Unpopular Celebrities Podcast LLC
Unpopular Celebrities. Learn all about leadership, finance and life - and a lot more. Follow your hosts of the UPC Squad along with guests as we take a deep dive into different topics. Our focus is on leading people! Come take a journey with us and discover how you are also an unpopular celebrity. "I may be not be everything to everyone but I am something to someone."
Unpopular Celebrities Podcast LLC
Security Forces Unfiltered: Pride, Posts, And The Beret Part II
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A slow Sunday of grills and games takes a sharp turn into one of our most honest conversations about Security Forces: what the job really is, how the culture drifted, and what it will take to get the edge back. We unpack the full spectrum—nukes and PRAP, flight line defense, law enforcement, Ravens and K-9, and the back office programs that keep a unit audit-ready—then press on the hard parts: shift fatigue, sleeping on post, and why “automatic Article 15” thinking often misses the mission.
We dig into the promotion reality most of us feel but rarely say out loud. Back office roles get the spotlight, awards, and strats; flight chiefs shoulder the heat and go home late. That imbalance bleeds mentorship from the line. We offer practical fixes: transparent selection into NCOIC roles, deliberate rotations, and evaluating people by outcomes that matter to commanders—base security and response—rather than proximity to staff. Along the way, we talk pride and the beret, and why uniforms in garrison still matter: not for vanity, but for discipline you can see.
Then we get tactical. Why are stateside lines still carrying legacy weapons and two-man patrols meant to keep each other awake? Where’s the facial recognition and automated gate tech that frees patrols to deter and respond? If force protection is everyone’s job, train it like it is: make every airman a defender to a reliable baseline instead of scrambling augments when the threat pops. Standardize core procedures across bases, allow smart local tweaks, cut low-yield training, and invest in the tech that multiplies your force.
If you’ve ever worked a 12, fought for leave, or tried to mentor from the driver’s seat, this one’s for you. Hit play for blunt stories, real fixes, and a challenge to lead from the post, not the slide deck. If it resonates, subscribe, share with a teammate, and drop the one change you’d make first in your unit.
Sunday Grilling And Gaming Plans
SPEAKER_01Oh, you didn't need it.
SPEAKER_02You said I didn't need it. Yeah, man, you didn't need it, but it was so nice when you didn't have it.
SPEAKER_04Got it back. We back in the business. Well, we'll see how long it lasts. This could be a one-time thing.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_04It's Sunday. No football today. No basketball games. I'm really excited about. There's really nothing on. So I'm gonna get my butt out there on the grill. I'm gonna do some barbecuing today. Nice weather out here. So I think I'm gonna do that. You put a little steaks on the grill, a little burgers, some brats, maybe some chicken. I don't know if I okay. Let me be honest. I can grill. I really suck at cooking fish on the grill. That is tough for me. It always sticks to the god dang thing. Oh, yeah, put some butter or oil on the grill. Retiree lead and retiree alpha. What it do? I think that's Dell. What up? What up? Who who's retiree lead? I said lead. It must be me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, you ain't got access, my bad. Uh boom. All right. Yeah, um, because I remember he had the Kanye thing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's Dell.
SPEAKER_04What's up, Dell? Famous fella one. Anyway, so yeah, that's my plans today. Gonna be a good Sunday. Play some video games later on. I shouldn't say video games, video game later on. That's my Sunday.
Building A Massive Retro Game Stream
SPEAKER_02Exactly. Video game. Yeah. What about you? That's a topic in itself. Um, I might get some gaming, too. I was, you know, I'm a um, I tell my wife all the time, those those who may be Sagittarians know we we're impulsive at times. We like to just do stuff on the whim. So, like for me, I know how I am. Like, there's things I have to do, but then I pick the most inopportune time to do it. So, yesterday I was on a computer and I got this little arcade hard drives on my computer where I can play arcade games and stuff. And so I'm getting ready to start learning how to stream this stuff on the uh YouTube. So I figured out I've been wanting to figure out coding to put prompts in the Stream Deck. You hit a button and a game will come up. Now, for Stream Deck, it's easy, like for um Steam. For Steam is easy, you just find the executable. But when you're dealing with a large hard drive, this hard drive is like 124 terabytes, so there's games throughout there. You're talking about over 90, 120,000 games, something like that. So, anyway, different platforms. So, in order to go to the specific game and hit the specific controller prompt and the specific prompt for the overlays, it's all programmed in the launcher. So, to be able to put it on a stream deck is glorious. So, I use AI as as most people do. I say, Hey, how do I do this? blah blah blah. This is what I want to do, and it walked me through the prompt, and no, it worked. Yeah, it's glorious. So, yeah, eventually I'm gonna try to map a whole bunch of games. So instead of me going through the launcher, I just hit the button, but anyway, just play some games. No, that's cool.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I'm looking forward to your little uh gaming expo, if that's what you want to call it on YouTube.
SPEAKER_02Yes, I'm looking, I'm looking forward to it too. I just have to remember it doesn't have to be perfect, just get started.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, man, especially how I see other people's stuff just get started because their stuff be trash.
SPEAKER_02I want to see you this dude Link, which is a great example. He's funny, but he's a great example of what I'm I'm talking about. It doesn't have to be great. This dude's name is uh Darnell Brown, but his channel is called Get Down Brown, he's about maybe late 50s, late 60s, something like years old. Yeah, he's got an arcade machine like mine. Uh and when he first started, he was real awkward, right? And I think his daughters told him, like, hey dad, you gotta do this to kind of get viewers. And so he starts his show every time. Welcome to get downtown with get down brown. You ready to get down and ponte with get down brown? Everything is get down brown, it's so funny, man. But he had like 2,000 subscribers.
SPEAKER_04That's good. This is a dude I saw. He has like one like yours in the background, and he has the phone set up, so it's like you say, you just gotta get started. It has that uh glare, so you can see the phone in the screen, right? And so he's just playing, and he has another phone or a camera that's on him, so you can tell that's pre-recorded, it's not live. So uh he's playing, and every time something messes up, or like the game, you know, cheats or whatever, he does that face of the thing, so he'll be playing, he'll look like this. So you see the screen, and then he'll just be like, hey, but the case is so funny, and then he'll go off for a second or whatever it was. I only watched him like three or four times, but it's hilarious. He just be doing you know, the game always cheat. I think that's the best part is when the camera goes on him and he just like what kind of man, that was the idea I had. Um, I'll flip it, you know.
SPEAKER_02I mean, but that's a good idea, though.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I mean, I mean, the the likelihood of somebody knowing him and knowing you at the same time would be kind of slim.
SPEAKER_02So I mean it won't be bad, but he'd be like nobody has what the duck face, nobody can do that.
SPEAKER_03He'd be like, If I'm the only one who saw that, did y'all not see that? Did that not just happen? I don't even feel like playing no more. I'm gonna get back on.
SPEAKER_04You just hear it's it's pretty funny, it's pretty funny. Yeah, but uh, we got part two today about security forces. Since y'all love the first one so much, we'll do the part two and see how y'all like this one too. Uh, should be a good show as well. Um yeah, it should be a good show. Hopefully, it's just not all hopefully it's not all negative stuff, but I can't think of too much positive stuff. But we'll see how it goes. We'll definitely see how it goes. Uh, we'll get some more people on here, man. I I you know what I need to stop looking at how many viewers are on here because it only shows one platform, and when I look at the other platforms, it's like a lot more. So, man, if y'all put more comments in there, it really help out. But Facebook be killing it. Uh, Chris, what's good, man? We chilling, chilling, chilling. Blessings, blessings, blessings. Happy Sunday to you as well and your family. If you have a family with you, but uh security forces, we kind of ended last topic, uh, talked about a bunch of stuff. Uh, the good and bad. We talked about the schedule. Y'all can see the YouTube shorts out there. If y'all didn't see it, it goes kind of over everything, and then uh we kind of talked about Ravens security force or not, uh Ravens canine, Cadum, different shred outs of security force, which is not a negative thing. I think actually, when I really thought about it, it's really a positive thing about security force. You are able to do different things, other career fields like CE, like uh maintenance, like uh, I mean, many other career fields. Uh personnel, this you're stuck basically doing one thing. You can do different things in that job, but you're stuck. Like if you're a 35 crew chief, you're a 35 crew chief, unless you go to 16s or something like that. But uh you're pretty much stuck with security forces. You can move. I mean, there's a plethora, plethora of jobs you could do. It's all kind of tailored around security force, but when people think security force, they just think of gate patrol, and it's that's probably 10 of what security forces really is, which kind of makes us masters and none. What they what's that saying?
SPEAKER_02Drag of all trades, master and none.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's that's kind of how I think of it.
Just Start Creating Content
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I see it differently. I think we're when you use maintenance as an example, like maintenance obviously has more AFSCs, and you might be a C 130 crew chief, but there is a potential you can end up at another base, and you could be on a C5 or something, or just like the folks at DM, they were working on A-10s and they they pushed the A10s to the side, or well, they haven't yet, but the plan was to, and a lot of them got uh pushed over into another airframe. Whereas in security forces, all you got is what security and law enforcement back office. And if you're a raven, which is some of the things we spoke about last week, you're a raven. If you go to a base, ain't no raven missions, what you gonna do? I mean, and then if you're canine, you can only be canine up to master sergeant, and that's it. You don't get to push a dog at chief, a senior, yeah. Like you talk about the CE career field, you can be a fire, you can be a fire dog all the way up to chief. So, why isn't you know, some people make argument why can't I be a canine troop at chief? Well, what's the chance the old man chief is gonna push a dog?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's not likely at all. Not likely at all. Chris says FsF open doors and allow me to go places I never knew I could go with that. The culture, experience, and understanding, the overall mission, let me know the ground level while learning the strategic levels. It's all about what we were willing to learn. Yeah, I give you that. That that's a good thing. This is the one good thing about there's many things. One good, bad thing about security forces, you could go anywhere. That's a good and bad thing. It's a good thing because you can see whatever you want in the world, it's a bad thing because you can end up in some really crappy places, but certain career fields like F-35s, there's only so many bases with F-35s. I think there's only four or fives, so you're stuck at those four or five bases. Uh but with Curry Four, you can go anywhere, anywhere, which is a good and bad thing. It's a good and bad thing. Why is it a bad thing? Because there are some really bad, okay. This is a personal thing for good and bad, it's all personal, it's all relative. But I wouldn't want to go to my knot, I wouldn't want to go to FE Warren, I want to go anywhere cold.
SPEAKER_02Why wouldn't oh, because it's a cold, yeah, environment.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's it. I wouldn't want to go to Alaska.
Teeing Up Security Forces Part Two
SPEAKER_02Would you go to a place like my knot if it was in Florida and work missiles? Or is it just the is it the missile, the duty and the weather, or is it just the weather?
SPEAKER_04So, my my problem is I never worked missiles. I heard about them. I never work nukes, never work missiles.
SPEAKER_02That's right.
SPEAKER_04So I don't know about that side about I just heard about it, but yeah, so I'm gonna throw that question back to you. Would you think more people want to do it if it was in a better location?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, because no, go ahead. I think there's some people that didn't mind it being. I got an old exec who's down there. Well, I mean, it's advantageous to her because she's close to family, but you know, when I was at Montana, yeah, it sucked at first, but it wasn't that bad, it was a good assignment. It was, you know, kind of out in the middle of nowhere, but it was beautiful, you know, for when it wasn't snowing. Yeah, I heard a lot of people like Effie Warren.
SPEAKER_04Heard a lot of people like Effie Warren, but I guess if the if you think that because I heard people love the schedule, love the schedule.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it was it was it has advantages and disadvantages, but it's better than the six and three we would work, you know. I mean, I remember they was like when I was a young airman, I didn't know any better. I was like, I want to work eight-hour shifts, and then we shipped from shift from uh 12-hour shifts, three and three to six and three. I was so happy. But after the first couple of cycles, I was like, Man, this sucks, man. You work six straight days, eight hours, and those three days you don't really get because you got training, training day coming on your training day, yeah.
