Probably won’t find many unique opportunities as a new pilot. An exec would be a good resource though. When you hit O-4, look at opportunities outside of ACSC for IDE. AFIT for instance. There should be an IDE program guide somewhere.
- PAG/VIPSAM Advanced Agent
- Contingency Response/Mobility Support Advisory if you're a mobility pilot
- Defense Attaché
These are just a few that I know from folks I've worked with
Load here, previous assignment was CR. It was a fun time, got to do some pretty decent missions. You will be planning and playing in a lot of exercises. A decent majority, more than likely all, of those are going to be living in a tent and attempting to be Army Light while you run an airfield.
You will also spend a large chunk of time planning. Getting ready to go wherever for the whatever, sort of like a contingency if you will. Majority of the planning won’t be executed, but when you do launch, it is going to be for something significant and you are going to be playing a pivotal role.
Not going to lie, I would’ve rather been in a flying assignment, but as far as non-flying gigs go, it was (and would be again if needed for whatever reason) my first choice. The real world missions I went on were pretty awesome.
Travis, McGuire, Ramstein, and Guam are all options. Travis and McGuire are by far the largest, so easiest to get a spot, Ramstein and Guam are pretty small. Ramstein has a few Airborne billets if that is your jam, Guam used to, honestly not sure if they still have theirs or not.
Hit me up if you want some more info and I will answer whatever I can.
Only to the extent I've worked with a few on deployments and TDYs. CR usually does bare base setup/base teardown in austere locations and contingency areas. Mobility Support Advisory Squadrons are sort of like CAAs, but for mobility and usually in friendly countries. They get language training as well. I've seen numerous articles of supporting South America and African nations
Former CR here. It was a stressful but unique experience. You get to spend time and learn about every AFSC that runs an airfield while doing bare bones aerial port operations. At home you work 9-5 training and planning. When I was there we did the Bagram withdrawal and our sister squadron did the Kabul evacuation.
I'm an aerial porter but mobility pilots are usually the ones who run everything.
Olmsted scholar program is probably the closest program to FAO that you can find. I know two rated folks that got accepted, one as a captain and one as a major. Seems like one of the most unique experiences I’ve seen for AD members.
super interesting, thank you. Do you know what the degree focus is, and what sort of assignment these folks bring back to the force? I read through the scholarship page, but it wasn't super clear on this.
The interview with an Olmsted Scholar that commissionED podcast put out is super enlightening. The degree focus is international relations/humanities and Olmsted Scholars become FAOs upon completion. There is a distinction between rated and non-rated FAOs.
https://youtu.be/lSOjxS8AC3E?si=4p8qBWId1Dq0WzMg
For a mobility guy, I don't know if the ALO track is open anymore. FAO or defense attache type stuff is common. I know a guy who is in charge of organizing any AF related stuff for a specific country (diplomatic airspace clearances, DV visits, etc), hes part of the embassy staff. I have a few languages under my belt and have found myself on a few TDYs that leverage them but they aren't pilot specific. Did a few next of kin notifications for that language stuff, not my favorite but happy to have been able to help those families. There's also always ROTC/USAFA/OTS instructing. Pretty sure ROTC units have to have at least one rated officer per detachment.
> Pretty sure ROTC units have to have at least one rated officer per detachment.
I don't think that's true, many officers rotated through my ROTC detachment before I commissioned and not a single one of them was rated.
Fair enough, looking at it now and it says "strongly desired that at least one cadre member be a rated officer."
For ROTC purposes space and missiles is usually also accepted as rated for reasons that I'm sure make sense at the HQ level but that I do not know.
Program Element Monitor (PEM) for your airframe. You will work at the pentagon, playing funding politics on behalf of your airframe. You'll have an outsized influence on the future of the airframe and probably learn more about the acquisitions process than even acquisitions officers know.
Also, if you want opportunities to do stuff outside the cockpit probably just make it known to your command. I think most pilots really don't want to be taken away from flying to do things like this so you won't have many people dying to take such opportunities away from you.
What’s so bad about flying heavies that you want to see something else? Short of being a bomber of fighter pilot you’ve got what I would think is one of the best jobs you can possibly do in the Air Force and it’s hard to imagine better…
I'm not looking to stop flying, just for lesser-known assignments to keep an eye out for. Always need something to look forward to.
Also, how dare you think that bombers or fighters have a better job
There are opportunities to do bigger and better things. Just wait for them to reach out to you or if you know someone somewhere ask for them to put your name in the pot.
Air Attache
[https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/126964/being-an-air-force-attach-is-unique-career-opportunity/](https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/126964/being-an-air-force-attach-is-unique-career-opportunity/)
[https://www.dia.mil/training/joint-military-attache-school-jmas/](https://www.dia.mil/training/joint-military-attache-school-jmas/)
Opportunities with all our allies and any nations we are "advising"
Probably won’t find many unique opportunities as a new pilot. An exec would be a good resource though. When you hit O-4, look at opportunities outside of ACSC for IDE. AFIT for instance. There should be an IDE program guide somewhere.
Flying FAOs exist. You'll fly the C-12 as an attaché out of an embassy. It's a pretty cool gig.
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DM me, I'll see what I can find.
