Why does the Warrant Corps Need WOLF?

  That was short and sweet!

   The Warrant Officer Corps is based on experience. We want the most experienced soldiers to ascend to the Corps. If we allow less qualified applicants to enter, our experience base, capabilities, and reputation, become tainted. Aviation is the example here. With the treatment of the aviators at an all time low, pilots are leaving in droves.  Promotion rates of 80% look good to some, but we are losing 20-30% of those each year. To make up the difference, the Army decided to pay the Apache pilots $12,000 a year to ease their pain while they train new people they won't have to pay the bonus to. Then, they lowered the standards to allow more people to be selected and accepted to flight school. Just what I want, a partially acceptable pilot!

   On top of that, they promote all flight Candidates to WO1 after just 6 weeks of politically correct officer training. Then for the next year, this soldier gets to go through flight school with almost NO guidance, mentorship or a CLUE about being a Warrant. Soon after getting to their first unit, they get promoted to CW2. 

   That gives us an unqualified CW2 pilot with less than a year in a unit. When that soldier is tasked to represent the Warrant Corps as an LNO or do any planning with supported units, the rest of us look like crap all because this soldier did not receive the training he or she required. It is not their fault (well, some it is). The army is a cheap institution and God forbid you want well trained people and have to pay for it! What's next, a 2 year option for West Point Graduates? Yeah, like the WPPS would allow any money to be taken from their programs!

   We need a voice who speaks FOR us. All the best intentions of the senior Warrant Leadership seems to fall short in many areas. There have been some great gains for the W-5's (and W-4(P)) but the rest of us are still sucking. Who does that leave? Where are our Grey Wolves? We must revitalize from within.  Many of our good Grey Wolves have left and (Sorry, guys) many who make W-5 shouldn't. Many were the one's who checked the blocks instead of mentoring the Pack. Don't get me wrong, there are outstanding W-5's. I don't know all of them.  But, there are concerns about what some of them are doing for the Corps.  Is it the Corps they care about? Or themselves?

(What is MENTORING?)