USAF Special Warfare Special Tactics Officer
EPISODE 24
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WELCOME TO THE TEAM ROOM FOR OUR FIRST EVER STO INTERVIEW. ON THIS EPISODE AARON USES BIG WORDS, WINK ABANDONS THE ENLISTED RANKS, AND WE ALL END UP A LITTLE SMARTERER.
INTRO
Intro (00:03):
You're listening to the Ones Ready podcast, a team of Air Force Special Operators forged in combat with over 70 years of combined operational experience as well as a decade of selection instructor experience. If you're tired of settling and you want to do something, you truly believe in, you're in the right place. Now here's your host, PJ team leader, jujitsu lover, meme enthusiast, dad joke aficionado , Aaron Love.
Aaron (00:27):
Welcome. Thanks. Subscribe!
AlphaBrew Coffee. Strikeforce Energy. Eberlestock.
Wink intro.
Wink (01:12):
Hey Aaron. Thanks for having me.
Aaron (01:14):
I like how we're having this conversation. We live literally a block away. We I was like, Hey, what do you want me to call you before the podcast? Wink and I were talking, I was like, you want me to just call you Wink? He's like, yeah. It's not like I'm hidden. There's one Winkeleer on the global. I think they're going to know it's me. So how's this Friday morning treat and you dude?
Wink (01:30):
It's pretty good. So far. Sunny and cold up here in Washington. It's not raining.
WINK’S BACKGROUND
Aaron (01:35):
So if you guys don't know, Wink was a prior enlisted CCT, so that means he started off as a Combat Controller. Just take us all the way back when you tell us a little bit about, , how you got into the Air Force, how it was getting into the Air Force and being a Controller or something you thought you wanted to do all the time or did you just come up with it in high school?
Wink (01:55):
So actually I enlisted the Air Force back in 2008. Prior to that I'm originally from Long Island, New York. I attended college and upstate New York and then at a school on Long Island. It wasn't something that I was originally planning on doing, but both my parents were prior Air Force, so I knew quite a bit about it. The effects of 9/11 back in 2001 hit our community pretty hard. And a lot of my friends and myself were feeling a little more patriotic than we used to. After that all happened. And we saw all the communities come together.
Aaron (02:33):
I imagine being in Long Island had something to do with it too, like just being in that anywhere in that area. I was in Ohio and I mean I felt at least some geographical connection because of the Shanksville plane Flight 93. But yeah, I imagine on Long Island there was a, there was a pretty big push at that point.
Wink (02:48):
Yeah. So I was a sophomore in high school when, when that all happened and we actually had some families from my high school that lost parents and relatives and stuff through that. It definitely kind of rocked through all the communities over there. I graduate high school 2003. Attended college, for soccer and track. My major at the time was linguistics. Yeah. My whole plan was to go like English as a second language teacher and do a whole bunch of traveling. After like three and a half years of college or so I decided to enlist. I felt like I was ready to at the time I was surfing, triathlons, soccer, a lot of endurance type things. So that aspect of Combat Control, Pararescue and stuff really spoke to me. I actually lived near the Pararescue Guard base in Westhampton and I was at the local Y with one of the PJ guys that came in and kind of told me a little bit about Combat Control and Pararescue. And he said basically, you can go Pararescue and save people, you can go to Combat Control and fight and kill people through like airpower. And my dad is a prior Air Traffic Controller with the FAA and in the Air Force prior to that. So I knew a whole lot about Air Traffic Control. So I leaned more towards that way. So again, enlisted in 2008 and then I did nine years as an enlisted Combat Controller at that point I finished up my college degree while I was enlisted and I decided that I wanted to go and try and lead people.
Aaron (04:41):
Oh, that's hurtful. I'm going to call you out. Let's pause right there. You talk about your enlisted time, like what was your enlisted time like as a Combat Controller? People always wonder, especially coming straight in off the streets and that was immediately post nine 11 so I imagine, the pipeline was probably pretty hectic. It was probably a different flavor. I was going through the same pipe or the same sort of feeling pipeline stuff, right about the same time as you are. So, what was it like for you back then?
