Tuesday, October 11, 2005

Air Force Doing Army Jobs

The Air Force just sent 3,000 troops to do traditionally Army jobs, per the LA Times.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-airforce11oct11,0,5242046.story?page=1&coll=la-home-headlines

Interesting article. It looks like the Airmen are going to be trained in some Army schools, and may be working for the Army. I saw some Airmen wearing the new Army uniform the other day, so I know that Airmen do fill roles that report to Army leaders.

The article talks about longer deployments for the AF, more than the usual 4 months. It also alludes to a bit of culture shock when the AF has to do Army business. The cited example is the forced march, which to the Airmen has little to do with being an intel pogue.

The Navy is doing customs inspections. Sailors inspected my gear when I went on leave, and I wondered why, and now I know. The Army is running out of bodies.

This presages a fight in congress. Each service battles over its budget and number of troops it can have. If Airmen are doing Army jobs, the question will arise, why not just reduce the AF and increase the Army? Something to watch.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

They are already cutting back on a lot of AF jobs. I know it was such a culture shock for my husband who was in the Army to go to the Air Force (Reserves) since they do things so differently and the AF is so much more laid back then the Army. Looks like now they better be on their toes!

Thanks for the article.

Mike said...

Hehe, I love my (ch)Air Farce, er, Force.

Anonymous said...

I prefer to think that we are getting smarter in the Pentagon-- saving soldiers for soldier jobs, like combat. Hire out the rest.

Lloyd