Open and Honest reporting culture? Clearly doesn't exist over there otherwise an evidently experienced and knowledgable engineer would not have taken the action he did. The USAF ought to take a careful look at itself... Just imagine if a 'whistleblower ' had highlighted problems with Nimrod a few years ago for example rather than relying upon what appears to have been a chain of command willing to ignore problems at some level? They ought to consider that he's done them a favour; particularly since it appears he went to Senators in the first instance and not the papers. Do they have a flight safety orgnaisation with teeth like we do?
In general I think we do pretty well across here but sadly I think that similar things happen on occasion on this side of the pond; I just wish that people would speak frankly up the chain and that higher would respect that frankness and do something about it, rather than sh*ting on the individual from above. There are far too many sh*t filters in all organisations and inevitably selection for promotion is from those who don't pass on the bad news .
We are the poorer because of it.