Exercise experiences

[chief0299]

I happen to see a few folks posting about their experiences with unit exercises. This might be the perfect place to post your thoughts and how things can be different. Do the "Hotwashes" really prove to be effective?

Here's my story:
My reserve unit (yes, I'm a reservist NOW) recieved a "Marginal" on it's ORI due to the inept abilities of only 1 squadron and the host bases' SFS. The SFS wasn't supposed to be participating in the exercise, they were doing their normal duties. EET caugt them without seat belts and reflective belts and somehow we took a write up for it. For the year and a half afterwards, we played in chem gear EVERY drill weekend. Policies became stricter, harsh words were used, our wg/cc even when so far as to put a memo to gp/cc's personally telling them that he is in line for his star and he will hold them personally responsible for another failure. There were also EET members who had a "Holier than thou" attitude and played syamtics with us the entire time.

There were other things to consider... we "deployed" to a remote location with 3 other units and did a combined ORI. Somehow, we ended up coming home with write ups that the other units committed. It wasn't that we ALL shared the write ups, it was only my unit that incurred these write ups. When we performed our "Make up ORI" the same squadron that screwed things up to begin with did it again.

Alas, the wg/cc got his star. Nobody was fired. The screw up squadron has since "deployed" on their own, passed their portion of the ORI and got a heroes home coming. The folks that initially passed? A hearty "Good job!" With "don't let it happen again" under the breath of our supervision.

One thing that sticks out in my mind is that in all of our ORI's, ORE's and what not, the entire unit has been cited over and over again about the lack of communication throughout the chain of command. Nothing has been done.

During a "Hotwash" I made almost one hundred suggestions as to how we could inspect ourselves better, provide a more realistic training environment and better train our troops. What has happened? Nothing.

Oh well. Such is life in the Air Force. Let's hear your story!

[VFFSSGT]

During a "Hotwash" I made almost one hundred suggestions as to how we could inspect ourselves better, provide a more realistic training environment and better train our troops. What has happened? Nothing.


I believe everyone could use more realistic training and realistic exercises. It almost seems exercises are a means to an end...someone just trying to get a promotion or something of the like. What I mean is, just like you said, it is near impossible to get anyone to provide realistic training/exercises. Everyone only wants to do enough just to get by. Simulate this, simulate that, simulate to simulate...and when it comes time to do it for real people often have the dear in head lights look. I personally believe the Air Force should ban the word simulate and the act of simulating. Then there are those things that are done only in exercises. I might be reaching here but it seems the emphasis in exercises is often misplaced. It almost seems we train to exercise instead of exercise to train.

Get the weapons out and use them things (with blank firing adapters of course), get some pyrotechnics that go boom, get the tear gas out, and make this mess as real as possible. Crap, we can't do all that, we might violate a safety regulation and get a write-up.... :rolleyes: ... and we spent all our money on televisions and cable.

[chief0299]

I've heard more times than I can count that we "Train as we fight." Well, if we fight while wearing reflective belts in broad daylight (per commanders instructions), use cones and tape to build our shelters, bunkers and harden our buildings, GREAT! One suggestion I made that was actually laughed at was to pull people from the exercise and use them as aggressors to attack their own career field. My example that I used was: Pull some crew chiefs off the flight line and have them attack their co-workers and the aircraft. The enemy isn't just going to over-run the base, they're going to watch us to see where we run to when the horn goes off. They're going to watch what we do when they test us. WE need to be able to test our own exploits, rather than have someone from an unrelated career field do it.

[proud2bblue]

I happen to see a few folks posting about their experiences with unit exercises. This might be the perfect place to post your thoughts and how things can be different. Do the "Hotwashes" really prove to be effective?

