Every ship I served on, with the exception of one (the smallest ship, with few officers of any kind) had at least a couple warrant officers. I never once saw them as looked down upon.
Maybe that was a culture problem within that particular community at that particular time.
Generally speaking, that might be true. It’s a function of experience or flight hours. Commissioned officers were (usually) excellent pilots in my experience - but administrative duties means they are flying a desk most of the time.
I enjoyed working with WOs for the most part, and always felt much safer with a couple old crusty warrant officers driving than younger, less experienced pilots. Even better, a maintenance officer or test flight warrant. This is yet another track within a field. If something really bad happened in flight, I knew these kinds of guys would at least give us a chance, due to their voluminous and encyclopedic knowledge of all the aircraft systems.
I think this is the real key to it. The Navy’s able to go hire civilians with experience to be Cyber Warrant Officers, without having to either force them through the enlisted pipeline or the officer pipeline, yet be able to pay them something more or less commensurate with their position. And it’s not forcing them to constantly get promoted to get more money, nor are they being pushed upward into more supervisory roles.
It’s kind of like the military equivalent of technology companies that set up non-management career paths for technical people. They’re able to continue doing work, without being forced into management in order to make more money/get more recognition.
A hypothetical example might be that they can hire a kid out of college with a pertinent degree, let him do his cyber security stuff, and get promoted in the warrant officer ranks, without his having to command a unit of some kind in order to get promoted. Nor does this kid have to enlist and grind upward over decades either.
I suppose they could do direct commissioning like they do for doctors, chaplains, and lawyers, but I figure there’s a reason they don’t go that route, but I’m not sure what that reason is.
Any manager will dispute that. They’re wrong, of course, but you cannot convince them of that.
The actual case is (and, yes, I know it’s silly and even pedantic) one is commissioned as a Chief Warrant Officer.
Of course this leads to another question. Why? What is the purpose of carving out the warrant grades and then commissioning just some of the grades (well, any of them for that matter)?
And that brings us back to the OP. So, what was so different about the Air Force as a military service (save the jokes) that they required as all the other services did the senior non-commissioned officer but no longer the warrant/chief warrant grades? What is so different now about the Air Force that they now require the warrant/chief warrant grades?
I can readily see the pros for the individual appointed as warrant or chief warrant. There’s presumably greater prestige and better pay. There’s, at least theoretically, recognition of the person’s technical knowledge and skill.
Over the years, I’ve heard that it’s time to get rid of the “up or out” system which operates across the entire military. If you look at the military pay charts, you will see that each pay grade tops out after a certain number of years. Why not remove that cap? If a person is a good fit at that position, go with it.
And regarding the theory that commissioned officers are more managers than specialists, well, so are the higher non-commissioned officers. Under the current military structure, the higher up one goes as an NCO, the more management one does, the further away from “the job” one finds oneself.
Good point – for a while the Army tried to wrangle that with the “Specialist” ranks, people in grades parallel to the NCOs who’d keep going up in pay but would not have “real” NCO authority. That did not work long term, as of course the more experienced technician necessarily had to supervise the up-and-coming ones and assist the officers commanding them. They ditched the super-grade Specialists almost as soon as they were created, then over a couple of decades kept dropping ranks until by the 80s they went to the current system by which only E4 are Specialists (and long before, that had become the “normal” E4 rank).
This is all about Drone Pilots.
Commissioned Officers want to be “top gun”, not “desktop pilots”.
Drone pilots quit the Air Force in droves, creating retention issues.
The rules will change, & Warrant Officers will now be allowed to fly droines.
Period.
Anything else simply does not work.
That sounds quite plausible/ logical. Do you have any cites?
I don’t have any contrary knowledge to contribute but that also sounds like a just-so story that might be anally extracted BS.
My roommate for a few years (and my cousin our entire lives) was an Army Warrant. He never felt isolated in his job. Might have been because he was a spook (actually, counterspook) and they are a close-knit community, no matter the rank.
Let’s say you are correct about the drone pilots. How do you explain other fields opened for these ranks? Camouflage?
Nope.
Opportunities.
And NCO retention.
Growing up on an air base, I remember there were still some AF Warrant Officers around in the late 60s/early 70s. Don’t know about later, as I went to college about then. When I joined the Air Guard in the late 70s, there were none in my unit.
The main question I have is: Do they get to join the Officer’s Club or the NCO Club? Maybe neither one, which would help account for any loneliness.
Warrant and Chief Warrant Officers join the Officers’ Club. Some bases have what the Navy calls an All Hands Club, which is for everyone. Such bases are usually very small outfits. Here is the Marine Corps Base Hawaii order establishing the Commissioned Officers Club bylaws. I refer you to Article III Membership Section 1:
All United States Armed Forces active duty,
reservist and retired commissioned and warrant officers and
their adult family members are members of the Club.
CWO4 James H. Long, USAF, retired in 1980; CWO5 Bob Barrow, USAFR, retired in in 1992.
I’ve mentioned this a few times already. Chief Warrant Officers are, in fact, commissioned officers in the United States military.
And now it is official.
AURORA, Colorado – The Air Force announced this week that it is bringing back warrant officer ranks, but officials clarified Tuesday it is not looking at developing aviators through that training – despite an ongoing pilot shortage and other service branches using warrant officers for those types of missions.
The service will instead focus on information technology and cyber operations for those ranks, and not pursue pilot tracks, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin told Military.com during a media roundtable at the Air and Space Forces Association’s Warfare Symposium conference.
The rest of the article goes into some detail as to why the USAF does not intend to have flying Warrant Officers and Chief Warrant Officers.
BTW, the last link in my post just above was to show the last two USAF Chief Warrant Officers and their retirement dates.
Warrant Officers aren’t junior officers. Junior officers are lower management. Warrant officers are dedicated specialists. It’s a way of providing a special slot for airmen who need to be top tier in their job, but without necessarily focussing on the leadership role of senior NCOs or enlisted officers.
I think you meant leadership role of senior NCOs or commissioned officers (O-1and above).
“Enlisted officers” would be NCOs (non-commissioned officers).
What’s an officer’s… club? Is that, like, something we get issued to club people with? I’m pretty sure that’s illegal, even for officers.
But seriously, such clubs are dead or dying pretty much everywhere (or at least they were in the Navy). Something about no one wanting to hang out on base in their free time. Because even if the drinks are cheap (I wouldn’t know) the flip side is… how are you going to get home without getting a DWI? Uber? On a military base!?
Of course. Sorry, brain-fart.
There are on-base taxi services. Additionally, some bases have a “free ride home” program for those residing on base. I’m guessing here that those who reside off base tend to patronize establishments closer to their homes than going to the base club.
I’ve been out a long time. The Officer’s Club made sense overseas and for bases in rural areas where everyone assigned to the base resided on the base. It was the one and only social place to go. And back in the more booze = more good era, they worked great.
Stateside they were already getting iffy when I got out back in the late 80s. Which is ~35 years ago now. I have to imagine they are nearly moribund now, and doubly so at the stateside bases anywhere near any actual ordinary civilian civilization.
When I was doing this, the club was where you went after work before going home whether on- or off-base. As such it was far more popular with the single officers than the married and within the married, far more popular with the officers with no kids or who didn’t much care about their family life.
Substantially nobody (single or married) went home, kissed the dog or wife, changed clothes, and went back to the base club with or without their wife / SO / GF.