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Published Airpower Journal - Fall 1991
CMSGT Robert D. Lewallen, USAF
Ethics Are Nice, But They Can Be a Handicap, Some Executives Declare
--Headline, Wall Street Journal
8 September 1987
IN 1986 THE US Department of Justice's Public Integrity Section reported that 1,027 public officials had been convicted of crimes. This included 596 federal officials indicted for criminal activity.1 Problems with ethics plague our society and make blaring headlines on a regular basis. The military is not exempt from such problems. Major studies of ethics in the Air Force in 1983 and 1986 showed that over one-third of Air Force personnel are convinced that integrity is a problem, and the lower the rank of the persons polled, the more convinced they are of the problem's exisstence.2 Military professionals are public officials and often executives. Due to the weight of their responsibilities, they frequently face tremendous challenges to ethical behavior. In no areas are such challenges more difficult than in those involving the potentially volatile equation of sex and power. Look at the following example:
Nine people work for a senior NCO [noncommissioned officer] supervisor who is by their own admission their hero--a truly fine person and a consummate professional. One day, while this paragon is on leave, his assistant, in his zeal to help his boss, opens the mail on his desk and discovers a letter from a young airman in a nearby work center expressing how much she enjoyed the sexual encounter they had experienced a few days previously.
So what does his assistant do? Tell everyone else and discredit the man? Confront the boss with a sermon on his sinful ways? Simply adjust to a shattered image? And, if the latter choice to elected, so what? Has the operational mission suffered in any way?
A valid question is, So what? Only three people know of the lapse of professionalism and the violation of Air Force standards in this case, and two of them certainly will take great pains to act as if nothing has occurred. But what has occurred? A volatile, potentially explosive mixture of sex, supervisory power, and unethical behavior has been brewed. Its effects may be nothing more than a shattered role model--or an eventual career-destroying, mission-blighting expose. The intertwined subjects of sex, power, and ethics demand the honest attention of every military professional in the mixed-gender Air Force of the 1990s. Nothing is more pertinent to operational effectiveness than morale; nothing destroys morale more quickly and completely than unethical sexual behavior.
Can relations between the sexes in the progressive workplace of the 1990s still bedevil us? Have we not moved beyond those sexual and racial tensions of the 1960s and 1970s when equal opportunity and treatment, affirmative actions, and sexual-harassment training reoriented our actions but left us both fearful and resentful? Of course, society is not perfect; there will always be unreconstructed bigots and chauvinists.
While it is true that we have come a long way as a society, and outward forms of sexual or racial discrimination may have diminished, the problem has also undergone a subtle metamorphosis. Power has now assumed a far more prominent place in the equation; and power, a key ingredient in the effectiveness of the professional supervisor, makes the equation itself far more volatile. As Dr Peter Rutter has recently written in a landmark study of sex and professional relationships, "Sexual violation of trust is an epidemic, mainstream problem that reenacts in the professional relationship a wider, cultural power imbalance between men and women."3
Obviously, a power imbalance exists between any supervisor and subordinate. Sex differences within a professional relationship add a troublesome new dimension to the nature and use of power by a supervisor. And this problem seems to be but one aspect of a far larger and very damaging it ill plaguing American society--a lapse of ethics. We've been barraged with examples of questionable ethics in recent years, from Lt Col Oliver North to evangelist Jim Bakker to Speaker of the House Jim Wright to candidate Gary Hart--the list seems endless. But the problem is by no means restricted to national figures. A recent study on college campuses indicates that perhaps 40 percent of the students have cheated on tests or assignments, and one university administrator notes that campuses "are becoming a breeding ground for the white collar criminals of the future."4 In our own profession, a Tactical Air Command lieutenant general was relieved from his position in November 1990 for "inappropriate actions and relationships with women, including subordinates."5
The popular television drama "L.A. Law" features an attorney who seems to spend as much time in bed with his clients as he does in defending them, which reflects a growing concern in the legal profession over "emotional advantage" taken of a client.6 That phrase perfectly describes the subtle power equation between supervisor and subordinate.