Here's my story:
My reserve unit (yes, I'm a reservist NOW) recieved a "Marginal" on it's ORI due to the inept abilities of only 1 squadron and the host bases' SFS. The SFS wasn't supposed to be participating in the exercise, they were doing their normal duties. EET caugt them without seat belts and reflective belts and somehow we took a write up for it. For the year and a half afterwards, we played in chem gear EVERY drill weekend. Policies became stricter, harsh words were used, our wg/cc even when so far as to put a memo to gp/cc's personally telling them that he is in line for his star and he will hold them personally responsible for another failure. There were also EET members who had a "Holier than thou" attitude and played syamtics with us the entire time.

There were other things to consider... we "deployed" to a remote location with 3 other units and did a combined ORI. Somehow, we ended up coming home with write ups that the other units committed. It wasn't that we ALL shared the write ups, it was only my unit that incurred these write ups. When we performed our "Make up ORI" the same squadron that screwed things up to begin with did it again.

Alas, the wg/cc got his star. Nobody was fired. The screw up squadron has since "deployed" on their own, passed their portion of the ORI and got a heroes home coming. The folks that initially passed? A hearty "Good job!" With "don't let it happen again" under the breath of our supervision.

One thing that sticks out in my mind is that in all of our ORI's, ORE's and what not, the entire unit has been cited over and over again about the lack of communication throughout the chain of command. Nothing has been done.

During a "Hotwash" I made almost one hundred suggestions as to how we could inspect ourselves better, provide a more realistic training environment and better train our troops. What has happened? Nothing.

Oh well. Such is life in the Air Force. Let's hear your story!

UCI's and ORI's are completely out of touch with what we are doing as a force today. Most bases live a REAL ORI every quarter when they deploy 500 troops for real. With modern weapons and the fact that individual weapons are not avaiable, unless something is scheduled makes a ORI utter nonsese. By the time 25 weapons are issued, the event will be over. UCI's, now I understand the intent, but stop inspecting us like we are 100% or 75% or 65% manned. The build up, while good for the unit has gotten out of control. Folks working 20hrs a day for 2 months to prepare. Now that is the problem. Units are deployed and working "real" missions. UCI's need to be scaled down to the absolute minimum and at least 5 years apart. This is an AF senior leadership mentality problem. UCI's should not be the only tool used to promote Wg CC's.

[BigBaze]

[quote=chief0299;149811]

During a "Hotwash" I made almost one hundred suggestions as to how we could inspect ourselves better, provide a more realistic training environment and better train our troops. What has happened? Nothing.

quote]


Sounds like when they came through and asked airmen what they wanted in the new uniform, and look what a disaster that turned out to be when they made it , after not listening to any of the ideas:>

[chief0299]

[quote=chief0299;149811]

During a "Hotwash" I made almost one hundred suggestions as to how we could inspect ourselves better, provide a more realistic training environment and better train our troops. What has happened? Nothing.

quote]


Sounds like when they came through and asked airmen what they wanted in the new uniform, and look what a disaster that turned out to be when they made it , after not listening to any of the ideas:>

Of course. Why listen to the input of the people who will put the camoflouge pattern and the quality of the fabric to use when all it takes is a general to reccomend pattern A made by company B to earn himself a medal and a bullet statement. In the meantime, I'm sure this general will have a prosperous career with company B once he retires. Politics and greed.

[VFFSSGT]

Touching on the politics and greed thing...

You know, most of the firefighters in this nation are volunteers. If I remember right its something like 70 percent or so. Why do they/we do it? Because we like to serve and help people. People put their life on the line for absolutely nothing and ask for absolutely nothing. And often times it is with substandard equipment because the politicians hoard all the money.

I have always believed the President and Congress should make no more than what the average American makes...like $40K/yr or so. Everything is provided for them, so please tell me why they need $400K/yr or $160K/yr respectively. General pay should be capped out too, somewhere at a lower number than it is now. And then lets see how willingly they are to serve their country...:rolleyes: We don't need leaders or workers who are here for money - We need leaders and workers who are here to serve a purpose for America! Greed of money leads to corruption and I believe it is all to evident how corrupt Washington is.

