Tailhook Scandal
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Tailhook Scandal
Ok you wise and sage guru's of knowledge......
The Tailhook Scandal, I have heard on television (simpsons and others) allueded to some sort of naughtiness in the USN. Can anyone provide some pukka gen on this topic or can they spin a nice yarn and tell all.
It's a depressing moroning day at work staring at my boss's empty chair. Long lunch and extra tea breaks are called for and I need some cheering up.
The Tailhook Scandal, I have heard on television (simpsons and others) allueded to some sort of naughtiness in the USN. Can anyone provide some pukka gen on this topic or can they spin a nice yarn and tell all.
It's a depressing moroning day at work staring at my boss's empty chair. Long lunch and extra tea breaks are called for and I need some cheering up.
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Have a mooch around Tailhook as a good starting point. It got very messy, with a lot of careers chopped short.
Even if you can't find the details, there should be plenty of other tales to fend off boredom for a while.
Even if you can't find the details, there should be plenty of other tales to fend off boredom for a while.
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Plenty of info around.
Reader's Digest version, what had been, for decades, a boys' party under the guise of the Tailhook Association's annual gathering, got out of hand regarding the then new inclusion of female aviators. Some were abused, some just offended.
An intense, politically driven manhunt (literally) ensued. Not only were the actual abusers disciplined, but, as mentioned, even being at the event was enough to stop/ruin careers.
To the point that a line on the officers' fitness/promotion record had to state whether the member was in attendance at that year's tailhook.
Dozens of officers were put out to pasture (no pun intended) as a result.
One of the best dark humor results was the subsequent flight suit patch:
Bart Simpson in the center stating, "I didn't do it, nobody saw me do it, you can't prove anything" with a "I survived Tailhook '91" or whatever the year was on the outer circumference.
It was officially banned by the Chief of Naval Operations which made it even more popular.
Reader's Digest version, what had been, for decades, a boys' party under the guise of the Tailhook Association's annual gathering, got out of hand regarding the then new inclusion of female aviators. Some were abused, some just offended.
An intense, politically driven manhunt (literally) ensued. Not only were the actual abusers disciplined, but, as mentioned, even being at the event was enough to stop/ruin careers.
To the point that a line on the officers' fitness/promotion record had to state whether the member was in attendance at that year's tailhook.
Dozens of officers were put out to pasture (no pun intended) as a result.
One of the best dark humor results was the subsequent flight suit patch:
Bart Simpson in the center stating, "I didn't do it, nobody saw me do it, you can't prove anything" with a "I survived Tailhook '91" or whatever the year was on the outer circumference.
It was officially banned by the Chief of Naval Operations which made it even more popular.
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stacker, that's the one.
max, apparently for many years it was. Not being USN or a tailhooker, I wasn't privy to attending.
I forget the officer's name, but apparently the USN lost a future great CNO after some very politically correct members of Congress made the Navy pull from the rear admiral's promotion list, an officer who was simply at the event.
Congress refused to confirm any further promotions for the Navy until they did so.
The officer retired immediately as a captain.
Imminent senility makes me not remember if the CNO also resigned as a result.
max, apparently for many years it was. Not being USN or a tailhooker, I wasn't privy to attending.
I forget the officer's name, but apparently the USN lost a future great CNO after some very politically correct members of Congress made the Navy pull from the rear admiral's promotion list, an officer who was simply at the event.
Congress refused to confirm any further promotions for the Navy until they did so.
The officer retired immediately as a captain.
Imminent senility makes me not remember if the CNO also resigned as a result.
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Quote:
Lehman ate whipped cream out of the stripper’s crotch.
- Now there's a real fighter pilot!
Lehman ate whipped cream out of the stripper’s crotch.
- Now there's a real fighter pilot!
Oh bugger.
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According to PBS many attendees were said to have "viewed Tailhook as a means of celebrating US [sic!] victory over Iraqi forces".
