Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Air Force Times
January 14, 2008
Pg. 9
By Michael Hoffman
The new 5th Bomb Wing commander at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., isn’t mincing words.
Col. Joel Westa described his wing’s looming nuclear surety inspection as “the most scrutinized inspection in the history of time.” He understands his airmen have something to prove to the rest of the Air Force and the nation.
So it’s not surprising that a recently announced delay of the inspection, which had been planned for Jan. 23, has many observers wondering what’s going on.
It’s been a little more than four months since airmen at Minot made the unprecedented mistake of unknowingly loading a B-52 with six nuclear warheads and flying them from North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base, La.
After a six-week investigation into the incident, Maj. Gen. Richard “Dick” Newton, deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements, said an “erosion of adherence to weapons-handling standards” led to five major procedural errors at Minot. Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne called it an “unacceptable mistake.”
The “Bent Spear” incident resulted in the firing of Westa’s predecessor, Col. Bruce Emig. Two group commanders and a squadron commander also got sacked, and 65 airmen were decertified from working with nuclear weapons, basically unable to do their jobs until they were recertified.
Still, with all that pressure and all that time, the 5th Bomb Wing isn’t ready to get back to work.
When Air Combat Command inspectors visited Minot on Dec. 16 for its initial nuclear surety inspection — held before the NSI can start — they decided to push back the scheduled Jan. 23 inspection, consequently delaying the process to recertify the wing to handle nuclear weapons.
Since the ACC commander decertified the 5th Bomb Wing from its wartime mission — maintaining part of the nation’s nuclear stockpile — shortly after the incident, the Air Force has relied on airmen from Barksdale’s 2nd Bomb Wing to continue operations at Minot.
Meanwhile, the 5th Bomb Wing’s airmen are sitting on the sideline, training until the wing is recertified. To do that, it must pass its NSI, Westa said.
It took two months before Westa was given authority by ACC to train and recertify the airmen who had lost their certification under the Personnel Reliability Program, which the U.S. uses to monitor those who handle nuclear weapons.
To date, he said about 95 percent of those who lost their certification to handle nukes are now recertified under the commander’s guidance. Westa recertified most of the airmen not involved in the incident, but he said there are still some who will never get it back.
Westa pointed to the lack of senior enlisted leadership and the short amount of time he and other Minot officials had to train the airmen on new procedures as the cause of the delay of the inspection.
“The key piece that is driving all this is the flow of information was slow to come after the investigation and caused us some time that we were unable to train, and there were some key billets that weren’t changed,” he said.
Along with the high-ranking officers, four senior NCOs with the 5th Munitions Squadron were fired, pushing back the squadron’s ability to train the recertified airmen, Westa said.
“We lost four really critical SNCOs, and then there were some other unfilled positions,” he said. “It took awhile to get [their replacements] identified.”
Westa said he expects to bring aboard the necessary senior enlisted leaders this month and, once they get settled, to get back on track toward restarting the inspection process following about a 60-day training period.
“There was about a two-month period until we could go back to just training, and it’s a significant skill set,” he said. “It’s something that requires constant honing. The weapons we are talking about have extremely tight tolerances.”
He did confirm that the disciplinary actions over the incident have ceased, and the ACC investigation led by Lt. Gen. Norman Seip, which looked into potential criminal charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, is closed without anyone being charged.
The 5th Bomb Wing commander could not go into detail over how his wing has amended its procedures to prevent a Bent Spear incident from occurring again, but he said he could “guarantee beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is not a weapon moved that [he] does not absolutely know about.”
The changes to procedure he could describe dealt with the lengths to which airmen go to verify they are moving the correct weapon. Every move is backed up by five or six personal checks and five or six database checks, Westa said.
Every time a nuclear weapon is moved, it can’t occur without Westa’s voice approval. This is not new, but Westa said only one or two checks used to be made. Now, he is intimately involved with each and every movement from storage to its final destination.
Also, the status of each nuclear weapon is now briefed to Westa, much like the status of each aircraft owned by the wing.
Although Westa said he was initially disappointed over the delayed NSI, he said this was an inspection that the wing needed to be 100 percent sure it would pass.
The last time the 5th Bomb Wing was inspected, in 2006, it received the highest rating — satisfactory.
“No one wants to see us fail,” he said. “It’s not one of those things where you can just scrape through an NSI.” So far, the date of the next inspection has not been set.
