“All too often, we are painted with the Val Kilmer “Iceman” stereotype – cool, capable speed addicts who live on the edge for the sheer thrill. We live harder, party harder, womanize harder, and are somehow larger than life. This book will challenge the stereotype. We are flesh and blood. We live in a dangerous world that whipsaws us from elation to fear in a heartbeat. This brotherhood conceals its emotions to outsiders. […] I can’t fly anymore, but my heart is still up there.”
These are the words of Dan Pedersen, retired Captian for the Navy and founder of the United States Navy Fighter Weapons School program known as Top Gun. His book, with the subtitle ‘An American Story’, combines autobiographic elements of his life with military history that forever changed how we fight wars. It is jam-packed with incredible detail, stories, and experiences that date back to the early 1950s. As I read through the book, I found myself taking deliberate breaks to research some of his stories – each easily material for a standalone Hollywood movie. And, parts of his story were already turned into Hollywood masterpieces, which makes the information density of this book, so fascinating.
We are all standing on the shoulders of somebody else, someone who came before us to blaze a trail or pave the way. His reflections on his father, mindful of this taking place in a long-gone era, left me in awe. It’s a level of devotion and commitment that seems to have disappeared from present generations: “My dad, a veteran of World War II, had served in Europe in the Army Signal Corps, keeping communications flowing between the front lines and headquarters. He came home to Illinois in 1945 to find his job had been filled. Victory in Europe cost him his career, and he found himself forced to start over in the middle age with a family depending on him. Never showing us the fear he surely felt, he moved us to California, believing that every problem can be overcome by hard work. He got a job laying pipelines in Palm Springs. After a shift in the sun, which baked his Scandinavian skin to leather, he would come home with twelve-hour days in his eyes. He never complained; he worked and lived for us. His example of resilience instilled in me that same devotion. I was blessed and I knew it.”
Again, the information density of this book makes it tempting to write a novel about each of his details and stories, but– for the sake of this post– I will try to limit myself to some of the more memorable passages. Pedersen enlisted in the Navy as a mechanic. When thinking about one of the most decorated and accomplished fighter pilot programs, it is not unreasonable to assume it would have started with the Air Force, a pilot, an aviator, but this detail– like so many details of his career– illustrates the happenstance and luck that comes with creating something larger than life. In one section, Pedersen writes about his fear of being assigned to a non-fighter command, or worse, to be commanded to a non-flying role in the Navy. As luck would have it, he would be assigned to the all-weather, fighter squadron with the Skyray as his primary aircraft.
“[…] one of my new squadron mates greeted me with a grin and said, ‘Welcome to the best squadron in the United States Air Force!’ Mom had told me to go make the best life I could. Carry on. Move forward. Easy things to say. Yet here I was, surrounded by men driven by the same passion for flight that burned in me. They were achievers, hard chargers, type A. The kind of men whose respect, once earned, offered meaning never found anywhere else. These men were among the best pilots in the Navy, and here they were opening a place for me in their circle. That night, I found my tribe, the men who would teach me to be a fighter pilot.”
The incentive to start Top Gun was due to the unacceptable losses of aircraft and airmen during the Vietnam War. During World War II, the kill ratio would be around 19:1, meaning one American aircraft would eliminate nineteen hostile aircraft. During the Vietnam War, largely due to Russian support, the kill ratio was a mere 2:1. “When you start a fight, you should always assume you’re facing the very best. Otherwise, chances are you’re going to have a really bad day.” Every service member feels this dark pit in the stomach when losses are reported. War is hell and losses are inevitable, but senseless losses, sending troops into hostile territory without sufficient strategy and tactics to accomplish success, or worse, to meet a political promise, are infuriating. Taking the initiative to mitigate these losses and improve overall performance almost becomes a duty at that point. However, as most start-up stories go, beginnings are not always as romantic as hindsight suggests.
“When Sam and I informed our skipper, Commander Hank Halleland, that I had agreed to serve as the Navy Fighter Weapons School’s first officer in Charge, he had only one directive: ‘Don’t kill anybody, and don’t lose an airplane.’ […] He also made it clear that the Navy was funding us on thin wooden nickels. We would have no classroom space, ready room, or administrative office, no maintainers and mechanics assigned to us, no airplanes of our own, only loaners. And, of course, we would have no money. […] There was one more thing: our deadline for preparing a curriculum and having it ready for the first class of students was short: sixty days. Aside from that, I suppose the job was a real plum.” Pedersen’s attitude is surely a factor that allowed Top Gun to thrive from its inception point, but reviewing this from today’s point-of-view, the obstacles that had to be overcome, and the shortness of support despite these incredibly high losses, make it hard to relate to his resilience and optimism that this program could actually work. Again, as luck would have it, if you’re surrounded by great leaders, greatness can ensue:
“Captain Ault described what had to be done, but – bless him for his wisdom and foresight– he said nothing about how it should be done. He prescribed the creation of the Navy Fighter Weapons School but did not say what it should teach, how it should be taught, or how it should be set up.”
When I read through this section, I remembered the few leaders in my professional career who were secure enough the permit this decentralized command structure–this freedom to execute. Few leaders can resist the temptation of micro-management; especially if leadership pays attention to every move, and careers could be made by projecting the “right” signals. It speaks volumes about the quality of the Naval command structure at the time when the political landscape began to grow tired of the Vietnam War, the losses, and the cost associated with the war. It perhaps led to Pedersen’s most obvious but often ignored takeaway:
“Look around any room and you’ll realize that your people are everything. It doesn’t matter if it’s a business, a charity, a government agency, or a military unit. Your people are your destiny. We had to be successful or our careers and reputations would be finished.”
I am certain that I can read this book again and again, and I will discover more depth in each of his stories and learn more about aspects of military and aviation history. That being said, the information density slightly impedes this book from being a page-turner. In some respects, that is a great signal for lessons to be learned. On the other hand, a few more weeks of editing could have made the content a bit more digestible. For fans of aviation, this book is a must. Its leadership lessons are nonchalant and often so simple and timeless that it is easy to overlook or downplay them, but taken at face value, this book offers the priceless insights for starting an organization that can become larger than life.