Watching recent events unfold at the Air Force Academy is like having front row seats to a slow-motion train wreck. Brand-new Superintendent Bauernfeind arrived in August of 2024 and immediately embarked on his own personal shock and awe campaign.

He’s planning on reinventing the Air Force Academy in the spitting image of the Special Ops command he just left. This small, specialized unit represents only about 6% of the regular Air Force.

The first phase of this campaign is a massive reduction in the number of civilian faculty. He plans to replace them with active-duty officers who have little or no teaching experience. The General predicts that this will somehow increase the number of cadets wanting to attend pilot training. It would be amazing if senior Air Force leaders are actually on board with the idea of reassigning mission ready pilots to teach entry level academic classes at the Academy.

Winning wars on the battlefields of the future is increasingly dependent on developing entirely new weapons and technologies. The current focus is on dominating space (via the newly created Space Command), computer cyberwarfare, and the use of less expensive force multipliers- such as Unmanned Aerial Vehicles that don’t need pilots at all – just to name a few. It’s not just about traditional air power anymore.

Despite all this, the General seems to have found a receptive ear in the “cut twice and measure later” bazaar of ideas that is alive and well in the nations’ capitol. Selling a plan to reinvent the Academy as a solution to the ongoing pilot shortage is exactly the kind of quick fix that plays well in DC when politically expedient.

Unfortunately for him, this kind of high-level top cover can be remarkably fickle and quickly shift allegiances when risky programs like this don’t bear fruit immediately or they become an unexpected political liability.

With minimal institutional support, zero buy-in from Academy graduates intent on protecting the institution – and no real backing from the Colorado Springs community at large – one really must wonder if his vision is just a house of cards.

Blunting the “tip of the spear” by stealing away busy warfighters from operational units already stretched thin seems like a monumental waste. Do we really want to start pulling flyers out of the cockpit to teach Chemistry 101?

If reducing spending is your thing, know that Gen Bauernfeinds plan will cost more than what is traditionally spent on the faculty. An unbiased study by the highly regarded RAND Corporation bears this out, concluding that we would save money by hiring more civilian educators, not the other way around!

The Academy has always attracted the best and brightest students from around the nation. Now, many parents are questioning whether or not they should encourage their sons and daughters to apply at all. They are rightfully concerned about the foundational changes being hammered through. This is not hyperbole – the number of qualified students accepting an offer to attend the AF Academy for the Class of 2029 has already decreased significantly compared to prior years.

It certainly did not escape notice when the word “educate” was unceremoniously
dropped from the Air Force Academy Mission Statement this year. This thoroughly
vetted document has always embodied the deeply held core values of the Academy. So now, out of the blue, educating our future Air Force leaders is no longer even a core
value??

This audacious move is clearly intentional. It’s a giant red flag signaling the end game of Gen Bauernfeinds vision for the Academy. Seriously, can even he think that it’s in the best interests of the nation to turn the Air Force Academy into a second-rate institution?

Kent Murphy MD
Colonel, ret, USAF
USAFA Class of 1980