Wink (05:09):
The pipeline was a pretty big shock when I first came into it. I think at that point you definitely didn't have the resources that you have now. Like I had to when I was trying to get recruited for Combat Control, they didn't have Special Operations recruiters or anything. So I basically went to my Air Force recruiter and I told him how to give me a PAST test and how to mark it down and stuff. So I had to tell him this is what you need to do. Like this is, this is what it is. And that's how it got submitted up. So, you had to do a whole bunch of research on your own because really you didn't have the resources that you have now. Once I entered the pipeline, it's kind of the same thing. You didn't really know what you were getting yourself into and within the first couple of days guys, once they were going through the orientation course were either pissed off and quit cause they're like, this is not what I thought it was going to be. Or you got guys that got super motivated and just were too dumb or too tough to quit cause they wanted to prove something to themselves or instructors or whatever. But there's a lot of emotions. But if you didn't have a good reason going in it was very easy to find reasons to quit, whether it's in those pool sessions or the really long ground training iterations where you're just doing calisthenics and that type of stuff.
Aaron (06:33):
Grass and gorillas in Texas forever. On the last podcast we were joking around about having those guys that kind of show up at selection don't really know what's going on. And they exactly like you said, they take like one of two ways. They either figure out what the job's all about and they're like, Holy cow, let's go do this thing. Or they're like, man, I am out of here. And they kind of quit and bounce out. So, moving forward throughout. Did you deploy as a controller?
Wink (06:56):
Yeah, I did apply multiple times as a controller to many different continents. I was previously stationed in Okinawa, Japan as well as in Florida. So I got the Pacific out, the central in Asia and all that. So it's been, no, deployment for me has been the same, which is something I really like about it. It's definitely not a career field that you go in and do the same thing every day. And that applies to your deployments as well whether it be moving up through the ranks, enlisted or officer or just in general where you're stationed.
TRANSITIONING FROM ENLISTED TO OFFICER
Aaron (07:27):
Got it. So then you hit seven years, you got some deployments under your belt, you've accomplished a whole lot at that point, right? So, and then you decide to take on another challenge and you want to go, you want to be an officer and you want to go be a STO. So what was actually, what was actually the trigger point? I know I was making fun of you for saying, you wanted to lead people and I was going to say, Hey, enlisted leadership, Hey, whatever. What was the transition point for you to go and say, all right, cool. I think I've accomplished everything I can as it enlisted, dude, let me try out being this officer.
Wink (07:58):
So for me when I transitioned over, I was in E-6 and at that point I was at my eight year mark and I had a decision to make if I wanted to make this a career like a 20 year career if I want to get out because I actually had a job lined up at the FAA as an air traffic controller and they were going to hold it for a certain amount of time for me and it was coming to that point. My wife still lets me know that I could be living in Denver, Colorado, being ATC guy, not traveling.
Aaron (08:29):
Every once in a while she just throws that just hit you with that note. Just, Hey, we could be in Colorado right now. You can be an air traffic controller. None of this would be going on.
Wink (08:37):
That's exactly right. Yeah. So at that point it was coming up to my 10 year mark and I felt like that was a decision point for me if I want to stay in and make it a career or if I want to get out. At that point I just decided I finished up my degree. And you're absolutely right about the enlisted leadership and the officer thing. Like there's no wrong answer when it comes to that, but I felt like I'm switching over into officer. I could help a lot more of the up and out and protecting the enlisted guys on the teams that I was going to be on what works and what doesn't in terms of leadership from a troop level and protecting those guys while still accomplishing the things that the commanders need you to accomplish. So I felt like it, strike that right balance. And I wanted selfishly at that point go from an E-6 to E-7 your team time is a little bit more limited.
Aaron (09:32):
Yeah. You're working on part of the time right there. Like you don't know when that next, that next WEPTAC assignment is coming.
Wink (09:39):
Yeah. So straight up the career for manager for Combat Control basically gave me a shout out that in the near future he was planning up on me in overseas unit in like a training and evaluation standpoint cause they needed like senior mid to senior level E-6 to go and do that. So I felt by going the officer out, it would allow me to get that team time more have that top cover for the guys that I knew and I knew wanted to train and work and I felt like I could do that effectively on both capacities. Ironically, once I turned switched over to become an officer, my first assignment was in future operations. Like literally the same job I would have had as an E-6. Got them. Didn't work out as planned, but it got a little better now.
Aaron (10:26):
Yeah. Can you can you talk about the selection process and we've put it out there for the phase one and phase two process, but straight from the horse's mouth. As a guy that's recently gone through it, just tell us what it's like for a STO or for an officer really to crosstrain specifically into STO and go to phase one and phase two selection. So if you can, it doesn't have to be crazy, but just hit the wave tops for us. What does that process look like?
Wink (10:49):
Sure. So like everything else you have your phase one application you're going to be submitting through and open to get picked up for that phase two. A majority for me since I was a prior, like the majority of the career field.
