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Disassociated tour for aviators on aircraft carriers/gators

Max the Mad Russian

Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Hello Gents (and ladies if there are some here),

I'm Russian Navy SWO and Coast Guard Cutterman, and when I'm looking at my Naval College classmates who had served in the ship's company of the Russian aircraft carrier Kuznetsov, I can see that the only aviator who is constantly hanging along with CO and XO (both SWOs) is the deputy CO for air, typically a colonel who, of course, quite could know something about seamanship but he shouldn't. He is the Air Force installation graduate and infested with Air Force etiquette and traditions. While he can be the good aviator, flying by heart, it is way too far from him to the good naval officer. Of course he will never be assigned to command something within the navy beyond the squadron, air regiment or division (a wing in US parlance), and it is impossible to him to be CO or even XO of the carrier. Yes the naval aviators in Russia all have the field ranks, and no naval rank officer can fly here as a pilot or NFO.
Sometimes, reading the Proceedings or NWC Review articles of ADM James Stavridis, USN, who is lifelong SWO and as a Lt (about 1981) was a boiler room officer on aircraft carrier USS Forrestall, I can feel some untrust from the side of aircraft carrier SWOs (say, CHENG or Combat Systems Dept Head) to the disassociated tour aviators, who dominated the carriers' companies, and their commitment to the job. So the question is - imagine the NavOCS ensign, say with psychologist degree from the Yale (joke, it was Stanford), who passed throug the maritime multiengine pilot's training pipeline and served four subsequent years as a co-pilot in VP squadron, been promoted to Lt, flying essentially civilian airliner/cargojet (P-3C is Lockheed Electra and P-8A is Boeing B-735 family). He is happy enough, and - boom - all of a sudden he is receiving a call from the detailer and that Annapolis ring-knocker is telling him: well, boy, now pack your stuff and go to Norfolk - your next assignment is the assistant Navigator on USS Stennis (or so). Let me ask: whether it means that it quite could be the first time when this Navy Lieutenant is making a step on the warship's deck? Remember, he is OCS boy and VP-community aviator. Nothing common with navigating of the huge angledecked hulk. And if ADM Stavridis's memory is solid, namely the Assistant NAV on the carrier is the officer in charge of the training of the fresh SWO divisional ensigns for their quals as an SWOs. A man who had never been onboard of any naval ship previously and some of those ensigns (say those from the ranks) will know much more about the ship and job for sure. How that can be? How long that frustrated and angry VP-Lt can endure, in turn? What is the reason to stay with the Navy for him, after all?

Thanks a lot, Max
 

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Hello Gents (and ladies if there are some here),

I'm Russian Navy SWO and Coast Guard Cutterman, and when I'm looking at my Naval College classmates who had served in the ship's company of the Russian aircraft carrier Kuznetsov, I can see that the only aviator who is constantly hanging along with CO and XO (both SWOs) is the deputy CO for air, typically a colonel who, of course, quite could know something about seamanship but he shouldn't. He is the Air Force installation graduate and infested with Air Force etiquette and traditions. While he can be the good aviator, flying by heart, it is way too far from him to the good naval officer. Of course he will never be assigned to command something within the navy beyond the squadron, air regiment or division (a wing in US parlance), and it is impossible to him to be CO or even XO of the carrier. Yes the naval aviators in Russia all have the field ranks, and no naval rank officer can fly here as a pilot or NFO.

We have a much different setup here in the US, by law the CO of an aircraft carrier has to be an Aviator (Pilot or NFO). When selected for the carrier CO track the selectees go through extensive training, encompassing everything from ship handling to nuclear power training, that can last as long as 7 years before they actually take command of a carrier. It has worked well for the US Navy for almost 100 years now and there is little reason to change it.

So the question is - imagine the NavOCS ensign, say with psychologist degree from the Yale (joke, it was Stanford), who passed throug the maritime multiengine pilot's training pipeline and served four subsequent years as a co-pilot in VP squadron, been promoted to Lt, flying essentially civilian airliner/cargojet (P-3C is Lockheed Electra and P-8A is Boeing B-735 family). He is happy enough, and - boom - all of a sudden he is receiving a call from the detailer and that Annapolis ring-knocker is telling him: well, boy, now pack your stuff and go to Norfolk - your next assignment is the assistant Navigator on USS Stennis (or so). Let me ask: whether it means that it quite could be the first time when this Navy Lieutenant is making a step on the warship's deck? Remember, he is OCS boy and VP-community aviator. Nothing common with navigating of the huge angledecked hulk. And if ADM Stavridis's memory is solid, namely the Assistant NAV on the carrier is the officer in charge of the training of the fresh SWO divisional ensigns for their quals as an SWOs. A man who had never been onboard of any naval ship previously and some of those ensigns (say those from the ranks) will know much more about the ship and job for sure. How that can be? How long that frustrated and angry VP-Lt can endure, in turn? What is the reason to stay with the Navy for him, after all?

