Hacker

PSA has aways been a crapshoot, but I've been lucky 99 times out of 100 with stuff I've ordered from them over the last 5 years or so. Never had anything out of spec, but this year I bought one of the Freedom stainless barrel uppers and the flash hider wasn't installed all the way (at least it was indexed properly...just not all the way down on the crush washer!).

Isn't this the kind of opinion we scoff when we hear it from non-flyer fanboy "journalists" like Tyler Rogoway? Thinking one aircraft is awesome or crappy based on....pictures of it? No direct experience with it?

FEB waivers for IFF and fighter FTU washouts only lead to ACC multi pilot aircraft; generally RC-135s, E-3s , EC-135s, or (less often) B-1s or B-52s.

I ran the FEB program for IFF washouts at Moody back 10 years ago, so I have handled a few waivers in my time. @ViperStud has it correct -- the "waiver" is something that the WG/CC (technically, the Convening Authority for the FEB) offers the pilot. The pilot is offered to waive his right to have a board hear his FEB in exchange for having his fate decided by the local WG/CC. That outcome -- at least in AETC world for guys who are all ready winged and fragged to fly fighters -- usually involves reassignment to an ACC heavy of some sort. In other situations, as @xaarman pointed out, guys with ratings previous to their current training (e.g. Navs going to SUPT) can be offered the FEB waiver, and the waiver will result in them returning to their previous rating.

I think it depends on who you are speaking to. Back 10+ years ago, CSAF Johnny Jumper was crapping on all of the space geeks who were fapping about space-based-radar, saying "we are an effects-based service, not a platform-based service."

I got mine about 2 weeks before my actual date of retirement, while on terminal leave.

Just for the record, they were aileron rolls.

Sod them all....

I toasted last night to a Shooter down, from a former Shooter.

Be very careful with this; the ATF ruling from about 18 months ago leaves the door open to you getting in a whole heap of trouble if you don't "manufacture" the lower using tools/machinery that you personally own. To wit: https://www.atf.gov/firearms/docs/ruling/2015-1-manufacturing-and-gunsmithing/download Note the overly general terminology in the last section of the document, especially the phrase "unlicensed machine shop".

Hmm, and here I was sure there were Vipers in the air at the same time I was dodging SA-2s, -3s, -6s, -8s, Rolands, and 37 and 57mm AAA in Iraq in March and April 2003. I guess not, though. Thanks for clearing that up. You Viper dudes all turn your Air Medals and DFCs back in yet?

First off, it is not ususual for a FEB final determination by the 4-star to take 4-6 months. Remind your bro that FEB findings are only recommendations, and the Convening Authority for the FEB and the MAJCOM 4-star are free to concur or nonconcur with that recommendation and determine just about any of the possible outcomes for the respondent. In other words, just because the FEB recommeneded your bro be retrained to a different airframe, that doesn't obligate leadership to do that. Second, FEBs have nothing to do with retention in the service. For an officer to be kicked out, he has to go to a Board Of Inquiry (a.k.a. a "discharge board"), which is an entirely separate process from an FEB. Even if an officer were to lose his wings at an FEB, the 4-star would have to initiate an entirely separate process to start and execute a BOI. BOIs are a whole additional legal process that takes place in a courtroom with another panel of senior officers, etc.

FWIW, the term is "Unlawful" command influence. Depending on the situation, it can be a very serious charge leveled at a Commander. That being said, ADCs also know that going to a Court-Martial is a very risky proposition if there is anything else in the respondent's history that could possibly be a detriment. Unlike in a civilian court, charges at a C-M can be modified, changed, or added to pretty much at the whim of the Government. While defense to a particuar charge may be relatively air-tight, the Government has the potential to go for the throat on something else (which is minor and unrelated to the primary event), especially if it is one of those catch-all charges like "conduct unbecoming" or "dereliction of duty".

I wish I could up-vote that post more than once. Excellent words and perspective.

Many of the best pics from this thread are no longer linked....f'n internet.

Our fatality and Class-A rate during that training was also astronomical -- not a good example.

You can actually even take the assignment if you want it without incurring an ADSC. You simply have to actually establish a retirement date in the system in lieu of signing the ADSC -- there is a carve-out in the "you are eligible to apply for retirement 12 months prior" rule that lets more-than-18-but-less-than-19 year guys do this. It is a pain; I did it, and I had to explain what it was and show the AFI to every level (up to and including the SQ/CC) at my local base MPF, as well as call the people at AFPC and explain it to them in order to get it to work. EVEN THEN, once I inprocessed into my new base, they added the ADSC anyway, and I had to fight with the same office at AFPC to get them to remove the erroneous ADSC.

What Whittle completely ignores is that the most significant amount of the destruction of the warrior culture took place under the W Bush administration (it is really post-9/11 that the changes he mentions in his video began). All of that change, by the way, was a natural evolution of the changes put into motion under the Clinton Administration during the mid-late 90s. All of the Clinton shenanigans, for reference, were part of the fallout from the witch-hunt following the scandal at Tailhook '91...which, for those of you historians out there, took place during the administration of the 41st President. So, I find his whole "Obama the Socialist's plan to destroy the tool of American Imperialism" schtick completely shatters his message because it represents a colossal misunderstanding of what has led up to the situation we have today. It gives way too much credit to one Administration -- it is really not possible that it is the "fault" of any one of these Administrations as part of some dastardly strategic plan, but rather it is part of an overall cultural shift in the US.

I miss your old eDodo stuff, Zero.

The best part is that he kept the curtain!

You are confusing the meaning of "role" with the meaning of "mission". A pure A-G mission aircraft is a single-role aircraft. By your argument, the F-15C is a multi-role aircraft because it can do OCA and DCA.

Regardless of what you think of Rick, I don't see how anyone who says they've sworn to "support and defend the Constitution" can possibly read this ruling and not find its logic and conclusions completely contrary to both the word and spirit of the 4th Amendment as well as the previous caselaw mentioned by MD. IMHO the dissent hit it on the nose.

Not that unusual...I've had to do it twice over the last 10 years or so.

A fair-ish point, but how would sharing him having his good-idea-fairy shut down empower other folks who've had similar experiences? Other people who've had it happen are probably well aware of the consequences and are all ready just as cynical about Big Blue as he is. If there were an altruistic motive here, it could simply be as a warning to others to not do what he did the way he did it...but it is pretty evident that's not the case, given the title of his piece and the punchline in the article.

An interesting topic, but unfortunately that "article" linked is basically a big whine about how big AF didn't buy into his idea even after it was presented multiple times to multiple different levels and authorities. If there's a point in there, it is completely obscured by his "woe is me" story. Guess what, dude: lots of us have "woe is me" stories about our careers, we just sport bitch about it to our bros at the bar, not publish articles about it trying to point the finger at The Man. All ideas don't have equal merit, nor do all ideas deserve equal further consideration. Even more importantly, while sometimes the "view from the Captain level" offers important insight that senior leaders may not be seeing or have not considered, often it also shows that the Captain-level is completely ignorant of higher, strategic-level aspects that outweigh the Captain's great idea. Culturally, the AF tolerates free-thinking. -- but don't you dare act on any of it, lest you risk any semblance of having a "good career". If you are willing to take that risk, then fire away. More officers should be willing to take that risk for a greater good of American airpower, unfortunately when given the choice between putting it all out there and advancing the larger cause and protecting the security of a "good career", most of us choose the latter.