It happens, each time we go through one of these “change” convulsions. It starts at the top, with the glad handing of petty thugs and enduring the remonstrances of tin pot pedophiles. And filters on down through the ranks. Suddenly every crank with a bone to pick gets equal time on the national stage, demanding serious consideration of his latest enthusiasm. I do not, for the now, include the recent silliness from Tom Ricks in this category, having come to the conclusion that his “close the service academies” op-ed had less to do with any serious recommendation, and more with the opportunity to tweak the establishment in the 500 words or less. I’m quite sure that the rest of us spent far more time rebutting his little foray into military education than he spent drafting it.
An after all, the guy’s got a deadline to make.
But now comes Paul Kane to recommend – in the New York Times – that the US Air Force ought to be done away with, its resources spread among the other services. In part, it seems, because too many airmen are fatties:
(Air) power is a critical component of America’s arsenal. But the Army, Navy and Marines already maintain air wings within their expeditionary units. The Air Force is increasingly a redundancy in structure and spending. War is no longer made up of set-piece battles between huge armies confronting each other with tanks and airplanes. As we move toward a greater emphasis on rapid-response troops, the Army has tightened its physical fitness regime and the Marine Corps has introduced a physically grueling Combat Fitness Test for all members. Yet an Air Force study last year found that more than half of airmen and women were overweight and 12 percent were obese.
Long time readers of these pages will have intuited by now that their host holds no brief for the blue-suited set, but this is more than just a little ridiculous. The Army doesn’t want to manage the deep air war, the Navy can’t use land-based TACAIR and the Marine Corps could never afford it, neither in terms fiscal nor cultural – maintaining a larger air arm than they currently possess would unbalance the Corps’ wonderful focus on supporting the engaged rifleman.
The USAF, for all its self-obsessions and corporate quirks, provides the kind of long haul, persistent, sustained combat power that has ensured that no US ground forces have had to even consider enemy air attack since Korea. The Key West Agreement might or might not have been a good idea back in 1948, but we have come too far to try and unspool it now.
Next Kane goes after the military’s “up or out” promotion system, wherein a serviceman that has twice failed to select for promotion is required to seek alternative employment:
The military should develop a new accounting and personnel system that tracks the cost of developing its human capital and tallies each service member as an investment with a fixed value based on his education, training, experience and performance. This would reflect the departure of a valued service member as an asset lost, not a cost cut. Why are fit men and women who have served in combat, a human experience that a million dollars can’t buy, being pushed out instead of retained for 15, 20, 30 years?
But Kane answers his own question in the preamble to this paragraph, noting that Congress sets end strength limits on the force at each pay grade. Retaining an unpromotable veteran, regardless of his previous contributions and experience, would mean fewer promotion opportunities for younger servicemen who deserve them, driving those more capable and qualified to seek opportunities elsewhere. And realistically, in my experience, the number of people who cannot advance to a position of eligibility to retire is rather small, and the pool self-selecting.
Finally, the Marine veteran and “former fellow with the International Security Program at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government” thinks that we ought to undo the all volunteer force and make national service mandatory “to increase the quality and size of the pool from which troops are drawn.” This, at least, is an arguable proposition, but from the standpoint of individual quality and military efficiency the argument Kane makes is not the compelling one:
We need to spread the risk and burden of fighting our wars. If more of our national leaders had been in uniform, or knew they might have children at risk in war, their decisions during military confrontations might be better.
This is a political argument rather than a military one. It presupposes that the existing Constitutional means of committing the military to war is flawed, entirely ignores the superb quality of our all-volunteer force today and omits consideration of the historical problems an increasingly pampered and libertine national culture has stomaching compulsory service, especially in wartime.
The surprising thing is not that there are people – even intelligent, experienced people – who earnestly believe that the world’s most capable military needs to be upended in order to do, well: I’m not entirely sure what. The surprising thing is that such people have access to such a prominent national megaphone to share their enthusiasms. But the Times has always viewed the military suspiciously, and seems to believe that change – any change at all – is preferable to the status quo, no matter how militarily effective and ultimately adaptive the existing model has heretofore been.
