After three months of being assigned to assist the Swedish Air Force with the fielding of their new UH60M Black Hawks, the biggest conclusion I can come to is that US Army Aviation is the best in the world. This surely isn't a block buster conclusion but rather a great reminder to those that serve in the best to realize what they have.
The organization of US Army Aviation just makes sense to me. There is a mission that is given to an organization, resources are allocated to complete that mission, commanders are chosen to ensure that the resources are properly utilized to make the mission become a reality. The commanders hold the responsibility and more importantly, the accountability to make their assigned mission a success.
Discipline of the members in an organization is the foundation that builds success. Strong leaders instill discipline into those members. One very small detail to this happens to be one of the most fundamental of all things that US service members probably never think about. A subordinate soldier would never dream of calling a superior NCO or Officer by their first name. That happens to be a very American Military concept as I have recently discovered. It has also been a very important segment of my military career.
The one or two members of my audience are probably asleep by now from my deep knowledge of the obvious. I bring this up to disclose this finding as a witness to why, in my opinion, being informal as a military is a terrible idea. Here in Sweden, all members of the Air Force are on a first name basis. For me that is a large assist as I am physically unable to speak most of the last names without verbally annihilating that individual with my lack of Swedish language ability. But for those born with Swedish as their first language, and therefor no excuse, it would aid in the amount of discipline residing in the force.
Our small US contingent has been invited to multiple social events that include an open bar followed by a formal dinner. These events include alcohol as an abundant resource, one that I have not been timid with my participation. I admit that I am quite shy as it relates to sounding out in song at the dinner table in an effort to down a shot of schnapps. Once just the right amount of liquid candor has been applied, I have discussed at length the topic of the first name basis. The resounding opinion, translated from alcohol induced Swenglish, has been that commanders are far more approachable and equal due to the lack of formality. Equality is important to the Swedes, Rank is not! If one chooses to increase rank, they simply apply to change rank, it isn't seen as a promotion. It is simply a change of jobs. The higher the rank, the less they are able to do the job that they like.
I can't imagine being asked to conduct a dangerous Air Assault, one in which the projected casualty rate will be high, and looking at my commander while answering, "Well Lance, I just don't feel that I want to be involved in that dangerous affair, I think I will sit this one out!" This ridiculous statement above is an actual reality in this country, well, minus the dangerous air assault. Deploying to Afghanistan to support the international community as a MEDEVAC asset is the mission. This appears to be a choice to the individual whether they want to go along.
My mission here is to prepare the unit for this impending deployment. This isn't my military, I am not on the team, I will not spend one second in the airspace over Afghanistan with this unit, but I really want to help prepare them for this venture. At first it was a breeze to set out with this very broad task at hand. There were only four pilots in country that were M model qualified. Those four were the top players, the Division Commander, Division Deputy Commander, Flying Commander, and Chief Pilot.
My first line of questioning was directed toward the purpose and duty description of the Flying Commander versus the Division Commander. The answer received was that the Division Commander gets the mission from the higher echelon of command, so he tells the unit what they are going to do, the Flying Commander tells them how they are going to do that task. I tried to apply my US experience and translate this to our US system. To me it seemed that the Division Commander was like the Battalion commander and the Flying Commander was like the Battalion SP. That leaves the Chief Pilot and my lack of understanding on what is the idea behind that position. Through my relentless research and multiple questions, I determined that no one in the Swedish Air Force understands either.
With no real understanding on how the Force worked together, I trudged on wishing to understand but realizing that it really didn't matter. I am not here to sharp shoot the Swedish Armed Forces but to aid them in their use of the M model in Afghanistan. Our group worked well together. We sat down prior to flights, went over the goal of the flight, reviewed questions that the commander wanted answers for, then went out and flew. We came back and conducted hours of debrief and lessons learned over topics such as; troop insertions, snow/dust landings, formation flight, and instrument flight. Those lessons learned were then applied to the beginnings of regulation. All very rewarding and something great to be involved with. Then it all began to fall apart. The reason behind the down ward turn, the return of more pilots to Sweden.
Not only were more pilots introduced, but a new level of confusion, er I mean command. This is the platoon commander. Trust me, there is no parallel here either. Suddenly this individual is in charge of all things, flight schedule, how we will fly in all arenas to include; troop insertions, snow/dust landings, formation flight, and instrument flight. That should all sound familiar, but suddenly all the work previously done, decisions made, text written, didn't matter to the platoon commander. I figured it was a simple oversight or lack of communication from the higher four, maybe that platoon commander just didn't see all that was completed and more importantly decided upon by the Division Commander and Flying Commander. I wanted that to be the truth, the reason things were going in a much different direction, but unfortunately the truth is that those decisions were just not what the platoon commander liked, a difference of opinion. WTF? My US Army brain can not compute! My natural instinct was to go off the deep end, chew some ass, puff up and threaten with physical violence and harm, that is what I would do in my beloved US Army, but not here. After all, this isn't my country, my military, I am not part of the team, I won't be spending one second in the same airspace over Afghanistan with the Swedish Air Force.
