I provide the following insights from a fellow member of another discussion group to which I subscribe. The author is Edward M. Van Court, MAJ, MI, USAR

Reflections based on more than a decade of continuous first-hand observation of the Air Force by an Army Officer. Hopefully, this will help Army folks who are working with the USAF to understand some of the (to a Soldier) confusing behaviors. Bear with me, these observations do not apply to every Air Force person you'll meet, but describe common patterns of behavior in the Air Force.

Special thanks to a fellow Army Major currently in a joint assignment and collocated with the Air Force for reviewing this piece

1. From the Air Force perspective - Flying is leadership (I have heard this *exact* statement from a newly comissioned Air Force officer, yes he was rated and an Academy graduate); the smaller the crew of the aircraft, the greater the leadership. Hence; any pilot is defined as being a better leader than any non-rated officer, never mind that the civil engineer or communication captain commands a 100+ member unit and the rated Captain might be in charge of one other person. Note also that an F-16 pilot who flies by himself is a better leader than a C-17 pilot who has a crew of a half dozen or so. This is a serious point of contention between rated and non-rated officers.

2. The Air Force does not understand the Officer/NCO relationship. AF doctrine is written/approved by fighter pilots and fighter pilots seldom work closely with NCOs before they are promoted to field grades. The idea of a LT going to an E-7 or a CPT going to an E-8 for advice or as a sounding board for ideas is utterly alien to them. In the Army, we pretty much take it for granted that we, as officers, will have an experienced NCO working closely with us throughout our career. There are exceptional individuals in the AF who break this mold, but they are just that, the exception and very rarely from the fighter or bomber communities.

3. It is easy to arrive at the conclusion that the Air Force is technology riven rather than people oriented, but give them a break. Since the creation of the independent Air Force in 1947, the Air Force, as an organization, has never had ten consecutive years (seldom had 5 consecutive years) without a radical change in basic technologies. Go back further, and you could argue that this extends all the way back to 1914 with the first Army air elements.
When your organization is being routinely radically changed by technology, when you are trying to cope with technology that feels like it changes hourly, it is easy to get in the habit of focusing on technological solutions rather than human ones.

4. What is an Airman? A Soldier is fundementally a rifleman, regardless of other specialization. A Marine is a rifleman of the littorals. A Sailor is a maritime vessel crewman. An Airman... well, there is no one definition that includes every uniformed member of the Air Force, and this is a profound cohesion issue.

Now here is the bitter pill for Soldiers. Before you complain about your Air Force counterpart, read Air Force history (and refrain from wisecracks about how this is easy as there is so little of it). The Air Force of today is a direct result of policy and doctrine decisions by the Army for the Army Air Corps in the 1930s and '40s. These decisions were necessary, and many of them were driven by the needs of WWII, but they had far reaching consequences.

Don't get me wrong; I respect the Air Force and the capabilities it brings to the fight. Learn the lesson of an Army officer who insisted that he didn't need to worry about that space stuff the Air Force does as long as he had his rifle and his GPS. Our capabilities compliment each other. (BTW; the "as long as I have my rifle and GPS" story has taken on mythic proportions in the Air Force).