How wonderful to have an ex-serviceman – and Harvard fellow! – come along and recommend a radical restructuring. It takes all of the heavy intellectual lifting off the shoulders of an editorial staff who reflexively believes that our national defense is overseen by an icky institution full of politically unpalatable people that happens also to be an eternally wasteful drain on the national fisc. Thus freed from the burden of thinking for themselves on such a trivial notion, they are allowed to think big thoughts on nationalized health care, and so on.
You know: The important stuff.
This guy did not spend much time in the service, or he spent too much of it behind a desk asking for coffee.
It’s probably the phrase “do away with” that whetted the appetites of the NYT crowd. Like Pavlov’s dogs, they couldn’t resist. Anything to denigrate or reduce the effectiveness of the armed forces–no matter what the branch.
OK, so we haven’t fought a large set piece war means that we never shall again? Man, what a fantastic way of insuring that we will, and soon.
What a strange idea to propose, with the Chinese starting to become agressive, and the Bear feeling frisky again.
It is now, in time of peace for us to start building Carriers, DDs, DEs, and air wings, things that cost and take awhile to make. Do none of these people ever read any history?
Yes indeed.
Let’s take, for example, ASW.
The Navy now has a dwindling fleet of P-3 Orions to perform the Maritime Patrol and airborne ASW mission. We are losing them on a regular basis due to metal fatigue. The replacement platform, the P-8 is still years away. In fact, several hundred millions of it’s funding was stripped away to provide for a 3rd DD-1000.
The S-3, the premier midrange ASW platform and all around utility aircraft, is no more. They sit in the desert, awaiting their fate(s).
That leaves helos, with a limited range and TOS, to fill in the gap, and they are not always available, depending upon various conditions.
Subs and FFG/DDG are pretty good. But ask yourself where the long ASWEX training periods are? They are shortened due to time and fiscal constraints, especially in light of all the other training that need to be done, such as diversity workshops, sexual harrasment lectures, fiscal responsibility for junior enlisted presentations, etc. You all know what I’m talking about.
Now compare that with a Chinese Navy that can currently flood the Pacific with some 60 Romeo class subs. Yeah, I know. They’re diesels. So what? It’s awfully hard to hear a battery when that boat goes sinker. I know. I’ve been there and done that.
If we get into a shooting match with China, it will be in THEIR waters, and they will, for a while at least, be calling the shots. We’ll have to transit to reach the battle space, and bring our supports and logistics with us, because the forward-deployed sites will be under the umbrella of PLAN missiles.
So there they sit with their Sino Wolfpacks, and how to we scrub the waters of them?
WE know HOW to do this, we did it in WWII & throughout the Cold War. This time, however, we are woefully undermanned, with fewer assets and dedicated ASW training and platforms.
We can give them a run for their money, but we better get it right the first time, because we won’t have any reserves to put into the fight if things go badly.
We WILL be involved in another conventional, large scale war. To think otherwise is to ignore not only history, but current political and strategic realities.
respects,
I wonder what we did with all of those ASROC’s that were pulled off the Tin cans back in the day?
There is a hidden reason to get rid of all those overweight USAF types
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2387203.ece
Kills two birds at one blow (to mix metaphors). A strike for peace by disarming nasty America, and ecologically save the planet as well!
“The surprising thing is not that there are people – even intelligent, experienced people – who earnestly believe that the world’s most capable military needs to be upended in order to do, well: I’m not entirely sure what.”
Try “make it less effective to reduce the effectiveness of American power in the world.”?
Do away with the USAF? In an economic downturn? Did anyone figure the damage that would do to the golf industry?
btw Sherlock has the right of it. If you try to ignore the left’s words, and just track their actions, the only thing that makes sense is that they are hell bent on restricting the ability of the US to influence world events to an area between I-95 and I-5, and only during periods of good weather.