Aaron (11:03):
Yeah. And then let me pause you there. So the phase one application that's, that's all your paperwork that you're putting like what did you have to put in that packet? Because people always ask us, how to, there's a narrative in there. How do I make myself sound in the top 10% of these packets.
Wink (11:17):
So that's a pretty good question and my answer to that is going to be, you need to know why you're doing it. There's a bunch of these packages I go through all the time and a lot of the guys that are involved in the selection process, you'll have a mix of guys that have been doing recruiting for a while or some that are just new to it and just reviewing your packet and it might be guys that a line unit, there's something that are looking there. So the biggest thing with that is if you are can I curse? Yeah, sure. Go ahead.
Wink (11:52):
If you're not a genuine in your responses and your narrative and why you want to do this, you can see through that whether you go into phase two and those guys have files on you while they're reviewing you. In a phase two sense, they'll know right away if your phase one packet was full of shit, for lack of a better term. A way to put yourself in that top 10% is to one, be genuine to do, do a lot of research and know why you're going into a STO or CRO or those types of career fields. And I think that kind of raised your across the Air Force. So you're going to be an officer, right? You're going to be a leader first. If you are trying to go into a STO career field and you're putting in your phase one packet and you're like, I want to be a STO because I just want to go and job it and fight on the front lines and stuff, that's probably not the right spot. You should probably go enlisted first. Cause that's the primary duty, right? As an Air Force officer, you're there to lead and manage people first. And that especially rings true throughout your time as a STO. If you get there it's a selfless leader position and the minute you start like trying to look to do things for yourself, you're going to take it away from those other enlisted guys. And that's on the enlisted guys see and it affects your credibility and their respect with you. And also from a leadership perspective, the leaders above you can see that too. So it's a pretty big deal. So understand that it's that selfless leader position. Make your phase one package accurately, sorry, read that way. And that you are there to better the career for allows a whole and not just like yourself for the glory or if you will.
Aaron (13:37):
Yeah. Well, and then where the rubber meets the road is that phase two selection so that 7-10 day process that they're running out of Hurby. How did that compare the phase two portion to your orientation course or INDOC or previous time as a, as a Combat Controller.
Wink:
Yeah, no. So the biggest thing was I came in through as a Combat Controller at 22 years old. I assessed for phase two as a stow with like multiple deployments and a 31 year old STO with two surgeries under his belt. Right? The biggest thing was understanding that ROTC cadet or an Academy cadet that was 21 years old training for this nonstop as opposed to me at E-6 Tech Sergeant just getting off of surgery, probably going into another one. And at the end of the day when that phase two assessment ended, I still had to go back to work to go TDY. So for me you want to crush every event that you come into that I'm sure you've addressed the phase two and what that's like. Understanding that it's a marathon and not just balls to the wall on every event for an injury perspective, you're not going to do anyone any good if you're getting injured. And I'm not saying to Slack on any of that that's not what I'm trying to imply there.
Aaron (15:01):
And I think you just said to scurve on a couple of events like, Hey, save your energy. It's going to be a long day. That's what I heard. So.
Wink (15:10):
Take it as you will at 32 or 33 knowing that you don't need to absolutely sprint the first event on a Monday morning.
NCO VS OFFICER MENTALITY
Aaron (15:23):
Did you find, so especially in the interview process and some of the psychological evaluations in the, in the phase two selection process, did you find yourself making it a point to try to transition between that tech Sergeant NCO, sort of team leader role over to the officer role? Like how did that work for you? Were you, did they trip you up with any of those questions when you were at phase two?
Wink (15:52):
Those questions are asked, but those questions were asked prior in phase two and then prior to that as well. And that was one of the main things that I felt would have been my not limitation but more struggle would be transitioned over from very career field savvy E-6 leader of those and not really the biggest struggle I continue to have is try not to micromanage those NCOs that are really well-skilled in knowledge and let them run and do the job correctly and not try and take on all those tasks. So those were a lot of questions that were asking me for my specific situation and they weren't trip ups at all. Like it was kind of something I knew was coming cause it's just the unique situation that I was in and I think anyone that's crossing over into whatever career field whether it be prior enlisted going in or a prior officer trying to cross in phase two, you're going to get some similar questions asked I would imagine. Really my answer to that was, again, pretty genuine. Like, I know this is going to be one of my struggles and it's something I'm going to be focusing on throughout my time there. So you try and strike that fine balance of leadership and delegation and then actually going and putting your head down and getting the task done that needs to be done. One of the biggest things that was brought to light for me during phase two is when I was putting those leadership positions, if I had my head down to doing one individual task, too focused, I couldn't take a, take a step back and see the big picture, which is what you need to do a lot of times as a STO on multiple different mission sets.
