LFCFan
*Insert nerd wings here*
I can't really disagree with anything you've said here, at the LT level, even as a slimy RL guy.
Maybe the best way to re-state my above post would be to note that we all "peak" at different points in our career. The most tactical aviators -- I won't name any specific community as someone will clearly get butthurt -- will probably hit their most tactical tour as a patch-wearing LT TRAINO or maybe DH. In the CRUDES world, you gain more and more responsibility as you rise through the ranks. LT TAOs can squeeze off missiles/torps/trons to defend the force...maybe do a little OCA and deliberate attack, depending on your definition...
An on-track VFA dude will be qualified to lead a division (4 jets) by the end of his first sea tour, and will qualify to lead a larger strike package while a DH. And then (someone correct me if I'm wrong) re-qual as a new XO, albeit only having to do one strike vice a few. So I'd say that while a training O might be the expert on the latest tactics, someone with an oak leaf on is probably the one leading the big strike into the People's Republic of wherever. But on day+1, plenty of LTs will be leading the strikes, OCA packages, etc.
The CDR CO obviously gains much, much more responsibility to act offensively in a multi-domain fight (hint: your quote above betrays a misunderstanding of TLAM employment)...and to over-rule the TAO if he or she is in CIC.
I think you've kind of proven of the points that the aviators are trying to make here - there is no CDR CO out there to overrule the LT pilot like a CO overruling a TAO. I'm also not seeing how someone leading a strike package (which is a multi domain fight: air-to-air, air-to-surface, to include dealing with SAMs, as well as trons) or even a large DCA mission against a near-peer has less responsibility. I don't disagree that a CRUDES skipper has more responsibility and tactical knowledge than a SWO JO, the point though is that aviators have way more responsibility than their SWO peers as JOs. I also had a good chat with a colleague of mine who is a post-DH SWO who has worked the TLAM piece on many tours about what the shooter is doing during TLAM employment...he thinks I get it, and agreed that a pointy nose guy has more responsibility in getting a bomb on target than a SWO skipper has for getting a TLAM on target.
The biggest thing for me is that SWOs are able to jump from DDG to rivron to amphib and back again...I think if being super tactical was as important to you guys as it was to aviators, this just wouldn't be the case.** The air force used to work a little more like the modern SWO community back in the 50s and early 60s, albeit not to the same extent...then Vietnam happened.
**I think it would be pretty hilarious if duffleblog wrote an article where the heads of SWO and aviation training accidentally get their orders swapped so that the training pipelines also get swapped. New SWOs spend two years on orange ships (finally, someone finds a use for the LCS!) learning their job, mids select their grey aircraft right out before commissioning just because they want to live in a certain location, disaster ensues, etc etc.