FY13 US Military Airshow Support in Jeapordy

[Mike]

The problem is that by law, the DoD cannot charge for aircraft appearances in public. This is part of the overall US Government restriction from competing directly with the private sector and is one of the things that the Collings Foundation has been fighting with the USAF over for years. They only started their F-4 demonstration/heritage flight program after the Collings Foundation won their legal battle to be able to fly their F-4, which is technically in violation of DoD rules (as it's to directly compete with a private entity with the same or similar equipment), but the USAF has managed to keep it bound up in procedural court matters at this point so an injunction has never been granted.

What it really means is that Warbird Operators will finally have a fair shake at a lot of this stuff that they've been prevented from doing for years because the US Military had been offering flyovers and appearances for free. Yes, that might mean your tickets to your favorite sporting event goes up a bit, but it also means that it might give some of these operators a chance for keeping their birds flying a few more years.

But haven't the AF already stated that there will be no F-4 HFs for 2013?

[CAPFlyer]

Mike, water under the bridge at this point. They had no F-4 demos before the US Congress granted the Collings Foundation their aircraft. They introduced them solely to try and take appearances from Collings. It worked to a degree, but the problem was it'd only work for a short time until all the F-4's were used up. Now that they're used up, Collings will be able to finally get a chance to show their plane more often, but in the end the USAF may win because many shows can no longer afford a big jet like an F-4 with the current economic situation. While I'm sure the USAF didn't want an economic slowdown and recession like this to win the "war", it certainly plays into their hands. I feel Collings will be able to last through this and get their plane on the circuit where it belongs, but it will have taken them a long time and a lot of lost revenue to do it because certain members of the USAF and politicians didn't want a "dangerous" aircraft like the F-4 being flown by civilians.

BTW Rick - I hope you guys, WHF, and Art Nall can start doing some really cool joint appearances in the coming years with your Skyhawks, Phantom and Harrier. Would also be really cool to see a full-on Vietnam Air Power demo at AirSho one year too including the Skyhawk, Phantom, and the goodies that already perform at AirSho every year. Nothing like a recreation of the Apocalypse Now wall of fire...

[Flyin Illini]

this was posted on fencecheck a few days ago

"Well it looks like we will have F-4 Heritage Flight after all. ACC is allowing one of the civilian pilots at Tyndall to be our F-4 Heritage pilot."

No source or anything listed, just a what a member said.

[Ken]

This is akin to rearranging the deck chairs on a sinking ship. If the DoD and the rest of gov't (from County to Federal) would ever find a way to budget without feeling the need to spend every dollar budgeted before the end of the FY, then we could have a meaningful discussion about where to make worthwhile cuts. Until then, it is completely misleading to say that unit X won't be sending an airplane on a weekend cross-country to an airshow when, in fact, unit X will be sending the same plane and crew out to drone around in August & September just to be sure the budget gets zeroed out. Net change in the cost to the taxpayer = zero ... unless you wish to factor in the reduction in airframe life and maintenance generated by the unnecessary hours flown or the fact that the airshow was going to provide rooms & rental cars vs using gov't funds.

Ken

[CAPFlyer]

The the spending issue is due to the way the US Government budgets work. If they don't spend their budget, they have an automatic reduction the next year and may not be able to fund everything they need to fund that year. This is one of the problems with our current budget system, it's biased to growth and not responsible spending. The honest discussion needs to start with the budgetary system being reworked to a real budget, not a system that grows by 3% a year unless something drastic happens and where saving money when you don't need to spend it is punished.

The government's budget shouldn't punish departments for coming in under budget. It should punish departments for coming in over budget. Right now, it works opposite. Fix that, and you'll fix a lot of the departmental spending problems.

[Ken]

The government's budget shouldn't punish departments for coming in under budget. It should punish departments for coming in over budget. Right now, it works opposite. Fix that, and you'll fix a lot of the departmental spending problems.

Since there is always someone looking to make points with "the system", a budgetary process needs to be crafted where an organization is neither rewarded or punished. One example is that a panel looks at what a unit spent for three years and establishes a baseline. If they come under next year, no big deal. And, if there are circumstances that cause them to go over, then there should be a mechanism which permits a certain percentage over without too much hassle. Three years later the panel looks at the data and resets the baseline. I'm no economist, but I've seen way too much of this first hand and the current methods are UNSAT.

Ken

[Fearless Tower]

I don't have a problem with that, as long as they concurrently reduce the golf course budget for US Military Installations at the same rate. You've got to trim the fat somewhere. And hey, I also don't have a problem paying an appearance fee for a B-2, F-22, or other such aircraft at a show. As long as the money goes into paying for the upkeep of the aircraft, and not some golf course somewhere.

I can't speak for the AF, but in the Navy we are way beyond cutting fat. To put it in physiological terms, the Navy wants to amputate a few limbs to protect the body, but Congress won't let us....so we hack out huge chunks of bone......we are becoming a very hollow force.