DirkDiggler

Would try to avoid this route if you can. Could lead to a General Discharge under Honorable Conditions, not a straight Honorable. If this was posted in jest I'll pre-emptively call myself out for sarcasm detector inop.

Thanks for sharing, did not know that. Wonder how much Lockmart wants for the data? I get having it isn't a "must" but sure would be nice to have. Apologies for the minor thread derail.

I sympathize with the TOLD; about 10 years ago our planes got carbon brakes, best mod the Bobs had put on the airplane in a long time. Trouble was, they didn't want to pay for the testing to redo the TOLD so all our numbers were still based on the old steel brakes. I could kinda understand that since at the time I was in legacy MCs and we had an upcoming (though moved several times) retirement date. I assumed that the newer MC-J would have revised TOLD since the aircraft is gonna be around for 30+ years. Wrong. TOLD is still based on the old brakes even though all the aircraft have been modd'd with the new ones. So our portions of our TOLD is "more better" but you don't know how much better and still have to use the old numbers.

Will the new engines give the BUFF a substantial increase in thrust/payload capability or is it more reliable/ease of MX/sustained supply chain? Understood if you can't get into specifics on this forum. I'm currently going through MC-J transition and the upgrade to newer engine technology feels like going from a rotary to cell phone.

My point is right at the top of this forum’s section it says “keep it civil, don’t abuse this forum”. Are you cool with dudes/dudettes going after people’s spouses/kids on here?

I get that you vehemently disagree with his positions on the vaccine and vaccine mandates but why go questioning his ability to raise his kids? It does nothing to advance the conversation/discourse.

Even if your first statement is true (I guarantee the first thing Scheuller's CC did before issuing that order is consult with a JAG), that won't be what causes him issues under the UCMJ. https://www.marines.mil/Portals/1/Docs/2021USMCSocialMediaHanbook.pdf Specifically see pages 17-18 and then reference Scheuller's last FB statement. If you strip away the emotion and politics from this he's making it really easy for the prosecutor on his courts martial.

Will be pretty cool to see a ~68 year old BUFF with a modern glass cockpit

You keeping the analog engine stack or is glass part of the upgrade?

It’s called the D.E.N.N.I.S system:

The Wu always has the answer…

Valid debriefing point

Anybody using a flight doc for anything other than: a. Your yearly "I'm still alive/don't take my flight pay" exam b. A referral to an off base, non-military doctor c. Ambien/Restoril Is doing it wrong.

I'd fall back to the question, is the current air defense commitment not/no longer adequate based on threat? And check me on this but isn't the -15EX supposed to be re-capping the Guard/Reserve fighter units that operate the oldest 15/16s? Understand that those are still swapping high end for high(er) end aircraft but MX rates should be much increased.

Honest question: is this enough of a threat/issue that it warrants not funding something that's applicable to the high end fight/peer fight? Not saying that funding issues always need to be an either/or but I'd venture a guess that our defense budgets will be flat to slightly decreasing going forward. For external VEO actors looking to execute the above scenario, is the vast increase in various intelligence collection and fusion (admittedly improvements in the second area is easily debatable) to ID/foil these types of attacks not enough of a defense? Then we still have the current alert commitment for the worst case scenario (not a pointy nosed guy so I can't speak at all to prosecuting an intercept against C-172 with an F-15/16).

