FLYING
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Walter J. Boyne
Welcome to Walt’s web hangar
For all who love flying, aviation
history
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The election is over, the votes are counted, and we will have a new commander in chief on January 20, 2009. The nation faces a host of challenges, and we can only hope that the new President will have the correct advice and make the correct decisions to overcome them.
The array of difficulties is staggering, ranging from military forces that are far too small for the demands made on them to a faltering economy to the biggest question of all: when will the next terrorist strike on the United States come. The question is not if but when, and most now think it will be in the form of some sort of biological assault. However, given a resurgent Russia and a venomous Iran, a nuclear attack should not be ruled out.
In the midst of all this, our Air Force sits with its reputation tattered by a series of bad situations and decisions, the most grievous of which was the criminal attempt by a handful of people to profit from the Air Force’s desperate need for new tankers. The saddest thing about this tragedy is that it overshadows the incredible combat record of the Air Force for the last eighteen years. Some flaw in Air Force psychology has allowed it to be moved from being a war-winning service to playing a support role in the media, in the thinking of the other services, and worst of all, in the mind of the
public.
The truth is that the Air Force has been far too modest over the years, never claiming as much for its efforts as it might have, and being far too enthusiastic about being part of joint force. The other services, while all equally expert and patriotic, have none-the-less been far more vocal and parochial, and this has paid off for them. The USAF, undefeated in combat; has been badly outplayed in the game of public relations. The new USAF Chief of Staff, General Norton A. Schwartz, will have to address this issue.
The Department of Defense saw fit to delay the decision on the procurement of a new tanker to the next administration. It will be interesting to see how long it takes after January 20 to get a decision on perhaps the single most important Air Force procurement issue. It is almost certain that funding will be restrained for both the F-22 and F-35 aircraft, but there is no way that combat operations can be sustained over the next decade without acquiring new tankers. The tanker fleet has been well maintained, and it has had many modifications to extend its life, but hanging over it is the threat of some massive failure which will ground a substantial portion of the KC-135s. It happened to the RAF’s Vickers Valiant bombers and to the USAF’s Boeing B-47s, and it could happen to the 135s. If it did, the nation would be in dire straits indeed.
There are other problems that are important—reducing the demands on our forces for overseas deployment, maintaining our industrial base, procuring a new generation of helicopters—but all of these are secondary to solving the question of procuring tankers. For my money, it would be a straightforward acquisition of the U.S. built Boeing product, but if politics calls for it, it would be better to go with a procurement split between Boeing and Airbus than to continue to dawdle.
With that said, I sincerely invite you to
browse my website. Just click the link button of your choice.
Walt Boyne
IN THE NEWS
Check here often for
the latest news.
|
| These are the coveted command wings,
meaning that the pilot had 3,000 hours flying time, fifteen years experience and a
”green” instrument card. It not easy to accumulate 3000 hours in fifteen years,
unless you were on a SAC crew, and even then, it was not assured. So if you really wanted
it, it meant checking out in base-flight aircraft and flying one or two weekends a month.
The men liked it, the wives hated it, but it had to be done! |
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