SPEAKER_04I say that's so so. When I came in, if you remember at Yakota, we were working six and threes, so that's all I knew, and everybody used to. I guess y'all just came out of Panama's, I want to say, or maybe four and fours or something. Uh, so everybody was complaining about six and threes. And at first, I was like, this ain't that bad, but it does suck only get one weekend every was it like six weeks? Because you go you're off Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and then you don't get another weekend for like six weeks. So that does kind of suck, like, and then by that fourth day, you're pretty tapped out. God forbid that you get a uh you have to do a report and stay after work one day, especially on your second or third day. Ooh, we yeah, and then only getting three days off for for most people is really only two days off because that first day you're just trying to recover, and the last day you're getting ready for work again.
What SF Really Does Beyond The Gate
SPEAKER_02That's true. Dell, famous fella won, aka Dell Brown, says, I'm glad the cold 50 came into play because a lot of folks were separating after their first enlistment at those nuke bases because there was no light at the end of the tunnel. That is true. If you get so part of the problem, too, is is you know, security forces, and to some degree it's true, had this idea that if you work nukes, uh you keep need to keep working nukes because you're experienced, you have the identifier, the SEI, special experience identifier that shows that you worked in the nuclear career field in the nuke field. And uh for those who don't know, when you work in that duty for nukes, you need to be able to pass. I don't think it's called PRP anymore, but it's something similar to that. It's very it's a program that PRAP. PRAP, what does PRAP stand for? Don't know. Personal readiness, something something program, yeah, yeah. Anyway, so it's pretty much what's up, bro. Yeah, we're still talking about SF trenches, man. Pretty much it's a program. Think of it as getting a top secret clearance. There's a bunch of things you have to requirements you have to meet to show that you're trustworthy to work around those particular type of weapons, so it's very difficult to get that. The other place is joint base Andrews in order to get a Yankee white clearance to work around Air Force One. So it's is it's difficult. Not everybody can get it. Not only that, the um the job is harsh because uh you're more likely in the missile field. What's up, bro? I did them last night. I did your joints last night, bro. I'm gonna send you the notes after the show. I did them last night. Um, what was that? Oh, yeah. But anyway, so I think for me, um, I think most people, uh I would assume wouldn't like being in the missile field. Because of the job? It's cold, yeah. It's cold, the place you're at, the job, you know, keep me. So some bases, like I'll speak about Montana and Malmstrom, they did have a base security. You had the 341st, I believe, and they were doing like normal law enforcement, but you didn't have that many law enforcement troops, it was mostly nukes. So if you're a law enforcement guy, you didn't want to go to the missile field.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Um, yeah, I I like I was when I was leaving Yakota, I was definitely scared of going to nuke base because that's all anybody was going to. I don't know how I escaped it. I have no idea. Uh baseline at F E used to be rough. Work that dub. What's dub? What's the dub? Missile field was stealing money. Oh, he said it was too easy. And that's what I that's one thing I that's everybody who's only done. So here's the negative part about the code 50. When people got cold 50s and they would want to come to good bases like Luke, Florida, Colorado, those are all law enforcement bases. They want to come there, they don't know anything, and most of them are staffs, senior airmen staff, some even techs, and they have never done law enforcement, and they're so lost with how to work in the gray area, they do not understand when something is written down. That doesn't mean you have to do it like that. There's different ways to do it. There's ways of there's ways to do it that is written down, and there's ways to do it like the right way to do it. Pete really ain't no cop, ain't no cop no more. Ain't no cop no more. But uh, so did you well you went from yeah, you went from security to law enforcement?
SPEAKER_02Not really. I mean, because you look at it when people say today that they're law enforcement, there's no such thing as law enforcement, right? They did away with that after um cobar towers.
SPEAKER_04But you went from nuke base to a non-nuke base.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I went from Maelstrom to Korea and then Korea to Yakota and then Kadena. Those were law enforcement. My first taste of law enforcement, like true law enforcement, was at Yakota.
SPEAKER_04Oh, you're frozen. Oh no, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good, you're good. Uh so yeah. So was that difficult for you?
SPEAKER_02It was a little bit, not because I couldn't think of the gray, it's because of all the concepts. I mean, it was all the forms and procedures, yeah, yeah, yeah. No shout out to she probably listened to shout out to um Texar Malia Bathea. She was the one that got me squared away in law enforcement. She was freaking good, man.
SPEAKER_01What about what about Masson White?
SPEAKER_04What's that? The QC guy, black, big, tall, skinny black dude. What's his name? White. You mean Anderson? No, that's Kill Anderson, not him. The dude after Kill Anderson.
SPEAKER_02I don't know who that dude is.
SPEAKER_04Oh man, big tall. He used to be like, I got a question for you, Troop, and I'm gonna give you three options. What is uh what is a statement for option A, 1364, option B, 1176, option B or option C 1325.
SPEAKER_03He'd be like, What? It's none of them. Good job, Troop. Just wanted to test you.
SPEAKER_02Do they even still talk like that anymore?
SPEAKER_04No, heck no, heck no, you ain't got none of the greats like that no more.
SPEAKER_02Heck no, I'm saying, yeah, I was gonna say, I actually applaud that really. 1168's got these new troops in the training.
SPEAKER_04I'm telling you, I'm telling you.
SPEAKER_02Maybe now, yeah, maybe now because they just I think it depends on a person.
SPEAKER_04Oh, yeah, totally.
Nukes, PRAP, And Tough Assignments
SPEAKER_02I loved it. Once I once I figured out or got the hang of how law enforcement works, the forms I ain't gonna lie, I was a beast, man. When I was, especially when I became a flight chief of Yakota, I was killing it, man. Like, you couldn't tell me. I knew every single form, how it was done, everything. And it was I wouldn't say I still wouldn't say I like law enforcement 100% better. There's some things about security I like. I think most people don't like security because it seems stagnated. You just sit out there waiting for stuff to happen, whereas law enforcement is a little bit more um, it's a lot of things to consider when you're doing law enforcement. Yeah, you know, and security will not put it this way security will not cause you to stay late. Law enforcement will.
SPEAKER_04Yes, well, I don't know about security, but the only thing they say is helping hand, they don't call helping hand anymore.
SPEAKER_02Security incident, my bad.
SPEAKER_04When a when an alarm goes down, that's all a bad thing. That's what I heard.
SPEAKER_02I mean, like in paperwork, like paperwork-wise, if you might have an alarm activation, you gotta do a statement, you can knock that out in a minute, right? Somebody breaks into the restricted area, you do a little quick statement. That's it. But if you get a DUI, an assault, oh bro, you might as well buckle up.
SPEAKER_04It's gonna be a long time. You just you just sparked my curiosity for you. A question for you and everybody in the audience. What do you think about troops falling asleep on post? What do you think about that? What do you think about, especially on the secure on the flight line?
SPEAKER_02In terms of what?
SPEAKER_04What what Is there a harsh punishment? Or is okay? Are you the type to take things into the proper way to do it? Which, as far as like article 15, read them, not article 15, but read them their rights, arrest them, uh, or apprehend them, read them their rights, and then start paperwork like that. Or are you the type that just says we'll just handle this internally? You'll have to walk for the rest of the shift, or you ain't getting no car no more. Which which which side are you on?
SPEAKER_06What are you doing?
SPEAKER_02Said hi. Okay. That's a tough one, man, because I don't believe in going straight from zero to 100 to handle a situation. Everything has certain things to consider, you know. Somebody falls asleep on posts. Um, I've had people sneak up on people, and somebody just, you know, maybe they nodded off for a second and two, and they're like, haha, I got you. And they want to just go through the ringer and talk about all you this. You could have called somebody getting the area, blah blah. Like, come on, bro. I think it depends on the severity of it. And I'm kind of dancing around the answer. I can't I can't pick neither neither one. I think it just depends on the circumstances behind it.
SPEAKER_04So you're okay with both, with either one happening, within the reason.
SPEAKER_02Yes. I don't what I don't agree on is you do it because you're just a you just don't want to hurt somebody. I don't agree with that. I think to me, it's black and white. If you were sick and you told me you were sick and you fell asleep out there, then I'll take that into consideration. If I came out there and you know, I walked up on you and you opened your eyes, that's something to be considered about out there. But if I walk up to your vehicle and I'm shaking the vehicle, I'm banging on the vehicle and you're out cold and you don't have your gear on. Oh, yeah, you're getting a 15. Dell Brown says it's a badge of honor to doze off the time with you in your career and do not get caught.
SPEAKER_04Uh West said, Automatic Article 15. Damn, Anthony Chambers said top three violations in security forces if they were actually sleeping on posts. Automatic Article 15. My whole career. Hmm. So I had a uh Massar, you know him too, but I'll take leave his name out unless you want to know. It don't matter to me. Yeah, I want to know. Matthew Claxton. Oh, I remember, yeah, yeah. Oh K9 true. I knew the staff this yeah, so this dirtbag was a Massar at I want to say Ramstein, I can't remember where, but uh no, is that Yakota? He was a staff sergeant, yeah. He's staff sergeant Yakota. This dude caught somebody, fell asleep. He was security one. If you remember the post, he was in he was the area supervisor for security. He went out to security two. Security two was sleep, security two was individual solo in their car. So he was security one riding around with somebody, right? So this dude, this dude tried to wake him up. I guess he didn't wake up, whatever that means. What however he tried to wake him up, didn't this dude handcuffed him, got him out the car, gave his his alpha this gun, handcuffed him, and told his alpha, stay out here. You got his post now. Walked him into triple nickel and read him his rights. And while he's still extreme, extremely walked him from the flight line all the way to triple nickel.
SPEAKER_02I mean, technically, he's right, but it's too extreme. That's too extreme. That's just like no different than um what's a good example that popped in my head? There are times when somebody commits a crime, like here's some point you have, let's say you have a um, I don't know, because they always teach you you handcuff every suspect and when you put them in the back of the car. But there are some cases where in that case, you definitely need to handcuff a man, like you know, you take him, you take his weapon, that's embarrassing, you know what I'm saying? Like, I don't think so.
SPEAKER_04Demon slayer, uh yeah, there's there's a lot to that. There's there was a lot, but that was what he was known, and then it's like then he had to work the next day. Everybody's looking at this dude, like, yo, don't be posted with him, don't be around this dude. So I think there is a balance, but everybody say automatic article 15. I don't think anything's an automatic article 15.
SPEAKER_02I mean, that on a tier level, I forgot who mentioned it, but on a tier level, yes, that's pretty high up there.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, uh Anthony said top three violations. So if you say top three violations, that's a good question. What are the top three violations for security forces?
SPEAKER_02Uh falling asleep on posts, okay, losing your weapon.
SPEAKER_04Oh, I didn't think about that.
SPEAKER_02DUI. I didn't think about the have you ever had some so what oh dui slash drugs, no dui and dui, and then the other would be drugs.
SPEAKER_04Oh, okay. Yeah, look. Have you ever lost your weapon?
SPEAKER_01Um, I had times where I thought about maybe I lost my weapon.
SPEAKER_02I thought about maybe no, I never I never did that.
SPEAKER_04No, I did, I sure did. I mean, luckily, I'm I figured out before they figured out, but I sure did. Hold on, let me uh put this up higher so everybody can see it. Where the hell is it at? There we go.
SPEAKER_02Corey says falling to sleep, falling and coming to work sleep are two different things. The handcuffing of a cop that fell asleep is the weakest move S of leaders could make. Automatic XYZ is also a weak leadership, my opinion. Hey, great point, great point.
SPEAKER_04I wanted to get into that negligent discharge.
SPEAKER_02Um, yeah, I would throw that up there. I don't know where it would be on the tier list, but it would be up there.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I'd definitely say dui.
SPEAKER_02D ui is definitely up there, dui is almost unforgivable.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. I think you can get away with losing your weapon more than DUI. Yeah, that's that's unforgivable, bro. Especially if you get caught coming on base. DUI. I would even argue if you in the car with somebody and you said that's even worse. The DUI should get footstock a lot more. Losing your weapon. I lost my uh we did an exercise. I lost my I shouldn't say my weapon, I lost my magazine because we had an exercise, we were running around out there, and I lost my magazine. I didn't realize until we returned. Yeah, I didn't say nothing to no way. I just took off, just took off and went to go find it. Oh, he said, uh no, his his MO.
SPEAKER_02That's what he put in his comment. That's a method of operation. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_04You say you want to talk about something.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, we talk about you were talking about negative stuff, and I wouldn't be saying negative stuff. Let's talk about what it is that what can we do to fix it? How do we fix it? That's what I want to talk about. One thing I brought up, I thought about was you mentioned the last show, the recruiting pitch is outdated, very outdated. How do we fix that? Like, what what do you think they could do better with the recruiting pitch?
