Disagree with your huge culture divide with respect to the herk community. Culture divide yes, huge no.
If you talked to your line herk pilots, 90% would be chomping at the bit to do more with the herk, especially regarding weapons or sensors. The issue is the risk adverse leadership above the squadron and group. Also, we have enough beans and missions as it is that it would be difficult to maintain proficiency in an even more diverse set of tasks. Slick J models do everything MCs do except air refueling, FARP and one or two airdrop varieties.
There’s a reason ac-130 crews don’t haul cargo and airdrop as well. They could dual qual ac/mc, but you’d have probably get a poor product.