Drone drivers in barco-loungers fat? Whoda thought? Sorry VX.
Articles like this are nothing but a sharp poke in the eye – meant to annoy more than injure. Kane’s premise on “up or out” makes no sense – where exactly do you stash “combat veteran” or a pilot that can’t hack it at the boat? We don’t have geedunk officers in Adak anymore. So what do they do? What about end strength limits? PCS costs? Cost of health care for families? And who really wants a guy that is twice passed over in their wardroom poisoning the well for the others?
I swear we need to figure out a way to get Lex on some “Point -Counter Point” Fox News commentary.
Well,
There is of course the cost-saving program of returning to Enlisted Pilots.
Seriously. Why not also consider taking pilots out of the command loop, or at least having a dual-track program. Identify those who long for command opportunities and develop them accordingly, and allow the remaining pilots to continue to serve as pilots, doing what they do best.
Drop them from having to act as division officers, etc, and give them only minimal collateral duties as needs be. Have them continue to refine their combat and aviator skills, spending their entire career flying, and teaching others what they have learned.
Let the Command tenure tracked folks develop along their own lines, and see how the division of skill sets works out.
But there is also room for enlisted pilots, and the Navy ought to be looking at that program. Helos, Transports, Hummers, MPA, etc. all could be considered as ideal platforms for enlisted aviators.
respects,
The reason I think they wont do this is… the CAG/DCAG/CO/XO all want to be leading the charge on the first strike… and by having pilots that only fly (and can cream those on the command track)… that ensures they wont… I mean all section / division leads would be terminal O-3/4 types, plus some salty CWO/Enlisted pilots… all of the “head sheds” in the rear with the gear, tripping over themselves to get the Admiral a cup of coffee and a…
“But comeon… they put me in charge, I must be good at flying this thing..!”
Sure, just keep telling yourself that one, chief!
They called it the ADO program, and it was very short-lived.
G-Man/
LOL! When I was in the REALLY IMPORTANT PT was elbow strength at the bar. The guy who had the additional duty as Sq. PT officer in one sq I was in simply fat penciled the 8min mile run for everybody–increasing everybody’s times by 30 sec every year. We were runnin’ fools, man! LOL!!
(Actually, as a varsity athlete in college, I always wondered in those days why there wasn’t a more organized, systematic approach to PT by the AF–whose effort along those lines in those days was virtually non-existent. The avg. univ. health center has a wider range of machinery, equip. and programs for college co-eds today than we, “America’s finest” ever had–or even have available today for all I know..)
AW1 Tim, the Navy is working a program for some Warrants in the fixed wing multi-engine arena.
As to up or out, the Army certainly remembers the difficulty it had with “The Hump” of officers after WW1 where NO one got promoted unless someone died. There were guys that spent 14 years as a second lieutenant. Do some good guys get caught in the up-or-out net? Sure. But who ever promised life in the service was fair? Overall, it has worked for many years. Why fix what ain’t broken?
XBrad, it wasn’t any better before WWI. It took George C. Marshall 14 years to make O-3. He went all the way to O-6 during the war and then back to O-4 after it was over. Fun time to be in the military.
The Navy Warrant Flying program is a pig in a poke-and it will quickly die as force shaping kicks in.
A better value for the Navy’s dollar and for the Enlisted folks accepted would be the Flying LDO program-which would have the added benefit of providing officers for ship’s company tours on CV’s.
There is no reason a good pilot cannot also be a good officer and the current system is not broken. Lets empower CPO’s again and also let them get into the mentoring of their division officers. ( I had a great avionics chief that I learned a lot off of).
I honestly believe that Warrant Officers would make great Naval Aviators and NFOs.
But I also know you are right. The Navy will strangle this in its crib at the first opportunity.
It is not that would not make good pilots and NFO’s, it is that the Navy could get a lot more use out of them as LDO’s and it avoids all the “wardroom” issues that come with the CWO program.
Plus-as long as it is not open to all avation communities (and it will be a cold day in you know where before you see them grace a hornet ready room…), then I’m not a fan.