SPEAKER_04So I don't know how it is now. I I wish there was a recruiter on here could tell me if like how they get people in security forces because now I think there's more avenues where people can know about security forces. There's probably YouTube pages that people just talk about security forces. Uh, so they probably just need to scrap that video all together and just be like, hey, if you want to know about security forces, go online, Google it. I don't know, but uh Google it. But uh, I think just making sure that they understand what security forces is, but it's hard to get people to understand because we go in so many different various directions, and the worst part is the people. You get a supervisor like Claxton who wants to hem everybody up and fall asleep. You get a supervisor like you who will look at the situation in all situations and play them for situations, and you never know who you're gonna meet or who you're gonna talk to. And then you go to your first base, you get somebody like you, who's somebody that thinks outside the box a little bit, and then you go to your next base, you get somebody like Claxton, who's just one way or the highway, and you'd be like, yo, what the hell happened? Like, I just had a supervisor who let me get away with this, so it's very different, very, very different. Whereas like personnel, they just expect for you to come to work on time and do your job, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Make sure you got a good keyboard and sharp pencils and all that stuff, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so it's a it's a lot different. I mean, it's kind of true. Uh, what up, Dooley? You get somebody like Dooley who who only wants to party and chill.
SPEAKER_02Oh no, Thomas White says, as a maintainer, one of my favorite things to do was to jump scare sleeping defenders. Oh, hold on. The fear in their eyes is priceless. We just laugh and keep rolling down the flight line. Hey man, you get a couple shots for that one. Cruz maintainers, but it's true, it's true, yeah, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_04But uh, I I think I I remember one time. Hey, this is no BS. I know people call me out and say that I'm lying. I was really studying on a flight line when you could have your uh CDCs on post, and I was studying my CDCs on the flight line, and my head was down, I was focused in this. Next thing I know, I hear on my window, I said, Oh shit, I look to my right, there's a freaking C5 about 10 feet from my window, and the ground crew guy that was walking the C5, you know, with the little little flat or little thing was like, Yo, move your damn vehicle, bruh. I was so scared to see a C5 that close to you.
SPEAKER_02Hey, I don't know if you even let it get that close to you.
SPEAKER_04I was my head was down. I was looking at look now. You asleep, I was asleep. I promise I was asleep. I put the same thing in church when I was a kid. That's hilarious. Nah, I wasn't asleep. That's funny. Oh, my stuff ain't working.
Falling Asleep On Post And Discipline
SPEAKER_02But to go back to the pitch, I don't know if there's anything they can. I mean, how I hate to use the analogy of you know putting lipstick on a pig, but it's a tough job, man. Like, it's a tough job. Not saying there's another other jobs in the air force, it's not tough, but I would argue next to being a maintainer, it's gotta be one of the tough jobs there out there. And I would say, in my opinion, got the maintainers, if a plane is broke, they could be out there in the middle of the night, exercises there in Kim Gear, fixing jets and moving stuff. Yeah, and then you know, you have somebody lose a wrench and they all get recalled, or if a plane crashes, they all under investigation. That's a lot of stress. But hold on, Anthony Chambers says the mindset and willingness of a new defender to want to learn, coupled with their supervisor's ability to mentor and lead them, is everything. I agree. I'll give you that one. Um, but quickly, I think for cops, man, like we are always under the gun, always like my no respect, disrespect to maintainers, but what career field do you know out there? Even when you're off duty, you can get in trouble because you're a cop. Yep, there was like yo, there was a fight in the dorms. You was yeah, yeah. Oh well, yeah, I was there, but I didn't get in the fight and do anything, but you could have stopped it, yeah. You're a defender, yeah, you're always on duty. Like, they don't say that to a maintainer and be like, Oh, you could have stopped the fight, you know. I mean, come on, man.
SPEAKER_04If my boy spot, I would hit her. If my boy spot, I would hit her right now. But uh, yeah, that's definitely uh, definitely the worst part is you are always it, don't matter what's going on, if something bad happens and you're around, it's like you're automatically at fault too. It's like you did it too. Like you said, if you're in the passenger seat and somebody's drunk driving, it's like you were drunk driving.
SPEAKER_02You know how many times I've heard people, commanders say, and you're a defender, you should know better.
SPEAKER_04I hate that, you know.
SPEAKER_02Like I hate that it's like it's like a civilian police officer, right? If if you go to a store and you steal a pack of gum, bad on you. But if you're a cop and you get caught, even off duty, you do something wrong. Like you're a police officer, you should know better. In the air force, they treat defenders the same way. They was like, yo, you was at the party and you couldn't stop them. I was outside. Well, you should have been around, right?
SPEAKER_01You should have did something, right?
SPEAKER_02You knew what was gonna happen. You come to work late, you're a defender. I expect different. Where was it? Like they expect us to be, they look at us as trying as being. I don't know how it is, but when I first came in, I would say maybe up to after OIF and OEF, defenders were looked at as the job nobody wanted, but it represented the best of the Air Force by how they looked, how they carried, not anymore. But back then it it was. I mean, people would be screaming to take defenders into other squadrons, and they would come to our guard mounts and watch us. It was like we were like the model, but nobody wanted to beat do our job.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, you know what's funny. I tell people about like guard mount, and Dell said guilty by associate GBA. Uh, I told people about, you know, like especially being a shirt and telling people like, oh, how is it like being a cop? That I always tell them, like, it's weird showing up to work an hour early, 30 minutes early, and then getting off 30 minutes late. Like, when y'all start work, it's at eight o'clock. As long as you're here by between seven and eight, you're good. You can show up at 7:59, you can show up at 8 o'clock. You probably show up at 8.01 and you're fine. And then at 4 o'clock, 4:30, you guys are getting ready to go around 3 o'clock, 3:30. Us, we show up. If our start times at 8, we show up at 7, sometimes 7.15, just to arm up and stand around, and then we get off. We're supposed to get off at 2. Oh, we won't get off until 3. And that's if everything goes right. They don't understand the concept of eight hours, it's 10 hours. 10 hours are 12 hours, 12 hours are 14 hours. They don't get that. It doesn't make sense to them. Chaber said I could write a book on this topic out here at Barksdale. Oh man, you have Barksdale. Okay. I don't think most people are sold on the pitch, to be honest. I think a lot of folks think take what they can get. What do you mean by that? Sold by on the pitch. What pitch is that?
SPEAKER_02Um I think we I think my personal take is I think I've always thought for years, the past 10 years, us as a career field have lost our way when it comes to at least in my opinion, how proud it was to be a cop. You know how like it's a job that's tough, it's a job that most people want it, but when you when you do it, there's a sense of pride in it. You know, like look, I know you don't like my job, but you can't do my job because you're not you're not mentally and physically tough to do my job, right? I think those days have gone because I think the majority of people that's in it now, and I'm gonna throw some shade on this, but even the young folks today, they think of it as a joke in most cases. Can you blame them? No, I can't. I I don't I don't necessarily blame them completely, I blame their supervisors too because they don't instill in them the dangers of how they portray the career field field and the how proud that they should be as a defender, and the senior levels they have a high regard for cops, right? Because they know the type of job we do is tough, and they know the majority of people they meet as defenders are professional and they're they're go-getters, and they is they want their own airmen to spire to be like that at the mid-level, it's a mixture at the lower level, and Wes could speak better to this because of what you know the type of job he does over at uh on Lackland. He could speak better, but from my observation, we have gone to the point where we've used society as a reason to accept the way our young people act now. Duda says supervisors can't instill what they don't know. We don't build on our folks like older days. I agree. I agree. Wes, what's up? Pride was lost when the uniforms changed. I think we lost the pride when the SF world was not taken seriously. That's a great joint, Pete. Do you think they should, if not, bring back the BDUs, but institute something that says defenders have to iron their uniforms, bring back black boots when they're in garrison? Would you would you be all for that?
SPEAKER_04I would be all for it if they could get away from the all-leather black boots because those things sucked. Those things sucked. The BMT all leather black boots. You're a score for them. No, no, no. They can have leather on them, but not all leather. Have some, you know, depending on the environment, have some mesh in that thing. Uh, but yeah, I definitely agree. I think all security forces should, especially security forces forces, should have an iron, crisp uniform on, at least at the beginning of shift. At the end of shift, I don't know, but at the beginning of shift, you should come clean, iron, crisp, and sharp. If that means you take it to the cleaner, if that means you do it yourself, however, you do it. That means you should be able to stay flow it, bring the stay flow back, bring the starch back, the heavy starch back, bring all that stuff back. Because I will agree with both of y'all there, you and Wes, that is where we lost our pride. Right when those ACUs came out, and you could do whatever you wanted to do, or abus, I say ACUs, abus, right when those came out, gone. Ooh, Struthers wrote a lot.
SPEAKER_01Oh man, I wish I could blow it up.
SPEAKER_04If you can't if you can survive your first four to six years, oh shoot, a lot of people, right? If you can survive your first four to six years, get experience, spread your wings in other S functions. SF really gets fun and it and explore tips. Yeah, if you are a proud and hardworking cop, or you can work the gate, and I think that's supposed to be wild, with the M E4 mafia who influenced how the career field appears in the court of public opinion. The recruits need to tell that story. I agree with that. West said we used to have stellar standards. Yes, the dress and appearance standards were yes, yes, yes, yes. Charles Davis, what up, big dog? Good morning, fellas. Not SF, but I noticed a change when SF let folks wear the ball cap. What's your opinion?
Top Violations: DUI, Weapons, ND
SPEAKER_02Oh, it was already going down the hill, bro. It was uh why is that any different for any other career for what you mean, and the talk maybe the standards?
SPEAKER_04That's a good question, but make sure we understand it totally. Uh uh Charles Davis. Uh oh, what's your opinion on the ball? I know your opinion on the ball cap, but go ahead.
SPEAKER_02I think we were already going down the wrong end, and we should have I look at security forces as the grunts of the Air Force. I was always taught that. We are like caught between the army and the air force because the way we carry ourselves, and as society started to change and the air force started to change with it and be a little bit more accepting of things for young people to make to entice them to come in. One of them was the ball cap. When I was in the desert as a command chief, I remember John Storm. Shout out to John Storms, a former well, he's a cop, but he's command chief at Northcom, I believe. I believe he is. But anyway, he put I remember reading the reg in absent that did away with ball caps, right? And I was fine with it. But then when they brought it back and they came up with the reasons why, I remember when I was at DM and they had this argument about how hot it was like, why can't you wear the patrol cap? It's like, oh, it's cooler. Who how do we know it's cooler? And then just people was like, Oh, just give them the patrol caps. We need to give back to we don't give two shits about what the society thinks, what the rest of the Air Force think. There's a reason why security forces. Way it is because when everybody's asleep on the base, we still protecting the base. Whenever there's an attack on the base, we're the first one there. When there's a fire, when there's an assault, we're the first ones there. And in order to be able to do that, you have to have people with the right mentality and the right discipline to be able to do that. And we shouldn't we should be proud of that.
SPEAKER_04That let me see. Wes said we allowed the Air Force, we allowed the Air Force's relaxed standards become our norm.
SPEAKER_01That's right.
SPEAKER_04It was already going downhill with the ballcast. People used to believe or still believe our sole forces in customers, focus in customer support. Question.
SPEAKER_02Oh what is the heritage? This is Charles Davis' question. What is the heritage behind the beret? And do you think all SF should know and make it mandatory, or do all already push that? I'll let you answer that first.
SPEAKER_04I don't know. I have no idea. Don't know, don't care. Never did care. Didn't give two craps about that. This is my problem with the whole Air Force as a whole, but mostly security forces. Our heritage is so I don't want to call it fake. It's so phony. It's so you. We are one of the only career fields that talk about heritage. One of the only.