Aaron (17:40):
It's funny how that stuff will transfer straight over. The like the lessons that you learned, Hey, I can't get sucked into this problem. I need to be able to step back, look at this entire problem and then fix it. It's funny that the first time that you were like, Hey, that's a transitional piece for me. This is who I am now. I can't be the guy that's on the X. I got to step back. That's, that's actually pretty cool that you can learn stuff from, from those selections and carry them forward. So,
Wink (18:04):
And I think like one of the biggest one of my biggest stories that I remember from selection without getting too into the weeds of everything tells is we were doing a team physical event over a long period of time. And I was put into a leadership position and finally striking that balance right away was something that I had to focus on because you either carry a whole bunch of weight and focus on the one task that needs to be accomplished while the whole team is trying to get that task done. But the minute you do that, like the instructors or anyone else will inject it to make sure that you need to take that step back and have that that head up and out and see the whole big picture and not just carry as much weight as you can. And that's the biggest thing that I've tried to take away from that is to continue to understand that. Yeah. Like I can, I can do this one task really well. I can take it off like one or maybe two guys hands, but the eight or nine other guys that are relying on me to guide them the right direction, see that big picture, some that I need to focus on more. And the guys that on my team will understand that that's my focus at that point. And that's really transitioning over to team level. It's where the up and out comes into play and having that credibility and really transparency and communication understanding from my level down to them from their level to me that that's like, those are our specified tasks.
WHAT IS A SPECIAL TACTICS OFFICER
Aaron (19:25):
That's a great transition. One of the questions that people ask us all the time about stoves is number one, like what is a stow? Like, tell us in your own words, man, what's a stow? What just, what's a special tactics officer?
Wink (19:37):
So for me, a Special Tactics Officer all comes down to you're in the Air Force, you're leading and managing people. Those people that you're leading and managing are those that have put in absurd amount of time into their job. They've got a lot of sacrifices up to get there and they want to be led correctly. So it's up to me to do that. Now we have a lot more dynamic challenges because we may have a whole bunch of different mission sets that we're dealing with. Whether it be that, Strike, that Access, that Personnel Recovery that we're focused on. And we do have a couple of different career fields that we're working with as well. But it's leading. Imagine those guys that have a great amount of talent and that want to be there it's very easy to lead people by force, but it's much harder to do it because they want to. And that's something that I have to focus on a whole launch. So with that you're training phases and stuff, yeah. You're setting up those training plans. You are taking those intents from your higher up and you are making sure that the team that you're on is accurately pursuing and achieving those goals. That leads up to your ultimate deployment. So you could be running an eight to 15 man team on a, on a battlefield for some kind of mission situation with recovery or access. Or you could be managing a whole bunch of guys that are focused on that JTAC and Strike portion that are going to farm out to those different teams. When you deploy. Or you could be sitting in a liaison position having to kind of answer all those questions to a bunch of other Air Force personnel that don't know much about Special Warfare. So those deployment pictures can look pretty dynamic. So I can't give you like, Hey, this is what you're going to do as a STO on your deployment. Like it's so wide ranging.
Aaron (21:32):
There's a ton of luck involved. Whether you think being busy as lucky or being not busy as lucky, depending on how you're kind of looking at it. But deployments are a weird beast. What, like what you see and what you do. And it's really a testament to the STO career field, how diverse you guys really are because you just ripped off like 10 or so many different capabilities that you had right there that put you in the position to do all those different things. On deployment. I always thought about Special Tactics Officer and then a Combat Rescue Officer. I always thought those were such diverse officer career fields cause you can really do a ton of different stuff.
Wink (22:15):
I think it's Special Warfare in general has such a unique mission set. Even outside of the STO/CRO look at like a Combat Controller/PJ/SR. You can say about how many people we have all over the world right now and each one of them their job is not the same as the guy as one country over or obviously a continent over. So, that's been kind of the recurrent theme throughout my whole career and most guys careers is, you're it's, you might have some deployments that look the same in terms of what you're doing job wise, but probably not.
Aaron (22:55):
Well, and you even have some really distinct stuff in your history just because I love that we're having this conversation and I'm pretending like I'm interviewing you, but once again we did all of these things yesterday. Like we saw each other yesterday and made our training plan and like we worked together every day. So it's funny, but I'll just continue to pretend as if I'm interviewing you and I don't know, but because I do know your backstory, you've actually been involved in some really distinct stuff like going for humanitarian operations or helping open airfields that were previously closed to assuage a national disaster and all that, all those other things like even you as a, as a STO have some of the kind of the one off missions of a lifetime. What was it like being involved on something that you, even as a STO, you're like, Holy cow, I could have never thought of that scenario.