We (the average Airmen/NCO), in the AF/military risk our lives for what? $3.50 a day? And these guys get everything handed to them on a silver platter in the comfort of a secure office and still make hundreds of thousands a year? Something just is not right about this picture and I am sure it is not the way it was intended to be.

[BRUWIN]

One suggestion I made that was actually laughed at was to pull people from the exercise and use them as aggressors to attack their own career field. My example that I used was: Pull some crew chiefs off the flight line and have them attack their co-workers and the aircraft. .

The only problem with that is knowing Crew Chiefs...they really will attack thier own co-workers and aircraft.

[chief0299]

The only problem with that is knowing Crew Chiefs...they really will attack thier own co-workers and aircraft.

As a crew chief myself, I'm going to keep an open mind about your reference. I made the suggestion during our hotwash so that we could get experience being attacked by means of our own exploits. Say for example, if we get into a habit of running to the same shelter, performing launch and recovery at the same times... the attacking enemy can easily spot this and adjust their plan of attack to hit when we are the most vulnerable.

As far as crew chiefs attacking one another and their aircraft, perhaps your experience may be with a unit where there is not much unit cohesion. The 7 units I've been to as a crew chief, both home station and deployed, all got along very well. Granted, it's impossible to go anywhere that there isn't a small amount of back-stabbing, but humans will be humans. A majority of problems we did have came from and dealt with supervision.

[ramprat]

in the 60s on a sac base i was ncoic of transient maint.we had a "broken arrow exercise"
all aircraft had to be moved at least 1/4 mile from the broken arrow.
didnt have a tow bar for a t33 so i told a previous cc on 33s to taxi that pos to the wash rack.
a couple of days later some asshole remarked about the violation to me .
my reply to him was ."i thought the exercise was a possible real broken arrow,and if we are
to assume all exercises were not real,whats the point"
never heard a word from the base commander who checked my area at least once a day
minimum.

[Ammoguy]

Touching on the politics and greed thing...

You know, most of the firefighters in this nation are volunteers. If I remember right its something like 70 percent or so. Why do they/we do it? Because we like to serve and help people. People put their life on the line for absolutely nothing and ask for absolutely nothing. And often times it is with substandard equipment because the politicians hoard all the money.

I have always believed the President and Congress should make no more than what the average American makes...like $40K/yr or so. Everything is provided for them, so please tell me why they need $400K/yr or $160K/yr respectively. General pay should be capped out too, somewhere at a lower number than it is now. And then lets see how willingly they are to serve their country...:rolleyes: We don't need leaders or workers who are here for money - We need leaders and workers who are here to serve a purpose for America! Greed of money leads to corruption and I believe it is all to evident how corrupt Washington is.

We (the average Airmen/NCO), in the AF/military risk our lives for what? $3.50 a day? And these guys get everything handed to them on a silver platter in the comfort of a secure office and still make hundreds of thousands a year? Something just is not right about this picture and I am sure it is not the way it was intended to be.

You're an idiot. I'm so sick of reading the crap you keep posting all over these boards. Booster clubs? Restore SSgt ranks? Appeal to "senior leadership" about the lack of discipline? You're a f*cking A1C with too much time on his hands. Go clean the bathroom like you should be doing and stop complaining about your perceptions of the state of affairs in the USAF on a very public forum. Sheesh.

[BRUWIN]

Getting back to topic....I once watched an 18 year SSgt try and smoke a cigarette through his drinking tube when wearing a gas mask during Alarm Black. Problem was when he exhaled he filled the entire mask with smoke and he couldn't see. Other than that it was totally doable.

[ART]

I have been involved in deployment exercises and real deployments for 25 years, and can say without a moments hesitation that I have never once deployed the way I've exercised.

MX guys in the airlift world generally run a BS "checklist" (99% of which can be pencil whipped in the briefing) then get someone from the shop to run them out to the plane about an hour before departure.

