The Air Force has decided that operators of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs, also known as Remotely Piloted Aircraft, RPAs) can log time in combat — even if they never leave the desert of Nevada:

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Mark A. Welsh III authorized RPA aircrews to log combat time when flying an aircraft within designated hostile airspace, regardless of the aircrew’s physical location.

What is unclear is whether those same operators will now be entitled to Imminent Danger Pay (Combat Pay) and the Combat Zone Tax Exclusion (CZTE).

Allowing those operators to claim “combat” time while physically residing in safety dilutes the value of combat time for everyone else.

In fairness, however, the dilution began long ago. Airlift crews and tankers have logged “combat” sorties and “combat” time for years, even if all they did was “touch” the airspace of a designated combat zone. (In 2011, a KC-135 tanker pilot claimed his 19th air medal for “combat” sorties.) Similarly, fighter crews have logged combat time for nothing more than turning jet fuel into noise.

And if an RPA operator can log time in “combat” for operating a joystick at a desk in Nevada, New York, or Texas, what’s to stop an Airman in the cyber, space, or personnel fields from wanting to do the same thing?

Granted, it’s an imperfect system. Logging “combat” time from a computer console in the United States, though, certainly doesn’t improve that imperfection.

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