Thanks a lot, Max

The ANAV position on a carrier is actually a relatively prestigious one for aviators on their 'disassociated tour', as that tour is called, and is usually reserved for folks who do very well in their first flying tour in a squadron. You are correct that the ANAV's tour on the carrier might be their first time on a US Navy ship but they go through training as well before actually doing the navigating. They also have enlisted personnel who help train and assist them, from the Quartermaster rating/specialty, and whose primary job in the Navy is ship handling and navigation. Also, more experienced SWO's on a carrier will be involved in training the ANAV as well.

Most importantly all aviators in the Navy have aerial navigation training and experience by the time they do a 'disassociated sea tour', and they have to do it much faster than our SWO counterparts. While many of the details are different most aviators are very comfortable dealing with charts, doing time and distance calculations and just plain navigating, but doing it while going 100-600 knots instead of 15-30 knots.

I hope that answers your questions.
 

wlawr005

Well-Known Member
pilot
Contributor
Whole thing smells like a VP-fluent comedian to me.

I've been wrong before though.
 

Max the Mad Russian

Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Well, people, I'm really Russian (I never studied English academically and you can easily confirm this by my grammatical mistakes) and I wish I could be an actor, even comedian, even in Russia, 'cause in that case I could have made more money in my youth. But since I was with the Navy and CG, it is not the case. Eventually, one of my business cards is hanging here - https://usnwc.edu/getattachment/b2e...9e30a5597cd/Kamikazes--The-Soviet-Legacy.aspx

To the matter

We have a much different setup here in the US, by law the CO of an aircraft carrier has to be an Aviator (Pilot or NFO). When selected for the carrier CO track the selectees go through extensive training, encompassing everything from ship handling to nuclear power training, that can last as long as 7 years before they actually take command of a carrier. It has worked well for the US Navy for almost 100 years now and there is little reason to change it.

Thank you very much Flash and I know that does work. It will work within any national navy where the aircraft carriers and naval aviation are the cornerstones. Brits while they were operating the real, "fleet" carriers, either were sticking with this approach, and of 14 COs of the HMS "Ark Royal" (pennant R09) from 1955 to 1978 eleven were aviators, while there was no claims within their carrier fleet to go along USN cadre politics, i.e. COs of the CVs could be an aviator as well as officer from surface ships or even submarines, while XO in any case was surface warfare dude. But Royal Navy nowadays has no carriers in commission for five years, and other major navies have at best two (both carriers and straight-deck amphibs). Look at the Spain - just one VSTOL ship, just a dozen jets, surmise twenty or so pilots. Screening the CO's armchair of that sole carrier to one of them will lead to a revolution by the other communities' officers who are postponed in promotion. By the way, how long is the USN carrier Skipper's appointment now? Two years? Sure a lot of SWOs, especially nukes, are murmuring that's too long...

They also have enlisted personnel who help train and assist them, from the Quartermaster rating/specialty, and whose primary job in the Navy is ship handling and navigation. Also, more experienced SWO's on a carrier will be involved in training the ANAV as well.

Thanks again. Let me skip full volume of your answer for awhile and confess that I used the unproper example - really, with the death of bombardier-navigator NFO subcommunity and given the old (AFAIK, since 1930s) tradition to charge the US Naval Aviator with all navigation, it is indeed easy to believe that good VP pilot will cope with it properly. Additionally, the long struggle between Brits and US views on officer's role: what has to be managed and what has to be done by officers and enlisted people, respectively. But let's look at those another SWOs on the carrier: who are they? Mostly black gang, isn't it? Today practice, as I see, is to have the Combat Systems Officer from Info Dominance community, which is Restricted Line sort of, while the CHENG of the carrier quite can be the nuke LDO or even Submarine Warfare Officer (they all are nukes, as far as I know). Suppose our VP boy got an order to the Ordnance Dept instead of ANAV. What then?


Regards, Max
 
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Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Thank you very much Flash and I know that does work. It will work within any national navy where the aircraft carriers and naval aviation are the cornerstones....By the way, how long is the USN carrier Skipper's appointment now? Two years? Sure a lot of SWOs, especially nukes, are murmuring that's too long...

