Biomedical service corps officers and judge advocate general competitive categories no longer will have to go before the reduction-in-force board in September due to sufficient voluntary separations, announced service officials Thursday. The board, slated to convene in mid-September, will consider roughly 9,000 captain and major line officers in the following year groups: captains, 2000 and 2003-05; and majors, 2000, according to a release. The board is expected to keep roughly 95 percent of these airmen. The service announced in April that it had removed chaplains and medical service corps officers from the board, which is one component of the services overall force-management initiative. “While this remains a challenging time for airmen still meeting the RIF board, the percentage [of involuntary separations] will be lower than previously projected,” said Col. Ken Sersun, chief of USAF’s military force policy division.
Amid NATO’s continued push to ramp up air defenses in Eastern Europe, Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall swung by seven allied countries to boost relations last week, including those on Russia’s and Ukraine’s doorstep.