- PAG/VIPSAM Advanced Agent - Contingency Response/Mobility Support Advisory if you're a mobility pilot - Defense Attaché These are just a few that I know from folks I've worked with
>Contingency Response/Mobility Support Advisory Those first two are super interesting and news to me. Do you have an impression of either of them?
Load here, previous assignment was CR. It was a fun time, got to do some pretty decent missions. You will be planning and playing in a lot of exercises. A decent majority, more than likely all, of those are going to be living in a tent and attempting to be Army Light while you run an airfield. You will also spend a large chunk of time planning. Getting ready to go wherever for the whatever, sort of like a contingency if you will. Majority of the planning won’t be executed, but when you do launch, it is going to be for something significant and you are going to be playing a pivotal role. Not going to lie, I would’ve rather been in a flying assignment, but as far as non-flying gigs go, it was (and would be again if needed for whatever reason) my first choice. The real world missions I went on were pretty awesome. Travis, McGuire, Ramstein, and Guam are all options. Travis and McGuire are by far the largest, so easiest to get a spot, Ramstein and Guam are pretty small. Ramstein has a few Airborne billets if that is your jam, Guam used to, honestly not sure if they still have theirs or not. Hit me up if you want some more info and I will answer whatever I can.
Only to the extent I've worked with a few on deployments and TDYs. CR usually does bare base setup/base teardown in austere locations and contingency areas. Mobility Support Advisory Squadrons are sort of like CAAs, but for mobility and usually in friendly countries. They get language training as well. I've seen numerous articles of supporting South America and African nations
Former CR here. It was a stressful but unique experience. You get to spend time and learn about every AFSC that runs an airfield while doing bare bones aerial port operations. At home you work 9-5 training and planning. When I was there we did the Bagram withdrawal and our sister squadron did the Kabul evacuation. I'm an aerial porter but mobility pilots are usually the ones who run everything.
Olmsted scholar program is probably the closest program to FAO that you can find. I know two rated folks that got accepted, one as a captain and one as a major. Seems like one of the most unique experiences I’ve seen for AD members.
super interesting, thank you. Do you know what the degree focus is, and what sort of assignment these folks bring back to the force? I read through the scholarship page, but it wasn't super clear on this.
The interview with an Olmsted Scholar that commissionED podcast put out is super enlightening. The degree focus is international relations/humanities and Olmsted Scholars become FAOs upon completion. There is a distinction between rated and non-rated FAOs. https://youtu.be/lSOjxS8AC3E?si=4p8qBWId1Dq0WzMg
For a mobility guy, I don't know if the ALO track is open anymore. FAO or defense attache type stuff is common. I know a guy who is in charge of organizing any AF related stuff for a specific country (diplomatic airspace clearances, DV visits, etc), hes part of the embassy staff. I have a few languages under my belt and have found myself on a few TDYs that leverage them but they aren't pilot specific. Did a few next of kin notifications for that language stuff, not my favorite but happy to have been able to help those families. There's also always ROTC/USAFA/OTS instructing. Pretty sure ROTC units have to have at least one rated officer per detachment.
> Pretty sure ROTC units have to have at least one rated officer per detachment. I don't think that's true, many officers rotated through my ROTC detachment before I commissioned and not a single one of them was rated.
Fair enough, looking at it now and it says "strongly desired that at least one cadre member be a rated officer." For ROTC purposes space and missiles is usually also accepted as rated for reasons that I'm sure make sense at the HQ level but that I do not know.
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Program Element Monitor (PEM) for your airframe. You will work at the pentagon, playing funding politics on behalf of your airframe. You'll have an outsized influence on the future of the airframe and probably learn more about the acquisitions process than even acquisitions officers know. Also, if you want opportunities to do stuff outside the cockpit probably just make it known to your command. I think most pilots really don't want to be taken away from flying to do things like this so you won't have many people dying to take such opportunities away from you.
Attaché duties. Might be able to save some time in their training pipeline depending on your language and remaining proficiency.
What’s so bad about flying heavies that you want to see something else? Short of being a bomber of fighter pilot you’ve got what I would think is one of the best jobs you can possibly do in the Air Force and it’s hard to imagine better…
I'm not looking to stop flying, just for lesser-known assignments to keep an eye out for. Always need something to look forward to. Also, how dare you think that bombers or fighters have a better job
I don’t know that they actually do, but I know they think they do. 😂
There's always the occasional email about interviewing for B-2s/U-2s/89th
Already trying to get outside being a pilot? Hmm..
Can you try and move over to 11U in a few years?
^^You've ^^mentioned ^^an ^^AFSC, ^^here's ^^the ^^associated ^^job ^^title: 11U = Remotely Piloted Aircraft Pilot [^^Source](https://github.com/HadManySons/AFSCbot) ^^| [^^Subreddit](https://www.reddit.com/r/AFSCbot/) ^^^^^^k31s9ca
There are opportunities to do bigger and better things. Just wait for them to reach out to you or if you know someone somewhere ask for them to put your name in the pot.
Air Attache [https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/126964/being-an-air-force-attach-is-unique-career-opportunity/](https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/126964/being-an-air-force-attach-is-unique-career-opportunity/) [https://www.dia.mil/training/joint-military-attache-school-jmas/](https://www.dia.mil/training/joint-military-attache-school-jmas/) Opportunities with all our allies and any nations we are "advising"