1950's film on weapons delivery, no GPS required, just "toss" it in the general direction of the target.

Let me paint a picture.

Being a fighter pilot in something like an F22 is generally seen as the coolest job in the USAF; akin to being CAG or some other high speed shit in the Army. Its seen as a selling point for prospective AF officers and to make missile field time mandatory would really fuck that up. I just don't see that kind of policy being made.

The easiest fix is no more using certain AFSC's as a dumping ground and to make nuke duty a controlled tour.

As bad as USAF SF have it, those poor missile bastards have it worse. We have a culture problem as much as we have a heritage problem and that's always bothered me. Im still torn on the issue though as its really become a focal point for Senior leaders.

The Genie was an air to air missile with a similar use.  Fire it in the vicinity of a Soviet bomber formation and let the nuke blast do its business.   Nike SAM system the same way (the nuke versions).
Fascinating in todays world.

The Genie would probably have gone off if it were ever in a fire, too.

Did someone call for a Genie?

 

Is nukes where the best officers go or where the worst officers get dumped?

You can tell from that whether the AF cares or not.

Nukes is a 4 star command now, right?

So tell me Rand's experience with nuclear weapons.

I'll wait.

I've watched pride, self-service and the attendant fear of failure undermine effectiveness more than once. Reliance on layered apparati and the concentric rings of defense in depth should allow for the safe realization of points of failure so they can be addressed effectively, but that'sthat's not how it works. Instead, it's used as a means to cover weaknesses in various security blankets and bolstered by threats against the worker bees. It's the way of the world.

You know what I'm going to say, so this is for everyone else.  

Nukes are an incredibly important part of national defense.  It has to be done, by someone.  But let's be honest.  How many of our all volunteer force wants to go sit in a hole up in the norther tier?  For more than 4 years.  Make it a mandatory assignment and see how many people re-sign after their initial commitment.  That's just the honest truth.  You can spin it as the best job in the world, but in 5 star resorts, give bonus pay, award a shitty medal that half the AF qualifies for, but in the end, you are away from home for 30 hours at a time living in one of the least populous places of the US.

The next argument to be made is that all pilots should have a nuke tour before flying planes.  Do you think anyone will actually sign up to fly knowing that?   This is a very different military than 10, 20, and 30 years ago.   Also, the airlines are hiring.  In addition, because of the ridiculous way the AF promotion process works, a brand new pilot with 5 years in is going to have a difficult time.

Haven't we had the debate about the CSAF or WG/CC being a pilot/non-pilot before?  Wasn't the consensus that it doesn't matter what his job was, as long as he was a good leader?
I don't know this Rand character from Adam, just a devils advocate question.  I will say that with all of the negative nuke exposure, this isn't the best decision.

As for nukes getting less money than fighter squadrons, show me the numbers.  I am well aware of sewage problems in silos and every other issue up north.  Shit's falling apart all across the AF.  Last base I was at didn't have the grass cut for 2 months.  It was awesome.   That's a leadership issue, not a money issue.

ETA:  Sit down with some nuke officers, if you already haven't, and listen to their gripes.  Then come up with a solution that will work in the current AF/military/modern world climate.  A realistic one.

It gets to culture and who we target for recruitment; when I was policy advocate for USMC nuclear weapon security and  had the numbers upped; our recruiting command even came back and said we can sell everyone of those contracts with no issue

Yeah. Video was dildos and completely anticlimactic.

so our self-less knights of the sky don't want to fly if they have to do a nuke tour?  Fuck them.  No shortage of guys who want to fly jets.

You know, as bad as the missile fields are, submarines are worse. Yet there are highly talented officers who go to nukes, its competitive to get in AND they often become 4 stars.

You will see pilots, submariners, and SWOs with 4 stars in the Navy because it respects the men who do their job.  The AF doesn't give a fuck about anybody who isn't a pilot.

Its not a professional military branch of service.  Its a flying club, sponsored unknowingly by the taxpayers with the aero-space industry doing the heavy lifting on the PR.

So tell me why ANYONE who actually does nukes for a living should give a shit when they know that their service will basically be ignored and somebody with the universal management badge will come in and tell them how to do their job.

Why not?



And did you mean the SBR-73?
 

Most likely it would be F-16s stationed in Europe.

 

No disagreements on the Navy part.

There's a lot of smart people out there.  How come they haven't figured out your theory of the AF flying club?  That would make a great news story for a politician or Army general.

ETA:  Im out for the evening.   Gotta be up early manning a sweet flying club desk.

It IS getting better, but until very recently, for the wrong reasons.

Big Blue had to get stung by some pretty bad PR before they started paying attention to the nuclear world. As late as 2013, it was more about fixing the optics than about building a competent nuclear force.  

The cheating scandal last year did more to panic senior leadership about the state of the nuclear, and in particular, missile, community than anything previous.  (The bombers are flyers, and even if their status is below the fighter guys, they're still zipper-suited sun gods who played in IRQ and AFG, so they've never suffered the same crushing neglect and outright abuse like the missile business.)  That scandal exposed a pattern of toxic leadership, practices and cultural gangrene that was truly dangerous to any military force, let alone a military one.

I have it on good authority that said toxic leadership, practices and cultural gangrene have been exported to affect far corners of the government.

