Danny:-
perhaps our Moderators (bless their little cotton socks), who by their forebearance have allowed Cliff's (RIP) Thread of long ago to grow into the best thing on PPRuNe, may allow it to run on renamed as above when its original title has (literally) expired.
Danny, if the Military Forum ran a thread called
Crewroom in Cyberspace
I suspect that, unlike with this one, they would be forever having to intervene. It could be argued that a whole Forum exists anyway at
Jet Blast - PPRuNe Forums
or indeed in the shape of the entire Military Forum itself. No, with due respect, you and your WW2 colleagues are the glue that binds this thread together. I doubt very much if a thread entitled "Gaining an RAF Pilot's Brevet in the Cold War" would get past page 1, unless it be filled by those of more junior years posting what is quaintly termed 'banter'.
So, back to the crewroom. I see that there is at last a battered chair free and a tea stained copy of Tee Emm to thumb through, so I'll just settle down with a cuppa and join in.
Danny, I'm sure that the basic problem with the Arnold scheme at the start was exactly as you surmise, ie not the students but the USAAC. It wasn't yet fully at war and wasn't going to change its habits for a bunch of Brits. The same syndrome existed in the USN which didn't do convoy, the US Army which didn't fear Rommel, and indeed the USAAC which could defend itself by day over the Reich. All very expensive lessons to learn. Being washed out stateside was perhaps a hard outcome but pales into insignificance in comparison perhaps.
blind pew, interesting stuff re BEA. It rather chimes with my admittedly biased outlook. I remember just before I PVR'd in '73 a friend of mine left to join BOAC. He was elated and didn't appreciate my put down that I wouldn't want to leave the RAF only to do yet more government work, thank you. As it was I got a job with Dan-Air until we were duly swallowed up by BA in '92. It was truly an eye-opener.
Professionally we had to learn the 'monitored approach', a different Flight System, etc, all fair enough for, "he who pays the piper...". The eye-opener was the labyrinthine bureaucracy of the company that occupied our one administrator that came with us 24/7, as well as low morale - both ours and seemingly the rest of BA. Ours was down to 'survivor syndrome' whereas we had kept our jobs (in a BA subsidiary BAEOG, paid at DA -10%) while the majority had lost theirs, being on the wrong fleet and/or the wrong base. Theirs seemed to be simply the BA status quo.
We were of course well monitored by the BA training establishment, and I remember one such captain down from LHR to route check us out of LGW. At the end of the day he had little to comment on other than to say, "your cabin crew, they're very friendly, aren't they?". I should hasten to add that this was said in an utterly sincere way lest anyone imagine some double entendre! It left us wondering what his normal experiences were to make such a comment...
Oh, for the record, at an all fleets training meeting at LHR, the worry was raised of BA taking on "all these ex charter pilots". The response was not to worry, as they had now all completed their BA "harmonisation" training with an average rating of a BA High Average!