Third and final week of “the most important thing”.

Several weeks ago I talked about ROTC and how I got through by following the sage advice of my ROTC instructor.  Well I took that lesson to heart and when I reported to active duty I decided that I would do all of the right things to get to where I, and the Air Force, thought I should go.  When you’re a lieutenant life is simple.  Your #1 goal is to fly.  That is, after all, why you became a pilot.  The progression is pretty obvious.  Upgrade to aircraft commander.  Then after a couple years instructor and, eventually, flight examiner. After that though, it gets complicated.

Guys that like to fly, and are good at it, want nothing more than to stay in a flying job for as long as possible.  But then there are the guys who either aren’t very good pilots or only became pilots as a career path to, shall we say, the “stars”.  That’s all well and good, but the Air Force has decided that everyone needs to reach for the “stars” or hit the bricks. Over my 34+ years the Air Force has gradually evolved into an, even more so, up or out organization.

I remember decades ago that everyone was encouraged to do PME, Professional Military Education.  Most guys did it, but if you were really good at your job and were an expert in some area, then you could get promoted without PME.  Those days are long gone.  It has gradually evolved into you MUST complete PME to even think about promotion, and I understand on active duty it’s not even good enough to do it by correspondence.  The problem is, once everyone is getting it done, then what becomes the next differentiator to make you stand out on a promotion board?  That led to whether or not you had deployed becoming the “most important thing”.  That worked for awhile but eventually, after a ten year war, everyone had deployed.  So what’s the new ‘most important thing’?  A Master’s degree of course.  So, now, while doing your job, deploying oversees, attending PME which in residence can take a year, you now have to go to classes to get a Master’s degree.  I’m sure the next step is to include fit-to-fight scores in your career brief and beyond that, a doctorate is the next logical step.

The Air Force pays endless lip service to taking care of airmen and their families yet insists that time that should be spent with the kids on their homework is spent on yours.  And, sadly, somewhere lost in all of the Air Force “most important things” is the thing that really should be your career’s “most important thing” and that’s doing your job the best you can.  Not maneuvering to get the next job or dreaming of the job after that, but giving the taxpayers what they deserve and have paid an enormous amount of money to train you for.  The cost to train an Air Force Pilot is well over a million dollars but most officers spend less than a third of their careers actually flying.  Careerism is a cancer that devours tax dollars and leads to thousands of talented airmen leaving the Air Force each year out of frustration and disappointment.

I left active duty 28 years ago for a variety of reasons and I found what I thought was heaven on earth in the Air Force Reserves.  I could fly my whole career, or not, it was my choice.  The experience level of the aircrew was light years ahead of active duty and people were here because they really wanted to be here.  But, times have been a changin’.  Over the last 10-15 years we have been adopting the mentality of Active Duty.  Priorities have changed and now, moving up and around, for not only ARTs but for reservists, has become the “most important thing”.  And when the mission is given second stage, and civilian jobs third stage and families fourth stage, and all sacrificed at the altar of almighty “careerism”, we have little hope of surviving as a command.  The differences in our people and our priorities is what made us what we are today and abandoning those strengths will simply make us “unnecessary”.

I don’t know what the future holds for AFRC.  I’ve always thought that it should be the “big brother” in the air force.  We should be watching over active duty and when it comes up with a boneheaded idea, that’s been tried and failed 20 years ago, have the gravitas to tell them so and them listen to us.  Instead, we find ourselves saying “me too” like the overeager little brother and then suffering the consequences.  We need to continue to be a voice of reason and experience and to concentrate on our strengths.  We know what the “most important thing” is and we need to keep doing it.

More fun stories next week!