Originally Posted by OK465
Energy Management (EM) in a fighter aircraft had nothing to do with the Earth frame of reference, other than avoiding contact with it.
I'm beginning to feel like I was lied to all those years and never noticed it.
Not really. Understanding the forces on the plane requires knowledge of what the plane is doing relative to the air mass. When you have have an air mass that throws curves at you knowing what the plane's going to do may become more difficult due to the plane's inertia. Considering only the air mass is good for estimating which direction the energy will change. For more absolute numbers one must consider that large annoying attractive lump of hard stuff far below. Then you know "how much" the energy changed and what factors are contributing to that change including changes in the air mass.