The American Spectator

Reader Mail

The Art of Refueling

1.29.03 @ 12:01AM

OUR DROGUE NAVY:
Re: Jed Babbin's Mad COW and Steve Jobson:

Re the comment: "The Brits carried much of the in-flight refueling burden in the Afghan campaign. It got to the point that our Navy and Marine pilots steered off USAF tankers if the Brits were around because the Brit refueling equipment linked more easily to that used by our carrier aircraft."

And the reason for that is that the Navy still clings to probe/drogue refueling while the rest of U.S. aviation uses a boom/receptacle arrangement. Those using the latter are all USAF and include the "heavies" that need to take on a lot of fuel in a short time. I suppose that USN clings to the old ways because they have no pressing need for passing a lot of fuel quickly; however, the boom/receptacle arrangement is more efficient, reliable, and less prone to damage because of the antics of the receiver (that's the one taking on fuel). I don't know what the flow rates for USAF receivers are nowadays, but when I was doing the air refueling job the max fuel flow from a KC-135 to a nearly empty B-52 was on the order of 8,000 ppm. We could fill a B-52 with 100,000 pounds of fuel in 20 minutes or so in good weather conditions; it took a bit longer in rough weather, but we generally got the fuel transferred. I was also on the receiving end with a probe/drogue arrangement flying the long defunct B-66. It was a real challenge to refuel in rough weather; often times a probe would break off in the drogue or someone would smash the drogue. When that happens the show stops and everyone goes home -- or bails out.

The KC-135, venerable old bus that it is, can be made probe/drogue capable, but doing that removes the preferred capability. That dedicates a tanker to doing nothing but probe/drogue refueling. When the worst happens you essentially remove a tanker full of fuel from the lineup. I know of at least one case where a USAF KC-135 saved several USN aircraft -- including some of their tanker aircraft (modified A3-Ds) over the Gulf of Tonkin. It happened in the summer of 1967, and the KC-135 crew won a trophy for outstanding airmanship.

In a way, I can understand the Navy's reluctance to change to the boom/receptacle arrangement even though it is the more efficient and easier air refueling method. There would be considerable expense -- and someone would have to come up with a boom-equipped tanker that could launch/recover on an aircraft carrier. Maybe because the USN screwed up their stealth fighter project (and a few others) they are all the more reluctant to try making the switch.

Other than that, I thought Babbin's article was spot-on.
-- Gerald P. Hanner
Papillion, NE

Great article, I always read Jed Babbin first. At the risk of sounding trivial, though, I must say I cringed when I read the reference to "winning" a Bronze Star. I would prefer "awarded," since to "win" such an award implies it was actively sought by the recipient. By the way, there is a distinction between Bronze Star (for service in a zone of combat) and Bronze Star with '"V" device (for valor). Technically, it is possible for someone to be awarded the former for "sitting behind a desk". Condite et Pugnate.
-- J.W. Purcell, 1SG (Ret)

Lovely column! And the French are worse than accordions. My Special Forces buddies say that any time they have the French attached to them, they have to detail one guy just to make sure the French don't get them all killed!
-- Mary McLemore
Pike Road, AL

HATS OFF
Re: Peter Hannaford's America Homogenized? and "Capped" letters in Reader Mail's Bring Back the Dixie Chicks:

I am a retired, follically challenged male who lives in New York. Admittedly, not exactly fly-over country, but I am always wearing a cap, preferably with a Yankees logo on the front. You will see me at any time with my pate covered, with the following exceptions: 1. When entering a church or someone's home, 2. When seated in the presence of a lady, 3. At the dinner table, and 4. During the playing of the national anthem. Why these exceptions? Because it is the right, polite thing to do. If you see me at the IHOP in fly-over country I will have my cap on at the counter eating alone. But in a booth in the company of my wife or anyone else, the cap will be hung up or on my knee, because that's the way I was brought up. It wouldn't hurt the younger generations to pick up on these gentlemanly actions.
-- Mike Minahan
Camillus, NY

Roger Ross from Wisconsin presumed none of us would remember former Oilers coach Bum Phillips and the fact that he wouldn't wear his cowboy hat indoors -- even in the Astrodome. Well, I remember. Bum always said his mama taught him not to wear a hat indoors. I also recall that when his son, Wade Phillips, was named a head coach Bum was asked what Wade learned from "his tutelage." It was reported that Bum replied, "I never tuteled the boy."
-- Terry Sautter
Wood Ranch, CA

PROTECTOR PROTECTIONS
Re: Mark Goldblatt's Racism and Rights:

Mark Goldblatt writes that "Intention, the obvious answer, is notoriously difficult to gauge," referring to whether a statement or incident should be judged "racist."

Surely, though, the right to free speech includes the right to insult; if not, what is the point? No one would ever object to speech that compliments, and rarely to speech that is "neutral," assuming that true neutrality could ever be agreed upon.

The Founders, I assume, had primarily in mind political speech when they offered Constitutional protection; and much political speech, then as now, was composed of insults. A proper respect for the Constitution should protect all speech that meets the test of not causing immediate danger. Penalizing people for opinions, however insulting, allows political correctness to trump the First Amendment.
-- Richard Donley

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Bill Clinton, Constitution, Law, Oil