Unintended Consequences of Senior Leadership Decisions – A Visionary Proven Right

By Col (Ret) Larry Chandler

Major General (Ret) Lewis Curtis, SA-ALC/CC (1987) owned the Aviation Depot Squadrons AVDS). The chain of command was AFLC/CC to SA-ALC/CC to SA-ALC/DSW to the three AVDS squadron Commanders---pretty direct chain of command. The AVDS squadron commanders  (Lt Col) wrote a monthly letter on the status of the squadrons direct to AFLC/CC and info to SA-ALC   (This was inspired by the “ADM Rickover Letter” that Sub Commanders had to write each month—the AF adopted the practice).  The following text resulted from the AF wide discussions on merging the munitions officer career field into the aircraft maintenance officer career field – a single consolidated career field in 1987. MG Curtis saw this merger as a bad idea… the story follows.

MG Curtis wrote a letter to BG Philip Metzler, HQ AF Director of maintenance and supply (LEY), 21 April 1987. MG Curtis argued that merging munitions and aircraft maintenance officers would produce only superficially qualified officers. He called the merger “dangerous.” --- Quote, “We have learned through long and bitter experience that nuclear logistics operations demand experience and technical expertise far beyond that required for general maintenance of even non-nuclear munitions (Curtis, 1987). MG Curtis wrote this memo in 1987 and 20 years later in 2007 we have the Minot and Taiwan incidents which were both obviously, “Nuclear logistics operations,” and were the management responsibility of 21M officers. The results of senior leadership decisions are often not evident until 15-20 years after the decision (Jacques’s Stratified Systems Theory [SST], 1986).

MG Lew Curtis was insightful to see 20 years into the future and be right! Even I thought the merger was a good thing in 1987---But I was drinking the “cool-aid” and trying to run with the herd to get promoted too. It is probably a good thing to remember, we want the AF/mission and America to be a win… and not just our individual careers to be successful.  Bottom line, MG Lew Curtis was absolutely right, the munitions officer career field (nuclear and conventional) are too technical and the risk of failure too great for a “generalist” maintenance officer model!  lchandler@avesllc.com

Culture of Conscientiousness

by Lt Col (Ret) Pat Thayer



In our business things are designed to “Blow Up” so we have to really know our business---the goal is to blow up the enemy and not ourselves! Back in “my day” there was a single overriding concept that guided all of our day to day activities in AMMO, both conventional and nuclear.  From the first day of training in munitions school we were taught to know the rules of AFM 127-100 (now AFI 91-201) and follow them diligently – no deviation allowed without proper authority.  We lived by this precept and deviated at our great professional peril because our bosses also knew the rules and demanded nothing less than full compliance.

It seems to some we were always out of sight and out of mind---i.e. the bomb dump is always 10 mile off-base for a reason; the flightline is where you get promoted? But when we go to war as we are now, live ordnance (conventional and nuclear) must be handled correctly or the mission will fail and good people will get killed. Sure, sometimes we screwed up or let political expediency (by officers who did not understand the requirement for “expert” management of the munitions function) overrule our better judgment -- the results were sometimes catastrophic, e.g. Bien Hoa (Blew up a base in Vietnam because of a loading error with an M121A1 anti-withdrawal fuze) and more recently the Minot and Taiwan incidents. We have to, as officers, KNOW OUR BUSINESS!  By and large we lived this “culture of expert conscientiousness”, which seems to have been lost in the modern era of generalists “the utility-infielder officer” who can play any position.  I fear that unless and until we recapture this idea of overriding officer experts with clear management responsibility more bad things will happen.

General Ron Fogelman – A Story of Leadership

By Col (Ret) Larry Chandler

While assigned to the 4404th Logistics Group at PSAB, Saudi, General Fogelman, then the CSAF visited and had the occasion to tour our transportation squadron’s vehicle maintenance facility (Tent). It was hot and our mechanics were working hard everyday trying to keep the oldest fleet of hand-me-down vehicles in-commission. The mechanics were sweaty, and their overalls were what you would expect of folks taking engines and transmissions apart and all these mechanics were deeply involved in the vehicle repairs. When General Fogelman walked through the facility he had an entourage and was getting a walking briefing from the transportation squadron commander, Lt Col Rita Woolwine. When Gen Fogelman stopped the procession at a Hummer (in the midst of major engine work), he engaged the young mechanic in a discussion of engine overhauls. Gen Fogelman was overhauling his car engine at Bolling AFB -- and he engaged in a very detailed discussion of problems and solutions. Very shortly there was a circle of the 70 mechanics around Gen Fogelman and the conversation had already lasted well over 30 minutes when the Colonel travelling with the CSAF, tried to get him to disengage and move on to the next stop on the wing tour. Gen Fogelman resisted lightly and the colonel decided to be a little more assertive because they were falling too far from the scheduled itinerary…until Gen Fogelman abruptly stopped talking, turned to the colonel and said, “Colonel you can see I am busy and when it is time to go, I will let you know”---stared, and then Gen Fogelman returned to the SSgt he was talking to. Every dirty and tired mechanic was engaged with the CSAF that day in the vehicle maintenance facility -- beamed with pride and you never saw such a vehicle in-commission rate ever. Gen Fogelman was not talking to these mechanics about the role of Air Power, or the importance of fighter squadrons to the Joint Task Force, or the need for mechanics to be “focused on compliance,” he was talking with them about vehicle maintenance. He was focused on what “they” were doing and not on what he was doing. He did not need to say how important vehicle maintenance was to the overall AF mission -- in words, because by spending his time and engaged attention, he had already done that in spades---that was real leadership. There were many of us who learned a valuable lesson that day!

This was the CSAF but the lesson in this story is not about a visit from the CSAF, the lesson is for those in leadership positions - you only have to genuinely engage your people on their jobs to have a tremendous impact on performance. It can’t be a fake performance but if you are genuinely interested in what they are doing and pay them the compliment of doing your homework and learning enough of the details to be able to engage them about the work, the entire AF team wins.

A quote from a recently published book about General Curtis Lemay supports this basic principle. Kozak (2009) described LeMay’s move out of Europe at the end of June 1944, when General Hap Arnold assigned him to run the B-29 operations in India. LeMay was told there were “problems” with the airplane. Lemay knew every part of the B-17 but had never even flown a B-29. Kozak wrote, “Lemay immersed himself in the planes’ technology. But rather than asking the ground [maintenance] crews incessant questions, he simply worked alongside them and seemed to just absorb what they knew” (p. 170-171).

The principle is pretty clear and has been modeled for us throughout our short Air Force history; effective leaders get firsthand knowledge of the problems to be solved and do not rely on 9 lines from a staff officer to understand complex issues. Real leaders are self-driven to understand the details and that is why they seem to always be able to “connect the dots” and make good decisions. lchandler@avesllc.com