Then within 5 years was the VF-213 F-14 accident in Nashville and the Navy's sudden interest in safety culture - bringing in trick cyclists to weed out poor leaders
The careers of fourteen admirals and almost 300 naval aviators were scuttled or damaged by Tailhook. For example Secretary of the Navy H. Lawrence Garrett III and CNO Admiral Frank Kelso were both at Tailhook '91. Garrett ultimately resigned and Kelso retired early two years after the convention.
A Navy-wide policy was implemented in which any officer who came up for promotion had to sign a paper asking if he or anyone in his command had been at Tailhook '91. If the answer was 'yes' the candidate's promotion was set aside for special evaluation.
A Navy-wide policy was implemented in which any officer who came up for promotion had to sign a paper asking if he or anyone in his command had been at Tailhook '91. If the answer was 'yes' the candidate's promotion was set aside for special evaluation.
beginning of the end in the military...the advent of political correctness
The whole Tailhook episode goes to show what happens in Vegas doesn't necessarily stay in Vegas. Any women there that wasn't aware of the antics that should have been expected was purposely naive. A lot of good men's careers were ruined.
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Originally Posted by brickhistory
apparently the USN lost a future great CNO after some very politically correct members of Congress made the Navy pull from the rear admiral's promotion list, an officer who was simply at the event.
Congress refused to confirm any further promotions for the Navy until they did so.
Congress refused to confirm any further promotions for the Navy until they did so.
To fullly understand Tailhook, one has to understand the times.
As you'd expect from a bunch of testosterone and adrenaline-fueled, aggressive, type-A personalities who have an annual party away from home, each new year brought the opportunity to outdo the last. This is a natural evolution which wiser and more experienced leadership should have kept an eye upon. Instead, they turned a blind eye and let boys be boys. Mix this with a Congress which saw integrating women into the military along the same lines as desegregating the military in 1948. Transitions are always difficult. While this transition was an excellent idea, the forced nature of having Congress jam it down the military's throats caused problems.
Without going into too much detail, part of the problem was the American culture itself. Another was the inclusion of people who weren't necessarily military material. Another, and the main one in my opinion, was an unreasonable timetable and expectation by certain Senators and Congressional Representatives who latched onto the sexual integration of the military as a reelection tool instead of looking after the best interests of the nation.
One side note is that Lt. Paula Coughlin, the main officer who filed a claim of harassment, contributed to the lusty activities by participating in a leg-shaving contest the night before her "assualt". On the night of her complaint she was sober and on duty. While attempting to carry out some orders, she had to pass through the party floor (fourth floor?) and several fellow but drunken Naval officers fondled her breasts as she tried to get by them. She was pissed and I don't blame her.
What should never have happened due to a failure of leadership then should never have been more than the repremands on the offending officers. Instead of responding to her complaints about being grabbed and fondled, Lt. Coughlin was basically told to get over it. This angered her and she bumped it up the chain until the politicians got ahold of it and we know the results.
Another outcome of the political nature of Tailhook was the death of Lieutenant Kara S. Hultgreen, a pilot who should never have been put into the position she was except out of political necessity to make up for the lapses committed by Naval leadership at Tailhook '91. If both the Naval leadership and Washington politicians had both properly done their jobs plus put the needs of the country first, Lt. Hultgreen wouldn't have died and our nation would be short one F-14 and a crew.
Also, by cutting a swath through the leadership of the Navy at a crucial time - including giving Dick Cheney the chance to install a protege, Sean O'Keefe, as SecNav - Talhook helped Cheney and OSD to drive through a single-source Super Hornet program rather than having a competition with an updated F-14.
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The whole Tailhook episode goes to show what happens in Vegas doesn't necessarily stay in Vegas. Any women there that wasn't aware of the antics that should have been expected was purposely naive. A lot of good men's careers were ruined.
Yeah! Any woman who goes to a convention on Naval Aviation should absolutely expect to be sexually assaulted.
I don't condone some of the stuff that happened. Just the same I question the motivation and the judgement of the women attendee's who later complained.
I've been invited to many a party that I've declined to attend because I was aware of what was going to happen.