SPEAKER_02There's a lot of things about the career I didn't like. I came an open general. I just was the type of person I like, wanted to do well at my job. I did pretty well, I think, as a defender. However, there is some prestige behind the beret. One, it is something to differentiate us from other Air Force career fields. And if I believe it started back during the strategic air command days in the Cold War, when we were out there security police in Sear. I would I believe, if I'm not mistaken, forgive me, Seer folks, my brothers out there, but I think we came before Seer, if I'm not mistaken. So you had Pararescue Men, you had us, and I would almost say TAC P. We came before TAC B, TAC P. So it is a way to differentiate us from other Air Force career fields. Yes, sack. Thank you, Corey. So there is some heritage behind it, and I think there's a level of pride behind that because in the end, like I said earlier, whenever something happens and they needed somebody to respond, it's almost like the Batman symbol. That's what the beret was. Whenever they see, like for instance, NCOs by regulation can apprehend anybody as an NCO. But if you're at a party and you're surrounded by NCO, somebody getting a fight, and you got a beret on, guess who they're gonna expect to do something? You yeah, because you wear a beret, yeah, right? That's why you wear a beret on and off duty. So when they went to the ball cap, and I get it, for those who are at these hot places like Arizona, Texas, Vegas, if you're on a gate, I'm perfectly fine with them wearing a patrol cap. I think they should nuke all ball caps, just the patrol cap. But hold on, I'm sorry, we got all these comments.
SPEAKER_04Oh, sorry, let me go back to this.
Fixing SF: Recruiting Pitch And Culture
SPEAKER_02West says the heritage started within their 50s with the strategic command. Yep, elite gate guard became a okay. Corey says we have heritage. Fun fact SF has never lost an aircraft on an airbase. Never. I guess, yeah, I can I can I can agree with that one. Yeah, Matt Morris. Oh, here we go. The habitual line stepper. Yeah, got to disagree. It's not lost pride, it's the system. Example the way the career field is the best people are normally taken away from the mass of people, yeah, flight chief, etc. Yeah, it's not a knock on us, it's the way it is. The troops want to be led. If you walk into a squadron right now, where are all the people deemed best or named high speed? Normally pull away from the flight. New the new troops. Uh nah, I'll give you that, but I don't necessarily agree with that either. Not 100%. Charles Davis says, Do you believe knowing the pride, heritage, history of the beret still's a level of discipline? In my opinion, we gloss over the details when we when every detail should matter. Wes says, then why are we still carrying 203? Oh, yo, you get you get served forever. You get two server. Yo, yo, yeah, why are we carrying two? Yo, all right, quick two second bit. If you're overseas, I get the 203. But if you're at Lackland, or if you're at I don't know, Luke, why do you need a 203? Right on the on the on the base, right? You think a mass attack is coming to blow up some airplane? You need a two or three.
SPEAKER_03Why do you need a 249 on the line?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, hey, the 240, the 240 Bravo on Sierra 2 was wild, and then your then your alpha had to carry your extra ammo, which made it work for your alpha too.
SPEAKER_02I hate to find a two on three, man. I especially the trainer, the trader rounds. Oh, the training rounds is hilarious. Oh man, you like do ball to your right, do your right target. Hit again. Corey said that's because your SCL is mismanaging. A weak flight chief in my unit isn't leading anything. Ooh, ooh. Didn't we change the 320? Oh, that's I don't know. Yeah, you would know whether it be the law rocket, the 184, the 203, the 320. We don't need it at a stateside base, bro. What you think? The cartel gonna come in and blow up an aircraft. I don't know. Why do you need it? Hilarious. West says we keep some of our worst off individuals. Uh oh man, yep.
SPEAKER_03Oh man, I hate yeah, I hated posted the 203 DC phased out.
SPEAKER_04I know it got phased out. That's called outdated doctrine. Yeah, outdated doctrine.
SPEAKER_02Corey, Corey, Corey. West Lawrence True, but they oh sorry. West Lawrence True, but they won't be leading. Corey, let me. You are a sensible man, Corey. We had an M60 on the oh M hey, shout out to M60 winners. I don't know what that is.
SPEAKER_04I know what that is.
SPEAKER_02Dead M60 Gunner, do do do do jam, do do jam, jam, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, jam.
SPEAKER_03Sounds like a 240.
SPEAKER_04M60 was bad. It was great, but it was bad. Dooley, we know it's for dead space, but there ain't no damn dead space, man.
SPEAKER_02Yo, yo, doy go hey, doy, go away, bro. Don't even try to dead space, man. Wait, bruh.
SPEAKER_03No, you can pay your duly, but we know it's for dead, right?
SPEAKER_04And joint base andrews. Doyle, where's the where's the dead space?
SPEAKER_02Come on, man.
SPEAKER_04Where's the dead space at Rampstein that you would need a 203 from on the flight line? Oh man, where's the dead space at?
SPEAKER_02You can see everything coming. Next thing you know, you're gonna need next thing you know, you're gonna say you need 67. Dooley, what you're gonna say next? You need a 240 on a base for grazing fire. Come on, man.
SPEAKER_03Come on, man. He building DFPs and stuff. I don't build a DFP in your head, yo.
SPEAKER_04Hey, but I will agree the worst, most of the worst flight chiefs after my first base, because at my first base, besides Marcus Marquez, all the flight chiefs were spot on solid. All of them at the time, at the time, you had black men that was a spot on flight chief, Todd Simmons. You had uh, what's your what's that boy's name? The black dude with the whistle. Hey, everybody take out their whistle. I got mine. Who the hell was that? Uh his first name is Daryl Massart Black Dude, dude, yeah, dude. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They was all short, or maybe I was just a young, dumb airman, just thought they were, but they all knew they shit. Uh we had one staring down, what staring? Standing down, airbase boulevard at Maxwell, fixing the shoot up the whole day off face down. Come on, man. I know what you said in your head. I get it, Dooley. I got it when you said it. What's good, man? Final protection lie. Uh, okay. Ant said the system is broken. Yes. Uh they have made it more difficult to hold these NCOs, C or NCOs accountable.
Pride, Uniform Standards, And The Beret
SPEAKER_02Yes, absolutely. Yo, I want to spend two minutes talking about that. It's more than just security forces, it's the whole Air Force in general. But let's just concentrate security forces to Matt Moore's point, right? It is true. It seems like if you're good on flight, somebody's gonna pull you off in the staff. Oh, yeah, that's true. Oh, that's almost to say, and I'll I'll ask you this and let you answer. Do you think they should never pull off people off flight if they're good?
SPEAKER_04No, you have to be able to do both. Yeah, is that this is where a good superintendent can understand you need good people in both places, you need because you remember back off is just programs and processes, flight is personnel and programs and processes. So, really, you would say your good people need to stay on flight, but there is something about wearing people out, just leaving them on flight all the time. So, a good superintendent or chief, whoever runs that uh part of it, depending on where you're at, would be able to handle both of those. The worst flight chiefs are always looking for their clipboard and dove at a GMC. I don't even know what that is, leisure van. I don't even know what that is. Gmc leisure van, you know, talent manager management is a must. Go ahead, your point.
SPEAKER_02Um, I think I do agree. This gotta be a mixture, but the the the solution is not pulling people off flight, the solution is holding people on a flight who are dead weight accountable, and that goes back to I think Ant's um I think it was Ant's comment about the system is broke NCL's accountability. We we have a tendency to make the good people work harder and then the subperformers continue to disintegrate or descend more into obscurity and as far as their job performance. So it's just easier because we get this perception in security forces, at least in my experience, back office is important. It is because you have processes that support the flight and to support the unit, and those are usually the first programs that your inspector generals look at that you're supposed to hold accountable, so you need good people in back office. But if you're pulling people from flight, you say, Oh, you're taking all our good people, then that's a problem in itself. If you've got one NCO and you can't afford to lose them, then that's a problem, right? You gotta find a way to be more accountable to people, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Corey said, the chief, your whole job basically talent management. Uh Wes said flight is not sustainable schedule for people with families and obligations. The system promotes those back office over flight. That's a good point, too. Amen to that. Wes. If I can give you a a chime, I would. But back office gets more promotion statements, they get more awards. You gotta think when you're competing for back office for uh yearly awards or security forces yearly uh awards, you might be competing against four or five other it's NCOs, especially senior NCOs, maybe four or five. But flight, oh man, you're competing against maybe uh shoot 30 people, a lot, and you just looked at as less. I don't know. Commander of the chief scared to fire a flight chief. Get the fuck out of here. Ah I never been around a chief who was scared to fire a flight chief. I never been a commander who was scared to fire a flight chief.
SPEAKER_02Members see who are getting promoted, and know those on flight are not getting the same shine. So that is true. I know there was one point when I was a defender where I think security forces enterprise was pushing out a narrative that from now on, I remember it was like master sergeants have to be on flight, that you have to have a flight chief EPR. And they were trying to push that. It was more important to be in the operational piece. I think there was the wrong way to look at it. I think ultimately the commander and the chief set the priorities of what's this important. They have to say the most important thing is your core job, and that's being a defender and protecting the base. Then everything else is based on your performance. So just because you are the NCYC of plans and programs doesn't mean you're gonna win automatically an award over a flight chief. Because some people say, Oh, how's the flight chief win? All he does is they they just check badges, whatever. Look at all these programs I did. I was the first in this, the first in this, the first in this. But what is the most important thing for a commander? That goes back, that's related to stratification. You say all you want, you did all these programs and stuff, but what's important to the commander? Correct. If no one gets on the base and everyone's protected, and you captured it right, you should win. Last point, and I'll be quiet. I remember at Luke when I was a group chief, they were doing strats. This is when Ron Thompson was there. Shout out to Ron Thompson, he was command chief there, and we were arguing back and forth, all as group chiefs, about who should be the in the top five master songs. So when we gave him our rankings, when I was at Luke, there was this guy, you remember him, Captain America himself, Dustin or whatever. What's his name?
SPEAKER_01Uh Walker.
SPEAKER_02Walker, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I had Walker six of six, right? At the MSG. So when we did, everybody had Walker, like, didn't even make the cut. And so Ron was like, I don't see Walker in there. We was like, Walker, we was giving up our reasons why, yada yada yada this, yada yada yada. How about a week later when we sat down, went over what the wing commander wanted? General Canterbury, I remember, he had Walker get in there at number 22 of 24, and he bumped two other people that was number number two and three at the MSG. And you know why he said because he remembers him being the flight chief the day they had an active shooter, potential active shooter on Luke.
SPEAKER_04Hey, you what's crazy? He wasn't even the flight chief, he was back office. Oh well, he just put a gun on when he heard the call and ran out there. Yeah, and he'd have been promoted because of it. Yeah, yeah, and he was the mass sergeant out there, the only mass art during day shift that quickly put on put on their gun. I'll tell you, man, that was a bad one. He was not the flight chief during that day.
SPEAKER_02It ran like he did, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_04Of course, of course.
SPEAKER_02If you can't flight chief or have it, oh he put all caps there. If you can't flight chief or have it, you are not getting strata. At least how I rock.
Doctrine Drift: 203s, Flight Line Manning
SPEAKER_04Yo, I think whatchamacallit Gallagher started that BS that only lasted a couple months. Oh, shout out to Donnie Gallagher. Yeah, he started that bullshit that a lot of chiefs try to feed into, but it never that thing never survived first contact, as we say. That thing never survived first contact at all. Uh, I damn near criminalized that back office type. Damn, okay. Uh-oh, she's gonna throw me some. Let me make sure I get this right. You want me to say this on air? That's crazy. That's crazy. Question as a chief, s2 falls under you. How much time do you put into the enlisted EPB versus Vector checking the others in the squadron? Question, would it look would it be looked at favoritism by spending more time on their same thing with QC, same exact thing with QC?
SPEAKER_02Hold on. What do you mean as a chief? You mean as a chief master sergeant, the chief of the unit, or are you saying as a chief of s2?
SPEAKER_04No, I think she's saying chief of the unit because I mean at different bases is different, but okay, I get it because all the chief all in the s two.
SPEAKER_02So I can only speak from my experience. I spent a lot of time on senior NCO EPBs because they're going to the board, and then of course, master sergeants when they started going to a board. I didn't really focus mostly on S2 or QC because they fell underneath me. I just kept them all the same.
SPEAKER_04Uh, so yes, Corey, right? Back office is supposed to support staff. That's not ever that back office is the least supporting the staff, they are the ones that support staff the least. I find a seven-year-old kid at the freaking elementary school that supports flight better than staff does. Staff will support flight Monday through Friday from 8 to 10 and 1 to 3:30. That's it, that is it. And then when active shooters happen, Corey, I agree, but the system outside of the unit does not see the flight chief in the SF is not held to the same esteem in his back office. As a flight chief, your job is to take care of people, they take care of the mission. Your job is to leave. Very true, Walt. Yeah. West said, when I was a young senior NCO, the number one senior NCO spot was NCO of A. Yep. Yeah, operations, and the flight chief wasn't, yep, yeah. Wes is a hundred percent. I think that's still the same thing. I mean, no, but that's that's saying that back office is more important.
