To open up a can of worms, but I've heard some O-6 non-helo types say that Navy helos guys don't deserve medals for valor. True story.
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To open up a can of worms, but I've heard some O-6 non-helo types say that Navy helos guys don't deserve medals for valor. True story.
This has been a theme of debate for decades - I don't know the answer and this deserves a more discrete thread in Private Naval Aviators. The theme is well known in the leadership forums at NHA every year. It's a really complex issue.
If NSW adopts the Glock 19, does that weapon get issued just to the operators, or to anyone (incl. support staff) attached to a NSW unit?
Yes and the culture of HC-7 died in the 70's which is why Navy helo community witnessed failures at Desert One, Praying Mantis, etc
The airframe and equipment mix in the helo community has never been better - ripe for the leadership to reinstall a combat mentality
Considering I wasn't alive on 19 June 1968, I'm pretty sure the conversation I mentioned wasn't referencing an O-6 that would have been associated with that award.
While I agree that the likelihood of a regular Navy helo squadron to go in to Iran with guns blazing is pretty small, I do think that the mentality can be trained to.
Spekkio
He bowls overhand.
Except these are Sailors maintaining weapons that don't belong to them. Stateside this is easily solved with open purchase authorization, but how do you suppose ships maintain supplies for their small arms on deployment?
I don't think that the service chiefs, the SECDEF, the Senate Armed Services committee, any other members of Congress, or the President is looking at personal award counts when deciding how to appropriate money to the services. I would also argue that anyone who forms their opinion regarding the worth of each service by awards for valor also doesn't know or care enough about the military budget process to actually influence it.
Most Sailors are not
-I wanted money for college.
-I wanted to learn a trade.
-I wanted to get away from my hometown.
-I wanted to serve my country.
Answers I never hear:
-I wanted to blow shit up.
-I wanted to get lots of medals.
-I wanted to be a warrior/warfighter.
The last thing we need is over-compensating leadership beating their chests about being
Expanding circle.
Training for a mission that you'll probably never perform is a waste of OPTAR dollars and Airframe hours, not to mention the maintenance man hours to support the flying. Also, it's a moral killer when you spend long hours, late nights and weekends at work for absolutely no reason other than training and chasing readiness for a mission you'll probably never do.
Just ask the VP guys- they've got a good bit of misc quals that will likely never be used, but still clog up the readiness matrix and waste everyone's time and energy just to say they can do if ever needed.
Training for a mission that you'll probably never perform is a waste of OPTAR dollars and Airframe hours, not to mention the maintenance man hours to support the flying. Also, it's a moral killer when you spend long hours, late nights and weekends at work for absolutely no reason other than training and chasing readiness for a mission you'll probably never do.
Just ask the VP guys- they've got a good bit of misc quals that will likely never be used, but still clog up the readiness matrix and waste everyone's time and energy just to say they can do if ever needed.
I'm not saying there needs to be incessant training for missions that won't ever occur. I just see a pervasive mindset of too much time and energy spent dealing with the admin part of the Navy at the expense of actually being awesome at the tactics we need to know.
All this talk of Glock 19's has got me wanting to buy a 19 Gen4 at the D.C. gun show on Sunday.
P.S. Regarding Navy valor, (seen as an outsider) I think it's a different form of warrior ethos. The danger is more subtle than door-kicking in Fallujah. Someone earlier in the thread said "haze gray and under way." It's the mindset of taking off across open ocean in your Grumman Avenger with 1 torpedo, no GPS, and maybe not enough fuel to return. It's the mindset of living and working 24-7 undersea in a steel tube that is perfectly safe most of the time... but where one accident can kill the entire crew with no hope for rescue, and it's happened a dozen times in history (all countries). Hospital Corpsmen are a different story, but they are U.S. Navy nonetheless.
P.P.S. The admin side of the Navy served a huge purpose in the 17-19th centuries. If you miscalculated your rations or fresh water needs before you set sail, you were SOL and people died. Captains faced mutiny if they ran out of ___. It's different than land armies that can subsist on local populations (which we still do today, by the way).
P.S. Regarding Navy valor, (seen as an outsider) I think it's a different form of warrior ethos. The danger is more subtle than door-kicking in Fallujah. Someone earlier in the thread said "haze gray and under way." It's the mindset of taking off across open ocean in your Grumman Avenger with 1 torpedo, no GPS, and maybe not enough fuel to return. It's the mindset of living and working 24-7 undersea in a steel tube that is perfectly safe most of the time... but where one accident can kill the entire crew with no hope for rescue, and it's happened a dozen times in history (all countries). Hospital Corpsmen are a different story, but they are U.S. Navy nonetheless.
P.P.S. The admin side of the Navy served a huge purpose in the 17-19th centuries. If you miscalculated your rations or fresh water needs before you set sail, you were SOL and people died. Captains faced mutiny if they ran out of ___. It's different than land armies that can subsist on local populations (which we still do today, by the way).
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Spekkio
He bowls overhand.
I had a winged 2-star tell us that hornet pilots don't deserve air medals because the enemy doesn't have good enough anti-air capabilities