I'll concede that your first statement is mostly accurate; looking back, most people on this forum did caveat things with "if true" or something to that effect. Since we're speculating, to your second point, predictability is the is one of the reasons I'm very skeptical about the allegations contained in this latest book. Most 3-4 star generals are politicians or at least very politically savvy once they get to that level, it's how they got there in the first place. In my experience, all the generals I've been around or worked with at that level invoke CYA in almost everything they do and say (I think they take a class in it prior to pinning on that third star). Slight derail, as I understand it (I've never done a puzzle palace tour thankfully) it used to be the JCS was actually one leadership level where this wasn't always true, since once you've made JCS or CJCS you've hit the ceiling, there's no where else to go. My buddies up in the Pentagon have told me that dynamic changed appreciably once Mattis was made SECDEF; several generals now had the attitude that they were still potentially upwardly mobile and started acting as such, but I digress. I find it very difficult to believe that Milley told the Chinese he'd give them a heads up before the US attacked or that he made other officers swear an oath to him regarding the use of nuclear weapons because if he did those things too many people are/were in the know and as has been stated on this forum, those are illegal acts that would result in UCMJ actions. If the people in the room for those calls or the officers he allegedly made swear an oath get hauled in front of Congress, the IG, or a courts martial, they're not going to fall on their swords for the good general. He'd be proper fucked and he's smart enough to know that. Another thing to consider, at least regarding the timing of the first call. What if Trump had won the election? I find it very difficult (though not impossible, as I said I'll be interested in what he says to Congress on the 28th) to believe that Milley would take such actions or say such things knowing the guy he allegedly is conspiring against might still be his boss. Trump sure as shit wasn't going to give him a pardon or be forgiving about it. To be clear, I'm not arguing that Milley didn't do and say these things because of his honorable character, I'm saying I think it's very unlikely because he's a political creature. On the Chris Miller denial point in particular, we'll have to agree to disagree. In a follow up to his statement to Fox about the phone calls, he told Politico, despite his pretty forceful rebuke: "I imagine there was a perfunctory exchange between us and our staffs about coordinating phone calls and messages for the day.” “I don’t recall the specifics, and it certainly wasn’t in a detailed or more formal way," he added. "It was more perfunctory/routine.” Always have an out/CYA. Also, the guy was in the seat as SECDEF for 53 days; before that he was ASD/SOLIC for only 3 months. In most staff gigs it takes a min 4-6 weeks to get your head wrapped around the day-in/out basics. At the time of the second phone call, he was two days removed from the storming of the capital debacle and he also was working to catch up on the transition to the Biden administration, which had been delayed due to Trump's refusal to concede the election results. My guess (once again I'm speculating) is that his office had been advised of the call and that he had other things going on. FWIW, I think at minimum McKenzie and Milley should resign over how the Afghan withdrawal was conducted, I'm just not fired up over this story unless more corroborating facts come out. My personal take on this right now is that it smells of the 10% truth rule on Friday night stories at the squadron bar.

Any of the vaccines meet the mandate requirement; DoD can only force you to take Pfizer since that’s the only FDA approved one. Got two guys in my class that got the J&J off base and they’re green as far the military is concerned.

Don’t know, honestly think it could be Wg/CC and timing dependent but I’m speculating, the email didn’t go into any more specifics. I also don’t have even close to the full story on this so any guess I make as to 19th/AF and AETC’s actions would be just a guess. Personal opinion, if the guy completed the syllabus, was just waiting on graduation and I was wing king I’d let him wing with his class; I wouldn’t see that as being tied to the vaccine refusal.

According to the 19th AF/CC guidance we got in an email last week, said individual WILL be put on administrative hold pending a determination of his/her future in the service. Whether the Bobs ultimately decide to wing him/her since according to the source he/she is syllabus complete I honestly couldn't say.

So who’s telling the truth? Edited to add: the news article in question has Fox quoting “sources” that said the calls were not secret, and that there were multiple people in the room including notetakers, State and DoD reps.

Agreed that there's a lot of spin going on.....from both sides. Last time I checked, even in the military justice system, someone is innocent until proven guilty. There's a lot of people out in the media and on this forum that are "raging for justice, throw him in prison, execute him!!" before all the facts are in. Maybe Milley did something illegal, maybe not. If Senator Cotton is to be believed, he's going to ask Milley in front of Congress in the next couple days. I'm willing to wait until more data is in before passing judgement over this issue. I haven't read the book (or any of Woodward's books for that matter), so it's difficult for me to definitively say or have an opinion that Milley was a primary source; I know you spent time up in the puzzle palace so assuming you'd have more insight into the goings on internal to that building. The most amusing thing to me about this whole story/situation is the different spin from the right and the left. Woodward's previous books on the Trump administration were pretty heavily denied/disparaged across the right leaning media because they didn't paint the administration in a favorable light. The left leaning media loved those books for the same reason. Now along comes the final chapter and people on both sides of the divide are are taking the words in said book as the god's honest truth, but for vastly different reasons.

If you could do me the favor of not quoting that Martian I'd appreciate it; it keeps the threads more coherent and you're quoting him complicates my blocking the garbage he posts.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/milley-chinese-counterpart-phone-calls-senate-testimony I would encourage everyone to read the entire article above and not just the headline. If you believe Fox News reporting, then it doesn't seem like the accounts in Woodward's book are 100% accurate to say the least.

Glad they're all ok!