Wink (23:44):
It comes down training and preparation. I'm being adaptable to whatever maybe thrown at you. So a couple of my deployments one of them in particular was a does, it wasn't supposed to be, but I ended up doing work in the Philippines and in 2013 when a typhoon high-end hit over there and it just destroyed a whole bunch of Eastern Philippines. And that was not my role at the time. I was like the one Combat Controller in the area that was working with the partner forces, but my base, I got phone calls and just said, Hey, like you're a Combat Controller, can you open up airfields? Yeah I can, but we actually had some old, like 1990s series, like runway lights and stuff that I ended up having to use. I was in Manila at the time cause we were in a lockdown just because of the typhoon was passing and we basically got a phone call like, Hey, like can you go open the airfield? Like at the East if we can, if we can get you out there and say, well yeah, I need lights so I need to fly down South. So I ended up like, they ended up flying me down South to pull up like a bunch of ACL lights which I like the old school airfield lights, they're just like the push button on and off just little white ones. And they were, they were not in the best work in order. Like the batteries expired in like 2008 and this was in 2013. So we had the whole flight out to the landing zone is that we were in a small aircraft because we knew that I could handle it. I'm literally like opening up boxes of little lights and testing batteries to see which ones work and what don't. So I can give an accurate lifespan for how long we can keep the runway open at night to start bringing in others. And my team that I asked for just any kind of support whatsoever for airfield security or excuse me or anything else and my team is a couple of conventional Army guys that were like a commo guy and then the embassy liaison that was like an Air Force major came out there to start like interface and against stuff in. So then we hit the ground and there was already like four or 5,000 displaced personnel that were lined up trying to get out. The air traffic control tower and the radios were intermittent but they had the Philippine air traffic controllers up there. So I gave him some of my radios to use for a primary ATC. And then whenever an American aircraft started coming in, I was that liaison to them, just to give them a heads up. Because as an Air Force Combat Controller you know a little bit more what the military aircraft are going to be looking for like these types of situations. Then Filipino conventional civilian air traffic controllers. So I ended up, I ended up being like the American interface for that as well as making sure the runway is clear, making more helicopter space and just clearing all debris out because we knew like a whole effort was common in men. There was something like 40 or 50 different countries and sort of bringing C-130s in and other stuff in at the time. Once the additional follow on forces got there the American guys from Okinawa, then then I went back to Manila where they were starting to stand up like a Joint Operation Center with a USAID and a couple other civilian entities. And I just ended up being a liaison for a special tactics at the time to let us know capabilities, limitations where everybody was and started like driving that way. One thing I find about such tactics is we're extremely proactive. We want to go get the mission done and we don't look at the limitations and give a can't we give why we can. So that's, that's what I found from there was our guys when we started getting down there, pulled CV-22s and everything else and just started going to find helicopter landing zones to bring aid or anything else and the humanitarian effort, times of the essence there. So that's something that that our guys did extremely well, was looked to find work, find displaced areas and start trying to get as far out there as you could to rescue as many people as you could.
Aaron (27:49):
Even if you need to commandeer, maybe, I don't know, a forklift, even if you have to like get some cars off the runway, who knows?
Wink (27:55):
I think the guys in Japan during the during the Fukushima power plant disaster, absolutely did that. And you might know a few of those guys.
Aaron (28:03):
I might've known some people that known some people that hot-wired a car one time, but I can't confirm nor deny that story.
Wink (28:13):
That was one of them. The most recent one was in 2016 and I'm in the Caribbean when a hurricane Irma and Maria and that whole series hit through, we ended up going down to the British Virgin islands at that. At that time I was tasked as the NCOIC and I had an O-3 CRO that went down with me and we staged out of Puerto Rico and I had an eight man team. We were going to like British Virgin islands and St Martin was the third one that we started doing assessments and stuff for and interface them with whatever military was out there. And that was again, now I could ramble on for an hour about how ST just gets things done ridiculously efficiently. It's pretty funny.
DAY TO DAY LIFE AS A STO
Aaron (28:55):
This is going to be another funny question because we work in the same office. But the other question we get about STO is Hey what's day to day life? Like? So what do you do when you're home station, when you're, so I know this answer very well because usually you're telling me what it is that you need me to do that week, but for everybody out there that's thinking about going this route, what's your day to day life?
