RE: http://www.military.com/opinio...15202,204959,00.html.

Absolutely not!!!You receive flight pay for actually flying,or being a part of the flight crew.I earned the wings I wore in the Marine Corps by becoming an airborne radio operator/loadmaster on a KC130F.It was hard work,and a lot of schooling.These joy-stick commandos are pogues,and will always be pogues.Incentive pay,maybe.Flight pay,forget about it!!

They are already receiving Air Medals for their drone flying and they never leave the comfy confines of Nellis Air Force Base Nevada or Kuwait. They are also pushing for allowing drone pilots to claim PTSD as "killing from any distance is still killing". There are Army junior enlisted flight personel NOT receiving Air Medals in Iraq/Afghanistan because of their low rank but at least they are deployed and are in the actually theater of combat operations. Im sure the AF will award these guys flight pay and whatever else. Everything else that had meant something the AF dishonors, why not flight pay....

Calling a UAV operator a pogue because they're not actually in the airplane is extremely ignorant considering the impact they've had recently. Some have argued that as a loadmaster you don't deserve wings because you're essentially a passenger and not in control of the aircraft during flight. Trust me... these guys put in a lot of hard work and school as well... quite a bit more school than any load master or obsolete radio operator.

That being said... they shouldn't call it flight pay. That should be reserved for those who take the risk of operating an aircraft. I'm on the fence about if they should get a monthly incentive pay at all or an initial career bonus like the other high-skill careers.

How about flightline pay!!! Everyone seems to be getting some form of special incentive pay, EOD has it, Recruiters have it, UAV's have it, and numerous other career fields have it. Well what about the flightline maintainers, there would be no Air force without them, No air support for ground troops without them. We deal with insane conditions, work around 2K pound bombs daily, all forms of explosives. Oh yea and millions of running parts moving at high speeds all built by the lowest bidder. I think flight line maintainers should receive special pay as well, bet we would have more retainability...

Not no, but HELL no!

You hear about AF pilots flying "combat" missions in Afganistan and Iraq. It's funny that the AF calls it "combat" when no one is shooting at you. I do not picture "combat" as dropping a gps or laser guided bomb from 20,000 feet and no one is shooting back.

Army helo pilots do fly "combat missions" but you will never hear the Army pilots call it that. It's Army pilots doing what they are trained to do.

With that being said, UAV pilots should not get flight pay. They are usually not in theater and they are not getting shot at. If they do get flight pay, as long as we are giving it away I want some flight pay as well! By the way, I was never aircrew and I have been retired for quite some time.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: armymanret,

I washed out of the army WOC helicopter pilot program in Ft Rucker, Ala after 7 months in the mid 60s and I don't think drone drivers deserve flight pay, let alone medals. Sure, it is stressful ("Mayday, mayday, my joystick's jammed" etc )but they get to go home or head for Vegas after their shifts. I'll bet there are many Taliban or bin Laden henchmen who consider drone hits unmanly compared to fighting face to face regardless of the distance between them and our forces.

A little reality check...


Guys like armymanret and 4499124 (?) will post up ignorant comments because they don't bother to educate themselves about the reality of the situation. I understand you guys were Army but that doesn't mean the other branches don't pull their weight.

The AF is flying plenty of close air support missions, including risky show-of-force displays by large, expensive B-1B bombers to help the ground pounders whenever they can (for example).

On the flip side, while in Q-West this year I was in a sea of Army support troops whose only apparent function was to sexually harrass every woman they saw and jam the chow hall up for hours at a time. Should they not recieve their hostile fire pay because they never left the wire?

My point being that we all have jobs to do. Just because some moron higher up the chain is giving an incintive pay and calls it "flight pay" is no reason to denigrate everyone who is flying a UAV.

quote:

I'll bet there are many Taliban or bin Laden henchmen who consider drone hits unmanly compared to fighting face to face regardless of the distance between them and our forces.

What the hell does that even have to do with the discussion? So we should put more troops in harms way to appear more manly to a group who fights by hiding in a civillian population? Brilliant.

They earned there wings, so pay e'm...

Speaking of pogues......

First of all let me say that we need UAV's. They provide a very good and valuable service to our guys on the ground. So I am thankfull for their help and their service.

As for the incentive pay I say NO. In a time where everyone is having a hard time getting funding how is it that the Air Force has money to waste on incentive pay for everyone? I think that it would be a travesty to give them insentive pay when the guys who do the most dangerous job ie. the infantry doesn't get incentive pay. The only pay they get is hazardous duty pay just like everyone else gets over there.

From what I understand EOD, airborne, flight pay etc is an incentive pay because all those jobs are hazardous. Flying a drone is not hazardous. I also don't think they should be able to receive awards such as the DFC, silver star etc as those require you to put your life on the line. If you are in Nellis you are not putting your life on the line. Now medals such as an air medal or AAM etc then yes they deserve all of those.

Flying drones has to be the ultimate (to date) in computerized war games ... the "pilots" ought to be paying the AF to play!

According to a recent Military Channel program on the F-22 that aircraft may be the last manned fighter. Afterward, the following generation of fighters will be unmanned. This may also apply to bombers. Pilots will sit in their air-conditioned rooms and fly remotely. They should get flight pay. The times are changing; get used to it.

LTC Mike

Give me a break! What will the folks up top think of making on eligible for next!

Oh wait, how about combat patches immediately available, no length of time required as had been in the past, for those in combat zones(Even this definition has been exppanded from the past)

Maybe special duty pay-maybe I know more than you do about flying robots pay, but don't call it 'flight pay'.

Tisk, tisk; the author has seen the writing on the wall of the demise of the zipper-suited-sun-god...

How about eliminating flight pay altogether. Every job has its hazards. Do you want to argue on why Security Forces don't get the same peacetime hazard pay that Fire Dept does? What about POL or LOX operators? Everyone gets a standard across the board pay, don't they?

What about those crews living in safe locations and then flying over the border of hostile territory once a month to collect hazardous fire pay? Please. What about the combat award created for flyers, because they got miffed about support personnel in combat racking up accolades?

Flyers do have a mission and a dangerous one at that, but today's battles are more assymetrical and support folks are just as important than those that HAVE to stay at the 5-star hotel downtown instead of base billeting while others are in tents. Get f-ing real!