The Air Battle Manager Badge is a military badge of the United States Air Force which is issued to officers who have been trained and qualified for airborne command and control, air surveillance, electronic warfare, and airborne weapons capabilities. The badge was first proposed in 1990 and was first issued to Air Force officers in 1995 after Air Battle Manager became an Air Force aeronautical rating.
The Air Battle Manager Badge is considered a successor to the Officer Aircrew Badge. Historically, it was awarded to officers who had completed both Undergraduate Air Battle Manager Training (UABMT) and follow-on courses at one of two locations: Tinker AFB, Oklahoma (for those ABMs assigned to the E-3 AWACS) or Robins AFB, Georgia (for ABMs assigned to the E-8 JSTARS). Graduates of UABMT who were not assigned to flying duties were not awarded ABM wings. As of May 2010, however, the new ABM training syllabus allows for students to receive their wings immediately following the conclusion of their undergraduate training - in the same manner as the other two rated career fields, pilot and navigator.
Air Battle Managers' career progression generally follow one of three paths: AWACS, JSTARS, or CRCs (Control and Reporting Centers- often referred to as GTACS Ground Theater Air Control Systems). Air Battle Managers are most often assigned to Air Combat Command, but may be assigned to other MAJCOMS (primarily Air Education and Training Command/AETC) as the needs of the USAF dictate.
The Air Battle Manager Badge is issued in three degrees being that of basic, senior, and master. The level of degree is denoted by a star and wreath above the badge and is determined by the number of flight hours accumulated.
Famous quotes containing the words air, battle, manager and/or badge:
“Soun is noght but air ybroken,
And every speche that is spoken,
Loud or privee, foul or fair,
In his substaunce is but air;
For as flaumbe is but lighted smoke,
Right so soun is air ybroke.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340–1400)
“... the big courageous acts of life are those one never hears of and only suspects from having been through like experience. It takes real courage to do battle in the unspectacular task. We always listen for the applause of our co-workers. He is courageous who plods on, unlettered and unknown.... In the last analysis it is this courage, developing between man and his limitations, that brings success.”
—Alice Foote MacDougall (1867–1945)
“Nothing could his enemies do but it rebounded to his infinite advantage,—that is, to the advantage of his cause.... No theatrical manager could have arranged things so wisely to give effect to his behavior and words. And who, think you, was the manager? Who placed the slave-woman and her child, whom he stooped to kiss for a symbol, between his prison and the gallows?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Just across the Green from the post office is the county jail, seldom occupied except by some backwoodsman who has been intemperate; the courthouse is under the same roof. The dog warden usually basks in the sunlight near the harness store or the post office, his golden badge polished bright.”
—Administration for the State of Con, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)