Attorneys are members of a calling universally designated as a profession. Unethical sexual relations certainly trouble the bar and afflict other professions, including the profession of arms. Two television series have recently dealt with the Vietnam conflict: "Tour of Duty" and "China Beach." In the former, a continuing story line featured a platoon sergeant dating a major; in the latter, enlisted-officer sexual relations enlivened more than one beach scene. And in the eternally popular "M.A.S.H.," Major Houlihan and Captain Pierce enjoyed a sexual encounter that affected performance and unit morale. But that's just TV sensationalism, right? Unfortunately, it also occurs in the real world. In any profession that brings men and women into close daily working relationships there is a key question that must be asked: Can a professional relationship be sexualized and still retain its integrity and effectiveness? In our particular profession, effectiveness translates into the ability of our people to execute critically important operational missions. Historically, this question of sex within professional relationships has been emphatically answered in the negative within all professions. The Hippocratic oath of the fourth-century B.C. forbade sex between physicians and patients; Air Force Regulation (AFR) 35-62, Policy on Fraternization and Professional Relationships, by implication forbids sex between supervisors and subordinates: "Unduly familiar relationships between members of different grades or positions ... are almost always unprofessional."7 AFR 30-1, Air Force Standards (Pocket Size), forbids personal relations that breach the bounds of propriety and warns that these become of official concern if they affect discipline, morale, or performance.8
Hippocrates lived 25 centuries ago, however, and despite AFR 35-62 or the Uniform Code of Military justice, we practice our professional responsibilities in the liberated and highly sexualized 1990s. Have the standards of professional conduct changed? This question can be answered in two ways. First, if society's standards (or values or morals) have changed, this does not necessarily imply that the military's standards must also change. In fact, much of what unifies our profession and links us to our predecessors is an adherence to an unchanging code of duty, honor, and country--and that word honor packs a real wallop in terms of ethical conduct. Second, even in the sex-drenched 1990s, have expectations of professional conduct really changed? A 1987 survey of psychotherapists revealed that "85 percent of the respondents considered sexual intimacies with clinical supervisees to be always unethical, no matter what the circumstances."9 Proscription of sex with clients still characterizes the formal codes of ethics for the medical profession, for teachers, for psychologists, and for military professionals. In short, it was wrong in ancient times, it is wrong now, and we know it is wrong.
Situational ethics nevertheless gained a certain following in the permissive, rebellious 1960s. While it is true that circumstances must at least be acknowledged when determining right and wrong, situational ethics can lead us step-by-step into ethical anarchy, particularly in questions of sexuality. Regulations simply cannot give us all the definite principles to govern conduct that may apply in dealing with people in every situation.10 Where do we derive those first principles on which law and regulations are built?
Is there a sense of right and wrong-an ethical sensibility-innate within the human consciousness? And if so, who or what was its architect? God? Religion generally holds that there is a Supreme Being who stands for morality, who demands right behavior, and who judges us against immutable standards. The only alternative is to give to each person the right to decide what is good and what is evil-which may again invite us to ethical anarchy.11 Anarchy is unacceptable in our profession. From somewhere we derive standards of right and wrong. Perhaps God provided them, perhaps society created them and ascribed them to God. Ultimately, we want to be held accountable, and accountability is certainly a state that the military professional can relate to! Whether or not our behavior matters to God, it must matter to us. In no area is this more critical than in the exercise of supervisory power in mixed-gender relationships.
A power differential is built into all professional relationships-educator and student, doctor and patient, lawyer and client, supervisor and subordinate. Through the instruments of evaluation and through uncounted formal and informal ways, supervisors hold subordinates' lives in their hands. Supervisors (like lawyers, doctors, educators, and military professionals) are people with power. Yet we have ambivalent attitudes about power. Every military professional should know Lord Acton's dictum on the corrupting influence of power. The British writer Malcolm Muggeridge echoes that view in a televised interview on "Meet the Press" on 19 March 1968, when he observed that "power is evil, and everything that belongs to power belongs to the devil."
Sex and power combined make a volatile, potentially destructive combination-hardly a secret in video age. For example, we have long recognized that sexual harassment involves a person motivated by power-power over another person's life. We know that much sexual harassment goes unreported in professional life because of a person's fear of a tormenter's power.12 Yet power is an essential attribute of a supervisor. Reduced to its simplest terms, power is the ability to influence people. This distinguishes power from authority, which is the permission to influence. Leaders must have power-they must have the ability to influence people to cause the right events (the mission) to happen.13 But power can be very subtly wielded, and its abuse-particularly where sex is involved-can be extremely hard to quantify. The US Supreme Court has stated that "for sexual harassment to be actionable, it must be sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of employment and create an abusive working environment."14 The supervisor today knows these limits and avoids transgressing them; nevertheless, power can be used delicately to elicit a certain desired behavior without an obviously "abusive working environment" ever existing. The supervisor can abuse many elements of the supervisor-subordinate relationship-power, dependency, vulnerability, and trust being the more prominent-for sexual purposes. Such abuse is not compatible with operational effectiveness.15 It is simply an undeniable fact that "superior status brings with it not only greater prestige and greater privileges, but greater power."16 This is true whether the supervisor is male or female, and although a good majority of supervisors in the military profession are male, the abuse of power for sexual purposes can certainly work for the female supervisor as well as for the male.