In an exercise, we are crammed in a deployment line getting our DD93 checked for the 50th time, we sit around and wait another 3 or 4 hours, get on a bus, sit in front of the plane for an hour then single file onto the jet.

But in today's AF, squares must be filled!

[JCH]

You're an idiot. I'm so sick of reading the crap you keep posting all over these boards. Booster clubs? Restore SSgt ranks? Appeal to "senior leadership" about the lack of discipline? You're a f*cking A1C with too much time on his hands. Go clean the bathroom like you should be doing and stop complaining about your perceptions of the state of affairs in the USAF on a very public forum. Sheesh.

Not saying I agree with his rants, but isn't the whole point of an open forum to be able to express one's opinion. If you don't like what he has to say then just skip over his inputs. You hate what he has to say but sounds like your reading all his posts.

[VFFSSGT]

You're an idiot. I'm so sick of reading the crap you keep posting all over these boards. Booster clubs? Restore SSgt ranks? Appeal to "senior leadership" about the lack of discipline? You're a f*cking A1C with too much time on his hands. Go clean the bathroom like you should be doing and stop complaining about your perceptions of the state of affairs in the USAF on a very public forum. Sheesh.

Wow, I'm an idiot...really now... I believe your posts speak for themselves. A1C uh, wrong on that account too first term airmen.

[Cornbreadrules]

Wow, I'm an idiot...really now... I believe your posts speak for themselves. A1C uh, wrong on that account too first term airmen.


OK he ment to say was SrA!

[BRUWIN]

. Go clean the bathroom like you should be doing and stop complaining about your perceptions of the state of affairs in the USAF on a very public forum. Sheesh.


I think you'll find that cleaning AF bathrooms was for the most part contracted out years ago.

[chief0299]

I think you'll find that cleaning AF bathrooms was for the most part contracted out years ago.

LOL, the truth hurts!

[Venus]

Back in the 80's we did "Salty Nation" exercises in Europe and they always ended up the same way the base got a tactical nuke thrown on it. When I heard that I just sat down a took a long drink of my canteen, had a local inspector saw me usaully a 1stShirt checking to make sure we had black socks on who told me to do don my gas mask it will save your life from the nuke. I proceded to tell him that the nuke exploded less than a 100 yards from me and the mask would not do me much good so I have been pretty much vaporized and was just waiting for the exercise to be indexed. He did not appreciate my logic.

[chief0299]

Back in the 80's we did "Salty Nation" exercises in Europe and they always ended up the same way the base got a tactical nuke thrown on it. When I heard that I just sat down a took a long drink of my canteen, had a local inspector saw me usaully a 1stShirt checking to make sure we had black socks on who told me to do don my gas mask it will save your life from the nuke. I proceded to tell him that the nuke exploded less than a 100 yards from me and the mask would not do me much good so I have been pretty much vaporized and was just waiting for the exercise to be indexed. He did not appreciate my logic.

I've noticed that some folks don't look past what they're told. I've had my fair share of situations like you described. I think it was probably 6 years ago, the Army was returning chem suits to the manufacturer because there were pin size holes that jeapordized the usefelness of the suit. At the time, we were using the exact same suits. Same stock number and everything. When I went to chem warfare refresher and brought this up, the instructor explained to me that a pin size hole won't affect the protective abilities of the suit and that he had never heard of anything like that.

During an exercise while on active duty, we had to take shelter in a fuel cell repair hangar (yes, there was an aircraft in it). When the EET came by and asked why I wasn't under a table, they couldn't grasp the concept that if an incoming round hits the hangar, the entire place is likely to go up in a massive fireball due to the fact that an aircraft with highly flammable jet fuel is sitting 20 feet from me and that it would be futile to find cover when the risk of being burned to death is higher than just having debris fall on me.

Some people don't want to see the reality of situations, they only see what the Air Force tells them to see.