The organization of US Army Aviation just makes sense to me. There is a mission that is given to an organization, resources are allocated to complete that mission, commanders are chosen to ensure that the resources are properly utilized to make the mission become a reality. The commanders hold the responsibility and more importantly, the accountability to make their assigned mission a success.
Discipline of the members in an organization is the foundation that builds success. Strong leaders instill discipline into those members. One very small detail to this happens to be one of the most fundamental of all things that US service members probably never think about. A subordinate soldier would never dream of calling a superior NCO or Officer by their first name. That happens to be a very American Military concept as I have recently discovered. It has also been a very important segment of my military career.
The one or two members of my audience are probably asleep by now from my deep knowledge of the obvious. I bring this up to disclose this finding as a witness to why, in my opinion, being informal as a military is a terrible idea. Here in Sweden, all members of the Air Force are on a first name basis. For me that is a large assist as I am physically unable to speak most of the last names without verbally annihilating that individual with my lack of Swedish language ability. But for those born with Swedish as their first language, and therefor no excuse, it would aid in the amount of discipline residing in the force.
Our small US contingent has been invited to multiple social events that include an open bar followed by a formal dinner. These events include alcohol as an abundant resource, one that I have not been timid with my participation. I admit that I am quite shy as it relates to sounding out in song at the dinner table in an effort to down a shot of schnapps. Once just the right amount of liquid candor has been applied, I have discussed at length the topic of the first name basis. The resounding opinion, translated from alcohol induced Swenglish, has been that commanders are far more approachable and equal due to the lack of formality. Equality is important to the Swedes, Rank is not! If one chooses to increase rank, they simply apply to change rank, it isn't seen as a promotion. It is simply a change of jobs. The higher the rank, the less they are able to do the job that they like.
I can't imagine being asked to conduct a dangerous Air Assault, one in which the projected casualty rate will be high, and looking at my commander while answering, "Well Lance, I just don't feel that I want to be involved in that dangerous affair, I think I will sit this one out!" This ridiculous statement above is an actual reality in this country, well, minus the dangerous air assault. Deploying to Afghanistan to support the international community as a MEDEVAC asset is the mission. This appears to be a choice to the individual whether they want to go along.
My mission here is to prepare the unit for this impending deployment. This isn't my military, I am not on the team, I will not spend one second in the airspace over Afghanistan with this unit, but I really want to help prepare them for this venture. At first it was a breeze to set out with this very broad task at hand. There were only four pilots in country that were M model qualified. Those four were the top players, the Division Commander, Division Deputy Commander, Flying Commander, and Chief Pilot.
My first line of questioning was directed toward the purpose and duty description of the Flying Commander versus the Division Commander. The answer received was that the Division Commander gets the mission from the higher echelon of command, so he tells the unit what they are going to do, the Flying Commander tells them how they are going to do that task. I tried to apply my US experience and translate this to our US system. To me it seemed that the Division Commander was like the Battalion commander and the Flying Commander was like the Battalion SP. That leaves the Chief Pilot and my lack of understanding on what is the idea behind that position. Through my relentless research and multiple questions, I determined that no one in the Swedish Air Force understands either.
With no real understanding on how the Force worked together, I trudged on wishing to understand but realizing that it really didn't matter. I am not here to sharp shoot the Swedish Armed Forces but to aid them in their use of the M model in Afghanistan. Our group worked well together. We sat down prior to flights, went over the goal of the flight, reviewed questions that the commander wanted answers for, then went out and flew. We came back and conducted hours of debrief and lessons learned over topics such as; troop insertions, snow/dust landings, formation flight, and instrument flight. Those lessons learned were then applied to the beginnings of regulation. All very rewarding and something great to be involved with. Then it all began to fall apart. The reason behind the down ward turn, the return of more pilots to Sweden.
Not only were more pilots introduced, but a new level of confusion, er I mean command. This is the platoon commander. Trust me, there is no parallel here either. Suddenly this individual is in charge of all things, flight schedule, how we will fly in all arenas to include; troop insertions, snow/dust landings, formation flight, and instrument flight. That should all sound familiar, but suddenly all the work previously done, decisions made, text written, didn't matter to the platoon commander. I figured it was a simple oversight or lack of communication from the higher four, maybe that platoon commander just didn't see all that was completed and more importantly decided upon by the Division Commander and Flying Commander. I wanted that to be the truth, the reason things were going in a much different direction, but unfortunately the truth is that those decisions were just not what the platoon commander liked, a difference of opinion. WTF? My US Army brain can not compute! My natural instinct was to go off the deep end, chew some ass, puff up and threaten with physical violence and harm, that is what I would do in my beloved US Army, but not here. After all, this isn't my country, my military, I am not part of the team, I won't be spending one second in the same airspace over Afghanistan with the Swedish Air Force.
