Missed it further down on the “Latest”
Apologies.
It’s probably more about the Air Force wanting to acquire the F22 in larger numbers...
It probably has more to do with the USAF not wanting to contribute anything near their fair share to the war effort.
I hope this isn’t related to the awarding of the new tanker contract to Northrup-Grumman/EADS and not to Boeing.
Looks like these two disagreed with the Iran bombing plans. Your outa here!
and the mistaken shipment of triggers to Taiwan.
Reminds me of the time a FSN got mixed up and resulted in shipping a CVN anchor to Ft Carson CO.
Seems as though the Air Force has had its’ collective head handed to it. Gates isn’t one to be messed with, and when the AF guys didn’t change anything in its’ operations, Gates changed it for them. This could get interesting as time goes along. IMHO, this was way overdue.
There is a huge fight quietly underway about the future of manned tactical A/C.
One one side, you have the folks who say you can pull 20g, need no HVAC, SAR ,etc. with the man out.
As soon as you have an A/C pulling 20g vs. one with a pilot that can pull 9g max, it's all over for the guy in the manned A/C. In addition, the best performances of “piloting” the drones armed with Hellfire missiles have come. not from the classic pilots, but the B/Ns with a history of playing a lot of computer games!
On the other side, the old hands say there is nothing like a pilot in the cockpit to make decisions, evaluate, etc.
Well this will have all the moonbats saying that it’s a divergence of views about bombing Iran — ooooooooohhhhhh — probably much more likely it’s conflict over what Gates said in April, demanding much more effort on UAVs and battlefield support in Iraq and Afghanistan, and AF brass did not like it.... probably built up over a long time and it’s come to a head in the past few months..... just my 2 cents worth of guesswork.
Countdown to the publication of the tell-all books...
(Probably not so much from the General as the Sec’y-AF)
I'm thinking these firings/resignations have more to do with what is talked about in this biased editorial from the "Army Times".
It’s been my impression that the Air Force is sort of like Club Med.
A ton of frat going on between enlisted and officers, enlisted and senior enlisted.
The Air Force was told to get the drones up and running in Iraq and Afghanistan for 2 years now but it’s been like pulling teeth in getting it going. The Air Force has purposely tried to distance themselves from these combat situations because they might miss the next air show.
I wonder if those that resigned are Carter and/or Clinton appointees.
Gates hit the decks running and firing and pushing the surge.
Gates appears to be a friend of McCain and vice versa.
What Gates may be doing is getting the Pentagon running how McCain and his think tanks feel it should be to win the WOT.
a small part of me hopes it was because of the stupid “over all” slogan they stole from the nazis and that some army officers were going to be asked to resign for “army strong” and “army of one” next.
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5006916&page=1
Top Air Force Officials to be Fired
Forced Resignations Come in Wake of Nuclear Screw-up and Contract Mess
Just another link
According to the lead editorial in this month’s Air Force Times, it has to do with the speech Gates gave on May 13 at Colorado Springs. He wants the services to concentrate on the the present War on Terror and not buy modern arms to fight potential future wars. He said, “It is hard to conceive of any country confronting the United States directly in conventional terms — ship to ship, fighter to fighter, tank to tank — for some time to come.” Apparently, the Air Force leaders said we need new aircraft to maintain air superiority, so he fired them.
Had either publicly shared an opinion on bombing Iran?
Good move. Bye bye to bad rubbish.