Wink (29:18):
So your day to day particularly addressed it on a team. Cause when you first get out of the pipeline, you're going to go on a team to get that experience is you're going to be managing an 18 to 24 man team consisting of Combat Control, Pararescue, SR or TACP depending on if you're on that Access or a Strike, Recovery package. You're going to a leading, executing that commander's intent and making sure it flows down. You guys are meeting those intents for ultimately a deployment because you're training to deploy, right? You don't want to practice all day and all year just to go next year and just practice again. That's just frustrates everybody. So you're preparing for that deployment. So it's a lot of paperwork and you have to know a lot about the enlisted force structured regulations as well as those intents of the commanders passing down. You're not only are you trying to develop those guys for that training for deployment, you're trying to develop future leaders into leaders. You have like your E-6s/E-7s that will be executing that down and in type stuff while you're working with the commander and your supervisors to make sure that up and out is accordingly between you and your troop chief. You're going to make sure that everyone's speaking the same sheet of music really. One thing I think it's important that a lot of guys younger STOs overlook when they first get in is understanding that you have a bunch of guys from like a brand new E-4 to an 18 year E-7 that are going to be on your troop. All of them have valuable information and a majority of them are going to know more than you about your, about their jobs. So you really have to put a lot of trust into them. And , if there's any questions that guys like your E-7 Troop Chief or your E-6s will let about that. And I think guys that are prior controllers like myself are in that unique position that we can, we have a little more understanding of the jobs when we get onto a trip and we can look and see those things. But as a new STO, like you're, you're going to be there to, to really work those intents, but also you're going to be a sponge because you want to learn as much as you can about the job so you can effectively make decisions and lead your guys.
Aaron (31:35):
Yeah. And it's even tougher for guys that come as a cross trainee or as a guy that goes officer to enlist a guy or gal goes, officer or enlisted officer. It's really tough because sometimes you can see exactly what needs to happen in that lane over there, but that's just not your lane anymore. And I struggle with it too. There are some times where I'm like I can totally see that problem right there, but that's not my business. So that's, that's always a tough one to kind of figure out is that officer enlisted role on the troop.
Wink (32:03):
They're the worst. The worst thing I see is when I watch guys struggle and I know I know how to fix it. And just like where we've been on situations where like, Aaron, I just need to shut up.
Aaron (32:14):
Like that's, and that's why I'm there because you can pull me and be like, Aaron, I need to shut up and talking too much. All right, well let's get it back here. I specifically remember that that was on the cold weather trip. So let's ski in the back over here. We'll just let the team go for a little bit. You just ranted and raved a little bit and then you were better.
Wink (32:32):
Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, I think it's like being a good as , to you, you let your guys fail within reasons. Let them, let him work through problems because that's how you're going to learn the best. But again, as a STO, it is your job to, to make sure those guys are learning those hard lessons and really knowing how those guys learn to like my E-4, 6'3, 250 pound vegan is going to learn different than 5'4, 160 pound SR guy. It's just everyone has those different styles. It's most effective for them. So it's up to you and your Troop Chiefs and your Special Tactics team leaders to really understand what each of those guys' capabilities, limitations are and affect them accordingly. So if you're going to be getting onto a new team, man, I get with those senior enlisted guys and learn as much as you can from them and making sure, I hate to say making sure all that paperwork and other stuff is done along the way. You want those guys to develop up, stay in and stay proactive. For a day to day to us really, I'm sure you've hit this stuff in terms of training like your TDY's are going to be different every week just like, just like every other specialty that's in Special Warfare. So from that training perspective, you're going to be doing all the same things. You're going to train for the deployments. You just have to do, quite a bit more paperwork and understand those leadership methodologies. And I think the other thing that Special Warfare guys need to focus on too is really understanding how the big Air Force works because a lot of your training is in that joint or that big Air Force combined capability.