SPEAKER_02No, I don't agree with that. My thing is this it goes back to body of work. If as a flight chief, you're working your butt off more than NCYC of ops, then yeah, you should get the nod. Here's but naturally the NCONC of the ops has control or subcontrol of the flight chiefs, so it assume that they are doing they have more scope. Well, that doesn't mean a flight chief can't do more.
SPEAKER_04Can you take that?
SPEAKER_02Corey says, I feel you. I think he's talking to Wes or me, maybe. I could only control my area, though. If we are doing right, the record is balanced with experience. Tony, I'm glad you didn't get fired from DA. I'm glad to hear that. Corey says, like a good staff support CNCO should. And that person has already done that. BS. She said, I did.
SPEAKER_04Oh. No, I ain't.
SPEAKER_02Oh well. Moving on.
SPEAKER_04Oh well is crazy. Oh well is crazy.
SPEAKER_02All right, hopefully that wasn't the case.
SPEAKER_04Uh let me clarify it's support staff, not back office. Oh, okay, we're calling it wrong. Sorry about that. Support staff, they don't support shit.
SPEAKER_02That person you call it back office in circles.
SPEAKER_04Barry, what's good, big dog? What's good with you? I need to call you, matter of fact. Uh Robinson said, I'm not SF, so please break it down. Why do positions hold so much weight? Why isn't performance the number one fact? Robinson, bruh, that is the security as security forces. We don't know that. No, no, I'll tell you, I'll tell you what it is. Well, go ahead. You go first, and I'll tell you the real reason.
SPEAKER_02Tony, I not because of the not because of what I did, I hope. I mean, anyway, we can talk offline. Um, so back to Brace Brace and Robinson's question. First of all, thanks for the question. Not being SF and you being on here, we appreciate it, man. It's good to get your perspective. Um I don't think it's the fact of positions hold more weight. I just think the perception of perception of positions. So everyone knows as a master sergeant and in some circles as a tech sergeant, your entry level is flight chief. You're always gonna be a flight chief, right? That's why what Corey said earlier, you're not getting a strat unless you've been the flight chief. I've had situations that has happened. Um if you you put on your your EPR that you're a flight chief, hey, you've got four other flight chiefs. But if you put on your EPR, you are the NCYC of ops, or the NCYC of police services, or the NCYC of physical security, you have more scope. Plus, in your records, you do have flight chief in there. It is perceived you would have an advantage because this dude, say you are a flight chief, and I'm the NCYC of Plans and Programs, I already been a flight chief. Let's not even let's not even get into how fast that could happen. If I only did six months at flight chief and somebody in and the senior leadership thought I was so great and they needed somebody and they pulled me off flight, I only was a flight chief for six months, but I got the EPR. Whereas you, this is your second EPR as a flight chief. But because even though you're killing it, I'm the NCYC of plans. Plus, they said, Well, he ain't never a flight chief. I was a flight chief for six months. So I think it just depends on performance is the factor, it just depends on the person who is who is making that determination. I think that's what it comes out.
Back Office Vs Flight: Promotions And Strats
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think that's I was just about to say that. Robinson, to your point, from my experience, because I could just speak off my experience, it's different than everybody else's experience, and I can only speak on what I know. When you're back office or support staff, you are in cahoots with the senior, the chief, usually the commander. And if you have a civilian boss, they're usually a prior SF, can write really well, they're in cahoots with the command. So your name is always coming up. Your name is coming up because of a program, because of a position. Like if you're a QC, every staff meeting, they talked about what how many QCs they do, and they know Peterson is the mass art over QC, they'd be like, Oh, it's you. So your name always comes up, so that's why position holds more weight than performance, because performance only gets measured when something happens, and something great. So if we'd be like, Oh, I was on flight and our flight wrote 12 tickets this week, people be like, All right, thanks. Next comment. Whereas back office, they always get their performance highlighted, so that's why the position/slash performance matters, and you're always in cahoots with the senior, the chief, you're just walking around, rubbing elbows, showing up at the same time, going to off-base events, going to sports days and stuff like that, depending on who your chief is. And if you share some common interests with your senior or your chief, man, you're golden, you're golden. Whereas a flight chief, you're more focused on your people, you're not focused on all that other stuff. So the people who you're focused on is not really the ones that are gonna help you get promoted. Like I said, my experience, not the same as everybody else's. Corey said the NCOIC is the is most of the time guaranteed to that position. Graduated. Oh, graduate to that position. They were usually the most squared away flight chiefs. Am I missing something? Are we placing random people in NCOYC of operations? Also, if their EPR is weak as an NCOYC of operations, operations NCYC is actually worse. That's very true. Uh, I won't say their graduated position, it's usually whoever they want to get promoted.
SPEAKER_02I disagree. I I can only speak from my my experience when I was at Kadena. We usually that job is usually hand-picked. You it was like say that's what I'm saying. We were grooming. What I mean by that is you was there's certain levels you have to achieve in order to get that position. So, in other words, it was never a job that you would put in a resume for. Right. It was okay, we look at your records. You was a flight chief, you was a flight chief at this base, this base. You wouldn't be the NCYC of ops at our base until you've done at least flight chief. Once you did flight chief, you do good or whatever. Because if you're NCYC of Ops, you're a second to the senior. You're actually running the flight. It's hard for you to run the flight if you've never ran, if you've ever been a flight chief. I guess maybe that's what you said. My bad.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's hand picked, so it's really whoever they want to put up for senior.
SPEAKER_02Do y'all disagree with that?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I mean, uh, what's the other way of doing it? Resumes and all that stuff, yeah. Yeah, so I'm 50-50 on it. I just think it needs to be an understanding that this is a hand-picked position, and usually they're picking the position not because this guy has graduated, because they want this guy to make senior. That's really what it is.
SPEAKER_02Live it, Wes are gonna never let me let us down. What happened? Look, I'll be look, Wes.
SPEAKER_04Look, DC, your guy uh Andrew wasn't it, but he was your guy.
SPEAKER_02Oh, he wasn't my guy. Let me make sure I make it clear, Wes. This guy that you're referring to was the most senior of all the master sergeants, he's worked flight, he was a former canine handler, he worked flight, he looked the way I look at it is this what was his name? And this is a great topic point. If you have someone in your unit that has had good EPRs, um, good performance, senior in rank, at some point you gotta either I don't want to use that analogy. At some point you gotta be able to determine, yo, who is this person? Example, let's say you have been in 17 years. No, no, let's say you've been in 22 years, right? How are your tenure for masters? What? I forgot 24. 24, right? Let's say you've been in 22 years, you had good EPRs, good performance, but you've been at the same position for two years, whereas there was other people last year that been in position six months a year and they got promoted, and it was six years, six years your your um junior. And it's one thing if you say I'm good where I'm at, but if you come to me, you say, Look, can you look at my records? What am I missing? And I look at it and I determine this is what you're missing. You got all this experience, but you're not in this position. At some point, we gotta be able to what is it take a ish or get off toilet? Same thing for you. So I'm gonna put you in a position. Hey, now it's time to show improve. If you don't show improv, then box check time for you to go away. And so I think that's what he's referring to.
SPEAKER_04So he didn't show improv.
SPEAKER_02He did. I don't think he was in hindsight. I don't think he was. You know how you you you you see something, somebody, and then they make it and they disappoint you when he made senior. I was disappointed. Oh, and he made senior. Yeah, he made senior. Holy and Wes, and let's be honest, Wes, there's some bias in there because you and him almost got in the scuffle.
SPEAKER_04Holy moly, this discipline mindset 24. Thanks for the follow. Thank you.
SPEAKER_02Yes, thank you so much.
SPEAKER_04Appreciate it. Oh, yeah, thank you. Corey said, All of my senior NCO positions were moved per CC and SFM decisions. E6 and below were resume processes, as documented in our human resources OI. It's not that hard to be transparent. Part of the problem is not documenting how these things are executed in the unit. Protect your CC. Great point, great point, Robinson. Thank you for writing up here because I like your comments already. When you have the high viz job and that that spotlight is on you, your wins and losses should speak louder. That job shouldn't come with expectations to stratify. Like Chief said, show your proof. Show your proof, show and prove. Yes, I agree with you on that, but when we realize they were terrible, it's time for someone new. That's true.
SPEAKER_02Wes, I will tell you, I will publicly say I could Gooch says yuck if he wasn't it, huh? You talking about the guy I'm talking about. I will tell you, Wes, I didn't realize that I my error, I didn't realize my error until after he made it.
SPEAKER_04And that's fair. That's fair. Wes, that's Wes, that's fair. That's fair, Wes. He admitted it. That's fair. Sometimes we don't realize it till it's too late. That's fair. It's like, you know what? Like that guy that you let be an officer when he wasn't ready to be an officer. Who I ain't gonna mention no name because he watches the show. They gotta you know, yeah.
SPEAKER_02I said I didn't want him to do it, but if you're talking about the same person, I'm talking, yeah.
SPEAKER_04We're talking about the same person.
SPEAKER_02No, I told him I told I told my boss I didn't want him to, but they didn't that sound like that over two.
SPEAKER_04Over two.
SPEAKER_02No, I said I disagree, man. You hater.
SPEAKER_03Oh, you just said the same thing.
SPEAKER_02I mean, that's you know what? I'll tell you full trans, not full trans, but shameless plug. We were going. I'm going, I plan on doing a show if you agree on that same topic about development and stratification, because uh that's the dangers of it, because there is no blueprint on how to assess talent, there are basic things you look for, and sometimes people don't reveal who they are until it's too late. The next topic should be the officer enlisted pay game. Oh, don't get oh, bruh.
SPEAKER_04We'll take that next topic, we'll do that next week.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we'll go to get back on on track though. Um, we already talked about the pitch, right? I want to talk about quickly smoke and mirrors, yeah. Yeah, why still matter like if the job matters, why people still clown it internally as well as externally, clown cops? Like, I hate the term, I hate the term freaking sec foe. I don't care about that. We gotta oh, okay. Does anybody care besides me that sec faux is embarrassing? I think we do it to ourselves.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I agree.
SPEAKER_04I think we really do it to ourselves, like we are our worst enemies, and then the public just and when I say public, the other airmen feed off of that. Like, yo, I'm getting paid the same amount as you. I get all these days off. I don't ever have to fight for leave, I don't ever have to fight for if I'm sick to show up to work. Most people just don't show up to work, like so. We do it to ourselves, and look at me, I'm sitting here fighting with especially if my flight chief don't like me. Oh my god, I'm done. I'm done. I can't do anything, I gotta fight for anything. Hate it. What's up, Roycer?
SPEAKER_02Hey, what sounds stupid. What are we talking about?
SPEAKER_04I'm not sure, I'm not sure. Uh oh, sex fo, yeah, yeah. I eliminate eliminate sex fo from our language at day from the whole language.
SPEAKER_02I because here's my thing if you know if you're internal to security forces and you come up with the term sex fo, I'm fine with it. Okay, we should not let people outside of our career field give us nicknames and we take it. Newer generation allowed that. Yeah, I agree. I agree. I don't care. I hate it, I hate it as long as you got in the fight a couple of times of that, and I was a command chief of the time, was got in a fight because of it.
SPEAKER_04You know what's funny is that people be like, Oh, you were sexful. Oh, I'm sorry, I shouldn't call you that. I don't care. Hey, as long as my paycheck is in my account on the first and 15th, you call me whatever you want. Second Lord, give me an intervention on this guy.
SPEAKER_02Let me somebody lay hands on this.
SPEAKER_04I don't care, never been a part of my language. I never said it, but I don't care. You call me wherever you want.
SPEAKER_02What about what let's let's let's we talked about this on the show and we had him on the show before? Shout out to the I'm I know I'm a butcher. Who man? Who man? What about the parodies you see of people making fun of security forces the stuff they do without the gear on it? Don't bother you. Nope, not one bit. You know, you don't think it hurts the image and stigma of security forces? Yes, it does. Yes, it does, and it doesn't bother you. What up now the mom?
SPEAKER_04What up, Chief Pete? Thank you. Also, the main hater of the nation, the nation, not the hater of the go back to the comic, go back to the comment. It's not go back, go back real quick. I have accepted it.