Professional military education (PME) for both officers and enlisted members constantly emphasizes the importance of leadership by example. We study great leaders of the past with a view to analyzing their traits and emulating them. PME embraces Gen Sir James Glover's dictum that "character is a habit. The daily choice of right and wrong. It is a moral quality which grows to maturity in peace and is not suddenly developed in war."17 Ethical behavior is critical to leaders of national stature-but no less critical to supervisors at any level in a corporate or military hierarchy. As Dr Norman Vincent Peale has observed, "A manager…affects the ethical experience of his employees and affects the happiness of their lives; therefore, he mustn't let them do a wrong thing if he can help it."18 Gen Matthew B. Ridgway has stated, "Character is the edifice on which the whole structure of leadership rests."19
The supervisor--the person in the position of power--can best keep subordinates from doing "a wrong thing" by setting the example of upright behavior. The possibilities inherent in a position of power are legion, and when biological desires are thrown in, the allure of a forbidden zone relationships--a term coined by Dr Peter Rutter--can be overpowering. Do those involved in such a sexual relationship know it's wrong, unethical? Of course they do! The person in power has no right to ever allow sexual misbehavior to take place. If there is any statement that captures the heart of sexual ethics for the military professional, it is Dr Rutter's statement that "the professional in power has the complete obligation to uphold the ethical standards of his profession. "20 Failure to do this in the very personal relationship between supervisor and subordinate means betrayal of trust, abandonment of responsibility, and the creation of an exploitative relationship. A person in a position of power becomes an ad hoc parental figure and incurs the ethical responsibility for setting the example in behavior and conduct because our subordinates learn from us the meaning of right and wrong as defined by our institution. Our problems with male-female relationships in the 1990s are for the most part far more subtle than they have been in the past. Sexual harassment is out, and a more pernicious, more difficult to define problem is in--and it involves power, that "ability to influence." Just as a psychologist, a doctor, or a teacher is a professional--a mentor--with incalculable (if subtle) power over peoples' lives, so is the military supervisor whether that supervisor be an officer or an enlisted person. Just as a patient looks to a psychologist or doctor for help, or a student to a teacher, so do our people look to us for help. We are trusted professionals, and, as Dr Rutter concludes, "Trusted professionals hold inordinate power over peoples' lives precisely because they offer as much hope as they do."21
The biological urges that help drive human behavior are neither inherently evil nor socially unacceptable, but they can become so within professional relationships. Where one party has power-that ability to influence-and another party is dependent, reliant, and trusting, biology can become a powerful motivator to wrong behavior. 22 It is useless to wish this were not so. As rational human beings, we must control our desire to give in to such behavior. As Peter Abelard discovered in the twelfth century, "It is vicious to give in to our desires; but not to have any desires at all is impossible."23Given the fact that we have desires, as professionals we must shape our conduct so that our actions can never offer even the slightest hint of impropriety. This is essential not only for operational mission accomplishment but so for our own psychological health and that of the people who work for us and with us.
There are several principles to keep in mind about the biological magnetism between men and women. First, such an attraction is normal; it should not inspire guilt or attempts to rationalize it away. Second, individuals have a choice in deciding whether or not this attraction will lead them into unethical conduct. Third, refraining from unethical conduct is an absolute professional imperative.24 While doing the right thing and behaving ethically is not easy, it is based on a simple formula: giving serious, honest thought to the problems of human conduct and sexuality. We do not suffer from a majority of people determining to do wrong. Such people have very short military careers. Instead, we suffer from too much indifference's to doing right, just as does civil society. Justice and right are not items stored on a dusty law shelf but are active principles that must be lived daily by real people. "One bent on wrong never lacks an excuse; and one seeking to do right can commonly find the way."25
Given our professional obligation to shape our conduct and behavior in ways that are ethical and right, we must look for help in doing so. As we have seen, discovering what is right is usually not so very difficult; doing what is right presents the challenge. Three sources of guidance are worth exploring. The first of these is friendship.
