To the pilots, standardization and authority were important, but not this kind of mentality, and so the best of them fought back. They saw a vast gulf between the jobs they were being told to do and the jobs they felt needed to be done, and it seemed to them they had three options: they could crack under the strain, do a half-baked job, or fight by deceiving—lie and do the real job as much as they could swing it. Thus, integrity meant lying—not a good place to be, and the strains showed.

They showed in many ways—problems with drugs, alcohol, race, and sex. Too many crashed, too many were lost. They showed in smaller but equally telling ways, too: too many aircraft inoperable because there weren’t enough parts, too many hangar floors filthy, too many NCOs in their offices instead of with their troops, too many troops without clean toilets or clean washrooms.

It wasn’t until 1978 that a general named Bill Creech took command of the TAC, saw what needed doing, and did it, but that was several years in the future. In the meantime, men like Chuck Horner started laying the groundwork for reform.

When Chuck Horner returned from Vietnam in August 1967, he was primarily an operations man: he flew fighter planes, that’s what he did. Now, while continuing his strong operational inclination, he found himself on a steep learning path. He needed to understand how to work the bureaucracy, needed the right kind of mentoring, needed to be shown how to get things done off the field as well as on. It was very lucky for him that his first major job offer after Vietnam put him in the heart of tactics development at Nellis AFB in Nevada.

NELLIS AFB

Nellis has long been, as it calls itself, the “Home of the Fighter Pilot.” Because of the large-scale ranges and the free and open airspace, much of the USAF’s fighter equipment and tactics development has been carried out there, and after Vietnam began to make its presence felt, and money was freed up to develop the new conventional systems needed to fight that war, it was a very busy place.

In the 1960s, two major functions were based at Nellis: a fighter wing that performed F-105 (and later F-111) qualification training; and the Fighter Weapons School (FWS), where top fighter pilots received (and still receive) advanced training in fighter pilot instruction—at first in the F-100 and F-105, and later in the F-4.

Fighter pilots with a great deal of experience (usually 1,000-plus hours) and credibility were selected both for their flying skills and their ability to instruct, and sent to the FWS for a six-month intensive training course—in effect, a doctoral degree in Fighter Operations. The academics were fiercely difficult, and there was nearly endless flying in which every move was graded in a laboratory environment on the ranges. Beyond that, FWS students learned how to be superb platform instructors, as well as how to work with maintenance to ensure that the bombing systems were working correctly and the munitions being maintained properly.