As a deputy or a crew commander, you never chose your crew partner. He was almost always chosen for you. Sometimes it was difficult to understand why they thought someone would be an ideal partner. Often they paired a strong commander with a weak deputy. Other times, it was a strong deputy paired with a weak commander--and any observer in a trainer ride or a standboard evaluation could tell that the crew was being run from the back (deputy's) seat rather than the way it was supposed to be. (Often, if the strong deputy realized that the weak commander was about to make a critical mistake, he would try to ask if, perhaps, another course of action might be preferable. If the weak commander weren't a total fool, he'd listen to the deputy and quickly change course.)
My first commander was very strong. My second, much less so; but we got along together quite well. My third commander was also a nice guy but somewhat weak in his knowledge of the weapons system. My first deputy was strong enough, but he'd gained the reputation as a great potential new deputy in missile school at Vandenberg. We got two HQ ratings while we were paired; but I soon realized that while he was smart, he wasn't nearly as strong as the evaluators thought he was. He was still a rookie who had a lot to learn. And I often felt that our HQ ratings were thought to be more his doing than mine.
At this point, however, I had four HQ ratings and two Qualified ratings. My first two commanders had made enemies of certain members of the standboard evaluation staff. Each got screwed out of an HQ rating because they'd been maneuvered into making an error by the evaluator. On my very first standboard "ride", I wasn't even a part of the error made by my commander; and it should not have been assessed to me. But their word was final, and I was stuck with the results. (I even read their report afterwards, and it was clearly written almost as a cover up for what had been done to our crew.)
My second deputy was extremely weak. I had to do my job as commander of the crew, but I also had to continuously monitor what my deputy was doing at all times, to ensure that he did not make an error on his own. (The standboard team often tried to get commander and deputy to separate during the evaluation so they could focus on each individual member rather than the team. It did not seem always realistic because you operated as a team in the field, but who were we to question standboard?) I was now up to six HQ ratings, paired with two commanders and now two deputies while being evaluated.
My third deputy and I seemed to get along well enough. Or so I thought. He was often quiet and sometimes seemed rather moody. On one alert, unfortunately, we were having a severe electrical storm above ground. That always played havoc with the phone lines to the LFs. They would start ringing even though no one was at any LF trying to call us. If you pressed in the lighted LF comm line button, the ringing would stop. But it would not stop if both the commander and the deputy were pushing in ringing buttons at the same time--it only made the situation worse and the ringing would continue. We also had a team of maintenance men outside the acoustical enclosure working in the capsule during this alert.
At one point, the ringing was getting annoying and both I and my deputy were pushing in the buttons at the same time, and the noise was not stopping. I calmly said aloud (my deputy almost never spoke to me), "Either you push in the buttons, or I will push in the buttons, but not both of us."
All of a sudden, he jumped out of his chair and started yelling at me. It was unbelievable and shocking and totally insubordinate on his part. I was stunned. Perhaps he'd never liked me or harbored some grudge against me even though he and I had gotten an HQ rating, my seventh overall, while crewed together. Regardless, on the drive back from alert, I could tell that he was still seething, so I calmly told him, "If you would prefer a new crew pairing when we get back, ask the squadron commander for a change."
What I did not realize was that, after we got back, he must have gone to see the commander immediately--while he was still angry. What he said about me must have been horrible even though he had been insubordinate on alert, though I never brought that up to anyone. When I was called in and notified about the crew change, the squadron commander chewed me out, ominously adding, "If they [the Academy] knew these things about you, they might not hire you."
I was totally shocked once again. What was the squadron commander even talking about? What had my deputy of only a few months said to him about me? I wasn't even given the benefit of being told what was said behind closed doors. After four years on the crew force, and the most number of HQ ratings of anyone in our squadron, and only two behind the most by one other commander in the wing who had been at Minot for years, I was being thrown under the bus by a deputy who had not even been on the crew force for more than a year. And this squadron commander had also not been at Minot that long either.
Fortunately, that squadron commander was replaced not long before I was to leave Minot; and, fortunately too, my final written evaluation at Minot was exemplary because that commander didn't write it. The squadron operations officer had seen to it that I got a good evaluation instead of relying upon what had been said about me behind closed doors.
On my final alert, my 235th at Minot, I expected to at least be recognized for my four years on the crew force. However, somebody simply did not get the word about this being my last alert. The pre-departure briefing was interrupted to recognize the achievements of a standboard evaluator who was leaving Minot early for an assignment elsewhere. He had been at Minot for only two years and, because standboard only pulled two alerts a month instead of the seven or eight we line crews pulled, he had only pulled a fraction of the number of alerts I had. But his contributions were being recognized and I had been totally overlooked.
After what had happened with the previous deputy, and knowing that I only had a couple of months remaining on the crew force, I was a commander who was left unpaired with a permanent deputy. I was given any deputy who was spare because his commander was on leave or he was about to be switched to a different commander. On one alert, I was embarrassed to learn that I was to be paired with a major (I had only recently been promoted to captain) who had busted a standboard evaluation as commander and was demoted back to deputy--a humiliating situation for him.
Before that pre-departure briefing, a thoughtless fellow commander came up to me and snarkily asked, "I didn't hear that you'd busted." (He had obviously assumed that they would not put a captain in charge of a deputy who out ranked him.) Without being any more specific in this already embarrassing situation, I flatly responded, "I didn't bust." Out at the LCF, the embarrassment continued when the security chief, assuming that the major was the commander of our crew (except for a bust, no captain was a deputy at Minot), began addressing him as to the security status of our flight rather than addressing me. Mercifully, the major informed the chief that I was in charge of the crew.
So, my final couple of months on crew had not gone well, at all. On this final alert, now paired with yet another temporary deputy, I was sitting there, listening to how wonderful this other officer was while no one was there from our squadron to recognize my contributions to the wing. But even my temporary deputy knew this was my final alert after more than four years, and he was determined to speak up on my behalf; but I firmly told him not to say anything. If I had to ask to be recognized, I didn't want the recognition.
Still, when I finally left Minot I was saddened that June morning of 1978. Roger and the others were still living in the BOQ. I had a few other friends at the base whom I was leaving behind. When my car passed the final LF off the highway, well to the south of the town of Minot, Jimmie Rogers was singing, "The World I Left Behind" on my cassette player (I'd sold off my 8-track player a year or two earlier). It seemed an appropriate way to leave.
I again do not know what motivated the writing of the following poem, which might have been penned while I was at Minot, or it could have been written after I arrived at the Academy. Just two to three years hence, it would have been an appropriate reaction to so many fellow gay men dying of AIDS beginning in 1980.
Autumn
Some will have no cure.
Disease meant to remain inside us,
leveling always,
and wept.
We question, "Shall I be the one
selected for notoriety?"
As an example,
stretching our to a few,
and so finally?
A progression in collapse
with all changing things.
With friends who would as soon be dead.
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