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Author: William W. Taylor
Publisher: Minnesota Historical Society
Published: 2002
Total Pages: 14
ISBN-13: 9780833031822
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe US Air Force is facing unprecedented problems in its efforts to provide adequate training for new and inexperienced pilots in its operational fighter units. This report assesses the Air Force's training dilemma with a view to finding ways to remedy it in both the short and long term.
Author:
Publisher:
Published: 2002
Total Pages: 0
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe U.S. Air Force is currently confronting unprecedented problems in managing fighter aircrews. There are too few pilots in the active component, yet so many new pilots are entering the force that operational units cannot absorb them without jeopardizing readiness and safety. The 1990s saw sizable cuts in force structure, increased tasking, and fewer training sorties in all remaining active operational units. These factors are the genesis of today's absorption problems. During site visits, we observed the adverse training environment that can result when the number of new pilots arriving at operational units exceeds the units' capacity to absorb them. At an active A/OA-10 combat unit located at Pope Air Force Base, North Carolina, for example, we found the following: (1) Sixty percent (47 of 78) of assigned primary mission pilots were decertified from combat mission-ready (CMR) status. (2) Pilots averaged too few sorties monthly, exhibited degraded performance in primary bombing events, and performed poorly on check rides. (3) All instructor pilot (IP) and supervisor survey respondents cited problems with both the quantity and the quality of training available to inexperienced pilots. Many also expressed concern that wingmen in their units were flying advanced missions without a fundamental foundation in certain basic skills. (4) Manning and experience levels exacerbated these problems. Available training sorties had to be distributed among an aircrew position indicator-1 (API-1) pilot population that was 16.7 percent overmanned and only 36.9 percent experienced even though the reported experience level was 48.6 percent.
Author: Richard S. Marken
Publisher: Rand Corporation
Published: 2007-10-03
Total Pages: 90
ISBN-13: 9780833044457
DOWNLOAD EBOOKWhat qualifications determine whether a fighter pilot is experienced? Surveys of expert pilots revealed that, while flying time is an element of the experience needed for both combat and staff jobs, other things are also important. The Air Force needs to measure and credit different types of experience-including time spent in advanced simulator systems-when revising its definitions of pilot experience.
Author: Commission on Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education
Publisher:
Published: 1990
Total Pages:
ISBN-13: 9780309590020
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAuthor: Michael W. Hankins
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 2021-12-15
Total Pages: 248
ISBN-13: 150176067X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFlying Camelot brings us back to the post-Vietnam era, when the US Air Force launched two new, state-of-the art fighter aircraft: the F-15 Eagle and the F-16 Fighting Falcon. It was an era when debates about aircraft superiority went public—and these were not uncontested discussions. Michael W. Hankins delves deep into the fighter pilot culture that gave rise to both designs, showing how a small but vocal group of pilots, engineers, and analysts in the Department of Defense weaponized their own culture to affect technological development and larger political change. The design and advancement of the F-15 and F-16 reflected this group's nostalgic desire to recapture the best of World War I air combat. Known as the "Fighter Mafia," and later growing into the media savvy political powerhouse "Reform Movement," it believed that American weapons systems were too complicated and expensive, and thus vulnerable. The group's leader was Colonel John Boyd, a contentious former fighter pilot heralded as a messianic figure by many in its ranks. He and his group advocated for a shift in focus from the multi-role interceptors the Air Force had designed in the early Cold War towards specialized air-to-air combat dogfighters. Their influence stretched beyond design and into larger politicized debates about US national security, debates that still resonate today. A biography of fighter pilot culture and the nostalgia that drove decision-making, Flying Camelot deftly engages both popular culture and archives to animate the movement that shook the foundations of the Pentagon and Congress.