I am espousing nothing new





The work has been done.  The evidence is there.

but there is too much money changing hands for anyone to care, and its not like we are ACTUALLY going downtown Beijing/Moscow, so its just dead grunts and wasted cash.

I ain't readin' all those fuckin' words. Too much cool shit to do.

BLUF.

The Air Force spends a lot of money on shit we don't need, and everyone knows it but no one cares.

No one who matters cares. And we know who matters.

I've had those conversations outside of the career field, and no one cared, until recently.

Your post is an outstanding example of the problem.  Those doing the mission really, really care about doing the mission, and, when done right, even the youngest AB on a camper team knows why he/she doing it right is important to the overall scheme of things.

But until recently, Big Blue (Air Staff outside of the A10 and AFGSC) only saw the nuke business as a money drain on their programs.  

In 2006, the #1 nuke guy in AFSPC headquarters was an O5.  He had a staff of five to help him out.

The #1 guy in the Air Staff was an O6.  He had 23 people on his staff to develop ALL nuclear weapons policy, doctrine, capabilities and requirements for the entire USAF.

The highest ranking general officer dealing solely with nukes in the USAF was the 2-star at 20th Air Force.  Note that there was not, at that time, any one-star positions for nuclear weapons--1-star missileers were doing space ops jobs.  The nuke "commands" (AFSPC, ACC, AFMC) all had nukes as a SMALL subset of their primary mission.  Even AFSPC, who got a combat unit in 20th AF, thought the only good news about getting nukes was the acquisition of another hundred-ish command billets they could stick their guys into.  

The Air Staff of the late 2000s/early 2010s regularly, knowingly, and intentionally made budget decisions that short-changed the nuclear business so they could fund other stuff.  They intentionally assumed risk in the nuclear community by leaving stuff under- and unfunded, because they had higher priorities...than the nuclear mission.  And I'm not talking about mahogany paneling in the MAF lounge, I'm talking "I know there are cracks in the UH1N tail booms, AGAIN, but if we replace them, we can't fund the latest GPS block whatever satellite."  Some ops units had to decide which kind of paper was more important--system printer (to print out emergency action messages), or toilet.  

So yes, there was a HUGE disconnect between the personal heroics of the men and women in the field like you, who knew/know how important the job is, and the people who were supposed to organize, train and equip you, and who truly didn't want to do any of that.

At your level, hopefully your commanders did their best to shield you from that kind of neglect, but trust me, it was there.

Open pit warhead?

Lemay wasn't know for being a pilot.  He may have created SAC and made it run like a Swiss watch, but for the majority of his career he was known for being an extraordinary navigator.  The fighter pilot mafia will not allow the work of a navigator to be repeated when some pilot has an idea of how to do things, whether it looks like it will work or not.

Yes

In the F-4E lofting a B61 using radar steering and the analog bombing computer the goal was to score hits within 35 meters of the radar aim point.  Most Mission Ready rated crews I dealt with were capable of better.  5 to 11 meters was the norm for most of the seasoned crews.   Not bad for tossing a bomb from 5 miles away.

I though the B61 was dial a yield from 0.3 to 340kT. 340 kT is nothing to sneeze at.

I think the -12 is only 50kT or so. Big bomb in a small package.

Apparently so do the Chinese... The W88 as well.

Oh. Noted. Thanks.

The Chinese bought that information from Bill Clinton fair and square. Delivery was a bit unconventional.

With a max yield of 50kt on the -12 I wonder if the secondary is removed and it's just the boosted primary...

Five men at atomic ground zero

On July 19, 1957, five men stood at Ground Zero of an atomic test that
was being conducted at the Nevada Test Site.  This was the test of a 2KT
(kiloton) MB-1 nuclear air-to-air rocket launched from an F-89 Scorpion
interceptor.  The nuclear missile  detonated 10,000 ft above their
heads.





A reel-to-reel tape recorder was present to record their
experience.  You can see and hear the men react to the shock wave
moments after the detonation.







 

I've seen the horrors, the horrors that you've seen.

Not only do we have common ground here, but you know the details of the situations I'm referencing.

I wonder what leaked secrets we have to look forward to under the next Clinton Administration.

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Big "boom."

Getting out ahead of the shock and Thermal pulses might be......lively

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That part shouldn't matter one bit, LeMay was squared the fuck away in every sector of his service. He designed and built SAC from the ground up. He was able to take nothingness and turn it into the worlds most competent nuclear force without a near peer, that's no small feat and he is revered to this day by real USAF Officers. Under his leadership we had high ready rates for A/C, weapons, and he unfucked my AFSC pretty damn well.

He laid out the foundation for nuclear ops and nuclear security, the blueprint to fix this shit is right in front of us and I always thought Global Strike Command was a step in that direction.

Are you propsing your idea to shove them out the back of a hooker?

Thermonuclear Bork?

We don't often agree, but this statement is dead-nuts accurate.

i just gotta say...these types of videos make me feel slightly better about paying thru the nose for taxes!!...murica!!!

I totes want to make this out of foamboard for an RC airplane!!!

 

Interesting to me how long it took to arm the aircraft, and that the aircraft didn't react like it had just dropped a nuclear weapon.

The Genie is a rocket, not a missile.  Rockets have no guidance.  Missiles have guidance.