U.S. Army vs. U.S. Marine Corps

a reply to: Echo3Foxtrot
No, I completely agree with you. I understand where you're coming from knowing so many officers abuse their power. My brother is a corpsman (Navy) and has spoken to me about this before. I'm not the type of person who would do that, I respect everyone. A title means nothing unless you've earned it

a reply to: cavtrooper7

Pilots have to be officers. The Army often uses CWOs to fly helos.

Back when I was in the Navy, they were looking to commission enlisted men as CWOs for limited flying duties, if I recall correctly mostly helos too.

I have always though Sr Enlisted men should be allowed to fly, especially experienced maintenance men to help troubleshoot problems a bird is having and possibly limited missions, like going from one station to another. In my opinion this would help the service operate more efficiently, thus more cost and time friendly.

originally posted by: RexPlex
a reply to: Echo3Foxtrot
No, I completely agree with you. I understand where you're coming from knowing so many officers abuse their power. My brother is a corpsman (Navy) and has spoken to me about this before. I'm not the type of person who would do that, I respect everyone. A title means nothing unless you've earned it

The thing that I learned early on was many junior officers do not become a part of the unit that they command. They only come around to inspect and inject their influence. They never become a member of their command just an over-seer. I learned this lesson by mistake on my first tour in Vietnam as a heavy weapons platoon leader (2LT). My commander was a very hard person to work for and insisted on superior performance especially young lieutenants. He was so demanding that the only way to stay ahead of this guy was to move out of the area where the commander lived and move in with my platoon sergeant. I was able to get to know my men and vise-versa. I was close to my responsibilities to the company and especially my platoon. This was a very formative experience to my command style that I kept to my retirement.

originally posted by: jrod
a reply to: cavtrooper7

Pilots have to be officers. The Army often uses CWOs to fly helos.

Back when I was in the Navy, they were looking to commission enlisted men as CWOs for limited flying duties, if I recall correctly mostly helos too.

I have always though Sr Enlisted men should be allowed to fly, especially experienced maintenance men to help troubleshoot problems a bird is having and possibly limited missions, like going from one station to another. In my opinion this would help the service operate more efficiently, thus more cost and time friendly.

The army had flying NCO all through WW2 and Korea. If you watch some real footage of MASH units you will see E7s driving the medivac helicopters. I think the commissioning of all pilots started in the USAF when the two services split in 1947. I think that all flying NCOs were gone by the early 1960's.

The army began pushing senior NCOs in several fields to apply to become CWOs not only in aviation. The army also has a program where EM can be selected to become commissioned officers if they qualify. They refer to this as going from green to silver for CWOs and green to gold for commissioned officers. I think the navy and the USMC has a limited duty officer program where EM can become commissioned.