January 31, 2014
Air Force secretary says ICBM launch officers cheated on tests because they thought perfect was only acceptable score.
Photo courtesy janes.com
A “culture of fear” made US nuclear weapons officers believe they had to get perfect test scores to be promoted fueled a widening cheating scandal within the military’s nuclear missile corps, Air Force officials have claimed.
Half of 183 launch officers at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana – soldiers who would carry out orders to fire ICBM missiles – have been implicated suspended over claims they shared proficiency test answers to pass regular checkups.
Speaking on Thursday in the United States, the secretary of the Air Force, Deborah Lee James and Lieutenant General Stephen Wilson, who heads the Global Strike Command, said Montana base was permeated by a climate of frustration, low morale and other failures.
“These tests have taken on, in their eyes, such high importance, that they feel that anything less than 100 could
well put their entire career in jeopardy” even though they only need a score of 90 to pass, said James, who
only recently took over as secretary. “They have come to believe that these tests are make-it-or-break-it.”
The launch officers did not cheat to pass the test, “they cheated because they felt driven to get 100 percent”, she said.
The implicated officers have been suspended but James said the scandal had not affected the safety or reliability of the military’s nuclear mission.
The cheating scandal is the latest in an array of troubles that now have the attention of senior defence officials, including Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel.
The test-fixing was discovered as the Air Force was investigating use of drugs among its officers.
Of the 92 officers implicated so far, as many as 40 were involved directly in the cheating, Wilson said. Others may have known about it but did not report it.
Separately, James said that an investigation into drug possession by officers at several Air Force bases now involves 13 airmen, two more than initially announced.