Aaron (34:16):
Oh yeah, there is nobody that cares less if you're in Special Warfare than somebody that works at the range that you haven't filled the paperwork out. Like that guy could not care less. If you are a, you could be a CAG operator of 20 years and have actually shot Bin Laden. And he's like, I don't care. Where's your 4445? That's the range for him. All right, get out. Like
Wink (34:38):
I think the minute you come in to any situation, whether it be with like working with aircraft, working with the logistics officer on your base for like vehicle maintenance issues or working with like an Army range control. The minute you come in you're like, Hey man, I don't know if this but I'm a STO, you're getting a boot in your ass out the door. Fantastic. It's something that you really need to consider. At the end of the day, man, people are people within the military and you have military structure. No one's going to care that you're like, O-2/O-3 just out of the pipeline that you need to get stuff done because Special Warfare depends on it. I promise you. Like that one scenario is not going to work out well for you. It's like everything else, right? You build relationships and you get those deals done and you're building your rapport and that's how you can really positively affect like your true or the squadron. So making sure you get that Air Force involvement is important both for your own development and for the development of credibility of the career field. As Special Warfare officers kind of open up they combine more like that STO/CRO 19Z, all that stuff. The opportunities for different positions are going to be pretty prevalent. And I think that's the same if you're an E-7-E-9 as a Pararescue/Combat Controller, you'll get out of the team Special Tactics squadron job position for a little bit and you'll go into a big Air Force or maybe a joint or other positions. So I really behooves you to know a lot more than just like, Hey, Special Warfare is my lane. This is what I do. That's it. It's great. There's nothing wrong with that. But you might not have the choice. You might be put into those other positions because you have a good personality for it or they just need a person there that's effective.
AFSC CHANGE
Aaron (36:26):
I want to hit two points here. So I want to talk about the AFSC change. So April 30th, they came out and now all STO and CRO and TACPO under Air Force Special Warfare, those dudes and dudettes are all underneath the new AFSC, which is your 19Z series for officers. So that's a huge change. We're all under the same umbrella now and there's, there's really no kidding progress that we're seeing going forward. What do you think are some upcoming changes that are going to happen inside of kind of like Air Force, Special Warfare as a whole? We went to SR away from SOWT. We've got all the officers under a single career field with different shred outs now. Like what are the other changes that you see coming down the road for Air Force Special Warfare?
Wink (37:13):
Are you asking from like an officer's perspective? So what I see for that 19Z, especially when it comes to STOs and CROs is you're going to, I would think you might have the ability to shift over a squadrons a little bit. What I mean by that, it's like I think in the future, STOs are going to have the ability to go into rescue squadrons and, and we already have CROs that are coming to Special Warfare squadrons and our leading teams and that's been for some time now. So I think the core missions obviously are not going to change with that Access, Strike, and Recovery and stuff. But I think as a STO it would make sense for us to have STOs focused in on that recovery aspect more so for that transition. So for example, I'm on a recovery focused team right now and I know that there's other squadrons that have those recovery mission sets as well. I think between those two, there's going to be a lot more interchangeability in terms of positions for TACPO officers since they fall under that 19Z, I would imagine you'd be seeing some more TACP officers come into those AFSOC units more than just the 17th STS, but actually coming through like something like the 23rd STS or 22nd STS or something like that. I foresee a lot more interchanging and more positions that are like, it's a 19Z, not a STO position, I think it's opened up some more doors and I also see us being put into more positions in a joint capacity. So that's what I would expect.
Aaron (38:55):
For everybody out there. So 19ZXA, those are your STOs, 19ZXB are your TACPOs, and the 19ZXC are CROs. Big things on the horizon and getting everybody kind of under the kind of under the same umbrella as far as the combination of career fields, it's not a combination of career fields. It's just putting everybody under the same sort of flag and moving forward to create efficiencies. If we all go together, it'll be a whole lot easier. How many have you ever gotten to work with a TACP officer? Just as a random question?
Wink (39:29):
No, I have not.
WOULD YOU CHANGE ANYTHING
Aaron (39:31):
Yeah, I haven't either. That's why I was asking. I haven't crossed paths with them either. I've never actually worked with one or been near one, so it would be a good thing. I'm sure they bring a lot to the fight. So. All right, so now for the for the big one here, so going back all the way back to your enlisted time, would you change anything about your transition from enlisted officer? Like would you have gone earlier if he could go back and perfect scenario you could avoid going through the pipeline. Is a 31 year old dude with two surgeries going back in time would you change that up at all?
Wink (40:04):
No, I loved my enlisted time, like I said earlier, when you go enlisted, you're going there to go and do the job, right? The job that you're assigned to do and you'll be tasked according to the if you guys if you're going STO, you might get that opportunity, but your ultimate goal is to manage the people that go and do those jobs. So getting those JTAC deployments, getting those other deployments that have Combat Controllers and yet absolutely wouldn't change it. I felt like that amount of time was, I crossed over at nine years. I felt like that amount of time was great. I was getting into that point that they were going to start, moving me off the team. I want to stay on the team, I want it to lead. And, and I really wanted to like manage those guys and I felt like I could affect them accordingly. So now, like even coming in at 22, I thought it was , looking back on it now, I thought it might've been too late at the time, but I felt like if I came in straight out of high school I wouldn't have had like the maturity or the drive to go in and complete the pipeline that I give a lot of credit to those young dudes that are like, I'm coming straight out of high school and I'm going Pararescue those Peach types that come in at 17. Yeah, you graduated the pipeline and you're like, cool, I'm 19-20. I still can't drink. With Aaron that are 37 and pissed off all the time.
