Women in the Air Force

The Air Force had their pick of the best - some guys could get into the Navy but not the Air Force. It was all based on your ASVAB. I supposed that the Air Force took some sub-optimal types since the Security Police had some real losers and I met them in all AFSCs. Working in personnel you see all kinds. But it was the late 1970s and getting women in and in large numbers was important so as market share goes female personnel had a bigger market share in the problem areas.

Not racial or ethnic - black or white or brown or whatever they were taking the top layer and they succeeded or failed on merit or lack thereof. But women were another matter. First of all the pressure to recruit women got a lot of bad ones in. The scene in Private Benjamin isn't that far off - there were unscrupulous recruiters and there were ditzy recruits. In the movie the recruit turned out pretty well but in the real world some didn't. Many didn't.

As one would expect there was a lot of buyer's remorse. Young women eighteen or not much more thrust into an environment that was hard for men. We had about three to five washouts in a flight of fifty but with men they could be strict as always - not so much with women. So most women (we're talking mostly eighteen-year-olds) unless they totally blew up during basic were passed on to tech school. That was easier so if they made it that far they would soon be at their first duty station.

As I said we had plenty of men of all kinds and colors. A black guy that couldn't cut it would either get it together or would be gone. There would be one now and then that would holler "racism" but the other 90% of black guys (or Hispanic or Asian or whatever) were doing just fine and that didn't work. But women were another matter. It wasn't so much that disciplining a bad one would get you accused of sexism - sometimes but not often - but most supervisors and commanders were men and didn't want go be seen as being too hard on women.

So there were a goodly number of crazies and they generally made for a lot of paperwork before they were removed. Even the ones that wanted out - homosexuality was grounds for dismissal back then and a couple of them arrange to get caught and be gone that way. And some were pretty much just unsuitable and never should have gotten through basic.

We had one in the CBPO. She was an A1C - it was pretty much automatic promotion from E1 up through E4 unless you screwed up and got it delayed) - and worked in one of the offices down the hall (I was in the big boss's office) and was always getting into trouble of some kind or other. We were all relieved when she requested a SWAP (where two personnel on different bases with the same AFSC and rank ask their commanders to let them trade places) to a base in Italy. It was approved and she was gone and we back in the U.K. were happy.

Col. Sawyer (actually Lt. Colonel but we called them Colonel informally) came in one day and updated us on the status of A1C Rike. His opposite number at the base in Italy she had gone to wasn't happy.

"Bill," he said, "that broad got here and got on her back and I haven't been able to get her off of it and now she's pregnant by an unknown officer."

That was her. Pretty good looking and most likely would have been fun but it was never offered to me. And her being mentally flaky as scratch biscuits wouldn't have been a good idea.

Screwing officers - especially pilots - was a popular activity among the young recruits. No doubt a lot were looking for a guy to marry but how many young guys that just want to get laid and the insignia makes it easier actualy want to marry any of the chicks they're screwing and what kind of woman wants to marry a man with that attitude. We were young and horny all the time but we kept things in perspective.

I palled around with one of them - they couldn't screw their pilots all the time with schedules and all - and as I said they were always horny. He gave her a TR-6 to drive around and I drove it some. Hell of a car and I bought one some years later and restored it. Steering wheel on the correct (not right) side of course being here in the U.S.A.

One little wench better looking than A1C Rike was - call her Cindy. Really good looking, about as smart as Irish Setters are reputed to be. I never had one but had a few chicks that were about that smart. The right personality could cover a lot of sins in the IQ department and some of them weren't bad. Cindy was about like that but she screwed anything that got close enough anytime or anywhere. Including when on duty. She eventually got in enough trouble they kicked her out - women had to work hard to get booted - and there was always a couple of months of processing and they would be given some duty where they couldn't do any damage. If their job was working on airplanes - or even trucks - you didn't want them doing it. They assigned her to the orderly room of my outfit and just hung out there. Pretty pleasant but kinda dumb. I said the Air Force got their pick of the best but the number of women applying wasn't high enough to meed their goals so they took a lot of substadard ones and they usually worked about as well as Cindy did.

There were a few that were good-looking and fairly smart and like to party with the guys. What they called the headquarters group was support people - admin types like me and cooks and some others and when I arrived at Cripple Creek they had one big three-story WWII barracks - all the others were just two floors - and even with the lowest floor used for TDY personnel it was big enough for all those that didn't want to live off-base. If you lived off-base you pretty much needed a car and for me it wasn't worth the trouble with all getting a car and jumping through the hoops of the British motorcar regulations - they were predatory on Americans - so I lived on base. It was easy enough to call a taxi if you weren't going somewhere with someone who had a car.

When I got there the top floor was women and the middle floor was men. By the time I left they had taken the second floor - half at a time. So one end had women and the other end had men until they moved the remaining men. Pretty good deal as we partied with some of them and had a pretty good time but we shared laundry facilities and sometimes they would steal you underwear. We took our uniforms to the base laundry but washed our socks and undies and civvies. What they were doing with our underwear I have no... well, considering how many lesbians there were I have some ideas.

Not that some of the lesbians weren't good-looking and some of those went both ways. And I often suspected that some normie females that roomed with a lesbian availed themselves of the opportunity to see what it was like. It would get you kicked out but if a gal was just fooling around with her roomie and didn't make a big deal of it no problem.

One chick that was pretty hot my roomie was doing and her roomie wasn't that not - the kind you would do if there was not something better - and she was a lesbian. I believe she was the real deal because I read her file (being in personnel) and somehow she got exposed and the file had some love letters in it (this was late '70s and before email) and it was pretty explicit like the kid who was seduced by the hardcase from the base post office they had the juicy details. So they get discharged but it takes a while with the paperwork and meanwhile they're just there - don't go to work or anything but still in their quarters - and my roomie was up there visiting his friend and comes back and says when he went in they had the lights off and some candles and wine and so on and he figured that his normal girlfriend was perhaps sampling the forbidden fruit. I figured it the same way.

I spent the last year and a half at Vandenberg in California. Cool E-8 that was going to retire in a year or so and a retread first lieutenant that thought I was the greatest thing since contraception and worked four days most weeks. The lieutenant apparently had a contraception fail - or his gal did - and she got pregnant. She was a Senior Airman (automatic at about three years) and would put on buck sergeant before her four years was up and a real cutie and real sweet. They got married and she exited the service to become a civilian.

I did't bang that many military chicks (there being lots of British chicks and all) there but in southern California and a buddy who came from the UK with me and got out about a year before I did and went to live at Porterville - near Bakersfield - and I used to drive up on weekends and party with him and his gang. The California girls around there like to have fun as much as or more than the military chicks did.

We had one chick in my shop - an A1C - and she wasn't even as bright as Cindy but at least close if not equal in promiscuity. She liked to do officers - most of them did - but between the lack of both intelligence and personality I didn't find her appealing even though she was decent looking and had a seriously hot body. She was into officers too when she could get them so wasn't avaiable that much or as appealing.