A CVN CO's tour is still about 2 years, maybe a little longer. The SWO's might take a little offense that the largest ships in the Navy are not commanded by them but they have the other 200-something to command so there aren't too many. As for Nuke SWO's, as far as I know they are given the opportunity to command conventional ships like their 'regular' peers so I don't think there is too much grumbling from them either, though I try and avoid them as much as possible.

Thanks again. Let me skip full volume of your answer for awhile and confess that I used the unproper example - really, with the death of bombardier-navigator NFO subcommunity and given the old (AFAIK, since 1930s) tradition to charge the US Naval Aviator with all navigation, it is indeed easy to believe that good VP pilot will cope with it properly. Additionally, the long struggle between Brits and US views on officer's role: what has to be managed and what has to be done by officers and enlisted people, respectively. But let's look at those another SWOs on the carrier: who are they? Mostly black gang, isn't it? Today practice, as I see, is to have the Combat Systems Officer from Info Dominance community, which is Restricted Line sort of, while the CHENG of the carrier quite can be the nuke LDO or even Submarine Warfire Officer (they all are nukes, as far as I know). Suppose our VP boy got an order to the Ordnance Dept instead of ANAV. What then?

Regards, Max

The carriers are unique in having a number of jobs filled by aviators instead of SWO's but usually aviators only fill specific jobs to include Tactical Action Officer, catapult and arresting gear officers, ANAV and CO/XO. Many of those jobs are carrier-specific jobs where it is beneficial for someone to have an aviation background, the added 'benefit' to the Navy, at least from the Navy's point of view, is that it gives officers who do not normally serve at sea exposure to ship operations. Most of the other ship officer billets are still filled by those personnel who would have them on a 'regular' Navy ship, mainly SWO's. SWO-Nuke is unique in the US Navy but they are still 'Unrestricted Line' and not engineers who are limited only to that like in the Royal Navy.

As for Combat Systems Officers being Info Dominance folks that may be just a position they got qual'd in and not their primary job. For example, you might have several folks qualified to be the Officer of the Deck but when you go to general quarters only one will have the duty to do that. While some restricted line personnel can make the extra effort to get qualified in positions outside their specialty to become a TAO, OOD or something else that is dependent on the command and the individual and is not a universal policy.
 

Max the Mad Russian

Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
A CVN CO's tour is still about 2 years, maybe a little longer.

Ok, is that mandatory to hit the Admiral rank for Naval Aviator/NFO? Can the officer from, say, VP or Navy helo community attain that billet? And more important - should the carrier CO (and XO) actually fly from his/her carrier as a pilot/WSO in some airplane of the embarked CVW? At least for pure quals?

SWO-Nuke is unique in the US Navy but they are still 'Unrestricted Line' and not engineers who are limited only to that like in the Royal Navy.

Yes, thanks, but what about LDO SWO nukes, whose top assignment, AFAIK, is the carrier CHENG? And according the Info Dominance regulations for officers (who stemmed from SWO community only), they can resign their transfer to RL and get back to URL only during the training, again as far as I understand.

Generally, your "aircraft carrier and naval aviation" culture is unique for sure. And to me, it seems to be not the result of the size of the carrier forces of USN, but the equally unique feature of the whole US Navy instead , which has very short name - CPO corps. Namely, it all works perfectly thanks to Chiefs. In this connection, the next question arose: why the senior enlisted personnell in USN is banned from the flying as pilots? Absence of a degree? Hardly that - British warplanes aren't much more obsolete than US', and neither Royal Air Force nor Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm or British Army Air Corps demand the degree for the pilots and WSOs, as A-Level certificate (plain high school education) is enough. Lack of so-called leadership? Hardly again - if the statement that "leadership cannot be taught, it can only be modeled" is true, then the CPO leadership style in general is more effective than the officers' one.
Maybe CPOs themselves show no interest in flying? Or the Navy will have a personnell problems with a bunch of CPO pilots who are reluctant to make a vertical career and ask to leave them alone just for the happiness of flying from the pointed end of the boat?
 
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Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Ok, is that mandatory to hit the Admiral rank for Naval Aviator/NFO? Can the officer from, say, VP or Navy helo community attain that billet? And more important - should the carrier CO (and XO) actually fly from his/her carrier as a pilot/WSO in some airplane of the embarked CVW? At least for pure quals?

