Squadron Officer School - Cogito Yearbook (Montgomery, AL)

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x 81. l .v-F AEROSPACE EMPLOYMENT Attention RAMROD Battle Staff! Attention RAMROD Battle Staff! Powerful enemy bomber forces that earlier penetrated the Distant Early Warning Line in the Arctic have now begun to cross the Mid-Canada Line. Lead ele- ments of the bomber forces have been contacted by inter- ceptors of the Royal Canadian Air Force. The interceptors attempted to divert the bomber aircraft but were fired upon. Canadian interceptors are now making concentrated attacks against the raid and report several enemy bombers have been destroyed. The bulk ofthe force appears to be head- ed for RAMROD Division. Alert all defense systems and weapons within your division. Engage the enemy with your most effective weapons and eliminate this raid as soon as possible. Good hunting. These harsh wards blurt out of the intercom set in your seminar room at the Squadron Officer School. No one stirs. You see the same strained expression on every face around you. This is it! Automatically each of the dozen other men in the room turn. They turn to you. Because today, you, Captain Joe Jones, are the Air Defense Sector Commander. This is your problem, this is your staff. No one for you to turn to now. Successor failure depends on you and your men. Can this be true? Can you, Joe Jones, 29-year old Pennsylvania native turned Air Force officer, specialist in aircraft maintenance, be commander in such a critical national situation? Can any school in a short l2 weeks of a l4-week course prepare you to make decisions of such magnitude and grave consequences? You wonder. In that split second before you bark out your first instruction to your staff, the past 12 weeks unfold before your eyes. You now see the why and wherefore of it all. It was all for this. To see that your first order, as well as your last, was the very best that could have been given under the circumstances. Not only were those lessons and practice sessions on clear thinking, clear writing, and clear speaking invaluable during the last two days - days spent designing RAMROD Aerospace Defense facilities from scratch - but now at the execution stage, you know you don't dare be fuzzy in either thought or word. And the thought strikes you suddenly that you wouldn't have as much as a map onthe wall if you and your mates couldn't function together smoothly as a command-staff team. The wide range of knowledge you now have from gaining an insight into the supply iob, the personnel iob, the communications-electronics iob, the operations job, and all the many other distinct functions of the modern aerospace force has enabled you to piece together a cle- fense system from masses of unrelated material, data, and facts. a -f , ,X H. A .L '4 2 i-gg ,f N, , , Sgfxkk, X . Q t Hi- '

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You look closely at your T2-man battle staff. Your team. What do you know of them? Which are strong-weak? Which are quick-slow? Which are conventional-radical? Which arecourageous-hesitant? You know. You know, and even more important-they know. They know about each other, and they know about you. Each of you has paraded his personal strengths and weaknesses before all the others daily in field activities, in study seminars, and social get-togethers. Now you know that the fish bowl atmosphere that rankled you so much wasn't an accident. It was for you - for your men. You have an instant to reflect briefly upon the inter- national situation that faces you. Do you represent a nation strong in materials, men, funds, and that unmeasur- able quality called grit or backbone or guts ? Can the United States defeat aggression? Aggression from whom? Will this country pay the price, bear the scars? Is there an enemy, an ideological aggressor, a faction in this world that confuses peace and happiness with weakness and cowardice? What causes such unbelievable situations? Then in a flash, almost automatically, you grasp the whole thing. Accumulated lectures, readings, and discussions on national power and international relations have familia- rized you with your country's position in world affairs. The positions of other nations, with you or against you, Q- ' 'Ive also become clear. You wonder how people could have asked during the Korean conflict, Why are we fighting? You resolve that this question will never bother you. No, nor your men. You not only know why you are fighting, but how to fight. Now you see clearly why this last phase of instruction covering the employment of aerospace forces is given to all students, combat crew members as well as WAF offi- cers. Here they are, each with a different background, each with a different specialty, yet they all fill a needed function on your defense battle staff. Thank goodness, you think, that the instructions in force employment covered the enemy land, sea, and air capability as well as the capability of all the Allied nations. You are especially grateful this morning for the data you had on the Royal Canadian Air Force. You also realize that no maior conflict of this nation will be fought by one service alone. You are comforted to remember that the Army and Navy have a slice of this action too. Comforted because their capability has been explained in such frank and useful fashion. No guesswork needed on this score. This is something you know very well - this is unified action. WEEULATC J --s' .AW +5 We s -. 1