Skippy, I’m in complete agreement with you.
**scratches that item off the “Coming of the Apocalypse” checklist…**
Didn’t we try this once before. You know, the experiment with Whiz Kids from Harvard and their statistical brilliance all focused on reshaping the military and strategy.
After that little fiasco, they all decided to become “quantizers” guiding hedge fund investments.
And we all know how successful that ultimately turned out to be.
“Helos, Transports, Hummers, MPA, etc. all could be considered as ideal platforms for enlisted aviators. ”
And why is that? Because the gucci-pointed nose set ought to be the sole province of officers and the EAP’s can be left with the trash haulers? I’d say the ghosts of the Flying Professionals (VF-2) might have a word or two about that…
If it’s because of ordnance-related activities – well, you well remember MPA/helo capabilities in that area and I submit that with the coming E-2D and requirement for “launch-on-TADIL” forced by LO/VLO weapons, you are going to have the Hummers deeply and intimately involved in ordnance-related affairs as well, even from the front seat because of the new mission avionics station.
If the WWII EAP was good enough for F6F’s as well as R6D’s I would think his/her 21st century counterpart would be capable as well, that is, if one is truly going to go forward with this sort of plan.
While it makes for an interesting peice of discussion, I don’t see it happening for a variety of reasons – cultural and cost related.
- SJS
SJS,
Not my intent to cause friction, but rather to lessen it. I saw it as a means to introduce enlisted or even warrants into the pilot’s seat, starting on the periphery and working into fleet-wide, all-platform service.
The big concern is interactions in the ready-room. The officer/enlisted wall is always there, and I’m not complaining about it. I did my time as an enlisted aircrewman, and got along famously with the officers. However, we (the enlisted crewman) rarely went out on town with the officers, and vice versa. We all knew where the professional lines were and were careful not to cross it. However, our times together were alwasys in briefing rooms, debrief, etc. We didn’t share a ready room, and even when together, the O’s always sat up in front of the E’s.
I don’t see any real issues regarding skill sets, drive, etc. My only concern, and I should have voiced it earlier, is how to maintain fraternity without familiarity.
Respects,
The Army has done well with Warrant Officer Pilots, and they have proven themselves effective. The Navy has a cultural problem with the idea, and I wonder if they can overcome the mental block. I know they are doing it now, but they are limited in what they are allowed to fly. the question must be ask as to why. Much the same problem when it came to combining Rotary Wing training with the Army. The flags couldn’t bear the idea the Army might do something better than they were.
The Navy Officer that evaluated the Army’s program told me they were doing better, so go ahead and argue.
SJS, they ain’t all ghosts. I’m pleased to tell you that Paul Mankin, the only enlisted Navy Ace is still kicking. Paul is alive and well in Southern California. I’ve been lucky to have dinner and drinks with him a few times.
And back when my Dad was getting most of his flight time in an R4D out of Sigonella, he was usually in the right seat. The left seat was the province of a crusty old Chief AP.
All fighter guys want from the E-2 is good L16 and “Judy!”.
LOL, but the truth hurts!
Don’t forget a reliable tanker posit…………
AW1:
Agreed – I was one of the few (then) E-2C qual’d supporters of the FT program in VAW – flew with two FT’s who were among the top controllers I’ve had the priv of flying with and was vocally opposed to shutting the program down. Community “leadership” disagreed however and strangled it in the crib as more squadrons came online with the E-2C by cutting out AIC qualifications for FT’s in the name of “efficiencies”
Saw the same happen for the flying LDO/Warrant program, so any discussion of putting enlisted in the cockpit I view somewhat jadedly – not because of lack of ability, but rather given recent (past 40 years) experience with the organization and its ‘processes’ …
Apologies if I came off a bit harsh below, not my intent.
- SJS
I can’t agree with Lex here, although i wouldn’t completely trash the AF, just transfer TACAIR to the Army to re-establish the AAF, and keep the strategic and air defense commands as a separate force. It worked well in WW2, and works well with the Marines now. The key West agreement was a bad idea and the AF has, alas, proved it was a bad idea.
