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WASHINGTON - A deadly aircraft accident in Afghanistan last summer is one of a series of exasperating crashes in the military that was blamed on recklessness, not enemy gunfire or faulty equipment. 'Top Gun'-style flying, personified by Tom Cruise as a brash Navy pilot in Hollywood's 1986 film, presents the Pentagon with a dilemma: How to breed aggressive aviators in high-performance jets and helicopters capable of extraordinary maneuvers without endangering crews, passengers and aircraft. Some pilots bristle over challenges to how they fly, says a retired Marine Corps judge. 'Hot-dogging is not necessarily negligent,' says Patrick McLain of Dallas, who presided at courts-martial. 'You need a person who's bold and daring and courageous. It rubs against the grain to have this sort of nitpicking oversight. A very small minority would be in favor of scrupulous adherence to the voluminous rules about flying.' Reckless accidents, which happen every year, frustrate senior military commanders because these typically occur during training flights and are considered easily avoidable. Marine Lt. Gen. Mike Hough complained last summer in a memorandum to his aviation commanders: 'We are killing more aircrew in training mishaps than during combat missions.... I will not tolerate the blatant violations and lack of leadership I am seeing from our aviators.'
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