[Battleshort]

Back in the 80's we did "Salty Nation" exercises in Europe and they always ended up the same way the base got a tactical nuke thrown on it. When I heard that I just sat down a took a long drink of my canteen, had a local inspector saw me usaully a 1stShirt checking to make sure we had black socks on who told me to do don my gas mask it will save your life from the nuke. I proceded to tell him that the nuke exploded less than a 100 yards from me and the mask would not do me much good so I have been pretty much vaporized and was just waiting for the exercise to be indexed. He did not appreciate my logic.

Did you remember to brace for shock?

[Gunner007]

Exercises may have a time and place but lately they are nothing more than a nuisance! We have guys getting ready to deploy but we have to stop getting ready to walk out the door because there is an exercise. So for a week instead of flying and finishing predeployment training we get to do an exercise!!!

I liked it better at another unit when we had our phase 1 worked in smartly before deploying. This way we packed all our ISU's and had inspected and ready to load. Then when we processed the line we were really leaving the country anyway so it was for real! Now we stop everything to play a game then try to pick back up later.

[ramprat]

I've noticed that some folks don't look past what they're told. I've had my fair share of situations like you described. I think it was probably 6 years ago, the Army was returning chem suits to the manufacturer because there were pin size holes that jeapordized the usefelness of the suit. At the time, we were using the exact same suits. Same stock number and everything. When I went to chem warfare refresher and brought this up, the instructor explained to me that a pin size hole won't affect the protective abilities of the suit and that he had never heard of anything like that.

During an exercise while on active duty, we had to take shelter in a fuel cell repair hangar (yes, there was an aircraft in it). When the EET came by and asked why I wasn't under a table, they couldn't grasp the concept that if an incoming round hits the hangar, the entire place is likely to go up in a massive fireball due to the fact that an aircraft with highly flammable jet fuel is sitting 20 feet from me and that it would be futile to find cover when the risk of being burned to death is higher than just having debris fall on me.

Some people don't want to see the reality of situations, they only see what the Air Force tells them to see.
great,i love it. youre making me homesick for SAC

[Venus]

One exercise I was on stateside we were in full chem gear alarm black and we removing and replacing a generator on a E-3 Sentry . We do everything by the book sign off the red X's and I get a outstanding from the inspector. 2 weeks later a QA guy same rank as me comes and fails the task because even though I was red X qualified in my 623's but it was not on my CAMS rip. I kind of lost it and told that fellow TSgt to suck my you know what and of course the Pr%$#$@ goes tell my section chief I wasn't very nice to him. God no wonder I stayed TDY in AWACS to stay away from non deploying jackasses like him, bet the little Pr!@# made Chief.

[10Man]

The only problem with that is knowing Crew Chiefs...they really will attack thier own co-workers and aircraft.

I agree with chief0299, Being in aircraft maintenance myself (Hydraulics with a C prefix) I find humor with your quote. There is so much teamwork and cohesion in the units I have been assigned to, I have to think you are simply making a joke. When i was a young airman during exercises, we actually worked in a "deployed" location on the other side of the base, after we "deployed" there. We lauched/recovered our deployed aircraft defended our airfield, used M-16's with the blanks. We were actually waived from the airfield defense scenarios because we were creating a FOD hazard with the blank casings accumulating near the aircraft. I never once aimed my M-16 at a teammate nor did I witness any aiming at one another. We were taught to only point your weapon were you plan to shoot! If you are aiming at it, you are planning on taking it out.
Back to the topic,
Times have changed, these exercises today are a paper tiger, a lot of higher level supervision drawing it up on paper and then the plan goes south once it is used in a "deployed" environment. SNCO's plans and tactics being trumped by light colonels and colonels with big egos trying to get the next promotion.
Also the "hotwashes" have become more of a soap opera and argument session instead of constructive phase to identify what needs to be improved upon the next time.

[BTDTNM]

Best way to cripple a Wing for 9 months or so. Schedule it for an ORI.