While the troops haven’t had to worry about an air attack for a long time, that’s a poor argument used to avoid talking about the problem of the AF not wanting to support the troops on the ground. The problem led to the Army having to come up with other means, very expensive means, to make up the difference.
QM/
SOoo–You want to go the old Soviet route with TACAIR = “Frontal Aviation” (FA) in the old SU model, and reconstitute SAC, uh? See, that only works if you’re going to only have to fight Corps-sized engagements in a limited geographical area forever into the future. Once you expand the conflict over wide areas you find that there is never enough of what is, in the best of times, a limited resource, and that quarreling generals in adj AOs refusing to relinquish opcon of their air assets to the next guy is not exactly the best way to rationalize the system.
And you’d better worry about getting what you wish for. If everyone buys into the idea we’re only going to fight land battles on corps-sized fronts, the idea will dawn that we can get rid of the Army entirely and simply beef up the Marines, as we already have a single sea-air-land command structure for TACAIR in THAT set-up.
And the AF will still be there with my great grand-kids flying B-52s!
This is territory we’ve covered before.
As far as getting what I wish for, or canning the Army to beef up the Marines, those are red herrings. What makes the Marines set up effective is they put their officers through the same basic course no matter where they go. Their model works because the guys in teh cockpit understand what they are seeing from the air. The AF GOs don’t really want to support the Army. That’s been a standard complaint since Korea. In ‘nam, the troops would rather have Marine TACAIR available than the AF simply because they did a better job.
Marine pilots understood what the troops on the ground were facing because they were trained specifically to work with ground troops. The AF GOs wanted to “go downtown” or sweep the sky of the enemy. As important as those things were, doing them to exclusion of the main job of supporting the Army led to problems in Korea, and on every other battlefield since.
If you need evidence of the antipathy of the AF leadership on TACAIR, all you have do is look at what they wanted to do with the A-10. As soon as the Army said they would take them, suddenly the AF said they needed them. This was not the only thing of this sort that has taken place.
Question: Are we getting enough value out of the EAF, that we can forgo reconstituting SAC and/or TAC?
I’ve always thought the EAF concept a good one, albeit a more tactical than strategic solution.
I think this is the money-quote in the entire piece. This has more to do with continuing to bash former President Bush than it has to do with a commentary on the Air Force and our military in general.
These are the same kinds of people who still talk about how Dubya “stole the election” from Al Gore way in the wayback.
They just can’t let it go.
I don’t want our leaders to be too eager to go to war simply because they don’t have any personal connections to the military. However, I also don’t want leaders who are too timid to make decisions about defending our country because their precious snowflake might end up in the line of fire.
“If more of our national leaders had been in uniform, or knew they might have children at risk in war, their decisions during military confrontations might be better.”
So…., instead of re-instituting the draft, make military service a requirement for Congress, VP and Prez. That’s regime change I could go for!
Off topic, but go to Rick’s blog at Foreign Policy.com and he has about three posts about the academies, one of which is targeted right back at the Navy.
“Long time readers of these pages will have intuited by now that their host holds no brief for the blue-suited set”
Ouch, Lex, great site, but as a long time reader…
Ouch
Jerry
Sgt USAF
PS: I did try to join the USMC @ 15. Long story short, first trip to the Mall where the Recruiter were did not see a USMC “office”. Trip two and three to the Navy Recruiter’s office, where the Mens dept was located (USMC
) was empty.
By then the USAF Recruiter had seem me three times and he swooped in. The rest is history.
PSPS: I sit next to an ex-marine DI. He tried to join the USAF, but they were not manning the office, the USMC Recruiter swooped in! Enlisted at 16, off to boot at 17, so I did not know better.
PSPSPS: I did end up in a forward air controller unit, so felt like I was in the army more than the AF.