January 14, 2008
Pg. 9
By Michael Hoffman
The new 5th Bomb Wing commander at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., isn’t mincing words.
Col. Joel Westa described his wing’s looming nuclear surety inspection as “the most scrutinized inspection in the history of time.” He understands his airmen have something to prove to the rest of the Air Force and the nation.
So it’s not surprising that a recently announced delay of the inspection, which had been planned for Jan. 23, has many observers wondering what’s going on.
It’s been a little more than four months since airmen at Minot made the unprecedented mistake of unknowingly loading a B-52 with six nuclear warheads and flying them from North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base, La.
After a six-week investigation into the incident, Maj. Gen. Richard “Dick” Newton, deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements, said an “erosion of adherence to weapons-handling standards” led to five major procedural errors at Minot. Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne called it an “unacceptable mistake.”
The “Bent Spear” incident resulted in the firing of Westa’s predecessor, Col. Bruce Emig. Two group commanders and a squadron commander also got sacked, and 65 airmen were decertified from working with nuclear weapons, basically unable to do their jobs until they were recertified.
Still, with all that pressure and all that time, the 5th Bomb Wing isn’t ready to get back to work.
When Air Combat Command inspectors visited Minot on Dec. 16 for its initial nuclear surety inspection — held before the NSI can start — they decided to push back the scheduled Jan. 23 inspection, consequently delaying the process to recertify the wing to handle nuclear weapons.
Since the ACC commander decertified the 5th Bomb Wing from its wartime mission — maintaining part of the nation’s nuclear stockpile — shortly after the incident, the Air Force has relied on airmen from Barksdale’s 2nd Bomb Wing to continue operations at Minot.
Meanwhile, the 5th Bomb Wing’s airmen are sitting on the sideline, training until the wing is recertified. To do that, it must pass its NSI, Westa said.
It took two months before Westa was given authority by ACC to train and recertify the airmen who had lost their certification under the Personnel Reliability Program, which the U.S. uses to monitor those who handle nuclear weapons.
To date, he said about 95 percent of those who lost their certification to handle nukes are now recertified under the commander’s guidance. Westa recertified most of the airmen not involved in the incident, but he said there are still some who will never get it back.
Westa pointed to the lack of senior enlisted leadership and the short amount of time he and other Minot officials had to train the airmen on new procedures as the cause of the delay of the inspection.
“The key piece that is driving all this is the flow of information was slow to come after the investigation and caused us some time that we were unable to train, and there were some key billets that weren’t changed,” he said.
Along with the high-ranking officers, four senior NCOs with the 5th Munitions Squadron were fired, pushing back the squadron’s ability to train the recertified airmen, Westa said.
“We lost four really critical SNCOs, and then there were some other unfilled positions,” he said. “It took awhile to get [their replacements] identified.”
Westa said he expects to bring aboard the necessary senior enlisted leaders this month and, once they get settled, to get back on track toward restarting the inspection process following about a 60-day training period.
“There was about a two-month period until we could go back to just training, and it’s a significant skill set,” he said. “It’s something that requires constant honing. The weapons we are talking about have extremely tight tolerances.”
He did confirm that the disciplinary actions over the incident have ceased, and the ACC investigation led by Lt. Gen. Norman Seip, which looked into potential criminal charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, is closed without anyone being charged.
The 5th Bomb Wing commander could not go into detail over how his wing has amended its procedures to prevent a Bent Spear incident from occurring again, but he said he could “guarantee beyond a shadow of a doubt that there is not a weapon moved that [he] does not absolutely know about.”
The changes to procedure he could describe dealt with the lengths to which airmen go to verify they are moving the correct weapon. Every move is backed up by five or six personal checks and five or six database checks, Westa said.
Every time a nuclear weapon is moved, it can’t occur without Westa’s voice approval. This is not new, but Westa said only one or two checks used to be made. Now, he is intimately involved with each and every movement from storage to its final destination.
Also, the status of each nuclear weapon is now briefed to Westa, much like the status of each aircraft owned by the wing.
Although Westa said he was initially disappointed over the delayed NSI, he said this was an inspection that the wing needed to be 100 percent sure it would pass.
The last time the 5th Bomb Wing was inspected, in 2006, it received the highest rating — satisfactory.
“No one wants to see us fail,” he said. “It’s not one of those things where you can just scrape through an NSI.” So far, the date of the next inspection has not been set.