How did I not catch this? Apparently in 2024 the USAF re-introduced warrant officers, the first time since 1959.

I keep up on military news pretty regularly and did not know this!

I never knew that either. But I don’t spend enough time on Davis Monthan to have spotted any of the elusive creatures

He’ll I didn’t even know it and I been joint-service for 9 years.

Have to catch on in the wild some day.

It doesn’t surprise me because the other services use warrant officers and even enlisted to fly drones, which I think the Air Force has resisted thus so far?

And I know the Army has more warrant officers flying aircraft, primarily helicopters, than they do commissioned officers.

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
It doesn’t surprise me because the other services use warrant officers and even enlisted to fly drones, which I think the Air Force has resisted thus so far?

And I know the Army has more warrant officers flying aircraft, primarily helicopters, than they do commissioned officers.

Hell, Army has more 20 year old warrants than they do sexual assault cases.

A 296-Day Sprint: How the Air Force Brought Back Warrant Officers In Record Time

Dec. 3, 2024 | By David Roza

When the first batch of Air Force warrant officers in 66 years graduates from their new training school at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala. on Dec. 6, it will mark not only a new era for the Air Force, but also a major bureaucratic achievement as career field managers, personnel gurus, and other experts sweated behind the scenes to stand up the new program in less than a year.

For an organization as large as the Air Force, big changes often take a while. But when Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall announced the return of warrant officers in February, he gave planners a tight deadline: graduate the first batch by the end of the year. Lt. Col. Justin Ellsworth, career field manager for cyberspace operations officers, clocked 296 days between the official announcement in February and the graduation on Dec. 6...

Complete article:

https://www.airandspaceforces....icer-program-sprint/

What’s the significance of this? I never served so genuinely curious.

quote:

Originally posted by cooger:
What’s the significance of this? I never served so genuinely curious.

When the services added the two 'super-grade' NCO ranks (E8 and E9) in 1959, the USAF chose not to have warrant officers. One suspects they did not want to have warrant officer pilots like the Army does, because they did not want to lose any of their authorized number of commissioned officer pilots by having some of their pilots be rated as warrant officers. They did have a number of non-flyer warrant officers in their force; I believe the last one retired in 1980. (I met one in the 1970's, a CW4 who was a logistician, and he told me that the Air Force managed his career as though he were a field grade officer in the appropriate AFSC as the gradually drew down their warrant officer force). Basically, the difference is that warrant officers (who are paid less than commissioned officers) are skilled technicians who operate at an officer's level of responsibility but are not trained, educated, or assigned to prepare them for command or broader duties outside of their specialties. NCOs, meanwhile, take on broader responsibilities in leadership roles, focusing on training, equipment, and supervision of enlisted personnel, as they move up to the higher grades. Ironically, warrant officers today are "commissioned" when they reach CW2 (aka CWO2), but generally speaking are still not career-managed like "commissioned officers" to take on command or broad staff responsibility beyond their technical specialty. They do manage and lead NCOs and enlisted personnel in duties related to their technical field. The new USAF warrant officers will be focused on cyber, and the idea is to recruit and retain a high level of skill in that very technical area. (These comments from the perspective of a retired CW4, USA).

In the other services, CWOs are former enlisted and become officers but are job specialists vs managers that regular officers are. Like the supply boss could be a CWO or my first boss was a CWO bosun who came up in the ranks to chief running deck department on several ships-having served in VN and was the 3rd in line for command under the CO and XO of the unit. The Engineer Officer was also a CWO.

They can also be a college kid the military just hired for his skills like already being a pilot.

quote:

Originally posted by HighRoadRover:
Ironically, warrant officers today are "commissioned" ....

The practice of commissioning Army warrant officers began in early 1987. I’m trying to remember the exact details of that change, but as I recall the warrants were offered the choice of accepting a commission. There was also the option of being commissioned in the Regular Army. Both were not very popular at the time, and that had to do with post retirement employment with the US government. I was in a small minority to accept commissioning in the RA. That and $7.95 will get me a cup of coffee, but it’s still one of the things that gives me something to be a little proud of.

The other discussions of Why warrant officers? are correct.

I have gone back to my earlier post and put quotes around "commissioned" to highlight the distinction between warrant officers -- even "commissioned" warrant officers in grades CW2-CW5 -- and "commissioned officers" in grades O-1 thru 0-10. Thanks Sigfreund for reminding me about how they used to offer "RA" (Regular Army) status to us with the incentive of being immune from RIFs, unlike the Reserve officers!

The distinction has narrowed, but in general you don't see Army warrant officers (although now "commissioned" except for WO1s) in command positions or with broad staff responsibilities across several fields, as we see with "commissioned officers" in grades 0-1 and above. I suspect the USAF will do the same with their cyber warrant officers. Although there are a few Army warrant officers who are officially commanders. And Army Marine Deck Officers are commanders of their vessels, and in aviation there is a "Pilot in Command" who of course can be a warrant officer!

So "it depends." The USAF is going to have to work out exactly where their new warrant officers fit and how they use them alongside their NCOs and "commissioned officers." These things have variance across the services, each of which has its own rules, protocols, and traditions. Just ask anyone in the military what a "Chief" is! It is a term of respect, and in the Army, that's what a non-aviation warrant officer is called, but aviation warrant officers are not generally called "Chief" because in aviation units, "Chief" refers to a Crew Chief (a NCO). In the Navy, a Chief is a Chief Petty Officer (E7); in the Air Force, its a Chief Master Sergeant (E9). In the USAF, they probably won't call their warrant officers "Chief," but they will find themselves being called "Chief" when they are around the Army. In the USMC, a warrant officer can be called Gunner but generally is not called Chief. In the USN, a warrant officer can be called "Warrant" but not Chief. And so on.