PSPSPS: Great site, Great “Author”
PSPSPSPS: Oh yeah, too comment on topic, I tend to agree, the current iteration of the US Military is not the problem.
Jerry
Yeah, when I first saw this a couple of days ago, my heart sank…but then the realization hit that this proposal to close the service academies is just the latest iteration of the Left’s assault on all things American…the family, Christianity, marriage, capitalism, liberty…on and on. It isn’t going to stop. It’s just the way it is.
Mike/
Along just the line you are thinking about I would refer you to an article in the American Thinker from last fall entitled: “The Drumbeat” @:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/09/the_drumbeat.html
I’m going to be the odd man out here.
Deep-sixing the AF would be an excellent idea. Better yet, dispose of DOD entirely and revert to the old War and Navy Departments.
Seriously, it makes good sense, particularly if you face facts about the likely threats. The War Department would be focused on major wars, and would have a large reserve component. The Navy Department would focus both on warfighting and low-intensity conflict. Since they are always deployed, the Navy Department would have a far smaller reserve component.
It worked well enough in the past…and the separation was a firewall between forces available for police actions and forces required for a major war.
Of course we need an AF, but along Mike M’s line of thought, why do we need a Dept of the Air Force? Fold the service into the Dept of the Army. I think we might be better served if the Air Force bore the same relation to the Army as the Marine Corps does to the Navy. Not that any of this is likely to happen…
Part of the problem is that the USAF takes care of a number of what you might call “meta-war” functions. The kind of things that don’t directly show up on a battlefield unless things go more-horribly-awry than have ever gone bad for us before. Which means that for the “USAF is to the Army as USMC is to the Navy” plan to work, you still need to setup a system that can execute those kinds of tasks well. I have my doubts to the Army’s interest or (no offense, Green-suiters) top-level competency at space operations, heavy airlift, heavy bombardment (including ICBM capabilities), or cyber-war. Whether all those tasks rightly belong in a Blue suit or not is debatable, but to succesfully operate nowadays, they do all need doing. None of the other services are set up for it.
I can see splitting the USAF, in that situation, into three pieces. Send ground support (and probably air-superiority) tasks to the Army; put heavy bombardment, ICBMs, and space (plus possibly heavy airlift) under a separate strategic department, and put the weather, cyberspace/infowar, and research arms (together with their counterparts from the Army and Navy) under a separate service-support department.
[Edit: By air-superiority and ground-support, I of course mean just the current USAF tasks for those duties. Why break what works with the Navy and USMC?]
“It’s ‘Tommy this’ and ‘Tommy that’
and ‘Chuck him out, the brute!’…”
Lex, I need to take issue with your 2FOS characterization as “small” and “self-selecting.” There was nothing self-selecting about the aviator CO on an AOR who rated all his SWO department heads and XOs as “normal promote” instead of RAP. Not a one of his XOs ever command screened, and none of his Dept heads ever XO screened or made O-5. Said CO got SERBed after his deep draft tour, but they never went back and fixed the folks he screwed. Not self-selecting, and it’s never small if it happens to you. A couple years later they changed to the new FITREP process to make it a little harder to damn with faint praise, but SWOs still eat their young.
I’ve way seen too many excellent people passed over for promotion (and completely inept folks continue to advance). I agree with you Navig8r (if I understood what you were saying through all the acryonyms I’m not familiar with).
Another problem with the promotion system (at least in the Airforce) at present is the push to change jobs to make rank. Those on the “fast track” for promotion have to change their job practically every year. In theory this gives the person a well-rounded background, but in practical reality it does everyone a disservice because they move the person out of position when they were just beginning to really understand their job. My husband had a squadron commander at Nellis who was only in that position for six months! It sucked for everyone.
My experience was: 6 months to really understand it, 6 months to manage it, the next 6 months, you could improve it, without destroying it, as you really understood how it worked. If you go at 12 months, I submit there isn’t the phase for real improvements. If you go at 6 months, then the troops just are stuck in chaos. And it’s the troops that make it consistent for the long haul.