SPEAKER_02Go back, go back, Chief Williams. Your people, thank you for watching the show. I did with that saying the only other person to hold this dude accountable because you yo, you deserve it. Because it is not a whole hater and a whole defender nation.
SPEAKER_04That is just because I don't care about sex both. Back to your point about Wu Man, I think it does hurt the image very badly, but in most of it's true. That's what makes it funny.
SPEAKER_02Doesn't this go back to what we were talking about of how to fix it, right?
Leadership Accountability And Talent Management
SPEAKER_04Thank you, Tony. That's exactly what I just said. Doesn't bother because halfway is true. Oh, let me get to uh Dell's point. Oh, did we just cut off? Are you still there? Yeah, I'm still here. Okay, uh Chief Lawrence. I got some solid airmen that just came to my flight out here in Germany recently. Definitely see the pendulum swinging towards hungry airmen. Enjoy the career field. Okay, Wes, get your kudos. Get your kudos. That's funny. We all have people who act like the paint. What? I don't understand it.
SPEAKER_03All right, go ahead.
SPEAKER_02I'm not saying it's not true. I'm just saying, can we all agree? Does it help their reputation or hurt the reputation? It hurts the 3P career field.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it hurts it.
SPEAKER_02So it's not so his skits are funny and they're true. And I guess if you were to look at it from the same angle as Drewski, yeah, they're parodies and they're designed to bring light and comedy to the career field. Corey says, Zero ducks to me. Pull up. We are better than you. We dang Corey. Wait a minute. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Pause for a minute. Pause. Corey, you good, man. You coming hard today. Better than you. We dominated the base, award strats, etc. Pull up, make your old battle space the ish. Jesus. The narrative changes. Nothing is laughing. Nobody's laughing at Indiana football right now.
SPEAKER_04That's what look. Okay, discipline mindset. I agree with the culture change coming out of tech school. Shout out to Wes. Okay, Wes. Yeah, I mean, Wes, look, let's be honest. We need to get Pete hooked on fire. Well, M to you, Wes. Never mind. Hey, kick Wes down. Never mind. Nope. Nope.
SPEAKER_02Shout out to Wes, man. Like this, this is a good example. Like Wes, the way talent Wes is so talented. I mean, he did a bit at the Pentagon. He worked for the Chief Master on the Air Force and all those folks. Even when he's an Andrews, phenomenal speaker, motivator, can get anybody to run through a brick wall. He's an example of would he do well at a regular unit? He would do exceptionally well, but he's right where he needs to be. You need somebody with that energy where he's at. And no offense to other people who've been at that school. I've never in my time since I've been in seen somebody with the type of caliber Wes Lawrence has working at the SF.
SPEAKER_04Very true. Hey, A, if I could hit the button, I would.
SPEAKER_02Perfect, perfect selection. It hurts wide, though, we have things that make us funny. Yeah, I mean, going back to that comment, uh shout out to Wu Man again. I think he's funny, hilarious. It's just it's true, it's it's just like Drewski's skit. Yes, having him come down from the rafters and Christi Laboton's shoes and and talking about he's gonna impregnate everybody with the spirit is funny, but it hurts at the same time because it's true how some of the preachers act, no different than the defenders. Exactly. So I guess the real question, the real question is not so much a question, or the real act is how do we fix it? If we are letting per if we are letting parodies hurt our reputation, we're not doing it right.
SPEAKER_04That's right.
SPEAKER_02Everybody know how we get down. There is good and bad with us. If you can't laugh at yourself when warranted, you lose it. Well, I guess I'm losing. I'm laughing a little bit. This one says says just gotta stop the marriages after graduation.
SPEAKER_04Hey Wes, how you all stopping that? That's a good question, Wes. What do y'all do in the schoolhouse about that? Especially you marrying another cop. Those don't last, those don't last. Nah, shout out to the ones who can make it last. Uh, I appreciate it. We pushing good energy and changing the atmosphere, tough training with care of individuals at the same, huh? Huh.
SPEAKER_01That's how it should be.
SPEAKER_04Hey, Wes, you should get unpopular celebrities come down there and talk to your graduating troops at graduation day. That's what you should be. Oh, yeah, absolutely. That's what you should do.
SPEAKER_02Oh, visit anyway.
SPEAKER_04Definitely, definitely. That's what we should do. You're gonna fly over here to do it. Yeah, I'll fly out there. Yeah, I got some miles I need to use anyway.
SPEAKER_01There you go, Wes.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, Wes. You should get us out there to talk to your graduating troops. Um, so wait, back to your back. I want I want to put a bowl on this woo-man thing. Okay, how do we change it? We change the culture. The culture is so effed up that we be trying to pretend that we are sometimes we think we're army snipers, next we think we're Delta Force, next we think we're janitors, next we think we're the the Air Force grunts, we're all over the place. Like, let's just get a culture, establish it, and own it. I think when I came in, when I came in, we had this culture that y'all instilled on us young people, and that's what it was. What happened was as y'all got phased out, and our new era got phased in, we lost it. I don't know what era we lost it in. Maybe 10 years after 9-11, maybe 15 years after 9-11, we lost it. Totally lost it. Uh, tech school ain't the problem, it's the damn unit. Tony, I agree. I agree. I agree. Man, this is a touchy subject. Too many marriages. Yep. Come down, come on down. Wes, don't BS, don't because if I fly all the way down there and I don't get no day invite, I'm gonna be pissed.
SPEAKER_02I know if I drive all the way down there, Wes.
SPEAKER_04I'm gonna be pissed. I'ma be in a business anyway. So I'ma blow some stuff up. I'll be pissed.
SPEAKER_02I didn't when you say identity crisis and Pete, when you say that, what should we be then?
SPEAKER_04Uh no, those are just the ravens. Bury out their faces on social media like they speak. Hey, yeah, hi Lenay.
SPEAKER_05I think the Ravens are pretty cool. Yeah, yeah. Well, all those game medals, it must be a lead, right?
SPEAKER_04Well, there goes our invite. You talk about Wes's pride and joy, right? Then there's our invite right out the window. Yeah, you just messed that up.
SPEAKER_05Everyone except Wes Warz. He's phenomenal. I'll stand defender and lazy. What's his number? 4A Bravo 393, exclamation part, asterisk, ambersign, I think.
SPEAKER_04I don't care about y'all being pissed. I mean, yeah, scared. Yo, if I come down there, I'll get an invite. You're gonna need that whole text. School, all 12 flights or whatever y'all got now to come down there and help you out because I'm blow some shit up. I'm be pissed, pissed. The Ravens are cool. Hey, well said, yeah.
SPEAKER_02That's what you say, don't it?
SPEAKER_04My baby count. My bank account. Yeah, toss to my bank account. You got a problem. Uh, but back to the point: the identity crisis. So, what do you think we should be? We should be security forces, whatever that somebody should identify what that is and go to that. Because I think there was a part where I came in, we understood what it was, or unless it was very easy to understand. Now we're all over the place. First, first we were base security. Now, then we went to air-based defense, then we went to law enforcement, then we went back to security, then we went to flights the most important thing, then we went to the flight chiefs, the most important thing. Then we're like, No, you gotta own a program. So we're just all over the place. I mean, that's just in my 20 years. We've been all over the place. We don't stay. Go ahead. No, go ahead.
SPEAKER_02I was gonna say, I think my former um boss shout out to Major General John Allen, who listens to the show from time to time. When he was in a seat, and he's an engineer by trade, and I thought the things he was his vision of security forces was great. He said that we need more civilians to take more garrison jobs and be on the gate so defenders can go train 24-7 and be able to go forward and do the job and not worry about the garrison.
SPEAKER_04That's the infantry.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's why I'm I agree with him.
SPEAKER_04I'm fine if that's gonna be our job. I'm fine.
Image, Parodies, And SF Reputation
SPEAKER_02But the problem is that we don't have the personnel to be able to concentrate on that, and the air force is not bought on that. The air force they don't even like defenders. Remember when they were allowing defenders to wear tactical caps at the gate? Yep. Now you're gonna see any defenders, maybe at the hot weather climates, wearing not wearing berets. The air force, even as long as they've been around, does not like having anyone else at the gate than a defender because they like having a defender at the gate because the way they look, right? And what the beret symbolizes when you think of the air force, the other services or the public, when they think of the air force, they think of you know chair force, you know, blah blah blah. But it's almost like I feel like the Air Force sees defenders as the poster child, and there's nothing against other career fields, but when you see sharp defender, exclamation, you know, asterisk, sharp defender, tactical gear, weapon, beret, fit, that's the image the Air Force want to see. You don't rarely do you see these these um you see these think about it when you see these promotional videos of the Air Force, right? Which one stands out the most? Usually a defender with a beret, extra points if they're having a canine dog. It's always like that. It's always like that. I don't agree with it, you know, because it you know, canine. First of all, their uniforms are always trash, but you know, we can go on to that. Wes Lawrence says just do open base, bring back 2220s. Ooh, I don't even know what 2220s are.
SPEAKER_04You got me. Oh, those are those base decals on your car.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, good, good catch, good catch. Anyway, that's why I think we need it.
SPEAKER_04Um, so that's where I say that's where we say identity crisis is I'm fine with whatever we want to do, and back to discipline mindset. We're like every two years, depending on who the top cow, I mean, Gallagher's been in there for goddamn 20 years. I don't know how long he's been in there for, but every two years we change. We can't stay every other career field for the most part. Man, what what structures did back in 1974? Structures does in 2026. We are, if we are just going to be now, what hurts us is we try to spread too thin. We realize we spread too thin, then we're like, oh, we can't do that anymore. We need to focus on this, we can't do that anymore, we need to focus on this. I get it. Base to base, your mission is gonna change, and we are one of the few career fields that base to base your mission change. I'm sure it's like that for HVAC. HVAC is different at FB Warren than it is at Luke, right? We don't need heat, we need AC, right? Different. I get that, I get that, but we can't even figure out base to base if you're gonna do this at this base, you're gonna do something totally different at this base, and you're gonna act totally. That's where it really jacks up, is we act totally different. Same job, same people, but for how they act at Effie Warren is different than how they act at Yakota, different than how they act at Korea, is different than how they act at Tyndall.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I would agree, especially when it comes to procedures, right? We never can get our ish together, man.
SPEAKER_04And that's where we look at the city.
SPEAKER_02Allows people entry on personal recognition when they forget an ID car in the other place. You gotta call somebody from inside to come get you.
SPEAKER_04There you go.
SPEAKER_02That work ever worked at Andrew's West.
SPEAKER_04That worked. Uh oh, talking about the uh the base decals. The base decals. Uh can you hear me?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, in Korea, half my tour. Dell, in Korea, half my tour, we were directed to keep our focus on processes in LE. Next commander's direction felt like we stood up a base to base defense group in PACAF and was the wild wild west. Yep, leadership vision matters. It does, and I don't see anything wrong with it. I just think, yeah, jack of all trades, master of none. That's what we said at the beginning. But at the same time, I mean, to Dell's point, commander's vision matters. More importantly, the wing commander's vision. If he wants you, if one commander comes in and all he cares mostly about is traffic tickets, guess what? You writing traffic tickets, but then the next commander comes in and says, All I care about is the flight line. You're building DFPs on the flight line, you know. I mean, it changes. You ultimately work for the wing commander. I'm fine. Command the commander at the SF Squadron's Defense Force Commander.
SPEAKER_04I'm fine with that. I'm fine with that, but somebody, and this is the problem that we didn't talk about. Somebody needs to be able to articulate that. Hey guys, I know last week we focused on traffic tickets. We got a new commander in the seat. His focus is on the flight line, so we're gonna focus on the flight line. So things are gonna change. But what happens is, and you've been in squadrons, I've been in squadron, everybody on this podcast has been in squadrons where things change, you'll be like, Why the hell are we doing that for? What the heck we doing this for? And nobody explains it. And most of the time, airmen to our this is another detriment of our career field, won't ask the dumb question, or if they do, they ask it to the dumb person, like they ask the squadron commander, and they'd be like, I don't know. What is it? Are y'all doing that? Why are y'all doing that? And then people be like, Don't ask the commander no more questions. So it's a lot, it's a lot of that all encompassed. Can you take this question?
