Training Cuts: Ex-​​Pilots React

Former Navy F/​A-​​18 pilot Harry Hirschman is dis­gusted by the Air Force’s deci­sion to dras­ti­cally cut back on train­ing time for fighter jocks.
“There’s a lot of games­man­ship that goes into the train­ing and readi­ness num­bers. But you can’t game the num­ber of hours each pilot gets to fly,” he tells Defense Tech.

In the Navy, it took at least 32 hours per month to even come close to full com­bat readi­ness. And that needs to be main­tained for sev­eral months per squadron per pilot in order to be able to get the myr­iad types of train­ing in. It’s impos­si­ble to be 100% effi­cient on the train­ing too, because senior pilots end up repeat­ing cer­tain types of sor­ties with junior pilots in order to move them along the learn­ing curve.
A cut like the one described below will hurt across the board because it’s so deep. Squadrons will give as much time to the junior pilots as they can in order to get them up to a min­i­mum level of com­pe­tence and safety but they won’t be able to do it all because they’ll have to send senior guys along to teach. It’s a very dif­fi­cult sit­u­a­tion for a squadron com­man­der and train­ing offi­cer.
But then, there may be some games­man­ship in what the Air Force is doing. By cut­ting so dra­mat­i­cally into some­thing that defense watch­ers know will impact com­bat readi­ness, they may be hop­ing for a reprieve. 

“The irony is the sav­ings pro­jected are a pit­tance,” adds retired Gen. Tom Wilkerson, who logged over 3,000 hours in the front seats of F-​​4s and F/​A-​​18s. “What is $272 mil­lion against one F-​​22 [stealth fighter] purchase?”

June 2nd, 2005 | Money Money Money | Comments Off Both comments and pings are currently closed.