Guys,

This is so simple, even a military (Marine) pilot could figure it out

Who has the best training? If you came from the military, then you got it. Air Force guys think they're the best. So do the other branches of military service. Coast Guard guys think they're the best too.

For us civilian guys, we think we're the best. The ERAU guys think they're the best and so do the UND and Prudue guys and gals. The night freight guys think we're the best (That's me).

Bottom line: There are enough bent planes (and dead bodies) flown by pilots trained by both the military and the civilian world to answer the question. Let's be careful out there.

P.S. Thank you USMCFLYR for your years of service to our country.

In my squadron, there are 40 active duty IPs, and 5 of them are "18 months removed from their first flight as a student."

The rest have thousands of hours of operational flying. There are more O-4s and O-5s that there are Captains, and the old farts outnumber the FAIPs greater than 4-to-1.

I went through a 141 program and later USAF training. I was also a CFII for a few years before I left for the military. I can say hands down I was a much better pilot at the end of UPT than when I got my commercial.

As a fighter guy most of our missions require us to be VFR. So if we do experience IFR, it's usually just enough to get us to and from the MOA. We don't get rides to go out and practice instruments, it's just expected of us. We learned that in UPT and as far as the fighter force goes it's admin (second nature), just like air refueling. It's just something we do to get us to and from the fight.

As far as insturment skills, I would say hands down a current 135 freight guy would take the gold on that. But the difference is, with a weeks worth of training I am confident that I could go fly the line there . With the same amount of training he could not go execute a opposed SAT or CAS ride.

Now if I tried to go fly pax around, oh crap that would not be good. The great thing about flying single seat is I can be as smooth or rough on the controls/engine as I want. As long as I don't make myself sick, I'm good. Which brings up another use of rudder...helps me kill some closure on a rejoin. If someone ever flew in my backseat they would probably throw up pretty quick.





True, but during my civilian training I also never flew tactical formation at 500 feet/500 knots.


I would not put them infront of some of our dudes who are putting planes on a dirt strip in the middle of kerplackastan, on NVGs, with a runway that is only outlined by few IR lights.



As all 20 year olds should be! I'm military and at 20 I was panty raiding and instructing...



Now this I DO believe. Outside of BFM, which is a full boot of rudder or none at all, I have rarely touched the rudder since I started flying the Viper. Heck in the 38 if you touched the rudders your IP would probably yell at you, especially in the pattern...

I personally went the civilian route for my career. I have also had the great pleasure of flying with many prior military pilots. In my experiences flying 91,135 and 121 with military and civilian pilots the biggest difference I have seen is the level of professionalism from the military pilots. The prior military pilots that did not have a very high level of professionalism were the very rare exception. I have flown with a great number of civilian pilots that were sloppy pilots, unkept, and had an attitude of entitlement. Those are traits that were very rare to see in prior military people. When I look back over the last 13 years of my flying career I have noticed a striking trend that the majority of pilots I have emulated and learned the most from were prior military.

That being said there are obviously civilian pilots in there that I have been positively influenced by as well and military guys that were not so good. Just passing on my personal observations from my short career.

Hey, first post here.

First of all, let me say that I'm not in the US, but I guess things dont change that much from country to country. Or maybe they do.

What doesn't change is that in the military, any student who doesn't achieve certain level is dropped from dropped from training and sent to perform any other non-flying duty. Is this important? I think so.
As a civilian, I might fail my exam 20 times before getting my licence. In the military, I cant't do that.
Apart from this, all military pilots get full IFR/IMC training. Not all civilian (GA pilots) get this level of education.
All military pilots travel, get to know different climates, different landscapes. In my country, the deploy south, they get to fly in windy and freezing conditions. They deploy north and they get to know how is it to take-off from elevated airports or in desert-like areas, then move west to get some mountain flying and east to get some flight hours over the ocean (well, all this is theoretical since they dont get much flying hours, but anyway, you get the point). Not all civilian pilots do this.
Taking all this into account, it is easy to confirm that military pilots are, in most cases, better trained.
But when it comes to decide which is the "best pilot", lets first define "best pilot".
IMO, this cant be established. An airline pilot might require to have good communication and instrumental skills, while a stunt pilot might require good stick'n rudder skills, etc.
I've seen former A-4 Skyhawk pilot (who also flew transport aircrafts) who couldnt make into the Captain seat (he basically failed the course) in ARSA. So, assuming that ex-military guys are always better prepared is nonsense.
Other A-4 pilot got out of the Air Force and went to fly...firefighting airplanes. Yeah, he couldn't get a job in an airline in a country for very few pilots.
Transport/Taker pilots might be better suited than fighter pilots for the airline industry, since they have experience in -almost- the same type of aircraft. But again, there's no guarantee in this.
For the airline industry, flying safer is better that flying aggressively showing off skills. Knowing how to properly do a SID/STAR is much more important than being able to sustain 9G's. Landing smoothly is way better than knowing how to perform a short take-off in a C-130.
What I mean is that, even when, doubtlessly, military guys may learn a ton of skills that are not present in the civilian world, those skills might not be necessary to be an efficient and safe (a GREAT) airline or GA pilot.