Socrates sang the praises of friendship 24 centuries ago--and the value of a trusted friend remains unequalled for today's professional in a position of power. We need a person to whom we can talk without restraint--an intellectual comrade who provides inspiration, who can give us balance by providing alternative viewpoints, and who can point out both our virtues and our blind spots. A friend can be a critically important person to us in questions of sexual ethic--where our own judgment may be warped by biology, by poorly understood needs, or by the temptations of power.26 There are several natural candidates for this role-your deputy, your assistant noncommissioned officer in charge, perhaps in some cases your boss, and in rare cases even a subordinate. How fortunate if we are connected to people in several of these roles who can qualify as our friends; how regrettable if we have none at all. However, several obvious caveats should be mentioned. Certainly we must be wary of friendships within the chain of command that become too close; we need to ensure that those we trust with our innermost thoughts merit that trust; we must surround ourselves with true friends, not a circle of sycophants or disciples. But given these significant qualifications, it is undeniably true that a good friend can save us from the inextricable morass of difficult ethical questions involving sex and power. If we prize integrity in our friends and associates, they will in turn help reinforce it in us, regardless of the temptations we may be exposed to. As Cal Thomas eloquently observed in commenting on the ethical situation in American society,
[In the military, our challenge becomes to] surround ourselves with advisors and friends who hold the same values as we do, [so] we will be able to be honest with them and ourselves and more likely to maintain our integrity .... We must value integrity in others--in our staff members, our families, even among ourselves. How often do we focus on the quality of work our staff members produce instead of the quality of their characters.27
Our friends and associates can help us establish boundaries--a key procedure in maintaining professional relationships where sexuality is involved. While regulations and moral codes may describe or prescribe boundaries, the final decision to observe them is an individual choice. Men and women can be friends, coworkers and professionals together if boundaries exist and are observed. A trusted friend and associate who is honest with us can see where these boundaries are threatened and can remind us of the potential professional, emotional, and physical consequences of transgressing those limits.28
A second source of guidance and assistance in defusing the sex-power-ethics equation involves written ethical codes. Certainly we in the military are well covered by such codes. The Uniform Code of Military justice is an all-embracing example, as are the provisions of the United States Code cited in attachment 3 of AFR 30-30, Standards of Conduct. House Concurrent Resolution 175, passed in July 1958, states a code of ethics for all government employees; it requires "loyalty to the highest moral principles" and reminds us that "public office is a public trust."29 Yet these statements, while laudable, do not really touch the heart of our current problem. They are fine generalizations, but the ignore the often painful immediacy of biological needs in a situation where one person holds power over another. There is, however, growing societal awareness of this problem and efforts to deal with it.
The relationship between faculty and students-an inherently tempting power inequality-has led many universities to explicitly state codes of sexual ethics. The University of Iowa's written policy recognizes that "faculty members exercise power over students" and that where a faculty member has professional responsibility for a student, sexual relationships are simply wrong, even if there is willing consent in the relationships.30 This statement clearly recognizes that important power factor that is extremely significant in the supervisor-subordinate relationship in the military. We too can benefit greatly from sensitively written yet frankly explicit guidelines in our own workplaces--guidelines that command authority backs to the hilt. Simply restating old prohibitions against sexual harassment is not enough; we must recognize and respect the "psychologically based power dynamics" of sexual relationships in an equation of power inequality.31
Developing a code of ethics--a statement that includes sexual ethics--is an excellent exercise if done right. But such codes will have greater impact and more staying power if developed jointly by the supervisor (the person in power) and the coworkers (the weaker partners in the power equation) and if they are published and displayed prominently. A group of people can learn a great deal about themselves and develop a greater sense of commitment to professional values through writing a code of ethics they all agree to support. As an in-service training exercise, an NCO Leadership School faculty was asked to draft up a simple code of ethics, and a class of 40 junior NCO students was asked to do the same. The two codes produced were almost identical; the results were the same in six subsequent classes. The broad ethical statements produced included these principles: (1) do the right thing 24 hours a day; (2) state what is right and live by It always; (3) be open and honest with others; and (4) get the job done but do it in a way that makes you feel good about yourself.32 Then, when such a statement or document is written and agreed to, post it! Make it part of the professional milieu of the work center.
