PS. Just had a PM from someone, so I thought I would clarify. I'm not digging at individuals regarding their op experience. However, I am asking the questionof whether we should ask our strategic leaders to have significant hands-on op experience? The fact that a large proportion of air traffickers have not deployed very much is not a dig at them - they have had a very important ops support task to do here in the UK.
I've served around Air Traffickers in the Falklands, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Balkans. Often it is their specialisation that lets them down as it is normally not easily transferrable to control in other country's airspace.
I've often thought we send too many non-op types to staff college who end up being starred ranks and their knowledge of our core business (airpower projection) is woefully thin - again, this is not a dig at any particular individual on this thread!
LJ