In order to make flag as a tactical/carrier aviator there are two paths, CVN command or Carrier Air Wing Command (CAG, an old term that is still used). VP folks make flag officer by commanding a VP Wing, they are separate commands that have only P-3/P-8/EP-3's. Helo guys unfortunately don't make flag too often, I am not sure on the path those few have made it to Admiral.

Yes, thanks, but what about LDO SWO nukes, whose top assignment, AFAIK, is the carrier CHENG? And according the Info Dominance regulations for officers (who stemmed from SWO community only), they can resign their transfer to RL and get back to URL only during the training, again as far as I understand.

I don't know much about LDO SWO Nukes, I have reached the limit of my knowledge on them so someone else will have to chime in. As for IDC officers, they are RL's and once you transfer from another designator you can't just change back. IDC officers fulfill their specified roles and don't do URL stuff like commanding a ship or a squadron.

Generally, your "aircraft carrier and naval aviation" culture is unique for sure. And to me, it seems to be not the result of the size of the carrier forces of USN, but the equally unique feature of the whole US Navy instead , which has very short name - CPO corps. Namely, it all works perfectly thanks to Chiefs. In this connection, the next question arose: why the senior enlisted personnell in USN is banned from the flying as pilots? Absence of a degree? Hardly that - British warplanes aren't much more obsolete than US', and neither Royal Air Force nor Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm or British Army Air Corps demand the degree for the pilots and WSOs, as A-Level certificate (plain high school education) is enough. Lack of so-called leadership? Hardly again - if the statement that "leadership cannot be taught, it can only be modeled" is true, then the CPO leadership style in general is more effective than the officers' one.
Maybe CPOs themselves show no interest in flying? Or the Navy will have a personnell problems with a bunch of CPO pilots who are reluctant to make a vertical career and ask to leave them alone just for the happiness of flying from the pointed end of the boat?

Enlisted personnel aren't aviators in the US military for several reasons. I think the main one is that to be an officer, with few exceptions, you need a 4-year college degree in the US military. While graduating from college in the US isn't incredibly hard it does prove you can pass through a higher education course and if you got decent grades and/or class standing while you did it you probably are a much better candidate than the average person. While there are many enlisted can do the same there is often no 'proof' like a college degree with good grades to say they can unless they have proven themselves otherwise and in the Navy that takes some time. Coupled with testing and other screening we generally pick good candidates for flying training.

The big difference in the UK is they have a rigorous screening program of their own, their military 'colleges' (Sandhurst, Cranwell, Dartmouth) that are not university degree-granting schools but a one-year program that provides an entry-level education to all officers joining the UK military. Sort of like a very long OCS with a lot more college-level academics, and for everyone. So they have their own 'screening' program that is 'in-house' where ours is a mix.

All that said not all US military aviators have a college degree, the Army Warrant Officer program doesn't require a degree but does have a high percentage of prior service enlisted personnel who have proven themselves in the military already along with other personnel who pass their screening program. It works for them apparently. We experimented with it in the Navy a few years ago but for numerous reasons it didn't work, one of them apparently being that the 'filter' of college was not required. And in the Navy we have at times had programs where all that was needed was either a few hours of college or a good enlisted career with no college degree and they did well, but it seems the smoothest and most reliable officer entry program is the one that requires a college degree.
 

Max the Mad Russian

Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Helo guys unfortunately don't make flag too often, I am not sure on the path those few have made it to Admiral.

Are you calling them rotorheads? Forgive me for the adherence to Royal Navy experience (as it is both archetype for any blue-water navy and the culture model for USN, while, for example, Russian Navy as well as German one is built around the general landmass military approaches), but the current First Sea Lord Admiral Sir George Zambellas is the naval helo pilot. Since the helo communities from all the military branches are tend to unite in both airplanes and tactics (and even is a single command - see GB and Netherlands, at least) and simultaneously they are seeing much more direct combat situations with high risk profile, it seems to me that the number of flag rank rotorhead officers will increase rapidly. Yet, both British Princes are helo guys, by the way. Maybe it's not a wonder that the naval helo community is in close relationships with the surface one as they are constantly maintain a detachments deployed on the surface ships. Like in business, in the pure military career the one of most important things is who you know and who is knowing you. Every-morning handshakes with the big amount of surface boys at the start and the first one-third of career can be very good for rotorhead's career, indeed.

While there are many enlisted can do the same there is often no 'proof' like a college degree with good grades to say they can unless they have proven themselves otherwise and in the Navy that takes some time.

