AIRCDRE Veronica Tyler is the new Commander of Combat Support Group
Clocking up 30 years of service with the Royal Australian Air Force, Air Commodore Veronica Tyler recently stepped into her “dream job” – becoming Commander of the Australia-wide Combat Support Group and the Senior ADF Officer at RAAF Amberley.
As a proud Queenslander, AIRCDRE Tyler is “absolutely thrilled” to be back at Amberley for the fourth time in her career – this time in a role she has been preparing for her whole Defence career.
“With most of my career in Command Support Group, it was what I saw as the pinnacle command position for me, and to be offered it was an absolute thrill,” AIRCDRE Tyler said.
Her experience in the RAAF began in 1989, going through the Defence Academy and graduating as a logistics officer.
“I went into a variety of junior logistics officer roles, in catering and movements.. so my pivotal junior officer positions were in Combat Support related roles and throughout my career as a logistician, I had a variety of combat support positions including command at both Wing Commander level and Group Captain level within Combat Support,” she said.
Becoming Commander of CSG and the Senior ADF Officer at Amberley is no easy feat, especially within the modern Air Force. The rapid evolution of the RAAF’s air craft capability, coupled with Amberley’s Super Base status means AIRCDRE Tyler will be juggling major complexities from both roles – but believes her prior experience and past mentors have equipped her sufficiently for the task.
“We’ve had an unprecedented amount of change in our Air Craft capabilities and more coming, and that brings with it the requirement of the rest of Air Force to keep pace,” she said.
“In CSG, I see we’ve done some amazing work to continue developing our combat support capabilities and my goal while I’m here is to ensure that we can be best prepared with those capabilities for future requirements of this modern Air Force.
“My role as senior ADF officer is equally complex and significant on this base to ensure I can build a strong sense of community amongst quite a diverse group of units so that we can foster those strong relationships between those units to enable the best capability outcomes for Defence. “Amberley is a super base, I hear it called that all the time and it’s not an understatement.. the amount of units we have on the base, the amount of air craft squadrons, we have both air force and army units, the contractors, the significant amount of support agencies.. all of that community contributes to our Defence capability.”
Following in the footsteps of AIRCDRE Ken Robinson, AIRCDRE Tyler said she felt “no pressure” coming into this role and was thankful to have worked closely with him in previous positions to gain insight into the role and projects he has worked on for the last few years.
“Having known [AIRCDRE Robinson] for a couple of years we were able to have quite frank and fearless conversations about the complexity of the roles and I certainly valued his insight into the jobs that he’s done,” AIRCDRE Tyler said.
“There’s a number of initiatives that combat support group has been progressing, so I hope to build on those going forward.. his insight as the Commander from the last couple of years to give me the most recent information on what’s been happening in this role was certainly helpful.”
As the first female Commander of CSG, AIRCDRE Tyler said she never felt any limitations in her thirty years in the Defence Force. She wishes to not only be an inspiration for other females, but for all junior members of the RAAF.
“I do recognise that roles for females have evolved over the years and we have certainly opened up a lot more roles to females compared to when I joined,” she said.
“I’m looking at some fantastic women coming after me and I won’t be the last [in this role], my hope is that the inspiration that I’ve seen from senior females that I have worked with, that I can be of similar inspiration to our junior members coming through.”
