And have volunteers in post at ATF alongside the paid staff
I’m less and less convinced the “RAF”, know how to run a national youth organisation, aside from putting layers of admin in the way of doing things. Never had this until we were landed with admin wallahs as CAC.
That aside it takes nothing to actually talk to people to get a real feel for what they do, like I’ve experienced in my working life.
It could also mean Air Cadets continues regardless of the RAF getting smaller and smaller, which is more likely. RAF shrinkage is behind many of our woes.
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Aside from uniforms and shooting, the RAF needs us more than we need them.
And uniforms of different types can be sourced easily enough without the woes of RAF supply issues affecting us.
Would a mass mutiny work?!
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It wouldn’t necessarily be a mutiny, more a staged move. We just need the RAF to man up and say we can’t do this anymore and pass control to say the Air League.
I think we also need a purpose for the 21st century Air Cadets, not some pie in the sky buzzword laden nonsense which changes with every new cmdt, open to interpretation, with no funding and lacking real focus. Also this would do away with pointless visions with unrealistic time frames. There is no point in say Air Cadets 2030, when the author(s) will be long gone and any new people will want to do their own thing to leave their mark. All of these have been a litany of failure, except perhaps some online/electronic admin, which doesn’t need anyone in authority to actually do anything vaguely constructive.
When the ADCC was formed it was done so with a purpose, which the Air Ministry liked, which largely secured the ATCs continuation through WW2 and a bit beyond National Service. Beyond that because the RAF was larger it was able to absorb our desirings. But as the years have gone on, especially after the SDRs which have seen the RAF reduce in all ways, the Air Cadets, despite all the fine words has got lost and now the question is 'what is our purpose, we aren’t the preparing for service in the armed forces as per the ADCC and not been for probably 60 years. If the “light blue footprint” meant anything tangible you might have thought the RAF would be putting real effort into maintaining the organisation’s broader appeal to teenagers and making life easier for CFAV…
So what is our raison d’être for the next 50 years that cannot be met elsewhere?’
It’s sounding scarily like something I heard I think from the Commandant previously about progressing the organisation in a direction that turns it very specifically and deliberately into a filter/stream/pre-training for RAF service.
Which is making the “not a recruiting organisation” a blurrier line than it it already was.
Unfortunately I can’t remember the exact original quote or where it was from, but I do recall thinking “that sounds like turning us into a recruitment organisation, and I won’t be here for that if it happens”.
I’m also seeing mission statements released that drop the “civilian life” aspects and focus solely on the RAF…
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The RAF like all the armed forces has a recruitment problem in the future plus recent events started at the top will not have helped the situation.
There was serious talk that if an aircadet had achieved XYZ in the corps , then they would skip phase 1 of training at halton or cranwell.
The regular training syllabus would be adjusted to take account of this.
The apparent savings of an individual not needing the first 8 to 12 weeks are huge.
But i haven’t heard anything on this for over a year now.
Maybe they realised they’d need to provide better training and resources to CFAVs if we’re essentially doing part1 basic training.
And arguably bring back the VR commission lol.
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IOT has now gone modular, four terms of 6 weeks. Anybody commissioning from the ranks skips the first 6 weeks - more if they were a JNCO, more again if a SNCO.
I have seen nothing, though, in the ATC that would mean a cadet could skip the first 6 weeks. Ok, they might know how to iron a shirt and march a bit, but we’re miles behind on the military skills.
Certainly, even though I was a cadet and on the UAS, I needed those first few weeks. I would not have been able to join in at week 7.
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I heard this in one of my specialist areas. AFAIK it is still being considered but it needs considerable extra resources including properly trained staff and the ability to deliver courses on a regular basis. None of which is free.
Historical perspective: this is how the public school OTCs worked in the years before WW1. Cadets who passed basic training in OTC were exempt from the first phase of officer training.
And I don’t think the officers they had in public schools then were experienced in actual war - the NCOs might have been. Obviously after WW1 that changed a lot.
Over the years, we have been trusted less and less to conduct actual training, especially as WW2 has (thank God!) faded into the past. But, as @WestlandScout says, we’d need better CFAV training and standardisation.
Yes - and probably either more paid staff (perhaps TEST equivalent) or a way of paying our existing CFAV who are willing to be trained up in a way more akin to the Reserves.
As @Farmerdan says the mechanism is there in the VR(T).
Probably a thread drift, can someone on a PC can split it?
Or existing CFAV who are ex-Forces who can be refreshed.
Anyone get the feeling that it’s the sort of thing dreamed up by air officers without any conversation with the Secretary of State nor any consideration for the political impact of it? (Especially considering the next decade is likely to be a Labour Government)
An uncharitable person/politician/journalist would argue that the expansion of the Cadet Forces into Schools combined with a change of role to prepare children for military service makes us into a modern day Hitler Youth.
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We (the UK) is already complained about on an international level because we allow people to join the forces at 16. This would make it worse…
I remember thinking something similar while reading the Astra ACP. While I don’t think it was explicit, part of me did think that there was a push to move from being a youth organisation that develops young people to become a pre-service cyber and space training school.
Like you, I wouldn’t want to be here for that change, however it might not be so obvious. Is it happening already?
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Indeed, recognition of prior experience should be a given.
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I don’t it would ever happen. The RAF isn’t going to be expanding any time soon and the number of people we take on in those roles is tiny compared to a- the number of people in the RAF, and b- the number of people in the ATC.
Those trades combined probably add up to no more than ~1000/1500, and that would include people who’ve been in for twenty years. Fully half the people in the RAF were never in cadets and they all manage the training just fine…
Training 30,000 kids in space command gubbins would be a colossal waste of time.
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Looks like someone has already got there
I don’t know anything about this site and their About page is less than revealing so best treat with caution.