>>2770493>My grandpa joined the Army not long after HS, if not right away, and somehow fast tracked himself to being an officer and Huey Pilot in Vietnam.Different time. US still had conscription back then and reserve officer training system was different due to that.
>He went into Vietnam in the beginning, so when they were setting up their base their Battalion consisted of like 10 Majors (including himself) and one Lt. Colonel commanding them all, all of them pilots. Apparently this is generally unheard of to have that many Majors in one flight unit but since it was the start of things I guess they felt they needed them.US army helicopter operations were expanding at massive rate back then. Air mobile cavalry and stuff. Earlier on helicopters had been used most to spot for artillery, medical evacuations and supplying ground operations. Troop movements had been at thing before as well, but not in same order of magnitude. They probably needed lot of new helicopter qualified battalion commanders to form new helicopter battalions and instructors as things were rapidly expanding, with preferably with combat experience. So they created abomination of a battalion set up things for further expansion.
To give completely opposite example... Reserve lt. colonel with experience from WW2 and Korea wanted to fight in Vietnam, USAF didn't have use for another lt.col and told him to fuck off we're full. Resigned commission and joined army as warrant officer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_J._Novosel The thing why US army allows warrant officers to fly is that they don't use things like nuclear weapons require authority and helicopters are used in scale that would completely overflow officer corps once their career progresses few years. Eventually leading lots of colonels with no useful positions to assign them. Some pilots are officers, others are warrant officers.
