polish their subordinates' 1206s to a fine glow. We've already seen one person advocating for submitting others for awards...I don't know about y'all, but I haven't often seen someone submit a 1206 for a person outside their chain of command. Finally, I'll say it again...you're also screwing over your SQ/CCE, who has to submit these awards to the SQ/CC and the OG/CC by a certain date, by just refusing to write them. If everyone in the squadron thought the way you guys do, it wouldn't be a refreshing experience for the SQ/CC. He'd be embarrassed at every OG staff meeting. "Not one of your people was good enough to submit for an award this quarter? Not a single one? What kind of squadron are you running over there?"

All this shit tossing is bullshit. I posted my PRF earlier in this thread complete with a bunch of awards in it with a P. I’m certainly not an HPO or anything other than someone who got a P. I submitted 1206s on myself for awards when I felt competitive so flame all you want on me. I standby what Pawn was saying... the rest of yourselves can go get ed. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Well guys, thanks for the support. I used to view this forum as a place to get the kind of honest feedback and insight that senior leadership refuses to give you in person. But I guess we're down to mocking anyone who wants to get promoted and/or stay in the Air Force one day past their ADSC. And we wonder why so few good people become senior leaders. I submit that part of the reason is that we heap scorn on anyone who wants to be senior leaders, so the "good dudes" feel like that can't remain good dudes and play the promotion game. Sorry for responding to a direct question with a direct answer. Good luck to those who want to get promoted, and good luck to those who want out as soon as possible. I don't understand why any of you continue to encourage people to join on the other parts of the forum.

Sounds like you need to do it again Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

Very well done. With that said, an alternate ending:

I've been a supporter of light strike for a long time, but as time goes on, I'm starting to see more and more holes in the idea. The real question that's bugging me is, why do we need it? What strategic or tactical need does it fulfill that's not covered by our current menu of options, or would it be creating a new role for itself? For us, it would fall somewhere between the MQ-9 and the A-10 as a CAS aircraft on the persistence/survivability/armament scale. Sure, a gap exists between those aircraft now, but it could be as easily filled by upgrading the MQ-9 as creating a whole new aircraft to address its shortcomings. I do think it definitely could fill a broader strategic role of Kinetic FID like we did for the Afghans. For conventional missions, however, what does it bring to the fight that an existing asset (or a slightly upgraded existing asset) doesn't?

I have a bud who was #1 of whatever FGOs while deployed. I was the #1 CGO. That strat propelled him to Lt Col in the eyes of his boss who was a Colonel I believe. Now he is a full bird. He just got hit with a 365 at his HQs job. I'm was like no thanks bro. Another bud just pinned on Lt Col in November. His deployment window opens in July. I told him to be ready for that 365. His longest deployment was 2 months his entire career. ACSC + 365 = Iraq👎

Is that good or bad? BREAK BREAK In my little corner of the AF, I didn't think DOs should compete for quarterly awards because they don't in flying squadrons. Until my CC made me submit a package after being on station for 5 months. I was going to defy my CC and not submit one, but she didn't forget. You compete against other DOs period in the Group and Wing. I was like game on after learning that information. Just put it to you guys this way. Nothing like looking the WG/CC in the face to accept an award after he had to give you a "P" (only eligible in Wing) and you refuse to do ACSC. My Chief who is a damn beast told me to walk up there and wait for the award before my name was called as the winner. I wasn't going to do that and give the wings a bad name. People already hate on us enough. But damn, you got to love a Chief with balls!

I'm not angry at the guy. He hasn't done anything to me at all. I just said I got to look him in the face for the second time since receiving my PRF. Now, I have never seen a WG/CC have all award nominees do push ups after a ceremony. People complain about Wing PT. Him barking orders and not doing the exercises. I don't have to go so it doesn't bother me. We did a Wing exercise and it was just him trying to get his star. It was pointless and people who never deploy trying to run the show. There must have been some flyers bravado circulating because lots of the names submitted to participate had already PCS'd. Most people didn't show up anyway. Too many Chief's, and not enough indians was a complaint as well. You are not going to storm or take any ground in the AF while deployed, but they did it. I did get to speak to my WG/CC boss who is a Maj Gen during a TDY. I was in the room with other leaders and didn't even ask about my WG/CC. I was discussing training and changing course for what we are doing to prepare personnel for the next conflict. The Maj Gen said I need to get someone in there who shares my vision and said my WG/CCs name. Shots fired! I almost died.

My best bud who pinned on Lt Col in November is applying for a Det/CC position. But he is ripe for a 365 now simply for taking the devils rank of Lt Col. Dude has 23+ years in already.

Sounds like a civilian responded to the guy you are referencing. Isn't that kind of being closed minded from a board perspective if you have won FGOQ at the squadron level 3-4 times, but never win at the Group, Wing, or a yearly? I would say most FGOs don't like to submit themselves for awards. You would think it's about you leading. But what do I know. "Leadership is about solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care." Colin Powell, General, Retired.

Damn dude I’m not the one who gave you the “P” chill out compare records all you want... but you come off as a huge tool every time you stroke your own record-cock on here

Have you ever had anyone go outside the flying world and become a DO as an O-4? For example, I was handpicked for my DO position.

Get real bro the airlines sucking everyone up (sts) is what’s causing the retention problem. Always has and always will. Maybe momma not keeping a job is on the list of factors...but I don’t think it cracks the top 3.

Show me in any survey or report where spouse job opportunity ranks.

I’ll throw a grenade here, but the fact that you put (sts) behind a comment like that is also part of the culture/retention problem. It’s the same thing as flying in the 60s at Nellis and hearing all of the Air Force call it the ‘container’ vice ‘box’, or ‘Hook-152’ vice ‘prick-152’. Flame away, but from the outside looking in, that’s an obvious contributor.