Such a deliberate, conscious act of writing ethical codes leads to the third avenue for managing the sex-power-ethics equation-education and training. These ingredients are an essential part of our profession. We spend huge block of time receiving both training and education. However, we devote much too little time in covering certain areas of supervisory responsibility and virtually none to training in sexual ethics. Our profession is not alone in shortchanging this area. Amidst growing concern over sexual relationships between ministers and members of congregations, the church has begun to ask if pastors are adequately trained to deal with questions of sexual ethics. The answer is clear. Pastors recognize the danger signs of sexual misconduct only "by feeling, intuition, and instinct."33 Those tools are not good enough to ensure mission accomplishment in the highly stressful operational environment. Professionals need training to confront the ethical issues that taunt us in supervisor-subordinate relationships. As Gen Creighton Abrams noted, "The object of teaching is to enable the young man or woman to get along without their teachers."34 American business management is beginning to face the need to teach ethics so that upcoming young managers can handle ethical issues. Peter Madsen, director of the Center for the Advancement of Applied Ethics, Carnegie-Mellon University, has said that "only by educating managers and future managers and future managers about ethics and about strategies for resolving moral mazes" can the current crisis in ethics be properly resolved. "Only education can prepare a manager for the moral tests that occur in the workplace, and only education can help the manager see the folly of his/her contemplated mischief."35 Professional military education and training for all supervisory grades must reach this same conclusion for us to begin to deal effectively with the sexpower-ethics equation in the Air Force of the 1990s-a force in which we are increasingly seeing males supervising females and vice versa, and a smaller force that can ill afford the operational impact of abuses of power by untrained supervisors. The 1983 and 1988 studies of ethics both revealed over two-thirds of our personnel believe we should teach integrity, and over half say to do so by formal training and personal contact.36 The study recommended that "ethics and integrity standards should be emphasized during professional military education courses and during command information periods."37 The unethical supervisor has failed us and deserves punishment; we have failed the uneducated supervisor, and we deserve censure.
The shape this training in ethics in general, and sexual ethics in particular, should take must be left to specialists. As a general guideline, it must begin in basic military training and precommissioning courses and should be reinforced at all levels of both officer and NCO professional military education. Specifically, this instruction should include basic principles of ethics and guidelines on making sound ethical decisions. Such training must not be afraid to include open discussion about the really tough sexual choices and temptations offered by the 1990s workplace.
Talking about and acknowledging the sex-power-ethics equation is the key to controlling it. We must always remember that one of many roles the military professional plays is that of teacher. We may teach others by classroom instruction, by one-on-one training, and by example, but teach we do, and "teachers are responsible for nothing less than the next generation's code of ethics-a heavy weight to bear."38
To bear this weight successfully, to discharge our responsibilities as teachers, and to ensure operational effectiveness and mission accomplishment, we must reinforce ethical perspectives in our profession and in our society. Sex, power, and ethics are inextricably tied together for the supervisors of the 1900s. We must recognize the imbalance of power between supervisor and subordinate, and the sexual temptations such an imbalance can present. We must understand that rigid ethical standards are a must in our profession, and that we possess power as supervisors that must be used ethically. Justice and right behavior are active concepts that must be lived to be real, but we must admit that in questions of sexual conduct, doing right may be a most difficult task.
Fortunately, three sources of help are available to us if we cultivate them. Our friends-honest, sincere associates who are our intellectual companions-can help us preserve our perspective in questions of sexual ethics. Written ethical codes can provide us a framework for measuring our conduct, and we can develop written codes for our units. Finally, training in ethical behavior can help us confront the ethical issues inherent in a position of power.
Ultimately, we come back to the operational necessity behind sex-power-ethics questions-the necessity for mission accomplishment. Without unimpeachable conduct by our people, without an irreproachable example from our leadership at every level, morale suffers and the operational mission suffers or fails. As Air Force Pamphlet (AFP) 35-49, Air Force Leadership, rightly observes, "Lack of self-discipline in a leader destroys the unit's cohesion and, ultimately, impairs its ability to perform the mission."39 Whether this failure occurs in the stateside workplace or in the deserts of the Middle East, mission failure is the one thing we cannot stand.