SPEAKER_02Gore says the defense force commander should report to someone not on the installation for customer service functions. Oh, those political gymnastics take up 90% of the triads time, thus, taking away from fixing the issue we have been discussing. I don't know if I totally agree with that one. Yeah, because in the end, may I mean I see what you're saying? It should not, but who should they report to? Because you think about it. If I see his point, there are times we got bottled up and stuff the wing commander heard from the public they didn't like. Maybe we didn't put off enough speed cards, or they wanted more patrols doing this, and we had to like kind of answer to it. But I mean, that's our job, right? I look at the the wing commander is being the mayor. If you're in the police force, who do you answer to? You answer to the mayor, the chief police answers to the mayor. Discipline mindset 24 says it's no different than what we deal with on a higher level. Administration should agree. What hey, agree. I agree a hundred percent. And so, to your point, I don't think people don't ask the questions. I think the question they should ask, or really not a question, what they should assess is is like, I got like, hey, look, they say, Okay, the wing commander, the previous wing commander was more concerned about security. Yes, the new wing commander is mostly concerned about law enforcement. Yes, well, we need it, sir or ma'am. You want us to focus on law enforcement. We only have two law enforcement vehicles, yes. We don't have we've only got out of the 400 defenders we have, only 10 are certified in law enforcement. It's gonna take time, and here are the resources we need. That's what should be sent done, and they could be doing that in the wing command, like you ain't getting it figured out, maybe true, but for the young troops, I think, and maybe to your point, I think for them to say pick one thing or two things we're good at, that will never happen. No, I think it's almost unrealistic, in my opinion.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, what says uh we have to show different SF capabilities at almost every installation. I tell the schoolhouse we are multi-face facet and have to be trained and ready to be ready to train. We have to be flexible. I know flexibility is the key to air power, and I think security forces shows that off more than anybody else. It's just hard to do that when every day something changes. And when I say every day, it's a little that's a little dramatic. Not every day, but stuff changes all the time. It's like God dog, we just got we really just got a hold of this. And to your point, I hope commanders are in there. And the installation commander says, the flight is the the flight is the number one thing, or the flight line is the number one thing, our number one asset is what's on the flight line. I want that thing buttoned down, knuckled down, tightened down. Nobody can step for I want to change restricted area badges, I want to change gate codes, I want new fencing put up, blah blah blah, security forces. I need you to have more people out there. Roger that, sir. We're gonna need more people, we're gonna need to hire more civilians, we're gonna need whatever, whatever that takes. Change the schedule up, and you know that's what we're gonna have to do. I hope they're not just in there being like, yes, sir, got it. Some right, but that's the that's part of the issue right there, yeah. And like, like, like you said, at one base, trusted travelers 100. At the next base, no trusted traveler. Now, that's an installation security thing, AT thing. I get that, but that's not projected. And the funny thing is, when you go to when I'm a young airman, I'm bit at Luke Air Force Base, and then I go to my or Beale Air Force Base, and something changed like we didn't do this at Luke, like shit. We look the same, we're both wearing berets, we're both carrying the same guns, we both got the same carrier plates, we basically the same mission, same climate. Why aren't we doing the same thing? It's never portrayed as gonna be different to Wes's point. Great point, you have to be multifaceted, it's hard to explain it, it's easier once you see it, and you just hope your words resonate once the situation comes up. But that's gonna be on person to person, yeah.
Identity Crisis And Standards Across Bases
SPEAKER_02Um, before we run out of time, there's two things I want to make sure we cover. And after all the stuff we did the last show and this show, we're kind of talking about things we can fix. What I would like to offer is we highlight maybe three to five things. Maybe that doesn't irritate you, but you can tell like that's a part of our career that people do that that you find funny. Like we were talking the other day about people who go out and they buy their own handcuffs, their own handcuffs or whatever, right? GI Joe. We give our I don't know, three to five takes on. If you were the top cop of the day and you had infinite resources unrealistic, but just give your three to five things you would do or you would offer that would help change the career field for the better.
SPEAKER_04Okay, can we go back and forth?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we can.
SPEAKER_04All right, one thing I really you said can't stand or pet peeve about the career field.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, just things you noticed that were pet peeves that you thought were hilarious, that were funny, yeah, you know, about cops, you know, like I guess, like I said, somebody buying their own handcuffs.
SPEAKER_04I was about to say people that buy their own gear, I think it's buy their own web belts, buy their own freaking handcuff. Uh, handcuff keys I'm good with because that little one that one's tough. The longer one is a lot better. So if you don't get that, get the longer handcuff key. Uh get the the little thing, the little lanyard for your restricted area badge. That was cool. That was cool. The little uh 550 chord lanyard, that was cool. But getting a flashlight on your M4 and getting a dang taser pouch and getting a dang M9 carrier holster, and and then the the the other thing that goes along with this is the name tags that they put on the front of their plate carrier that they have O positive on there, bro. We ain't this ain't Vietnam, ain't nobody taking your blood and giving it to somebody else. Like, come on, big dog. Like, ain't nobody care what your blood type is.
SPEAKER_01I did it too.
SPEAKER_04I know you did, I know you did.
SPEAKER_03Oh negative, man. Ain't nobody give a duck.
SPEAKER_01I'm guilty.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, anyway, those are one thing. Go ahead.
SPEAKER_02You took all the good ones. Um, I used to I used to love or thought was funny when people would get the little SF badge and they would put it on their their belt in civilian clothes.
SPEAKER_04Oh, I've never seen that.
SPEAKER_02They were wear well, you know, mostly your investigators will wear it, you know, because oh, yeah, that way regular defenders wear it, and I've had young defenders tell me when they got pulled over, they showed the the police officer that he's like, I'm a mil, I'm a police officer too. We had one defender told me was like the police officer said, What's that? He said, I'm a cop too. He's like, cop of what? I'm a security forces member. What's that? That's what the defender told me. You'd have getting a ticket anyway.
SPEAKER_04Real shit. We had a dude that uh did that at a bar. Basically, people were getting into it. This guy and this girl were getting into it. We went over there, showed his SF badge, said he was a cop. He actually got arrested for that for uh impersonating a uh officer or whatever the hell it was. Training would be hard. He said he's a federal impersonating federal law enforcement. That's what it was. Training would be harder. Get rid of L and make it all on the locals' authority to handle, focus on money and oh that's that that's if he was yes.
SPEAKER_02I think your law enforcement folks would like that one.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I'd be pissed.
SPEAKER_02Uh, you probably need more people.
SPEAKER_04The other thing, the other thing to go along with the other thing to go along with the gear is the people that buy the things that uh that go in your radio, the earpieces, and yeah, cracks me up one person on flight, and you never you never find out until actually happen.
SPEAKER_02You'll be riding around somebody, delta three, delta three security, and you're about to pick it up. They'll be like, Go ahead. You'll be like, Yeah, what the hell? You'll be like, Oh, I got this earpiece, blah blah blah. You got the little thing right here, you know, it's whisper, you know, it's mic here. You said well, how oh, it's 350, but I didn't care, you know, blah blah blah blah. And they're wearing it at garb out.
SPEAKER_04Oh, yeah, those are ones that do the least amount of work. Those are I can always find the ones that do the least amount of work with the most gear. Always find the ones. Uh, another pet peeve of mine, this is I have so many. Uh, another pet peeve of mine is posting. I think posting is the craziest thing. We put we say the most the the the highest value posts are always the worst ones. The worst posts are always the ones that need to be posted first. Security always has to be posted first. The what the and then law enforcement is way down there at the bottom, but that's the ones everybody wants to be on.
SPEAKER_02Well, I mean, that's I think priority. It makes sense, it makes sense. West says the power went out, and I heard a lieutenant say, I am security forces, I'm a security forces officer. Please stay calm. People yelled out. Oh, Curtis Cockrail. What's up? Cockrill, what's going on, man? Raw gums, all that crappy on weapon cops thinking they don't need a weapons class. Get the range and can't shoot then. Unqua all that and fail M9.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, those be the ones got their own holsters, they push button holsters and all. I think just gear overall is my pet peeve. Gear overall.
SPEAKER_02But to the posting piece, what do you think? In your opinion, I know you know. Oh, I hope you know this. What is the most vulnerable put post on the base?
SPEAKER_04Uh, the fly, uh, the the gate.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. Yeah, why do we put A1C on the gate?
SPEAKER_04That's it. Yeah, yeah. Don't forget about the developmental podcast you brought up. That would be fine. Developmental development podcast?
SPEAKER_02Hey, do me a discipline mindset 24. Do me a favor when you get a chance, send us some notes on what you would like to see. And and quick plug, these two podcasts were sponsored by um Sarah Rodolfo. She's a former defender, now admin troop at IMSC. Love to hear from listeners when they have ideas for shows. So, this is from her. So, discipline, send me some notes on what you would like for us to talk about. It sounds familiar. I just want to make sure I hit everything. Secure for security forces is still one of the only AFSCs that attach rank to medal. Oh, a tech sergeant and mass art could do the same thing, but that tech is definitely not getting the MSM. Oh, that's another story, another show. You earn man imper PPC. Yep, great point, Corey. That's a cheap talking right there. Dell says I'd push the mandate, augmented duty for a year to make a more lethal wing. Actually, that's what we're supposed to be going to because of the deployed combat wing. Yeah, everyone is supposed to be doing it, but yeah, another thing, and I forgot who mentioned it. There was something that said somebody said something that's similar to what I'm about to say. The problem is the Air Force perception, they want cops, but they don't want to do what the cops do. When they went to force protection and they start talking about, oh, everybody should have force protector, everyone's a censor. You try to get somebody on the gate. Oh, I I got more, I got more stuff I gotta do in retirements and processing. Oh, I can't go out there. Who's gonna feed people with defect? I gotta pack parachutes. No, I don't want to go out. Deployed combat wing is now there. That's a that's that's unfortunate. I didn't know that. I didn't know that either. That's unfortunate.
SPEAKER_04That thing didn't survive on the comments.
SPEAKER_02You know what the sad thing is? This concept of deployed combat wing, and what you said is or what his comments said about augmentees and Curtis Cock was saying ready augmentees. This was supposed to be done decades ago. Because when you have a base in a high threat area in a war, you know, cops, we don't have enough cops to defend the base. So everybody is part of base defense. But the air force in general, not everybody, but the majority of the people in the air force still do not get this concept. They're like, we can't do it. You know how many? This is a rant. You know how many exercises I've seen at Diem and at IMSC where they say, oh, they have a they have a um a hot wash. They say, Oh, well, you had an attack at 12 30 a.m.
SPEAKER_06What happened?
SPEAKER_02Oh, well, the base was overrun in 30 minutes. Why? Well, because we lost 30 people on the live, blah blah blah. What about the other people? Well, we retrogated back. Did they have weapons? Right. Why didn't they stand a fight? We didn't have enough defenders. You couldn't go out there and help.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think that's my other my other pet peeves exercises, whether flight level, base level, tabletops, only people talking is the flight chief and the fire chief. Everybody else is just there, and they might have something to throw in. Medical might be like, Oh, yeah, we're here. We got bandages. Personnel's be like, Yeah, we're here, we're taking dim count. Like, yeah, everybody else like security force, what would you be doing? Man, we'd be doing this, we'd be controlling this, we'd be setting the ECP up here, we'd be doing this, blah blah blah. We're all over the place. Everybody's like, Yeah, but you d like to your point. I remember back in the day, you remember this too. When something were to happen, there was they always said, take anybody active duty ID card and tell them to stand right here. Don't let nobody come in here. You remember that? If there was like a major vehicle accident or something, they had to do traffic duty. Hey, stand right here and make sure all traffic flow that way. That's all. You had to say that's all you had. Or remember that alarm activation when people would come out the building? What would we do? We take their ID card and make them stand right there. Not no more. They go to their car, they go out to lunch. Early lunch. Hey, early lunch. Go home early.
SPEAKER_02Not too much of my medics. They fight for their life. Oh man, yeah. Shout out to the medics, man. DHA. I'm trying for the medics, bro. Um, the other pet peeve I was gonna bring up is I love how they want so much from Pete. Never forget crazy, crazy fire. Really? They always want so much from defenders, right? But somebody put in there and Wes said he Corey mentioned about post-priority chart best based, you get manning based on assets. That is true, but the problem is they always want us to do more, but we don't get enough. Remember the year of the defender?
Exercises, Augmentees, And Base Defense
SPEAKER_04Oh, that was that lasted a day.
