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Ivan G Thompson
a book bubble about
The Air Force's Black Pilot Training Experience
History
Author Insight
Is Air Force Pilot Diversity a "Crisis"?
I saw a Military.com article dated 10/20/20 that the Air Force is considering retraining Weapons Systems Officers (WSOs) to be B-21 pilots. I have always wondered if all the people who washed out of USAF pilot training were just not "cut out" for flying, irredeemable. I have wondered if there were people who weren’t deemed “unsafe” but who maybe needed more time to grasp what was flowing out of the firehose than their classmates. I have always wondered why the Air Force didn’t look back into this group of people that it already had made a significant investment in. I see this as an amazing opportunity for diversity. Am I wrong? If we are just opening up the gates to fill future B-21 Bomber slots, why not open it up to those who passed significant portions of pilot training that still desire to be pilots? Why not identify some minority pilots that were on the fence that might deserve a relook? Every effort should be taken to carefully transition the WSOs into careers in which they can still be successful/get promoted. But at the same time, the Air Force is already predicting a future shortage that they could be targeting for greater diversity? Which is the greater crisis? Pilot diversity or retraining displaced WSOs?
Book Excerpt
The Air Force's Black Pilot Training Experience
This is an excerpt from the chapter entitled "Diversity and the Pilot Shortage":
I have shared the history of the flight officers in the Tuskegee Airmen’s ranks not only as an interesting historical fact but to point out that this was one way that was successfully used to increase diversity in the flying ranks before the Air Force became a separate Service.
In 2018 flight officers/warrant officers are being considered once again as an answer to the pilot shortage. It raises the question of why flight officers/warrant officers weren’t previously considered as a remedy to the long-standing shortage of minority pilots. That question almost answers itself. The Air Force’s pilot shortage wasn’t a crisis worthy of crisis-level responses until there weren’t enough non-minority pilots to put in cockpits.
The Air Force has had a shortage of minority pilots since the Creech era, post-Vietnam targeted drawdown that I refer to in “Black Ceiling” as “the Great Black Out.” In this drawdown, minority fighter pilots were overwhelmingly and disproportionately selected in the Air Force’s fighter pilot cuts. In “Black Ceiling,” I stated that it is the single greatest reason we do not have greater diversity in the Air Force fighter pilot force, at every rank, even today.
The Air Force’s crisis response considerations in 2018 again reinforce the fact that the non-minority pilot shortage is viewed as a crisis, yet the shortage of minority pilots historically has not been.
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