Notes
1. Cal Thomas, The Death of Ethics in America (Waco, Tex.: Word Books Publishers, 1988), 26.
2. Ethics in the Air Force: 1988 (Maxwell ABF, Ala.: Air University Press), 1990, 64, 66, 75.
3. Peter Rutter, Sex in the Forbidden Zone (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., 1988), 2.
4. "Colleges Train White Collar Criminals," Omaha World-Herald, 21 January 1990, G-1.
5. Julie Bird, "3-Star Relieved of Command," Air Force Times, 19 November 1990, 4.
6. "Sleeping with Your Lawyer: Is Sex with the Client Inherently a Conflict?" Newsweek, 26 March 1990, 62.
7. AFR 35-62, Policy on Fraternization and Professional Relationships, 16 April 1990, 2.
8. AFR 30-1, Air Force Standards (Pocket Size), 4 May 1983, 10.
9. Kenneth S. Pope, "Teacher-Student Sexual Ethics," in Sexual Exploitation in Professional Relationships, ed. Glen O. Gabbard (Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Press, 1989), 171.
10. Chaplain (Col) Samuel D. Maloney, "Ethics Theory for the Military Professional," Air University Review 32, no. 3 (March-April 1981): 63-71. As proof of this fact, observe the deliberately vague language in AFR 35-62.
11. Harold Kushner, Who Needs God? (New York: Summit Books, 1989), 71-72.
12. Nina Burleigh and Stephaine B. Goldberg, "Breaking the Silence: Sexual Harassment in Law Firms," ABA Journal, August 1989, 51-52.
13. This definition is currently taught in the enlisted professional military education curriculum of the SAC NCO Leadership School at Offutt AFB, Nebraska.
14. Meritor Savings Bank FSB v. Vinson, 477 U.S. 57 (1986), cited in Burleigh and Goldberg, 48.
15. Jerry Edelwich and Archie Brodsky, Sexual Dilemmas for the Helping Professional (New York: Brunner-Mazel, Inc., 1982), 210.
16. Nancy Henley and Jo Freeman, Women: A Feminist Perspective (Palo Alto, Calif.: Mayfield Publishing Co., 1975), 393-94. (Note that this closely echoes the language in several Air Force directives.)
17. Quoted in Robert A. Fitton, ed., Leadership Quotations from the Military Tradition (Boulder, Colo: Westview Press, 1990), 34.
18. Kenneth Blanchard and Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Ethical Management (Escondido, Calif.: Blanchard Training and Development, Inc., 1988), Sound Cassette.
19. Fitton, 37.
20. Rutter, 25.
21. Ibid., 50.
22. Pope, 211.
23. Quoted in A Treasury of Philosophy, ed. Dagobert D. Runes (New York: Grolier, Inc., 1955), 174.
24. Edelwich and Brodsky, 210.
25. Borden Parker Bowne, quoted in Runes, 174.
26. Pope, 135-136.
27. Thomas, 154-55.
28. Cathy Ackerlund, "Drawing the Line on the Job," Air Force Times, 29 January 1990, 49.
29. AFR 30-30, Standards of Conduct, 26 May 1989, attachment 3, 1; also see H. Concurrent Resolution 175, 85th Cong., 2d sess., 1958, Congressional Record, 13556.
30. Rutter, 163.
31. Ibid., 164.
32. These general statements were developed by the staff of the SAC NCO Leadership School at Offutt AFB from January through August 1990.
33. "Testers Struggle with Sexuality," Omaha World-Herald, 10 June 1990, G-1.
34. Fitton, 161.
35. "Moral Mazes Trouble Managers," Omaha World-Herald, 24 June 1990, S-1.
36. Ethics in the Air Force, 85-86.
37. Ibid., 162.
38. Sherry S. Cohen, Tender Power (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., Inc., 1989), 66. 39. AFP 35-49, Air Force Leadership, 1 September 1985, 9.
CMSgt Robert D. Lewallen (BS and MA, University of Tulsa) is commandant, Strategic Air Command (SAC) Noncommissioned (NCO) Professional Military Education Center, Offutt AFB, Nebraska. His assignments within the information management career field have included U-Tapao Royal Thai AFB, Thailand, and Shemya AB, Alaska. Chief Lewallen is a graduate of Academic Instructor School and a distinguished graduate of the SAC NCO Academy and the US Navy Senior Enlisted Academy.
Disclaimer
The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.
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