An Air Force Senior Airman with the 6th Communication Squadron network infrastructure technician, bundles a fiber jumper at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, Mar. 7, 2023. (Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Derrick Bole) The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement.
By: FEDweek StaffThe Air Force plans to bring warrant officers back into the fold. Speaking at the Air Force Association Warfare Symposium in Aurora, Colorado on Feb. 12 Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin said the service intends to place warrants in IT and cyber career fields. The hope is by reintroducing ranks that disappeared from active duty some 45 years ago would help attract and retain highly skilled specialists.
“We are going to be cautious before we broaden this beyond these particular career fields, because we want to make sure what we’re doing is fit for a purpose specific to the need that we have,” Allvin told the audience as he delivered the symposium’s keynote address.
“We are in a competition for talent, and we understand that technical talent is going to be so critical to our success as an Air Force in the future,” said Allvin, according to the Air and Space Forces Association.
His comments followed reports regarding the reintroduction of warrant officers that appeared recently in social media. One such anonymous Facebook post referred to a plan to conduct training for new warrant officers at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama. The Air and Space Forces web story said the plan, as described on the Facebook post, would call for an initial class of 30 airmen with prior service. The association later learned that the training could actually entail as many as 200 junior and 50 senior warrant officers a year.
Allvin said the service would proceed cautiously with the plan. Key to the reintroduction’s success, he said, would be how effective it is in encouraging talented people to join and keeping them in uniform once they decide to do so. Assessing its efficacy would take years, he added.
“We’re still a force that develops leaders, so we’re not going to relegate the entire force to warrant officers,” Allvin said.
The Air Force and Space Force are the only armed services that currently do not have warrant officers.
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