Aaron (41:25):
So thanks for giving me the breakdown on two years, but I am pissed off all the time. You're right there.
Wink (41:31):
So I give all those guys a whole bunch of credit and I don't think there's any one time that you're like, Hey, 22-23 years old, that's when you should come in. And everyone develops, matures different and has different reasons for coming in. So we had guys on my team that were 18 years old and we had guys on my team that were 30 years old and both those guys made it through for whatever reasons they had. Obviously the older you get, you might have families or other things to deal with. I couldn't imagine being 18, 19 year old guy that's just gets his ass kicked all day out in the pool or anything else goes in and like gets online and sees all his buddies on Facebook, like partying and the colleges that you could've went to mentally prepare for and you like now like this, you got to know why you want to do it at that point, I think is the biggest hurdle that you need to, you need to overcome. I've seen some guys come into early and get washed out and then come back a couple of years later and then crush the pipeline and they're doing great as Combat Controllers and Pararescueman. There's no one right situation for everyone. For me I thought I thought 31, I thought it was a little bit later to cross into STO, but I, I didn't want to do it any sooner because I want to at that point I was planning up for another deployment. I knew what I was going to be doing and I wanted to go. So I assessed after like one of the deployments I got through and I could train properly for it. So no, I really wouldn't change anything. Long story short, it was pretty sweet being enlisted for that long and I got some really good experiences that I can kind of carry over to the guys now.
PIECE OF ADVICE
Aaron (43:08):
I want to close it up on this one. I want you to give your, give your top three pieces of advice. If there's somebody out there right now that's considering coming in as a CRO or as a STO, a Special Tactics Officer or as this Air Force Special Warfare officer as a whole, if they're considering, making that leap, whether they're in college right now or if they're an enlisted guy or gal that wants to make that transition, give us like you, your big three pieces of advice for those people.
Wink (43:36):
So coming into these career fields you need to be a selfless leader. The minute you focus on yourself as a minute, everyone else sees it and you're just, will not be as effective. You're going to need to be transparent with your communication in every aspect, both looking up and looking down. And that's something that's very important in my mind is that communication and that ability to be that transparent. You need to really know why you're doing it because it's a two year pipeline. If you're going through that phase two that's just the start of the two year journey and those cadre and those recruiters, they are assessing your ability to endure a two year pipeline. And if the risk is worth the reward of taking you on, first of all that, 80-90% washout rate that is the pipeline. Then and then beyond, is it worth it to pick you up and why is it so that's something you'll need to consider there. And then my third one is make yourself as physically capable as you can because when you're going through you as going through for STO or CRO probably have a little bit more knowledge and understanding than the people that you'll be leading throughout the pipeline that are enlisted. One of the reasons is because if you go STO and you get picked up, like you'll be based out of Hurlburt Field, Florida where you're training, add the Special Tactics Training Squadron every single day while your guys are a while enlisted counterparts will be going through bootcamp or be sitting down at Lackland waiting to go to their next school, you'll have a lot more understanding at that point. And if you are not physically capable, it is just one more thing for you to have to worry about while your team is getting put through very dynamic, challenging scenarios. Like you don't want to focus inward on yourself while you're doing your 997th pushup and about to go on like do litter carries for the next two hours. You want to focus on your team to make sure everything else is good. And I think that's inherently what being a Special Tactics leader is all about. So don't physically a limit. You don't not be physically capable to do that and focus on your team while shit's hitting the fan.
Aaron (45:56):
That's an awesome one to end on, Sir. Hey, thanks for coming on Wink. We really appreciate it. Everybody go check out, check out the podcast on Apple Podcasts anywhere you can find us. Hit the Instagram account if you've got questions for Wink or do you just want them to hit the ones ready account? And we can, we can link you up with those people if you need to. Yeah, so drop us a note if you guys have further questions on STO or Special Tactics Officer or Air Force Special Warfare officer, let us know. But for now, Wink, thanks for coming out. Appreciate it. Everybody else train hard. We'll see you next time.
TLDR: If you’re thinking about becoming a STO, you better come prepared. It’s dynamic and difficult, but ultimately worth it.
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