In article ,
(ArtKramr) wrote:

Subject: Bomber Pilots Never Look Down
From: Robert Briggs UCKET
Date: 8/13/2004 10:09 AM Pacific Standard Time
Message-id:

ArtKramr wrote:
buf3 wrote:
ArtKramr wrote:

I was surprised to learn that bomber pilots never looked down.

Maybe *your* bomber pilot didn't look down as much as you would have
expected, but even that leaves two obvious questions.

How do you justify extrapolating from one example to "bomber pilots"
in general?

Did you have to call out directions to him on final approach at the
end of each mission?

Later that day I had to get in the copilots seat and complete an
air refueling the pilot could not handle. Several years later
when I was at SAC Headquarters this pilot's name came up for a
staff job there. I vetoed him immediately without reservation.

I would have voted to give your pilot that staff job. Get him the
hell out of airplanes where he might hurt someone.

I guess the wisdom of that would depend on the staff job in question:
after all, guys behind desks have a habit of sending aviators into
harm's way.


Harm's way is the name of the game.


The name of the game is winning, and conserving your resources as best
you can so you can win the next game. Yes, the targeting staff could
just say "hit this target". Even then, and I realize the choices are
much more complex today, someone has to pick the right ordnance so you
don't have to go back.

But it may be staff guys that pick ingress and egress routes that thread
you through gaps in the air defense network. It may be staff guys who
plan deceptive feints to draw defenders away from the true hard target.

It may very well be not-even-rated staff operations research analysts
that figure out the most effective fighter coverage, the best bomb
patterns, etc. The engineers that designed the plane, the weapons, the
navaids, etc., may not even be "staff".

There are warriors that also can do very well with staff assignments --
Jimmy Doolittle was clearly one. People like that are national treasures
-- but so was Kelly Johnson.