Yes sounds reasonably, thank you. Here in Russia too, only the officer can be the military pilot and 99% of officers here have the full 5-years university-level degree. And we do not maintain the "major" system, the military education here is built along the military specialties rather than any other thing. Eventually, each man (no coed approach in military here) who is intended to fly in command way (pilots and WSOs) has to choose the respective Air Force Command college (pilots OR weapon systems officer) to enter, while the boys interested in air engineering are applying to Air Force Engineering College, both systems of five years course - three to four math semesters (six for engineers), two to four of physics, and the rest of time is themed in the specialty, ten and a half months a year. Yes we have two great shortcomings in our military educational system - almost zero time to economics and business administration and very moderate efforts in foreign languages, that is why the average Russian officer is usually very uncertain in the business world and cannot freely communicate, at least at the start of his civilian career. All above is about military and not valid to law enforcement and state security or intelligence, who are technically officers too (Mr. Putin is formally Colonel of KGB, Ret), but as I (and most of former and active military officers) have no slightest respect to that crowd, let's drop them from discussion.
Again, if you have a degree, you are winner at least in some ways. Yet again, your compatibility with military in general and aviation in particular is rather a matter of proper testing than of the show of diplomas. Nuclear submarines in Royal Navy are commanded by the officers who have no degree for lifelong. But the testing boards which are evaluating the officer candidate and officers further on duty are very detailed and evaluation itself can last for weeks. Of course you can argue that given the size of USN Aviation it is impossible to spend a weeks to evaluate single person. Mix... If so, then OK, it's reasonably enough, thank you.


And in the Navy we have at times had programs where all that was needed was either a few hours of college or a good enlisted career with no college degree and they did well

NAVCAD you mean? I have read the book of one of them, Capt B.K. Bryans, USN Ret, titled "Flying Low". It seemed to me that at the main career points there was very little support that system provided to that guys, in comparison with routine AOCS/ROTC people, let alone Canoe U grads... By the way, what do you think about AOCS effectiveness?
 
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Max the Mad Russian

Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
Hi Flash,

the Army Warrant Officer program doesn't require a degree but does have a high percentage of prior service enlisted personnel who have proven themselves in the military already along with other personnel who pass their screening program.

The logic that had been placed under the Army WO helo drivers existance, as it seems, can be traced to the Vietnam War via, for example, the "Chickenhawk" book and alike, and it is mostly about the numbers: even if the top brass could have grabbed all the West Point and Army ROTCs annual grads in 1965-66 and stuffed the Hueys' cockpits with them all, the sufficient amount of the Army helos could have still been grounded due to the shortage of the pilots. As far I as know, the Army Fort Rucker training pipeline for aviation doesn't include the light fixed wing indoctrination/training, i.e. their skills are pure "helicoptering" from the scratch. Are the Navy and Marines helo boys compelling to do the same or they have the general primarily training in the piston-engined fixed-wing aircraft and switch to helos just after that?
 

Hair Warrior

Well-Known Member
Contributor
Hypotheses:
1. Mad Max is an AirWarriors regular (or regular lurker) with a spoofed IP address just jerking us around for ships & giggles (99.98%)
2. Mad Max is an actual Russian who has spent a butthurt amount of time honing an astounding depth & breadth of U.S. military knowledge, acronyms, euphemisms, and command of English language nuances that can only result from long, specialized training... yet he has chosen to reveal himself here under a comedic name and write long-winded essays (dare I say Tolstoyan in length) that go out of their way to show off such knowledge (0.02%)

If scenario #2, what the heck would the purpose be?
To waste your time and laugh about it?
To lat transfer from the Russian Navy to the American one?
To understand Americans better for some future nonexistent coalition exercise?
To get career advice on how to rise the ranks in Russian Naval Aviation to maybe one day command its lone flattop?
To generate an OSINT psych profile for Russian GRU services on U.S. carrier COs for the purposes of social engineering/ finding potential vulnerabilities for HUMINT to later exploit? e.g. "What might cause a senior U.S. Naval Aviator to get depressed about his/her career, how can we be on the lookout for those factors, and what mindset will be exploitable?" LT Jamali proved the GRU still operates on U.S. soil in the 21st century.

Who knows.
 

