At Odds With Air Force, Army Adds Its Own Aviation Unit

At Odds With Air Force, Army Adds Its Own Aviation Unit

www.nytimes.com

WASHINGTON — Ever since the Army lost its warplanes to a newly independent Air Force after World War II, soldiers have depended on the sister service for help from the sky, from bombing and strafing to transport and surveillance.

But the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have frayed the relationship, with Army officers making increasingly vocal complaints that the Air Force is not pulling its weight.

(visit the link for the full news article)

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[edit on 23/6/2008 by Mirthful Me]

SIGH!!! Its getting bad when our armed forces aren't even getting along.

Actually I thought all branches, including the army had their own aviation units already... I mean the Marines, Navy and Coast Guard do.

www.nytimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Grover,

You are correct that all the services have their own aviation program. The problem is that the Army's program is Helo based. They do have a couple of planes I believe, but they really aren't "warplanes" so to speak.

With all the pats on the backs about the Joint Operations and what not the services are pretty much all self-sufficient to a point. The Navy has planes, SEALs (soldiers) and boats. The Marines have planes, Marines (soldiers) and boats, The Army has Helicopters, Soldiers and boats (actually, the Army has more boats than the Navy, we just have more SHIPS than anyone else...probably in the world....lol)

The rub here comes from the specialty programs like UAVs and Submarines etc... When I was in Afghanistan there were a lot of problems with UAV priorities and I was at a Special Operations Headquarters!!! We'd see the video from the UAV and see a firefight or some other action happening and then we'd find out after 2 hours of hair pulling, nail biting, headless chicken running that the UAV's were all sent to Iraq without anyone knowing.

Joint operations is a joke until all the services are rolled up into one branch. The Army hates the SEALS because we fight on land, the Airforce hates the Navy because we fly over land, The Navy hates the Marines because they stink up our ships...lol and the Marines? They hate everybody, unless you're a marine too.

And the Coasties called the Navy squids and they called us shallow water sailors. Silly.

I prefer calling Coasties "puddle pirates"....lol

I mean it's all in good fun right? More like a sibling rivalry than hate speech...

But back on topic, lest the moderators do something dreadfully nasty to me, there are a lot of units that have their own UAV capabilities. It's just that the cool big ones are owned by the Air Force. The USAF is right in the fact that there are limited numbers of Predators and other drones in the arsenal. The problem is when the Generals are fighting for priority. Does the Special Forces unit deserve the drone more than the grunt on patrol? I guess it really depends on many factors. The mission, the threat, the end results ect...

Not unusual, the british army has somethign similar, I was reading about it somewhere and it is alot easier because the pilots understand what it is like for the soldiers, and they mostly fly helicopters in support of ground troops.

The Army already has an aviation section, but they're limited to helicopters and small cargo aircraft. They recently ordered several C-27Js for cargo hauling. For years they used the C-7 Caribou. You'll also find a few VIP transports with US Army markings.

Every few years some party tries to challenge or bend the Key West Agreement. Every branch is constantly trying to take missions from each other. The AF and Navy fight over maritime patrol, LR maritime strike, and command and control missions/roles. The AF and army go at it over the tactical air support and reconnaissance roles. Everyone wants more money for transport. This is really nothing new, other than the war-time situation makes the politics all the more tragic.

reply to post by _Del_


Very, very true! This has been going on since AT LEAST Vietnam (I'm not old enough to remember WWII and Korea except through movies...And Vietnam I only know through older relatives who served) But it's not just UAV and aviation, Special Operations have been fighting with each other for missions not just between services but with the CIA and International Groups as well. It's still happening today except that the speed that knowledge is available and the fact that its wartime and an election year makes it harder to ignore.

I think there is more to this story than meets the eye. In the news recently was the story of forced resignations of USAF brass for the "accidental" loading of nuclear missiles onto a B-52 heading out of Minot AFB, and the subsequent overflight of the continental US. I did a little research and discovered that there is something big going on behind the curtain. 6 of the airmen who were involved in loading those nukes were killed off base within 7 days after the story first broke. The root problem was the fact that the USAF simply refused to haul nukes to Israel so that they could irradiate Iran with them. You'll have to do the math yourself.