SPEAKER_02That was the day of the defender. I've heard right. What did we get? What did we get? I think we got one patrol.
SPEAKER_04Who was in charge during that time? Was it Sherman? Or was this before?
SPEAKER_02No, I wasn't Sherman. No, I wasn't sure. General Sherman. I want to say it was um what was the black guy's name? I can't remember. Oh I think Steven White. Shout out to Stephen White, he was the the enlisted cop top cop. I can't remember Collins.
SPEAKER_04Was it Collins?
SPEAKER_02Might have been.
SPEAKER_04He said K right. Oh, it's during K right's stint.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but that was cheap ass heartfight. What are you talking about? Top cop. Top cop, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Maybe it was Collins.
SPEAKER_02But that was a right. That was to me. You know what it was? That was that was terrible. All this stuff that you're a defender. That's what makes us look bad.
SPEAKER_04That's what made that's what makes things so funny. Like we do it to ourselves. No, do you never heard of the year of the personnelist? You never heard the year of the the the the uh the freaking main maintainer. I don't think I have one patrol car for every six bases. Yep. Oh, Jim Jameson. Thanks, Lampkin.
SPEAKER_02Okay, Jim Jameson. Thank you.
SPEAKER_04Thank you.
SPEAKER_02Tulos is okay. Uh don't own her and her hurtlister chief. Freaking what was her name? Uh heart. Heart. Oh no, what's that?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that'd be like oh Tulos Jameson, Tulos.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. Yo, terror. Yo, I remember that time when I was at Cathedral. She was, I was like, yo, you know, I would like to see, you know, I was like two years in. I was like, I would like to go work at the group. Well, you know, we need you there, Chief. We need a good chief of continue doing good things. Then all of a sudden, next email I got, you know, we can use a good chief in Korea. I wanted to say, just told me you needed me to stay here, but you want me to Korea? Yeah, then the next year I was like, Yeah, you know, this is my third year. She's like, No, we need you there. Next, you know, we need a good sharp chief. It might not. You just told me to stay there.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I know I I usually don't talk about people, but heart. The first time I met that girl, I was over the phone, and I said, Hey, how you doing, ma'am? Oh my god, I got 10 minutes air chewing about how she's a chief, not a ma'am. I like, man, this wasn't even the purpose of my phone call. We were talking about day. Uh, what was that? Police week. I was like, man, what the hell? I just want to see if you're gonna show up to this event for police week. At the end of the day, the money has to come for those items. Yep, good point, Corey. All right, uh, if I was Chief Master, or if I was uh top cop, right? That was your other question.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, if you if you had the if you were top cop, what are like three or five things you would recommend? Well, let's go back and forth so you don't take all of them. What is one thing you would recommend, starting with one you would recommend to help the career field?
SPEAKER_04Standardize what we're going to focus on.
SPEAKER_02Okay, what would be your what would be your answer to that?
SPEAKER_04What do you think? I'm different from everybody else. I like focusing on law enforcement, gate, and security. I say, here's what I say, and people ain't gonna like this. Get away from so much training, get away from so much useless training. I'll say that. Useless training. Yeah, same as what's AC for me too. Uh I for I don't know what AC is. Uh Devender optimization. Yep, that bullshit. Go ahead, go ahead. What's one thing?
SPEAKER_02Um, I would I'm still Wes Lawrence said, I would find a way, and this is not gonna be popular, go back to the uniforms where you make a requirement. Yes, your uniform is iron pressed shiny boots in garrison, not in garrison, not in a deployed area. When you're in a deployed area, yeah, you throw on your OCPs, we want you to be, you know, blah blah blah. But when you're in garrison, you will wear a pressed uniform, priestess, and some people would say and to the people who will say, How does that make a good defender? It's not about making a good defender, you're right, it's about discipline. If you even the worst defenders, if you can do your uniform, that's a start. Corey says, rewrite 52-10. It's 2000. Damn, Corey, you remember the red? Anyway, that would be one of mine. Over to you.
SPEAKER_04Other thing is, uh, if we're going to use technology, I think we need to use it. If we want, if we're not, then don't. A key thing is the gate operations. If we want to just do gate operations, ID cards, only one defender in the gate shack, and they scan an ID card kind of like at a I don't know, at a at a uh parking lot, at a you know, hotel parking lot. I'm good with that, but let's do it, let's not just talk about we have these things, let's actually do it. And I know everybody's gonna say money, money, money. I get it, I get it, but that that would be me. Uh, y'all in here getting y'all ish off. Is that what we got to look forward to retire? Yeah, pretty much, pretty much. Uh, it makes a massive difference. Uh, Royster says, I impressed BDUs was different maker in attitude. Yep, we just talked about that.
SPEAKER_02I love your comment too. Um, because you're right again. Shout out to Major General John Allen. Wrong one. Anyway, shout out to General John uh General Major General John Allen because he he pressed and pressed the Security Forces Center to come up with a plan to implement what Scott Air Force Base was doing with base entry. They had technology where vehicles would go through like the army, and it would it would alter it would scan your face. Oh wow, and it would go through, right? They had a defender at the gate, but they didn't have that many because they had technology, and John Allen was like, yo, why can't we do that at every base? Right, and yes, there is some money involved, but a lot of times, which goes to my second point, which ties into yours, the old school mentality, we need to remove the old school mentality and use new technology to operate security forces. Let's again, why do we need a 203? Why do we need a 302 502? Why do we need that to protect the flight line? Why do we need so much forces on the flight line? It's a dang stateside base. Put automated technology, make it a pro, make it a make it um a priority to get technology on the gate, to put more defenders on the road, and also I'll need a third one for the next one because I'm getting ahead of myself. But anyway, yes, I agree with you. We need to we need we need to get rid of old school mentality. This old idea of integrated defense, and is we need to get rid of that. There's no need for, and it's been a while, there's no need for us to have an art and a Sart and an area supervisor for a base, right? You know, I mean, shout out to Tara Opelowski was my old commander. She was like, Yo, why do we need all these patrols on the flight line, Kadena? We need just one person on the flight line, because you know what they'll say, they'll say, We need two-man troll patrol. Why? So that way they can keep the other one awake. Yep. Or they get a plane from from Korea, right? And these protection levels, oh, it's protection level two. We need an EC, we need an intern art, we need a SART. And we're like, yo, we ain't got enough people. Well, we need to drop a patrol unit for that, drop a law enforcement unit. We need we need better school of thinking. Anyway, go ahead.
SPEAKER_04Uh, discipline mindset said the problem is with that, is you have old people at the top that can't get out of their own way and let new things in. Yep. Yep. The face scan tech is dope. My company uh has it now, it's getting used at AETC. Well, ATC based because ain't that loot. Damn sure ain't that loot, it damn sure ain't that lackling.
SPEAKER_02And are y'all partnering with IMSC with that? Because I didn't know about that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, Corey over here dropping.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, Rodney Woods. Hey, Rodney Woods, we listen, hit him up. Uh okay, over to you.
SPEAKER_04Uh, I don't know. Uh, I think if we could just stick to one thing for the next 10 years, I would be happy. Just stick to one thing, or or two or three things, but we try to focus on all types of different things, and we just need to focus on one thing. Like, like we used to say, get good at the basics. I think we actually did that, that would mean a lot to me. Get good at the basics, uh, stop trying to do all this other crazy crap, and um, yeah, I I think that'd be my number one thing is let's just stick to two or three things and focus on that for 10 years. And if the war changes, then F it, the war changes, the war changes, it's okay. If we go to war with Russia, it's okay, we'll go fight in Russia. We don't need to think about oh, this is how they fight. Now we need to do set up another uh what are those things called where we go pre-deployment training and all this man? Let's just go, let's just go. Or if you're gonna do pre-deployment training, make pre-deployment training good. But that goes back to useless training again. 31, 1-1 and 52-10 is the Achilles heel standing for 12 hours is crazy at this point. Yep, yep, definitely crazy. Not SF though, logistics. Oh, oh, okay, it makes a massive difference. Uh supplying building gates right now. Okay, okay. Why do you think what do you think about the 820th then? I I F with the 820s because they are focused on what they are doing. I like it. Focus on that, do that. Don't have 20 different things. We're focused on this, we're doing this, focus on this, doing this. Like it's all over the place. Redeployment is needed, Pete. I see it in four years at bliss. You're talking about re redeployment training? Are you still there? Yeah, I'm sorry. Oh, okay. I'm sorry, you got quiet. All right, go ahead. That's my last thing. I think if that makes sense.
Pet Peeves: Gear Culture And Posting
SPEAKER_02No, I agree with Curtis. I I like the A202. The only thing redeployments need a peak, trust me. I've seen the folks that came down at Bliss for four years. Good point. Um, I would we should have done this a long time ago. Now we, the Air Force, a long time ago, stop bullishing and make it mandatory doctrine that all Air Force personnel must perform force protection duties and be trained for at the drop of a dime. Don't make it this this just in time crap, this yeah, ready augmented stuff. Some base A got it, but not base B. Base C got it, but not base D. And then making it optional. Stop with this bullish. Like, is force protection so important? Put your money where your mouth is and make it mandatory. So when they talk about us going to these up these obscure sites where we have to perform our own base security, and you've got only 20 defenders, that's not the time to train people. You shouldn't worry about training people for base security only when a war or fight is coming. It should be constant, it should be regular year training, which goes back quickly to Curtis when he was here. When he was just on here, you ever notice how the defenders are always training base pop, yeah, just on firing weapons, on tactics, yeah, even pre-deployment training. So it should be normal. Dell says now we're involved in drones, which is an A3 priority, which I actually enjoy getting to know about. Ground attacks are a thing, bar threat will become. I agree. But here's the thing, Adele. Here's a scenario for you. If you've been watching some of the video of the Ukraine war, seeing how these troops react to drones is scary fish. Yeah, can you imagine having bass pop out there and they see a drone and they're like yelling? They'll be like, yo, be quiet, bro. Like, you know, whatever, and don't know what to do. All people I'll put like this if defenders are if you go from one to five, three being average, five being you know, um, well disciplined and well trained, all people in the air force should be trained to be at least level four, right? And they say defenders are the experts, base defense or whatever, blah blah blah. Everybody should be trained to level four, at least at the minimum, at the least minimum three and a half. Oh, I'm contracting, I'll never have to do that, or I'm finance. I'm no bull-ish. If you in a military uniform, you should be able to employ a weapon and you should be able to defend somebody or a base. Dante says, just like the army sent out, not just career force, exactly. Yep, exactly, exactly. It should be, and it's like I told General Allen all the time. Every just like the army says, every soldier is a right, every marine is a rifleman. It should be the same for the air force. Every airman is a defender. Yeah, that's what the new that hey, I'm gonna coin it myself. Every airman should be a defender, everyone, it just depends on the level.
SPEAKER_04Yep, and uh it's just like the navy, like everybody's a fireman. Same thing, yeah. Anyway, all right, put a bow on this two-hour long podcast, long one this time. Yeah, yeah, we have fun for this one. Uh, we're done with the series. Uh, we'll work on the next one. Uh, should be next Sunday about uh pay gap, enlisted officer pay gap. So look for that coming out. That would be fun. Uh, the real issue Air Force personnel do not have a core skill. Yep. Uh, all cops need to go through ECAC. Yeah, oh, remember ECAC. ECAC was fun boy, and seeing and see uh, I'll get off this rant because if I do, I'll get it, I'll be on for a while. Seeing other career fields go through ECAC at the same time. My god, my god. I got stories for days about these freaking uh legal personnel going through ECAC. My god. He said I was on a plane. Well, you should have shared with the plane, share with the plane, tell everybody go to Unpopular Celebrity, it's been a good plane ride. Y'all should have all talked about anyway. No, I appreciate you. Appreciate y'all, y'all for tuning in. See y'all next Sunday. I ain't gonna leave you without your last words. Go, bird. Is that it?
SPEAKER_02Oh, thank you for listening. Like, share, subscribe. Catch us on YouTube. If you got any ideas for shows, please let us know. You know, you know, all seriousness, man. We think we thank y'all for listening, man. We really do. We try to do that all the time. But I recognize when you give us ideas and stuff you want to hear about, and so you know, it'd be great to give you that. So if you've got ideas for the show, please hit us up either personally or on our unpopular celebrities, send us a DM and then talk to you.