Back in the ‘80s when I was in the USMC, we called our warrant officers, “gunners” which wasn’t accurate. There were real gunners who had their cwo bar on one collar and a bursting bomb on the other.

I finally saw one at the PX in Yuma, and I stopped to talk to him. He told me to tell my cwo to stop allowing people to call him gunner when he wasn’t one. He was certainly proud of his position.

Also, we had another one of our cwo’s become a first lieutenant, but he was an “LDO” lieutenant which stood for limited duty officer. He told us the difference between a regular first lieutenant as opposed to his LDO position, but it has been too long ago to remember.

My 93 year old father-in-law just died last year. He started at the end of World War II and retired as a cwo 4. He got reactivated during the first gulf war, and they were going to actually make him a cwo 5, which didn’t exist while he was active duty. The war ended too soon for him to go through the process so he remained a cwo 4.

The Army doesn't have Limited Duty Officers (LDO). LDOs are commissioned officers in grades O1 generally up to O3 or O4 in the Navy (and USMC) because of the need for strong technical expertise and responsibility in a specialized field. They are not "line officers" or "staff corps officers" per se, and I'm guessing they usually do not command or hold positions requiring generalists. They are typically former senior NCOs and/or warrant officers with specific education, skills, and long experience in their specialized technical fields. Sound familiar? The Navy uses LDOs in ways that are similar to the way the Army utilizes its senior warrant officers. Two different approaches to developing and retaining relatively small cadres of technical experts. Thinking of the Air Force's new warrant officers, the USAF may want to create a pathway for some of them to become "commissioned officers" (lieutenants, captains, majors) at some point in the future.

These personnel programs take a lot of management, and its not surprising that the USMC considered doing away with both warrant officers and LDOs back around 2014, presumably to streamline their personnel system. In the end, they decided to keep warrant officers and LDOs because of their value.

And finally, a warrant officer in the Canadian or British Army is an altogether different thing... in terms of NATO rank equivalents, a Warrant Officer 2 is equivalent to a U.S. E8, and a Warrant Officer 1 is equivalent to a U.S. E9. In other words, equivalent and serving in roles similar to U.S. senior NCOs. The new USAF cyber warrant officers will have to learn to navigate around this difference when serving alongside our allies.

About our LDO, we all thought it strange he went from cwo4 to 1st LT, skipping boot Louie. Again, I don’t remember too much of the details why that was…possibly pay?

quote:

Originally posted by ftttu:
Back in the ‘80s when I was in the USMC, we called our warrant officers, “gunners” which wasn’t accurate. There were real gunners who had their cwo bar on one collar and a bursting bomb on the other.

I finally saw one at the PX in Yuma, and I stopped to talk to him. He told me to tell my cwo to stop allowing people to call him gunner when he wasn’t one. He was certainly proud of his position.

Only “Infantry weapons officers” which are warrant officers with an a small arms expertise get the bursting bomb. They are the only one traditionally referred to as “gunner”.

Time to invest in coffee futures if there are going to be even more warrants roaming the earth, though I've been told CW05s are issued a Romulan invisibility cloak

^^^^^Ha Ha Ha^^^ My wife's brother-in-law is a retired CWO 5.

quote:

Originally posted by Blackmore:
Time to invest in coffee futures if there are going to be even more warrants roaming the earth, though I've been told CW05s are issued a Romulan invisibility cloak

Don’t forget the mystery. The rank and file (even most of the officers) really had no idea what the CWO actually did.

quote:

Originally posted by cooger:
What’s the significance of this? I never served so genuinely curious.

A Warrant Officer is a highly specialized technician who spends their entire career doing the same role, they’re not eligible for leadership positions. The most significant example are Army helicopter pilots. They’ll spend 20 years flying helos, they’ll never be a Squadron Commander, etc.


Of notable interest to me is which AFSCs they’re standing up for WO. The only example in that article is “Cyber”, I.e., they’re looking for experienced sysadmins/devops to keep technical knowledge in house without resorting to contractors. Any word on any other specialties they are teeing up for WOs?

quote:

Originally posted by Shackelford:
they’re not eligible for leadership positions.

That’s a common and somewhat pat description of warrant officers’ responsibilities, but it’s like saying that an Army E-7 platoon sergeant or E-8 first sergeant doesn’t fill a leadership position, and both of whom would strenuously object to that characterization.

I have been retired from the Army for a long time and things change, but as a warrant officer I was the special agent in charge of two separate CID (criminal investigation) resident agencies and responsible for the supervision of their operations and personnel including other warrant officers, NCOs, and civilian employees. In Germany there was even a separate one-agent branch office under my overall control.

When I was assigned on temporary duty to protective service details for the Secretary of Defense and to various investigative task forces, warrant officers ran the operations. Yes, there were “real” officers higher up the chains, but I don’t recall so much as seeing them.

In Vietnam a warrant officer was the agent in charge of the separate counterintelligence unit I was assigned to, and near the end of my tour when a second lieutenant was assigned to the unit, he didn’t do anything more than (and really not as much as) the CW3 had been responsible for previously.

As I understand, now warrant officers are assistant “commanders” of Special Forces detachments who can operate in the absence of the captain commanders.

So in the Army at least warrant officers have definitely filled leadership positions.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: sigfreund,