[edit on 23-6-2008 by applebiter]

You need to do a little more research into that. They weren't related to anything dealing with the nuke loading. One was a weather/intel officer, one was a pilot, one was an MP. Those are the three I remember off the top of my head. And they weren't killed within 7 days of the story first breaking, it was actually a longer period than that.

Darn those meteorologists! Always foiling my zionist schemes...

Pretty sure we can call this unrelated to the OP.

In August 2005, a version of Predator B, called Warrior, was chosen for the four-year System Development and Demonstration (SDD) phase of the US Army’s Extended Range / Multi-Purpose (ER/MP) UAV program. 11 Warrior systems, each with 12 air vehicles, and five ground control stations. Initial operating capability is planned for 2009.

Army Predators

Army hopefully will get theirs next year. That'll stop the gripeing and sniping and give the Army its own badly needed eyes on.

The two quotes I pasted below say a lot to me:


"But the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have frayed the relationship, with Army officers making increasingly vocal complaints that the Air Force is not pulling its weight."

"In Iraq, Army officers say the Air Force has often been out of touch, fulfilling only half of their requests for the sophisticated surveillance aircraft that ground commanders say are needed to find roadside bombs and track down insurgents."


I can see how it could be seen that the Air Force is not pulling its weight now. Since approx. 3 years ago, the Air Force has tried to drop 40,000 active duty members from its payroll in order to pay for the new F-22 and modernization of the aging air fleet. This has made homefront duty as stressful as deployment duty.

Add to that the fact that you have a seriously undermanned Army that, theoretically, would recieve a good majority of the outsted Airmen through the DoD "Blue to Green" program never panning out, you also have a seriously stressed Army dealing with 15 month deployments.

It seems like this is all coming to a head though. Who knows how long it's going to take to sort it out though. The active duty military member, from ALL branches, is being run into the dirt (or sand) and it's not looking to let up anytime soon.

In the Joint Operations environment you need to have cohesion and that is slowly but surely wearing away simply due to the fact that we've been at "war" for almost 20 years. This all started with the first Gulf War, which lead into Somalia and Kosovo peacekeeping initiatives which rolled over into the war with Afghanistan/Taliban factions which continues with the second Gulf War and the continuing insurgency in Iraq.

Simply put, the machine is wearing out like all machines do. That's just my two cents though.

If they ask me, they can give the Army all the planes they want so we in the Air Force dont have to go there to do squat. And I say that not because I dont want to do my part, I say it in the sense that the Air Force right now lacks everything, lacks leadership, direction, plus its a corrupt force from top to bottom, just do a quick search for Air Force officers or civilians getting fired or getting in problem for getting bribes or being involved in quid pro quo deals.

I can see daily the difference between the Army and the Air Force, the Army is truly and Army of one, the Air Force is more like everyone for himself.

Originally posted by Bunch
I say it in the sense that the Air Force right now lacks everything, lacks leadership, direction

I think that is the root of most of the problems facing the branch. I don't have a problem with the Army taking over CAS and battlefield reconnaissance at all. I don't think it will be easy to pry that money from the AF budget, however. Politics.

I meant no offense. The information I gave was accurate, as far as I know. The part regarding the USAF's refusal to ship nukes to Israel came from a military rag, and that was very surprising to me.

Zionist? Not sure what that means, anymore... so I might be one, for all I know.

reply to post by _Del_


Regardless where the initial funding comes from I think that the Army should at least have their own aviation unit. It is no secret that the Army and Air Force have their own culture their own priorities. I hope this unit do such an amazing job that the DoD take on their request, that would be a big wake up call for the Air Force, a much need it one.

I'm not a military guy, but it always seemed odd to me that the government thinks it's a good idea to have two separate branches, under two separate commands, trying to work together to do the same job despite having two separate budgets and two separate "styles," so-to-speak. I mean.. that just can't be good for budget planning, cooperative efforts, or logistics... can it?

In my humble opinion, which is worth absolutely spit on this matter (but you're getting it anyways,) the Air Force's part should be in gaining air superiority in the opening of the war, and shooting bad guys in the air after that. The army knows where the ground battles are being fought, which ones are being lost, and which ones are the most important to win, so they should be flying anything that shoots stuff on the ground.