Author: Steve Ladd
Publisher: Air World
Published: 2020-09-30
Total Pages: 269
ISBN-13: 1526761254
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis behind-the-scenes account of a USAF career is “an absorbing read, written with the classic humor fighter pilots seem to have” (Flight Line Book Review). From Baron von Richthofen to Robin Olds, the mystique of the fighter pilot endures. The skill, cunning, and bravery that characterizes this distinctive band of brothers is well known, but there are other dimensions to those who take to the skies to do battle that have not been given the emphasis they deserve—until now. You don’t have to be an aviation aficionado to enjoy Colonel Steve Ladd’s fascinating personal tale, woven around his twenty-eight-year career as a fighter pilot. This extremely engaging account follows a young man from basic pilot training to senior command through narratives that define a unique ethos. From the United States to Southeast Asia, Europe to the Middle East, the amusing and tongue-in-cheek to the deadly serious and poignant, this is the lifelong journey of a fighter pilot. The anecdotes are absorbing, providing an insight into life as an Air Force pilot, but, in this book, as Colonel Ladd stresses, the focus is not on fireworks or stirring tales of derring-do. Instead, this is an articulate and absorbing account of what life is really like among a rare breed of arrogant, cocky, boisterous, and fun-loving young men who readily transform into steely professionals at the controls of a fighter aircraft. “This book will appeal to a variety of readers with its Vietnam War combat stories and accounts of flying the Warthog in Cold War Europe. Fun, flying, international experiences—you won’t want to put it down.” —Aviation News
Author: Jerry Cook
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
Published: 2002-04-26
Total Pages: 239
ISBN-13: 0071399208
DOWNLOAD EBOOK* The true adventure tales of a U.S. Air Force fighter who flew more than 400 combat hours while on duty in Vietnam * Provides a rare insider's glimpse into the world of the flying elite, detailing their education, training, emotions, and day to day experiences * Poignant, sometimes funny, brutally honest, always exciting, and an eye-opening look at one of the most tumultuous eras in U.S. history.
Author: Stephen Lee McFarland
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Published: 1997
Total Pages: 96
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKExcept in a few instances, since World War II no American soldier or sailor has been attacked by enemy air power. Conversely, no enemy soldier orsailor has acted in combat without being attacked or at least threatened by American air power. Aviators have brought the air weapon to bear against enemies while denying them the same prerogative. This is the legacy of the U.S. AirForce, purchased at great cost in both human and material resources.More often than not, aerial pioneers had to fight technological ignorance, bureaucratic opposition, public apathy, and disagreement over purpose.Every step in the evolution of air power led into new and untrodden territory, driven by humanitarian impulses; by the search for higher, faster, and farther flight; or by the conviction that the air way was the best way. Warriors have always coveted the high ground. If technology permitted them to reach it, men, women andan air force held and exploited it-from Thomas Selfridge, first among so many who gave that "last full measure of devotion"; to Women's Airforce Service Pilot Ann Baumgartner, who broke social barriers to become the first Americanwoman to pilot a jet; to Benjamin Davis, who broke racial barriers to become the first African American to command a flying group; to Chuck Yeager, a one-time non-commissioned flight officer who was the first to exceed the speed of sound; to John Levitow, who earned the Medal of Honor by throwing himself over a live flare to save his gunship crew; to John Warden, who began a revolution in air power thought and strategy that was put to spectacular use in the Gulf War.Industrialization has brought total war and air power has brought the means to overfly an enemy's defenses and attack its sources of power directly. Americans have perceived air power from the start as a more efficient means of waging war and as a symbol of the nation's commitment to technology to master challenges, minimize casualties, and defeat adversaries.
Author:
Publisher:
Published: 2007
Total Pages: 0
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKOne of the main responsibilities of an operational fighter unit is to turn inexperienced pilots entering the unit into experienced pilots who are able to carry out the unit's operational mission effectively. The process of turning inexperienced pilots into experienced pilots is called absorption. The Air Force must manage pilot absorption to achieve two goals. First, it must ensure that operational units have enough experienced pilots to perform the unit's mission and to sustain the development of pilots for supervisory flying positions in the unit. Second, it must ensure that pilots gain the experience they will need to perform duties in nonflying positions that require rated officers.
Author: Christina Olds
Publisher: Macmillan
Published: 2010-04-13
Total Pages: 417
ISBN-13: 142992909X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFighter Pilot is the memoir of legendary ace American fighter pilot and general officer in the U.S. Air Force, Robin Olds. Robin Olds was a larger-than-life hero with a towering personality. A graduate of West Point and an inductee in the National College Football Hall of Fame for his All-American performance for Army, Olds was one of the toughest college football players at the time. In WWII, Olds quickly became a top fighter pilot and squadron commander by the age of 22—and an ace with 12 aerial victories. But it was in Vietnam where the man became a legend. He arrived in 1966 to find a dejected group of pilots and motivated them by placing himself on the flight schedule under officers junior to himself, then challenging them to train him properly because he would soon be leading them. Proving he wasn't a WWII retread, he led the wing with aggressiveness, scoring another four confirmed kills, becoming a rare triple ace. Olds, who retired a brigadier general and died in 2007, was a unique individual whose personal story presents one of the most eagerly anticipated military books in recent memory. Please note: This ebook edition does not include the photo insert from the print edition.