HH-60H

Manager
pilot
Contributor
Hypotheses:
1. Mad Max is an AirWarriors regular (or regular lurker) with a spoofed IP address just jerking us around for ships & giggles (99.98%)
2. Mad Max is an actual Russian who has spent a butthurt amount of time honing an astounding depth & breadth of U.S. military knowledge, acronyms, euphemisms, and command of English language nuances that can only result from long, specialized training... yet he has chosen to reveal himself here under a comedic name and write long-winded essays (dare I say Tolstoyan in length) that go out of their way to show off such knowledge (0.02%)

If scenario #2, what the heck would the purpose be?
To waste your time and laugh about it?
To lat transfer from the Russian Navy to the American one?
To understand Americans better for some future nonexistent coalition exercise?
To get career advice on how to rise the ranks in Russian Naval Aviation to maybe one day command its lone flattop?
To generate an OSINT psych profile for Russian GRU services on U.S. carrier COs for the purposes of social engineering/ finding potential vulnerabilities for HUMINT to later exploit? e.g. "What might cause a senior U.S. Naval Aviator to get depressed about his/her career, how can we be on the lookout for those factors, and what mindset will be exploitable?" LT Jamali proved the GRU still operates on U.S. soil in the 21st century.

Who knows.

Perhaps our new guest is genuinely interested in Naval Aviation. Did you read the paper he linked to earlier?
 

Max the Mad Russian

Hands off Ukraine! Feet too
I do, of course;-)
Don't stick for long to the spy TV series, please.
Japanese Naval Aviators up to 1945 were hair warriors, indeed - their silk scarfes were of such a poor quality that the IJN top brass had allowed them not to cut the hair down to the shoulders level. They quite could play the heavy metal gigs, why not?

Of course you can suspect GRU stuff and alike, and I can only reply with the old story: when I've been at Honolulu as a tourist, the security jerk at the gates of USCG base there demanded my "military ID" to enter there. No other military base in Oahu has that claims - neither PH, nor Schofield barracks, let alone Kaneohe Bay where I've been given the special guest invitation. But that's Homeland Sec, so OK, I gave him my retired officer card, where the big red star and Russian lines are as evident as it can be. That guy said: Look, I cannot approve it by myself, so please wait for a minute, I'll ask the permission in DC". Namely, he said Washington, DC. Of course it was denied, but I, in turn, suspect that the scanned copy of my poor card is in the FBI database. Check it if you wish and can with your security clearance. My data is in the "author" section of noted article. But what do you think about the reason according to which the potential GRU spy can reveal himself so bluntly?

First of all, the real answer to your question is very simple - I'm just interested in carrier-based naval aviation. Since it is USN that is most advansed navy in the world in this matter nowadays, I put my questions here. When and if it will be replaced by the PLAN, I'll try to learn Chinese and then will ask them. Nothing more. I have little interest even in surface navies which are much more familiar to me given my personal experience, as the time on duty within any surface navy (Coasties, either) is the wasted time from the majority of standpoints. Nearly so in respect of "silent services". There is only one category of the naval personnell who is 100% happy about their surface and/or submarine careers - the retired admirals. At least they wrote mostly that. Almost everyone who quit before the hitting the flag rank has almost nothing positive to reveal. But you the US Naval Aviators and NFOs are, evidently, of only kind of naval officers who is not so regretful about your time on duty. It attracts, to say the least. So that is why I am here. You know or feel something that's hidden from the vast majority of the naval officers. And in that respect you and your Air Force brethren are much closer to each other than you and the naval officers from other communities.

Secondly, I'm not so stupid to get rid of understanding that USN carrier approach is not very useful to any other navy - I underlined it above. Neither Russian Navy nor Chinese or who-also-wants-to-rewrite-the-history will build the nuclear flattops in numbers to challenge the USN or for any other reason. In my personal opinion, the supercarrier is very close to be doomed for several factors and not the last of them is that one and only view on her future exists officially - your, an American, view. History, at least the relatively recent history of death of the capital ships wrapped around the guns (BBs and CAs) shows that right after those types that have to die for sure, some others, still relevant, had evaporated too - that's an historical law. If there will be some weapon system that will be evaluated as the means to effectively kill the supercarriers (say, the PLA DF-21 development, which is so scaring the USN naval analysts), supercarriers will be scrapped and all the VSTOL ships will follow nearly automatically, and ship-based aviation will come to the end. Yeah that's fiction but the mankind really works in the ways prescribed by fictions all too often to neglect it.

Further - studying of USN carrier affairs is much easier, actually, than you may think. Look at Kindle storages and you will see the tons of books about it, meanwhile. Some people reads fantasy, some old classic, I myself - the books concerning naval aviation. Say, I have the right by law to do that, isn't it?;-)
 
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