No, Lt Col Billy "Rasta" Songer, Violating the Constitution is Not Heroic

Back in the late 90s, I started Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) to learn how to fly the T-37 and see if I had what it took to be an Air Force pilot.  My flight commander was Captain Billy "Rasta" Songer, who pinned on O-4 while I was there.  He was an old F-16 pilot turned white jet instructor and he had graduated from the University of Florida.  So, naturally, during our flight commander meeting at the beginning of the program he told my butter bar self, "I see you went to FSU.  You'll be the first person I wash out of this program."

I have to admit it added to the stress as I wasn't sure if he was joking or not.  Of course I didn't wash out of the program and he was a wealth of knowledge.  He became a fixture in the AETC world and made a very long career out of it which has only ended recently.

Given that I loathe the Air Education and Training Command (AETC) with every fiber of my being for its non-combat culture and for turning flying airplanes into mindless cubicle dwelling clock-punching un-American careerism, it's perhaps not surprising that Rasta and I had a difference of values three decades later that ended up with him unfriending me on social media.

For some reason, Songer chose to use Memorial Day to discuss the crew of Zeus 95 which went down while participating in the unlawful war with Iran.  He took the opportunity to discuss how heavy drivers make up much of the white jet instructor force and insinuated that might have been a contributor to their demise.

Songer might well be correct, but I added that the crew also had some professional training deficiencies, given that they failed to refuse unlawful orders to participate in an unconstitutional and illegal war.  This blog is nothing if it's not a documentation of the many failures of AETC to role model, train, or support military officers making good on their oaths to support and defend the Constitution.

Songer thought me bringing up professional training deficiencies was funny but did not want to express why he found it laughable.

Despite my cajoling the ole Gator, he was not interested in discussing professional training deficiencies and only the shortfalls of heavy drivers instructing students.

So while winchester and outmatched, he decided to disengage and pickle the unfriend button.  It was an unwinning position he found himself in, offering up a Memorial Day tribute to failed public servants who violated the Constitution of the United States and broke our supreme law and offering them up as heroes.  He didn't stand a chance.  Maybe next year he'll memorialize General Benedict Arnold for his service or speak highly of a soldier who died while robbing a liquor store off post.

Public service has standards.  When an officer cannot meet those standards, we wash them out, we don't honor them for their failures.  You should know better having spent a career with grade sheets.

Splash one, Rasta.